The court cases about the misappropriation of the 1Malaysia Development Berhad (1MDB) fund have revealed a few interesting findings, such as the amount of money allegedly deposited into personal bank accounts and the amount of money spent using money from the funds.
It was recently revealed that Datuk Seri Najib Razak’s two AmIslamic bank accounts had received a total of US$731 million (RM3.21 billion) and £9.45 million (RM51 million) in 12 transactions from overseas accounts from 2011 to 2014.
AmBank’s SWIFT unit manager Wedani Senen confirmed this while testifying as the 29th prosecution witness in Najib’s trial over the misappropriation of more than RM2 billion of 1Malaysia Development Berhad (1MDB) funds.
The bank accounts, under the codename of “AmPrivateBanking-MR” and “AmPrivateBanking-1MY”, received 12 transactions from overseas accounts.
Last week, Wedani verified 5 of the 12 transactions, totalling almost US$670 million (RM2.94 billion), which had entered Najib’s account between 2011 to 2013 after the bank charges were deducted.
The largest transaction of the 5 was a US$620 million (RM2.7 billion) transaction from Tanore Finance Corp’s Falcon Private Bank account in Singapore in March 2013.
Yesterday, Wedani verified the remaining 7 transactions between 2013 and 2014. One of the transactions included a US$61 million (RM268 million) sum from Tanore’s Falcon Private Banking account via the Wells Fargo Bank’s New York branch to Najib on March 25, 2013.
When Najib’s lawyer Wan Aizuddin Wan Mohammed, asked how she knew that the 2 accounts belonged to Najib, she explained that the thermal slips printed out by the bank’s systems would show Najib’s name when the bank converted currencies to be banked into the account.
“There were a few transactions in 2011 to be credited into 9694, and there is a name. The thermal slip is on Datuk Seri Najib’s name.”
After confirming that one of the accounts was known as “AmPrivateBanking-MR” after 2011, she said that any staff in the crediting department would know Najib received the money if the money went into this account as the thermal slip would carry Najib’s name.
As for the other account number, Wedani said she only knew that this account with the code name belonged to Najib after the Malaysian Anti-Corruption Commission (MACC) started investigating the case.
She also confirmed that she did not know who was the account holder of the “AmPrivateBanking-1MY” account when processing the transactions then and that she had not asked further within the banking system on who the account holder was.
What do you think about this? Let us know in the comments.
Also read: No M’sian Lawyers With His Expertise, Najib Intends to Appoint UK Royal Counsel to Lead His Case
