“That is what I have indicated and that is what my efforts are directed (at), to bring a conclusion to it during my term in office so that I can give the next governor a clean slate.”

She said this when asked if she was confident that investigations into 1MDB could be concluded during her tenure as central bank governor.

Zeti, who was appointed the central bank governor in May 2000, is the first woman to helm the position in Malaysia and has won several accolades, including the world’s best central bank chief in 2009 by the renowned “Global Finance” magazine.

She also declined to delve into questions on the investigation into 1MDB’s inability to repatriate the USD1.83 billion, saying:

“I can’t discuss this because everything has not been concluded yet. It would be premature for me to say anything at this stage,” she told reporters after the ground-breaking ceremony for the Asia School of Business in collaboration with MIT Sloan School of Management here today.

Zeti had previously said that the central bank was validating 1MDB’s statement after the state investment fund claimed it was unable to repatriate USD1.83 billion as the money had been utilised.

Meanwhile, when asked on Fitch Ratings’ move to reaffirm Malaysia’s outlook to stable later today, Zeti said in this period of uncertainty, that was positive as the agency remained unchanged in their ratings despite the challenging environment.

“This will demonstrate that Malaysia has a high degree of resilience despite the very challenging environment.

“We are actually going to show that policies and measures that we put in place before have positioned us well to withstand the current challenges,” she added.

– BERNAMA