Investigating officer Mohd Zamri Abdul Rashid said the MACC probe against Zahid started in June 2018.
“We went to the law firm of Lewis and Co to gather the relevant documents. It was not done within 11 days, as what the counsel had said” he said, responding to deputy public prosecutor Mohd Afif Ali on the defence’s contention that MACC only “took 11 days” to investigate Zahid.
Lawyer Hamidi Mohd Nor asked Zamri earlier whether the investigation was completed in “the shortest time”.
He said Zamri had said in his witness statement that he was assigned to the case on Oct 8, 2018. “And Datuk Seri was taken to the sessions court to face charges on Oct 19. So it only took you 11 days to investigate.
“Based on my client’s instruction, we would like to put forth our defence case that these charges were, in fact, biased?”
Zamri denied the defence’s contention.
Hamidi then pointed out that “no one would deposit money that they received from bribes” into their bank account, in an attempt to dispute MACC’s corruption probe that linked Zahid to the companies.
The prosecution contends that Zahid had received bribes from three companies as an inducement for him to award them the MyEG project, between July 15, 2016 and Feb 8, 2017.
“The sum of RM13.25 million was a ‘donation’ from the three companies, Jogabonito Jewellery & Diamonds, Mastoro Kenny IT Consultant & Services, and Berani & Jujur Trading to Yayasan Akalbudi,” the lawyer said. Yayasan Akalbudi is a foundation owned by Zahid.
“I do not agree,” Zamri replied.
To further questions from deputy public prosecutor Ahmad Sazilee Abdul Khairi on the three companies’ financial status, Zamri said the correspondence addresses for the companies were registered to three different apartment units in the city centre.
“There were no business activities conducted by these three companies,” he said.
“For Berani & Jujur, we raided the registered apartment unit and found there were no employees. However, there was a high volume of transactions in their bank account.”
Zahid, who is also the Bagan Datuk MP, is facing 12 counts of criminal breach of trust (CBT), eight counts of corruption and 27 counts of money laundering, totalling RM117 million.
The trial before High Court judge Collin Lawrence Sequerah continues.