KUALA LUMPUR: A director of a one-stop visa processing centre (OSC) company claimed in the High Court here today that former deputy prime minister Datuk Seri Dr Ahmad Zahid Hamidi received RM2 million in bribes from him to enable the company to be appointed to operate OSC in Nepal and Pakistan.
Profound Radiance Sdn Bhd (PRSB) director Azlan Shah Jaffril, 48, said this when responding to a question from lawyer Datuk R. S. Sodhi during cross-examination in a civil suit brought by former director of PRSB, Nor Rosnani Ibrahim as plaintiff, against Azlan Shah and his company PRSB, as defendants, before High Court Judicial Commissioner Ong Chee Kwan.
Sodhi: I put it to you that the three offences Ahmad Zahid was charged with were in respect of receiving RM2 million in bribes from you?
Azlan Shah: Yes, that was what he (Ahmad Zahid) has been charged (with).
Azlan Shah also told the court that he will be a prosecution witness in Ahmad Zahid’s ongoing trial for bribery.
To a question from Sodhi, who is representing Nor Rosnani, as to why the first defendant (Azlan Shah) had given money from PRSB to one ‘masjid Tapah’, Azlan Shah said he had donated money to a mosque every month, allegedly as a payment to “officers” in the Prime Minister’s Office (PMO) for assisting the company to reinstate the contract for the OSC.
“I did seek assistance from officers in PMO after the contract was terminated…but they said, ‘we don’t want any money from you, just donate to this mosque every month,” he said.
Meanwhile, Azlan Shah in his witness statement said that the Home Ministry had revoked PRSB’s contract on Nov 11, 2015.
“The reason was Ahmad Zahid, the home minister at that time, was not happy with the individuals behind PRSB and he informed me about this when I met him,” he said, adding that after the contract was revoked, he continued to engage with the ministry on his own initiative.
“I also convinced him (Ahmad Zahid) that in fact the company was 75 per cent owned by me and not by the others anymore,” he said, adding that the company was awarded a contract to process voluntary repatriation of foreign workers and OSC applications for Nepal and Pakistan in mid-2016 after a series of negotiations.
In a suit filed on May 8 this year, Nor Rosnani, 43, alleged that Azlan Shah had breached the agreement and requested the first defendant to re-transfer 30 per cent of shares in PRSB to the plaintiff.
In the statement of claim, Nor Rosnani alleged that Azlan Shah shall re-transfer 30 per cent shares to her after he has resolved an issue relating to PRSB’s operation in Dhaka, Bangladesh.
Nor Rosnani also claimed that Azlan Shah refused to distribute the revenue from PRSB’s operations to shareholders, including the plaintiff, according to their respective shareholdings.
The hearing continues on Friday.
— BERNAMA
