PUTRAJAYA, April 7 — A businessman with the title of Tan Sri and his son are among six people being remanded for six days from yesterday to assist in the investigation into false claims made to the Drainage and Irrigation Department (DID) over the Sungai Malacca beautification project. 

The Tan Sri, in his 60s, was arrested at his house in Johor at about 10am on Wednesday. His son, who also works in his company, was the latest suspect detained by the Malaysian Anti-Corruption Commission (MACC) at 11pm the same day in Johor. 

Four others remanded for the same period are three DID officers and a DID pensioner. 

According to MACC sources, the DID officers were detained on suspicion of colluding with the Tan Sri, who is the owner of the appointed company to supply geotubes for the DID project, involving work to rehabilitate the river using the digging method in 2012. 

In Kuantan, two Cameron Highlands farmers were slapped with corruption charges at the High Court yesterday for allegedly bribing enforcement officers to cloak their wrongdoings two years ago. 

Chan Kok Fong, 40, and Law Hee Thiam, 38, claimed trial to separate charges which were read in front of Special Corruption Court judge Datuk Habibah Mohamed Yusof. 

Chan is accused of offering and giving bribes of between RM1,000 and RM20,000 to an enforcement officer as an inducement not to take action on a farm he was illegally operating in the Ringlet forest reserve. 

Law is accused of giving a RM15,000 bribe to an enforcement officer for the same reason. His farm is located in the Gunung Siku forest reserve. 

Both offences were alleged to have been committed between April 8 and May 19, 2015, at the coffee house of the Heritage Hotel in Tanah Rata, Cameron Highlands.

Chan was slapped with three charges of giving or offering gratification to an agent, under Section 17(b) of the Malaysian Anti-Corruption Commission Act 2009. 

Law was hit with one charge under the same section of  the MACC Act.

Habibah set Chan’s bail at RM10,000 in one surety while Law’s bail was set at RM5,000, also in one surety. 

The judge also set May 3 for re-mention of the case.

If convicted, both men could face up to 20 years in jail and fined five times the value of the bribe or RM10,000, whichever amount is higher.