KUALA LUMPUR, March 11 — A total of RM6 million were deposited via 10 cheques into Parti Pribumi Bersatu Malaysia’s AmBank account within 10 months in 2022, an AmBank banker told the High Court during Bersatu president Tan Sri Muhyiddin Yassin’s trial.
AmBank’s OUG branch assistant manager Nor Paizah Osman, 45, confirmed and verified the RM6 million transactions, based on Bersatu’s AmBank bank statements and copies of the cheques.
The first two cheques were RM1 million each and deposited in February 2022, while the eight other cheques were RM500,000 each and deposited on four days in May, October and November 2022.
As the third prosecution witness in this trial, Nor Paizah confirmed that the cheques were Bank Muamalat banker’s cheques and from Maybank, but did not say who were the account holders who had issued the RM6 million to Bersatu.
The balance in Bersatu’s AmBank account fluctuated after the cheques were deposited, with the account balance being RM6.6 million after the first two cheques were deposited, RM3 million in May 2022, RM8.8 million in October 2022, RM52 million after the November 8, 2022 deposits and RM29 million after the November 17, 2022 deposits.
In this trial, Muhyiddin is accused of allegedly abusing his position as Bersatu president and as the then prime minister in 2021 to obtain RM225.3 million in bribes from three companies and one individual for his associate (namely his party Bersatu), and of allegedly money laundering by receiving illegal funds of RM200 million from one of those companies in 2021 and 2022.
Nor Paizah was previously the assistant branch manager at AmBank’s Amcorp Mall branch, which is also where Bersatu had on September 18, 2018 opened the bank account which received the RM6 million worth of cheques.
She confirmed that Muhyiddin was Bersatu’s president during the 10-month period when the RM6 million was deposited into the party’s AmBank account.
Nor Paizah agreed with Amer that this means that transactions of money in and out of Bersatu’s AmBank account is “transparent” and not “surreptitious” or hidden, since all transactions are recorded by AmBank.
She confirmed that she had not received any enquiry from the Registrar of Societies (RoS) about financial issues in this Bersatu account, but said she did not remember if she had received any instructions or enquiry from Bank Negara Malaysia about this bank account.
She agreed with Amer that there were no issues on AmBank’s end when the RM6 million cheques were deposited into Bersatu’s AmBank account, also confirming that the banks which issued the cheques did not give any instructions to AmBank to not use those cheques.
She agreed with Amer that everything seemed to be proper for the RM6 million transactions and that these were normal banking transactions.
Based on Bersatu’s 2020 documents where at least two trustees’ agreement and signatures were needed for the use of the account, Nor Paizah agreed with Amer that this means no single person has sole control over Bersatu’s bank account.
Muhyiddin is one of Bersatu’s trustees for its AmBank account.
She said AmBank merely processed the 10 cheques worth RM6 million, and that AmBank has no authority to instruct other banks to stop payment for the cheques.
Asked to clarify why she had agreed that there were no problems with the 10 cheques, Nor Paizah said AmBank did not receive instructions from those who had issued the cheques to stop payments.
When asked by deputy public prosecutor Noralis Mat to clarify, Nor Paizah said she had agreed the transactions in Bersatu’s AmBank account were “transparent” as there were records of physical cheques going into the account and it was known that the money was from banker’s cheques.
Yesterday, CIMB’s Menara CIMB KL Sentral branch manager Lee Hui Nee as the second prosecution witness confirmed that RM19.3 million in 28 cheques was deposited into Bersatu’s CIMB account from August 2021 to November 2022.
The trial before High Court judge Noor Ruwena Md Nurdin resumes on April 13.
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