PUTRAJAYA, March 1 ― Tan Sri Azam Baki today confirmed the Malaysian Anti-Corruption Commission (MACC) is not investigating Datuk Tawfiq Ayman, the husband of former Bank Negara Malaysia (BNM) governor Tan Sri Zeti Akhtar Aziz, over allegations that he received bribes in a deal linked to the 1MDB global financial scandal.

The MACC chief explained that Tawfiq is currently being investigated by the police and that the commission was only given the task to repatriate the sovereign investment company’s funds from Singapore.

“For all things related to the 1MDB scandal, there is a task force for all agencies involved, including MACC, the police.

“Our role in this matter is just to repatriate the money linked to 1MDB in Singapore. That is MACC’s only task,” he told a news conference here this afternoon.

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Tawfiq was alleged to have received bribes as part of a deal so that Malaysia’s central bank would approve an “overnight” foreign exchange transfer of US$1 billion (RM4.9 billion) from 1MDB to PetroSaudi International (PSI) that Zeti was said to have greenlit.

He has denied accepting bribes from former employees of Goldman Sachs as reported in the ongoing US corruption trial of the investment bank’s former Malaysian head Roger Ng who has been linked to the misappropriation of funds from 1MDB.

MACC announced in November last year that Singapore had repatriated to Malaysia US$15.4 million in 1MDB-linked funds that involved a company co-owned by Tawfiq.

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The MACC also cited a news report from local business paper The Edge saying that the transfers totalling US$16.22 million took place in 2008 and 2009 and were flagged to BNM in 2015 and 2016 when Singapore began investigating 1MDB linked transfers.

Responding to the testimony given by Tim Leissner in Ng’s trial, BNM said that all investments abroad by resident entities are subject to the requirements under the Exchange Control Act 1953 that was in force prior to 2013, which has since been replaced by the Financial Services Act 2013.