PUTRAJAYA: Malaysia will look into claims that China had offered to bail 1Malaysia Development Berhad (1MDB) out in 2016 in exchange of securing lucrative projects, and will pursue the matter if found to be true.
Finance Minister Lim Guan Eng said he was unaware of such claims previously, and that he only knew that the cost of the projects were inflated.
He was responding to a Wall Street Journal (WSJ) report, citing minutes from meetings between Chinese and Malaysian officials, that Beijing would use its influence to help on the 1MDB issue on condition they were awarded the USD16 billion (RM65.76 billion) East Coast Rail Link (ECRL) and the USD2.5 billion (RM10.27 billion) Trans Sabah Gas Pipeline projects.
“Whether there was such a deal, I think I have to check the records first. We would be interested to have a copy of those minutes by WSJ,” he told a press conference, here, today.
“I have to refer back, and if any details were explicitly said in black and white, then this is something we will pursue.”
Lim noted that the previous administration had already paid RM8.3 billion — or over 80% — of the overall cost for the Sabah pipeline project, although only 10% of the works have been completed, and that this showed something was dubious.
“It’s clear something is wrong there, that is so clear. You don’t have to be an accountant and lawyer to know something is wrong,” he said.
WSJ, in its report published earlier yesterday, said China officials had proposed to persuade the United States and other countries to drop their probe into the state sovereign fund following revelations of corruption and abuse of power.
The daily also was also quoted as saying that the minutes claimed China had offered to bug the homes and offices of WSJ reporters in Hong Kong who were pursuing the 1MDB case to identify where they received their information from.
“In return, Malaysia offered lucrative stakes in railway and pipeline projects for China’s One Belt, One Road programme of building infrastructure abroad,” the report said.
