Public duty to recharge Najib and Irwan in RM6.6b case

COMMENT | In October 2018, Najib Abdul Razak and Mohd Irwan Serigar Abdullah were arraigned to face six criminal charges of criminal breach of trust (CBT) involving RM6.6 billion in government funds involving payments to IPIC.

The former prime minister and the former Secretary-General of the Ministry of Finance were jointly charged with committing all the offenses at the Ministry of Finance Complex, Putrajaya, between December 21, 2016 and December 18, 2017.

They were jointly charged under Section 409 of the Penal Code read with Section 34 of the same code – in their capacity as Minister of Finance and Secretary General of the Treasury in charge of public money belonging to the government – for committing TCC.

While the public expected the prosecution to always be ready to proceed with the trial, to their utter disappointment and frustration, both the accused were instead granted a Discharge Not Amounting to an Acquittal (DNAA) by the learned trial judge.

It goes without saying that both were never found innocent by the court. Of course, they have the right to be presumed innocent until proven guilty by a court of law. For now, they have been granted only a temporary release due to such an order of the DNAA.

To be fair to Najib and Irwan…