The admission confirmed widespread suspicions that Mr Najib was “Malaysian Official 1” mentioned in a Justice Department lawsuit filed in July.
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MALAYSIA’s Prime Minister Najib Razak took to his official blog today in an apparent bid to temper the storm over the relentless attacks against his administration by detractors, saying no leader in his position could wield that much power or knowledge.
The lawsuit – part of U.S. moves to seize more than $1 billion in allegedly ill-gotten assets – repeatedly fingered the official as someone conspiring to divert vast sums from state investment fund 1MDB.
However, Abdul Rahman said the fact that the United States Department of Justice had not named Najib showed that the prime minister was not part of the investigation.
Referring to his interview with BBC published on its website yesterday, he said it was obvious the so-called “MO1” referred to by the DOJ was Prime Minister Datuk Seri Najib Tun Razak.
Rahman Dahlan, who also is communications director for Najib’s ruling coalition, did not address whether Najib committed wrongdoing. In August, thousands of protesters participated in an agitation in Kuala Lumpur demanding the arrest of “Malaysian Official 1”.
Razak had inaugurated the state investment fund called 1Malaysia Development Berhad in 2009, AFP reported.
Najib, however, has shut down Malaysian investigations, clamped down on media reporting of the affair, and purged critics from his ruling party. It unfolded that 1MDB’s accounts were victim of an allegedly worldwide, billion-dollar money laundering scheme, and Najib was a central figure in the accusations.
The US lawsuit said Malaysian Official 1 played a key role in the misappropriation of billions of dollars from the fund.
USA prosecutors allege that the 1MDB money was embezzled and laundered into the US, from where it was used to buy luxury properties, paintings by Vincent Van Gogh and Claude Monet, a $35 million jet, to pay off gambling debts in Las Vegas, to invest in EMI Music and to fund the production of 2013 Hollywood movie The Wolf of Wall Street.
Najib also denies being involved in the scandal, but many Malaysians still believe their prime minister is culpable, at the very least because the looting was able to occur under his watch.
It was not immediately clear why Mr Rahman Dahlan, a staunch defender of Mr Najib, had outed him.
The news has dominated headlines in Malaysia.
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Analysts warn the scandal could harm foreign investment in Malaysia, but Najib has refused to give way.
