Azam Baki demands apology, RM10m damages from whistleblower
MACC chief commissioner Azam Baki has initiated legal proceedings for defamation against the whistleblower who first published the shareholdings allegations against him.
The whistleblower, Lalitha Kunaratnam, had posted on Twitter today a snippet of a letter of demand sent to her by Azam’s lawyer.
“I have received...
MACC chief commissioner Azam Baki has initiated legal proceedings for defamation against the whistleblower who first published the shareholdings allegations against him.
The whistleblower, Lalitha Kunaratnam, had posted on Twitter today a snippet of a letter of demand sent to her by Azam’s lawyer.
“I have received a letter of demand from MACC chief commissioner. Thanks,” she said in the tweet.
In a statement later, political economy professor Edmund Terence Gomez said the letter of demand is an act of “serious intimidation”.
Gomez had last month resigned from the MACC’s Consultation and Corruption Prevention Panel in protest of what he claimed was the panel’s inaction against Azam’s alleged ownership of close to two million shares in a public listed company.
“I am shocked, even appalled, that this whistleblower, who raised legitimate questions of national interest, is now being sued by Azam.
“By sending this letter of demand to the whistleblower, what is now occurring is nothing more than serious intimidation by Azam,” he said in a statement today.
Azam’s lawyers are demanding Lalitha to make a public apology for a report she wrote on this matter and is asking her to pay damages amounting to RM10 million.
“If whistle-blowers are threatened in this way by those in a position of power, long a trend we have seen in Malaysia, how can we make any progress to get citizens to expose corruption and protect them for doing so,” Gomez said.
As such, he called on Azam to withdraw the letter of demand immediately and to cease his attempt to victimise the whistleblower.
Instead of initiating legal proceedings against the whistle-blower, Azam should be publicly disclosing all his business interests in order to protect the image and integrity of the MACC, Gomez added.
Aside from Azam, Gomez also called on Prime Minister Ismail Sabri Yaakob and Opposition Leader Anwar Ibrahim to jointly act and begin an immediate review of the MACC.
“The prime minister must also act immediately to create an independent panel to review the allegations of Azam’s business interests,” he said.
Azam recently has come under intense scrutiny after allegations surfaced about him having owned shares in two companies back in 2015.
According to Excel Force Bhd’s 2015 annual report, Azam owned 2,156,000 warrants in the company as of March 21, 2016. At the time, Azam was the head of MACC’s investigation division.
In a press conference yesterday, Azam said he had told the Anti-Corruption Advisory Board that his trading account was used by his brother to acquire the shares in the two companies in 2015.
The shares have since been transferred to his brother, Nasir.
Azam also said he had received legal advice and will pursue legal action against those who tarnished his reputation.
MACC's Anti-Corruption Advisory Board chairperson Abu Zahar Ujang, who was also present at the press conference, had said they were satisfied with Azam’s explanation that he had neither pecuniary interest nor conflict of interest in the acquisition of those shares.
Critics have since panned the MACC’s press conference, saying it raised more questions than it answered and more due process is needed before Azam can be exonerated from the allegations.
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