Shamsul lodges report against Albert over 'PM greenlit recordings' claim

Malacca PKR chief Shamsul Iskandar Akin has lodged a police report against businessperson Albert Tei over the latter’s claim linking Prime Minister Anwar Ibrahim to video recordings of several Sabah politicians in the mining licence scandal.

In his Facebook post today, Shamsul said the slanderous accusation is a clear and sinister conspiracy to tarnish Anwar’s image.

“At 5.05 this evening, on the sidelines of Sabah's state election campaign in Gum Gum, I filed a police report against Tei, who had made accusations and slanderous allegations that there was an order from Anwar to make recordings about several Sabah politicians.

“This act of slanderous accusations is clearly a sinister conspiracy to tarnish (Anwar’s) image and a planned effort to undemocratically topple the government, let alone during the Sabah election campaign season.

“I will not let any individual use my name or my previous position to try to overthrow the government or tarnish the prime minister’s good name,” he said.

He added that he is confident that the police will immediately investigate the matter and that he is ready to cooperate with any investigation by any enforcement agencies, including the MACC.

However, Shamsul's statement did not mention whether he had lodged any police report against Tei’s claim that he had spent RM629,000 on Shamsul after being purportedly assured that he could recoup the money channelled to politicians in Sabah.

Instead, Shamsul's police report today was lodged against Tei’s claim in a video which was uploaded on the “Pejuang Tun Mahathir” Facebook page yesterday. According to the video timestamp, the recording was made last Friday.

More evidence

In the six-minute clip, Tei was seen conversing with a woman, allegedly Shamsul’s proxy, who told the businessperson that Anwar had given his blessings for the Sabah politicians to be secretly recorded.

Tei claimed that while the camera pen belonged to him, the idea to record the politicians came from Shamsul, a point the woman confirmed.

“I asked him (Shamsul) if he had told Anwar about it, and he (Shamsul) replied, ‘Yes. Anwar said to do it’,” Tei said.

The woman, whose face was blurred, corroborated this, stressing: “Anwar said ‘buat’, ‘buat’ (do it).”

Feeling” used and cheated”, Tei pressed on who benefited the most from the recordings. The woman replied bluntly: “PMX la.”

Following this, PAS information chief Ahmad Fadhli Shaari demanded clarification on the allegations, while DAP lawmaker Lim Lip Eng dismissed the video, saying that it is not evidence of anything and that the video is “doctored”.

The video’s release followed a Malaysiakini report on some of Tei’s claims against Shamsul, including that the former had paid for renovations, appliances, and furnishings for two properties - one in Bangsar and another official residence in Putrajaya.

According to Tei, he has compiled a dossier of over 300 pages, including WhatsApp screenshots and receipts, to substantiate his allegations against Shamsul, and also produced WhatsApp screenshots from December 2023 in which Shamsul allegedly requested money while travelling abroad.

Tei said he was introduced to Shamsul by a woman believed to be the same individual in the video. Their first meeting took place on Nov 8, 2023, at around 10pm at the Jesselton Cigaro cigar lounge in Kota Kinabalu.

Tei on a warpath

Shamsul had since tendered his resignation as Anwar’s aide and vowed to defend himself against the allegations, which he did not specify.

Tei has been on a warpath to take down politicians he gave money to for mineral exploration licences, which he did not end up getting.

Since last November, Tei has released multiple videos, documents, and WhatsApp screenshots implicating over a dozen Gabungan Rakyat Sabah (GRS) politicians in accepting bribes in exchange for the licences. Tei and two assemblypersons were subsequently charged.

GRS chairperson and Sabah caretaker chief minister Hajiji Noor has accused Tei of being part of a cartel aiming to monopolise mining in the state.

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