KUALA LUMPUR: Graft investigations involving the Sarawak Yang Dipertua Negeri Tun Abdul Taib Mahmud were closed by the Attorney-General’s Chambers (AGC) during the previous administration.
Minister in the Prime Minister's Department Liew Vui Keong said the Malaysian Anti-Corruption Commission (MACC) had conducted a number of investigations against the former Sarawak chief minister.
“All the investigation findings were referred to the AGC for further decision,” he said in a parliamentary written reply today.
“After deliberating the evidence available, the AGC decided all investigation papers involving the issue would be closed in 2013,” he said in reply to a question by Kelvin Yii (PH-Bandar Kuching) on whether MACC would prioritise and start a fresh probe on Taib.
The AGC was then under attorney-general Tan Sri Abdul Gani Patail.
Taib had been implicated in a number of allegations of corruption and abuse or power related to logging rights on native customary land and forest reserves.
In May, the leader of Sarawak NGO Movement for Change Sarawak, Francis Paul Siah urged the newly-appointed MACC chief commissioner Datuk Seri Mohd Shukri Abdull to reopen the file on Taib.
Siah said he had lodged a MACC report against Taib in 2011 but did not receive any update on the case.
Earlier this month, Shukri said MACC would require new witnesses or evidence to reopen its probe on alleged corruption against Taib.
Shukri said 15 separate investigations against Taib had been conducted in the past and submitted to the Attorney-General's Chambers, but the latter found that no charges could be pressed against him.