OBTAINING the communication documents between several bankers and 10 individuals are vital as it could prove that Najib Razak had no knowledge of monies coming into his account, his lawyer Muhammad Shafee Abdullah said.

“These communications will show if Najib is complicit in criminality or not. Is he a victim rather than a perpetrator? If he (indeed) was misled,” Shafee told reporters after day four of Najib’s SRC International trial.

Shafee said as prime minister, Najib did not have time to manage his accounts and left that duty to trustees to manage it for him.

“The telephone communications will show whether he is a part of it or not. We hope to prove that no instructions came from him (Najib), it came from people who claimed to be his nominees,” he said.

Kuala Lumpur High Court judge Mohd Nazlan Mohd Ghazali ruled today that communications that were previously not included as evidence, must be reproduced by central bank investigating officer Ahmad Farhan Sharifuddin, if the witness has them.

Najib’s lawyers have requested the communication documents between three AmBank relationship managers – Joanna Yu, Daniel Lee and Krystle Yap – and 10 individuals.

The 10 are: Low, commonly known as Jho Low, former SRC International CEO and director Nik Faisal Nik Ariff Kamil, former director Jerome Lee Tak Loong, former 1MDB finance executive director Terence Geh Choh Heng, former 1MDB general counsel Jasmine Loo Ai Swan, former 1MDB CEO Shahrol Azral Ibrahim Halmi, former SRC International CEO and president Mohammed Azhar Osman Khairuddin, former 1MDB CEO Ismee Ismail, former SRC International director Suboh Md Yasin and See Yok Peng.

Shafee said that just because the money went into Najib’s account, it doesn’t mean that he is aware of the criminality.

“I’ve said this since day one. Just because money goes into someone’s account, it does not mean that he is aware of criminality,” Shafee said.

He said that communications between Yu and Jho Low via a seized Blackberry were in the bestseller “Billion Dollar Whale” and also in several Wall Street Journal (WSJ) reports.

“If he (Najib) is not part of it… he is not in the loop, how can you say whether he is in the know about the (money) source and criminality?

“That is the reason why we want the communication,” Shafee said.

Earlier in court, lawyer Harvinderjit Singh read out excerpts from the book, where Low allegedly coached Yu on how to use the BlackBerry to communicate discreetly.

Yu was alleged in the book to have been Low’s primary contact at AmBank.

The trial continues tomorrow at 9am. – April 17, 2019.