FORMER attorney-general Tommy Thomas today denied that he had agreed to accept a US$1.75 billion (RM7.6 billion) settlement with Goldman Sachs.

There was no settlement in place when he resigned as the attorney-general on February 28, he said.

“We did not (accept the US$1.75 billion deal). No settlement on any terms had been reached with Goldman Sachs when I resigned on February 28, 2020,” he said in a statement.

He was referring to Finance Minister Tengku Zafrul Abdul Aziz’s disclosure in the Dewan Rakyat yesterday that Thomas had proposed for Malaysia to reach an out-of-court settlement with Goldman Sachs over the investment bank’s role in the 1Malaysia Development Bhd affair.

Tengku Zafrul said Thomas had written a letter to the effect.

“At all material times, the former AG was seeking a settlement with Goldman Sachs. It is disingenuous of him to say that we should not do what he wanted to do in the first place,” he said during his winding-up speech.

He told the house of a “never before revealed letter” dated February 11 from Thomas informing then prime minister Dr Mahathir Mohamad that Goldman Sachs had agreed to raise its offer from US$1.5 billion (in December 2019) to US$1.75 billion to settle the case.

“This amount includes tax payments of US$164 million and fees of US$567 million.

“Thomas’ recommendation in the letter was to seek an out-of-court settlement,” said Tengku Zafrul.

The Perikatan Nasional government last month accepted Goldman Sachs’ offer of US$2.5 billion to settle a case over its role in the 1MDB financial scandal.

The sum was a third of the US$7.5 billion sought by the Pakatan Harapan government.

PH leaders criticised the deal, saying that the government had gotten much less than the actual losses it had suffered from the 1MDB scandal.

Thomas had also previously stated that the deal was rushed and premature, resulting in the government giving up its greater bargaining power in getting a better deal to recoup its losses.

In his statement today, Thomas said that he did not want to prolong an unnecessary slanging match with Tengku Zafrul over this issue, adding that he would stop commenting on the subject.

He said he is severely handicapped without copies of all his letters on the matter to the then prime minister, Dr Mahathir Mohamad.

Tengku Zafrul should also be devoting his time and energy in managing the economy which is affected by Covid-19, Thomas said.

Thomas was appointed as the attorney-general by Dr Mahathir after PH came to power,but he stepped down following Dr Mahathir’s resignation as the prime minister. – August 7, 2020.