THE prosecution must prove that Umno president Ahmad Zahid Hamidi instructed a lawyer from Lewis & Co to deposit funds into the law firm’s account, the defence submitted today at Kuala Lumpur High Court.

Zahid’s lead counsel Hisyam Teh Poh Teik said the prosecution must prove that Zahid instructed Muralidharan Balan Pillai to put monies alleged to be proceeds of an unlawful activity into 25 separate fixed deposit accounts maintained by Lewis & Co with Malayan Banking Berhad (Maybank).

The Umno president has been charged with 25 counts of money laundering, using Yayasan Akalbudi funds, a charity foundation.

The defence told judge Collin Lawrence Sequerah that the evidence of Muralidharan, who was the 87th prosecution witness, was unreliable.

“It is the version of Muralidharan that all the monies that went into Lewis & Co were then put in fixed deposit accounts belonging to Yayasan Al-Falah.

“His evidence was that he was acting for Yayasan Al-Falah and not Yayasan Akalbudi.

“In law, Zahid is an outsider or a total stranger to the monies belonging to Yayasan Al-Falah and as such, has no legal capacity in law to give valid instructions, either directly or indirectly, to Muralidharan,” Hisyam said.

The defence also said that Muralidharan, as a lawyer, was also duty bound to put money in fixed deposit accounts of his clients.

“Muralidharan agreed in cross-examination that he put them in fixed deposit accounts because of the mandatory compliance of the Solicitors’ Accounts (Deposit Interest) Rules 1990.

“This concession by Muralidharan has killed the prosecution’s case in respect of all the 25 money laundering charges, where they alleged that the accused gave instructions to Muralidharan for the various sums of monies to be put in fixed deposits with Maybank,” Hisyam argued.

The defence also used the testimony of Leong Siew Kong, 39th prosecution witness and Dataran Maybank branch manager, that there was no evidence of illegality.

“Leong confirmed that the bank did not receive any subsequent letter from Lewis & Co saying it was suspicious of the funds.

“He further confirmed that the reason for the deposits was to earn higher interest and there was nothing illegal about that.

“Leong had testified there was no red flag that required a report to be made to the central bank as the transactions were normal,” Hisyam submitted.

Zahid, 68, is facing 47 charges – 12 for criminal breach of trust (CBT), eight for corruption and 27 for money laundering – involving tens of millions of ringgit belonging to the charity foundation.

On March 19, the prosecution closed its case after 53 days of trial, in which 99 witnesses testified.

Today is the fourth day of oral submissions by Zahid’s lawyers to present their final arguments before the court decides whether the Bagan Datuk MP should enter his defence.

Yesterday, the defence ended its submission to defend Zahid’s CBT charges and is now defending his money laundering charges.

Court adjourned at 12.10pm and the proceedings will continue on Monday. – September 9, 2021.