THE attorney-general must now clarify if anti-graft agency chief Azam Baki had committed an offence by giving contradictory statements to the public and to the Securities Commission (SC), DAP lawmaker Lim Lip Eng said.

The Kepong MP said there are now more unanswered questions following the SC’s dispute of Azam’s claim that his trading account was used by his brother to buy shares in two public listed companies in 2015 and 2016.

The Malaysian Anti-Corruption Commission (MACC) chief commissioner, on January 5, told a press conference that his brother Nasir had used his trading account, and that the shares were later transferred to the brother, leaving him (Azam) with no pecuniary benefit.

However, the SC, after completing its probe into the matter, said that Azam is the named account holder and had control of his trading account in all transactions. 

The SC said there was no breach of section 25(4) of the Securities Industry (Central Depositories) Act 1991 on the use of a trading account by only its beneficial owner. 

“I urge the attorney-general to enlighten the nation if any offence was committed when a high-ranking government official gave contradicting statements, one to the media and the other to an official inquiry,” Lim said in a statement today.

He added that Azam’s conflicting answer to the public and to the SC was a pertinent point that the SC had failed to address in its statement yesterday. 

“For the sake of public interest and transparency of its investigations, I demand SC to publicly disclose the minutes of its inquiry into Azam’s trading account sans his personal data. 

“In particular, we would like to know if the SC had asked Azam with regard to his public admission that his brother used Azam’s trading account and owned the shares.

“Secondly, did the SC obtain financial trails of the transaction between Azam and his brother to back Azam’s public statement that the shares belonged to his brother?”

Lim also said that police, the Inland Revenue Board and MACC should investigate Azam’s source of income, if he was able to acquire that much wealth.

Other opposition MPs have said that Azam’s shareholdings must be assessed in the context of civil service rules on owning shares, even if he did not break SC laws.

This would be the Peraturan-Peraturan Pegawai Awam (Kelakuan Dan Tatatertib) 1993, wherein item 16 states that no officer can involve himself in the commodities or futures market, whether as a buyer or seller, or in any other role, in a local or foreign market.

This regulation also requires public officers to declare all their assets to their heads of department.

Another regulation is the Pekeliling Perkhidmatan 3/2002, where section 23 prohibits civil servants from owning more than RM100,000 worth of shares in any company. – January 20, 2022.