FEDERAL Commercial Crime Department officers will be travelling to Singapore at the end of March to record statements and information with regard to the 1MDB scandal, including the investigation involving Tawfiq Ayman, Mohd Kamarudin Md Din said.

The department’s director said that Singapore’s Commercial Affairs Department has agreed to allow PDRM officers to travel to the republic on March 29 and 30.

“PDRM is committed to ensuring that this investigation is conducted in a transparent and fair manner.

“Whatever statements that were made with regard to this investigation and the team’s travel to Singapore were not meant to hide any facts or confuse any parties,” Kamarudin said in a statement today.

PDRM previously said that it was waiting for Singapore’s permission and assistance to conduct further investigations into 1MDB, specifically the probe into Tawfiq Ayman, whose wife is former Bank Negara Malaysia governor Zeti Akhtar Aziz.

In reply to PDRM, the republic’s police said that it had facilitated all requests of assistance, adding that Singapore’s Commercial Affairs Department agreed to Bukit Aman’s request on December 6 for multiple visits.

In response to the delay in the investigation, Kamarudin said it was due to several factors including the temporary suspension of the vaccinated travel lane between the two countries from December 23 last year to January 20.

“The investigation officer was also found to be a close contact and subsequently Covid-19-positive in February. This meant he was unable to give a date for travel to Singapore.

“At the same time, we had not received any reply from the witnesses, who are Singaporean citizens, on their readiness to be interviewed by the investigation team,” he said.

It was reported that police started investigating Tawfiq in March last year, after it was found that he had received 1MDB funds in his bank account in Singapore.

Singapore police had said previously that it had informed Bank Negara of a suspicious transaction amounting to RM66 million to a company allegedly owned by Zeti’s husband and their son from fugitive businessman Low Taek Jho, or Jho Low, in 2015.

Malaysian Anti-Corruption Commission (MACC) chief Azam Baki recently said the agency was tasked with only repatriating the money allegedly received by Tawfiq from 1MDB.

Tawfiq said he was cooperating with MACC and police on the matter. – March 16, 2022.