Auditor-General’s 1MDB Audit Excluded Scrutiny of Najib’s Personal Accounts, High Court Told

KUALA LUMPUR, Aug 6 — The Auditor-General’s interim report on 1Malaysia Development Berhad (1MDB) was strictly confined to examining corporate records and explicitly prohibited any investigations or inquiries into former Prime Minister Datuk Seri Najib Tun Razak’s personal bank accounts, the High Court heard from Tony Pua today.

Testifying on the fourth day of 1MDB’s USD 5.64 billion civil suit against Najib and six former executive officers, former Public Accounts Committee (PAC) member Tony Pua, 54, stated that he was directly familiar with the report’s contents after reviewing it during his tenure on the parliamentary panel.

Reading from his witness statement before Judicial Commissioner Mohamad Redzuan Idrus, Pua, appearing as the plaintiffs’ second witness, explained that the National Audit Department was forced to conduct its assessment by relying almost exclusively on 1MDB’s audited financial statements and supporting documentation provided by external auditors due to an uncooperative management.

“1MDB failed to provide many critical documents, including but not limited to investment agreements and bank statements of its foreign subsidiaries. The scope of the Auditor-General’s audit was also strictly limited to 1MDB, and no investigations or questions were allowed into Najib’s personal bank accounts,” Pua testified.

Pua added that following the release of the interim report, then Finance Minister II Datuk Seri Ahmad Husni Hanadzlah publicly urged critics of 1MDB to cease making accusations, citing the internal report as having found “no evidence of wrongdoing.”

Earlier during the proceedings, the High Court allowed an application by Najib’s lead defense counsel, Tan Sri Muhammad Shafee Abdullah, to expunge several paragraphs from Pua’s witness statement on the grounds that they contained inadmissible opinion and hearsay. The struck-out passages primarily referenced media coverage surrounding the 1MDB issue published during Najib’s administration, including articles from the investigative publication Sarawak Report.

The civil lawsuit was initiated on May 7, 2021, by 1MDB alongside its four subsidiaries—1MDB Energy Holdings Limited, 1MDB Energy Limited, 1MDB Energy (Langat) Limited, and Global Diversified Investment Company Limited (formerly 1MDB Global Investments Limited).

The plaintiffs accuse the defendants of breach of trust, breach of statutory duty, abuse of power, and conspiracy to misappropriate 1MDB funds. Beside Najib, the suit names former 1MDB finance director Terrence Geh Choh Heng, former executive director Casey Tang Keng Chee, former chief investment officer Vincent Beng Huat Koh, former chief operating officer Radhi Mohamad, former investment director Kelvin Tan Kay Jim, and former chief executive officer Nik Faisal Ariff Kamil as co-defendants.

The civil trial comes after the High Court on December 26, 2025, sentenced Najib to 15 years’ imprisonment and imposed an RM11.4 billion fine after finding him guilty on four counts of abuse of power and 21 counts of money laundering involving RM2.3 billion in 1MDB funds.

The trial continues on Monday.

–NMT