Mohamed Nazri replied\u00a0“No”.<\/em><\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n The witness also denied he had received RM500,000 in cash from Zarul Ahmad.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Meanwhile, during a re-examination by deputy public prosecutor Wan Shaharuddin Wan Ladin, the 14th prosecution witness said Zarul Ahmad knew that the donation was for the construction of religious schools in Pattani.<\/p>\n\n\n\n When questioned by Wan Shaharuddin, as to whether the donation was for charity, Mohamed Nazri replied, \u201cI am from\u00a0Hulu Perak, a Malay of Pattani descent. I have visited Pattani since 1975, there are many Pondok schools that are rundown. So from the 1990s, I got involved in getting donations to build schools in South Thailand.<\/em>\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n When he read his witness statement earlier, Mohamed Nazri said he came to know Zarul Ahmad in the early 1990s as a businessman through some of his old friends and they often exchanged views about the country\u2019s current affairs.<\/p>\n\n\n\n \u201cAfter the introduction, I knew Zarul Ahmad owned several companies in Malaysia. One of those was Consortium Zenith Construction Sdn Bhd. I am close to Zarul Ahmad but not in terms of politics or business.<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n \u201cI don\u2019t have any business dealings with him. I am close to him personally and socially. Throughout my association with him, I know he worked with various agencies and companies,<\/em>\u201d he added.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Initially, Zarul Ahmad did tell him that he wanted to know someone of influence in Penang to get him a project, but he did not state what the project was related to, he said.<\/p>\n\n\n\n \u201cAfter that, I\u00a0took the initiative to contact and ask Lim if he is interested to meet Zarul regarding projects in Penang. Lim agreed to meet with him and I arranged a meeting for them in early January 2011 at the Shangri La Hotel in Kuala Lumpur. I don\u2019t recall the actual date of the meeting.<\/p>\n\n\n\n \u201cIn early January 2011, I met with Lim at a pub in\u00a0Shangri La Hotel. I don\u2019t remember the nature of the conversation at the pub, but Lim and I met around 9 pm.<\/p>\n\n\n\n “Zarul Ahmad, who came alone, showed up 10 minutes after. Besides introducing Zarul Ahmad to Lim, I really did not have any other dealings with Lim. Lim is an acquaintance of mine in politics,\u201d Mohamed Nazri said.<\/p>\n\n\n\n The witness added that he could not recall if Zarul Ahmad had asked Lim to choose his company for any project in Penang throughout the one-hour meeting.<\/p>\n\n\n\n \u201cAs far as I recall, I also met Lim and Zarul Ahmad in March 2011 at an Italian restaurant in Kuala Lumpur. But I don\u2019t remember if I contacted Lim or Zarul Ahmad to meet at the restaurant. I also don\u2019t remember what time they both left the restaurant,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Lim is charged with using his position and Penang chief minister to solicit RM3.3 million in kickbacks for helping a company owned by Zarul Ahmad to secure a construction project worth RM6,341,383,702 at the Penang Chief Minister\u2019s Office, Level 28, Komtar, George Town between January 2011 and August 2017. <\/p>\n\n\n\n He is also charged with soliciting 10 percent of future profits from Zarul Ahmad as a reward for helping secure the project near The\u00a0Garden Hotels, Lingkaran Syed Putra, Mid Valley City, Kuala Lumpur in March 2011.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Lim, who is also DAP secretary-general, is facing two other charges involving two plots of land worth RM208.8 owned by the Penang state government that have been disposed to two companies allegedly linked to the undersea tunnel project. <\/p>\n\n\n\n The hearing before Judge Azura Alwi continues tomorrow.<\/p>\n\n\n\n NMT<\/a> as reported by Bernama<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" KUALA LUMPUR,\u00a0Nov 30 \u00a0— A former Tourism and Culture Minister, Datuk Seri Mohamed Nazri Abdul…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":7879,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[21,524],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-12524","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-crime","category-nation"],"featured_image_urls":{"full":["https:\/\/newmalaysiatimes.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/01\/5b26ce5a9923b79a710caa8d40c12e005f3b991f22b77.jpg",1092,597,false],"thumbnail":["https:\/\/newmalaysiatimes.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/01\/5b26ce5a9923b79a710caa8d40c12e005f3b991f22b77-150x150.jpg",150,150,true],"medium":["https:\/\/newmalaysiatimes.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/01\/5b26ce5a9923b79a710caa8d40c12e005f3b991f22b77-300x164.jpg",300,164,true],"medium_large":["https:\/\/newmalaysiatimes.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/01\/5b26ce5a9923b79a710caa8d40c12e005f3b991f22b77-768x420.jpg",640,350,true],"large":["https:\/\/newmalaysiatimes.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/01\/5b26ce5a9923b79a710caa8d40c12e005f3b991f22b77-1024x560.jpg",640,350,true],"1536x1536":["https:\/\/newmalaysiatimes.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/01\/5b26ce5a9923b79a710caa8d40c12e005f3b991f22b77.jpg",1092,597,false],"2048x2048":["https:\/\/newmalaysiatimes.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/01\/5b26ce5a9923b79a710caa8d40c12e005f3b991f22b77.jpg",1092,597,false],"newsium-slider-full":["https:\/\/newmalaysiatimes.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/01\/5b26ce5a9923b79a710caa8d40c12e005f3b991f22b77.jpg",1092,597,false],"newsium-featured":["https:\/\/newmalaysiatimes.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/01\/5b26ce5a9923b79a710caa8d40c12e005f3b991f22b77.jpg",1024,560,false],"newsium-medium":["https:\/\/newmalaysiatimes.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/01\/5b26ce5a9923b79a710caa8d40c12e005f3b991f22b77.jpg",720,394,false]},"author_info":{"info":["Editor"]},"category_info":"Crime<\/a> Nation<\/a>","tag_info":"Nation","comment_count":"0","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/newmalaysiatimes.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/12524","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/newmalaysiatimes.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/newmalaysiatimes.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/newmalaysiatimes.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/newmalaysiatimes.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=12524"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/newmalaysiatimes.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/12524\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":12525,"href":"https:\/\/newmalaysiatimes.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/12524\/revisions\/12525"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/newmalaysiatimes.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/7879"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/newmalaysiatimes.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=12524"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/newmalaysiatimes.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=12524"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/newmalaysiatimes.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=12524"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}![\"nazri\"](\"https:\/\/newmalaysiatimes.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/01\/5b26ce5a9923b79a710caa8d40c12e005f3b991f22b77-1024x560.jpg\")
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