KUALA LUMPUR (June 27): “Dummy” documents were used to withdraw company money to make bribe payments to former Penang chief minister Lim Guan Eng, a former executive testified on Monday (June 27).

Azli Adam, the former senior vice-president of finance and corporate services at of Consortium Zenith Construction Sdn Bhd (CZCSB), said falsified invoices and payment vouchers (PVs) were used to obfuscate the withdrawal of the company cash.

Testifying in Lim’s undersea tunnel project graft trial at the Sessions Court, Azli said CZCSB director Datuk Zarul Ahmad Mohd Zulkifli "confessed" this to him after Zarul was arrested by the Malaysian Anti-Corruption Commission (MACC) in January 2018.

“After Zarul was arrested by the MACC around mid-January 2018, he made a confession to me and Ibrahim Sahari (another CZCSB director) that the payments related to his instructions to falsify PVs and invoices of [inactive companies] prior to this were for bribe payments to Lim.

“His confession to me was the ‘turning point’ that convinced me that the payments were indeed made [to Lim] from 2012 to 2017 as Zarul had instructed me and Ibrahim to use ‘dummy’ documents (invoices and PVs) to manipulate the company’s account and close the trail of the cash payments made by him,” he said.

Last week, Zarul testified that he gave Lim bribery money amounting to RM3.3 million cash in several payments from 2013 to 2017.

Azli, 58, said Zarul had instructed him and Ibrahim to use “dummy” invoices from inactive companies to withdraw the company’s money.

“Ibrahim and I looked for an intermediary to reach out to companies in order to obtain the ‘dummy’ invoices. In early 2014, I met with a friend of mine in Kuala Lumpur and I asked for his help to introduce me to anyone who could get me ‘dummy’ invoices.

“Then my friend suggested an intermediary to help get the invoices from several companies. After I met the intermediary, he got me invoices from two unknown companies called Sinar Bina Consultancy Services and Bintang Ria Engineering,” Azli said, adding that he paid the intermediary between RM10,000 and RM15,000 cash to obtain the fake invoices.

Azli, the 28th prosecution witness, said that “dummy” invoices from JKM Konsortium Sdn Bhd and Jurutera Konsult Maju Sdn Bhd were also used to facilitate withdrawals of CZCSB money.

He added that whatever payments made on CZCSB’s PVs to Sinar Bina Consultancy Services and Bintang Ria Engineering were never made at all, and noted that the invoices were for financial record purposes to evade issues with the company’s auditors.

Consortium Zenith BUCG Sdn Bhd — the company awarded the Penang undersea tunnel project — had been renamed as CZCSB in 2017 after Beijing Urban Construction Group exited the special purpose vehicle on the instructions of the Penang state government.

During cross-examination by lead defence counsel Gobind Singh Deo, Azli said he never enquired Zarul on the purpose of the cash withdrawals.

When pressed further, Azli also agreed with Gobind that he never took the opportunity to ask Zarul as to who was to receive the withdrawn CZCSB money, and that aside from Zarul’s confession, he had no other knowledge of who received the money.

Gobind pointed out to Azli that falsifying financial accounts of a company is a criminal offence under the law, to which Azli replied that he is aware of that but was doing it under Zarul’s instructions.

Gobind posed to Azli, that as an individual who has illustrated his willingness and capability in fabricating evidence (fake invoices and PVs) on the orders of Zarul, he is a person “not to believed”, to which Azli disagreed.

Lim is accused of using his position as Penang chief minister to aid CZCSB secure the undersea tunnel project in return for 10% in the profits of the project from Zarul, which resulted in an alleged RM3.3 million in kickbacks to be received by the former.

The DAP chairman also faces two charges of dishonestly misappropriating property by releasing two plots of state-owned land to Ewein Zenith Sdn Bhd and Zenith Urban Development Sdn Bhd.

The trial at the Sessions Court continues on Tuesday, with Ibrahim taking the witness stand.

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