(April 30): A DAP lawmaker wants the police to immediately freeze the assets of businessman Low Teck Jho as they may have been bought with funds siphoned from troubled Malaysian state investor 1Malaysia Development Berhad (1MDB).
Petaling Jaya Utara MP Tony Pua said it was bewildering why the police have not taken any action against Low, also known as Jho Low, even after months of exposés on how the Penang-born businessman was tied to scandals in 1MDB.
Low has been a central figure that keeps popping up in some of 1MDB’s most spurious deals such as the botched PetroSaudi International venture worth US$1.83 billion (RM6.59 billion).
In that deal, Pua claimed that Low pocketed US$1.19 billion directly via the company Good Star Limited, while US$260 million was used indirectly to acquire UBG Bhd in Malaysia.
“The evidence trails have already been carefully laid out for the police and yet, after months since the exposés, no concrete steps have been taken to try to put these robbers behind bars.
“The police for example, haven’t even questioned Jho Low. This is despite the IGP being ruthlessly efficient when investigating other inanities like the 'royal my foot' issue,” Pua said in reference to police investigations into a statement that he had made previously.
The phrase “Royal my foot” led Pua to be investigated by the police after he tweeted it in March.
Pua had used the phrase when criticising the police’s arrest of fellow lawmaker Nurul Izzah Anwar over a speech she made in the Dewan Rakyat.
He has since deleted the tweet. The official title of the Malaysian police is the Royal Malaysian Police.
Civil society had slammed the police for wanting to haul up Pua and accused the agency of starting a crackdown on political dissent.
Low was in the news again yesterday when a Singapore daily claimed that he had bought two upscale apartments in Singapore including a triplex penthouse for S$54 million (RM154 million).
The Singapore Business Times (BT) reported that Low bought the apartments in 2013, based on transactions involving Singapore-based Angullia Park Ltd, a shell company said to be linked to the businessman.
Last year, The New York Times revealed that Low purchased a penthouse in Manhattan, New York, for US$24 million (RM85 million), which he resold to Riza Aziz, the stepson of Malaysian Prime Minister Datuk Seri Najib Razak, for more than US$30 million.
Also in his US property portfolio is a Beverly Hills mansion in California, bought for US$17.5 million, which was also sold to Riza and is now valued at US$39 million.
Pua today claimed that Low had also bought expensive art such as a US$48.8 million piece by renown American painter Jean-Michel Basquiat titled “Dustheads”.
“With the multiple explosive exposés from the Sarawak Report… it is not too late for the Malaysian authorities to request a freeze of all Jho Low’s banking accounts and assets globally,” said Pua.
“(The Inspector General of Police) should start the process to seek his international counterparts to freeze all of Jho Low’s assets and banking accounts to ensure that no more of the money, which was fraudulently embezzled from 1MDB gets frittered away.” – The Malaysian Insider