KUALA LUMPUR: The identity of “Malaysian Official 1’ is not as important as why the official was not explicitly named in in US Department of Justice's (DoJ) civil complaint against assets allegedly linked to 1Malaysia Development Berhad (1MDB) in the United States.
Minister in Prime Minister’s Department Datuk Seri Abdul Rahman Dahlan, in an interview with BBC published today, questioned why the DoJ did not mention ‘MO1’ by the person's proper name.
“That tells you that the Department of Justice feels that whoever is supposed to be Mo1 is not involved in the 1MDB saga,” he said.
Rahman said 'MO1' was referenced in the civil complaint document for the purpose of clarity, and not an accusation of guilt; directly nor by association.
When pressed by BBC interviewer Karishma Vaswani, on who Rahman thinks MO1 is, the federal minister responded, “I’ve said it openly and publicly, if you have read the documents, obviously people say that it is the prime minister.
“But when I’m asked this question, I always ask back, why is it that the Department of Justice did not name him using his proper name?
“And that reason is because he is not part of investigation and not a focus of this investigation.”
The civil complaint, he said, is about the three to four people whose names are detailed in the documents, and are accused of misappropriating funds related to 1MDB.
He said these individuals will be brought to court and the judicial branch will decide on the matter.
In July, the DoJ filed a civil complaint to seize assets in the United States allegedly acquired with misappropriated funds from 1MDB.
The Malaysian government has since pledged full cooperation to all the investigating agencies and institutions.