PETALING JAYA: A coalition of 30 civil society organisations (CSOs) has called on Attorney-General Dusuki Mokhtar to publicly explain why businessman Nicky Liow was granted a discharge not amounting to an acquittal (DNAA) in his RM36 million money laundering case.
The groups said Liow’s lawyer confirmed that the DNAA was granted on June 15, 2023, after the Attorney-General’s Chambers (AGC) accepted a representation submitted on his behalf.
“More than three years on, the AGC has offered no public account of why that representation was accepted, what considerations informed the decision, or whether the 26 charges will ever be reinstated.
“The public is entitled to know why a RM36 million money laundering prosecution was discontinued, rather than learning about it years later through a press conference by his lawyer,” the groups said in a joint statement today.
The organisations endorsing the statement include Bersih, the Institute for Democracy and Economic Affairs, Transparency International Malaysia, the Center to Combat Corruption & Cronyism, Rasuah Busters, The Malaysian Islamic Youth Movement and Aliran.
Liow’s lawyer, Rajpal Singh, announced last week that the prosecution discontinued the case after Liow paid RM400,000 in outstanding taxes. Rajpal also said Liow had never been convicted of any offence and should not be treated as a criminal.
The CSOs argued that Liow’s case reflected a broader pattern of high-profile corruption and money laundering prosecutions being discontinued through DNAAs without public explanation.
They cited the case of deputy prime minister Ahmad Zahid Hamidi, who received a DNAA in September 2023 on 47 corruption, criminal breach of trust and money laundering charges linked to Yayasan Akalbudi.
They also referred to former prime minister Najib Razak, who received DNAAs in separate criminal breach of trust and money laundering cases in 2024 and 2025.
The groups said the government’s anti-corruption credentials would be judged not only by the filing of charges but also by how prosecutions were handled after they were brought to court.
They reiterated their position that separating the roles of the attorney-general and public prosecutor would not, by itself, improve accountability.
They said prosecutorial discretion must be accompanied by statutory safeguards, including mandatory written reasons for discontinuing high-profile prosecutions, guidelines governing the exercise of that discretion, and annual public reporting on discontinued cases and their outcomes.
They urged Parliament to include these measures in the enabling legislation for the proposed separation of the attorney-general and public prosecutor’s offices.
