Recently, in a written parliamentary reply, the Minister in the Prime Minister's Department (Law and Institutional Reform) said a total of 12 politicians were granted a discharge not amounting to an acquittal (DNAA) across 19 criminal cases between 2010 and July 2026.
Amazing!
When a graft case ends in a DNAA, it naturally raises questions about the strength of the initial investigation or the strategy of the prosecution.
63% (12/19) of those politicians suspected of committing graft, arrested and then charged granted a DNAA.
It is like a pattern, moreso the accused in these cases are politicians.
Naturally, this begs the question that if a case wasn't fully ready or backed by bulletproof evidence, the individuals shouldn't have been charged so hastily in the first place.
Charges followed by dropped cases especially where the accused is a politcian appears to lend credence to the long held beliefs that incoming administrations used the judiciary to target rivals, only for those cases to dissolve when political dynamics shift.
According to recent MACC data spanning from 2020 through April 2026, a total of 6,643 individuals were arrested for corruption-related offences, leading to 2,843 people being charged in court.
Out of those, 1,459 resulted in convictions.
What happened to those remaining cases?
Acquitted?
Trials still ongoing?
DNAA or DAA?
Earlier, in a written parliamentary reply in Aug 2025, the same Minister in the Prime Minister’s Department (Law and Institutional Reform) said MACC recorded civil servants making up the largest group of individuals arrested for accepting bribes in the past decade.
In Feb 2022, 1 of the 4 key suspects involved in Sabah’s biggest graft probe dubbed the Sabah Watergate scandal was given a discharge not amounting to acquittal by the special corruption court.
The suspect was charged with 146 counts of money laundering involving RM32.93 million linked to project power abuses within the department and the Court granted a full discharge and acquittal (DAA) after the suspect paid a RM30 million punitive compound in full.
Similarly in the Jana Wibawa case, the accused was charged for receiving RM6.7 million in bribes, but was acquitted after agreeing and paid a RM4.1 million compound.
Another was the acquittal of a businessman who, earlier, was charged with 26 counts of money laundering involving a total of RM36 million had the charges withdrawn in 2023 after he paid a RM10 million compound.
Looks like non politicians arrested and charged for graft do enjoy the same privileges as the politicians except that for non politicians, it is pay to settle, a form where the authorities justified by saying winning a trial does not automatically guarantee getting the money back. Compounding forces the suspect to return millions directly to the public purse immediately.
The elite, rich and powerful wins. The poor will always remain down there, at the bottom.
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