While testifying as the first defence witness in his trial involving 1Malaysia Development Berhad’s (1MDB) RM2 billion, Najib reportedly said, to quote ad verbatim, - `At the meeting with King Abdullah, I was told specifically that I would be assisted in my coming general election to ensure that I would be returned as the prime minister to the government of the day. I understood this to be financial assistance.'
Big irony coming from him.
Considering that in Sept 2013, at a media conference before leaving for the United States at the Bunga Raya Complex in the Kuala Lumpur International Airport, he reportedly advised all top Umno leaders not to abuse their power, use money politics or launch personal attacks in efforts to obtain posts in the Umno election that year.
And during the period of 4 years from 2011 to 2014, he received US$681 million, or over RM2 billion deposited into his personal account for what he claimed as financial assistance from the Saudi King to help him be returned as the Prime Minister of the country.
No sovereign country allows its political parties to accept money in the form of donations or by whatever means from another sovereign country for election purposes, lest its political parties be influenced or controlled by foreign countries, to the detriment of the nation.
And it appears that this was not the 1st time he sought help from foreign countries to help him stay in power.
In July 2018, it was revealed that the Director General of an agency in the Research Department of the Prime Minister's Department wrote and signed off a 3 page letter dated May 4, 2018, a week before the 14th General Election, addressed to the CIA Director in the US.
In that letter, the Director General reportedly asked the US to support the administration of Najib should BN win or won by a slim margin of just 1 seat.
Back in 2001, the then 4th PM reportedly accused supporters of PM10 who was then jailed of seeking foreign help to overthrow his government.
He, however, did the same in 2016, where in an interview with the Australian paper The Weekend Australian, while admitting that that there was little hope Najib would resign without outside pressure, he said he would allow legal legitimate foreign interference in the country’s domestic affairs.
It is common knowledge that during his tenure as the 4th Prime Minister, any local political activists who were working with a foreign government to criticise Malaysia would be detained on grounds of treason.
Even though the real reasons would never be known, the official reasons for the detention of Abdullah Ahmad, a political secretary of the 2nd PM in 1976 was for being infatuated with communist ideologies and for propagating it.
Another, Siddiq Bin Mohamad Ghouse a former political secretary to the 4th PM when he was the Deputy PM, was arrested in 1981 for being a spy for the Russian government.
Concurrent with his arrest, 3 Russian officials from the Russian embassy in Malaysia were expelled from the country.
In 2019, 2 politicians and a businessman were accused and arrested for having links to a foreign separatist group that has been disbanded since 2009.
The above appears to indicate if the request for assistance is legal and legitimate, foreign interference in the country’s affairs is not a treasonous act.
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