KUALA LUMPUR (Aug 11): A partner of law firm Lewis & Co testified in court today that the firm was never a trustee for Yayasan Akalbudi, the charity foundation linked to Datuk Seri Dr Ahmad Zahid Hamidi in his corruption trial here today.
The Umno president and his legal team who are fighting the case have been trying to establish that the law firm was a stakeholder and trustee for Yayasan Akalbudi, but the claims were refuted by lawyer and Lewis & Co partner Premshangar Venugopal.
Premshangar testified that there was indeed a file in the law firm for a Yayasan Al-Falah, but there were none for Yayasan Akalbudi.
Yayasan Al-Falah and Yayasan Akalbudi are two separate entities.
The former was set up by Ahmad Zahid's family for charitable works and is chaired by Ahmad Zahid's brother Datuk Seri Mohamad Nasaee Ahmad Tarmizi.
Meanwhile, the latter is run exclusively by the former deputy prime minister. He has been accused of misappropriating funds from his foundation.
Premshangar testified that he did not know anything about the Yayasan Al-Falah file as his co-partner Muralidharan Balan Pillai was the one handling the file. He added that they were never a trustee for Akalbudi.
"As far as I know, we only handled Yayasan Al-Falah," he reiterated.
Ahmad Zahid's lead counsel Hisyam Teh Poh Teik suggested that the Yayasan Al-Falah file was in fact the file on Yayasan Akalbudi, but the witness affirmed that he had never seen a Yayasan Akalbudi file, and to his knowledge there was only a Yayasan Al-Falah file, which was handled by his co-partner.
Premshangar told High Court judge Justice Collin Lawrence Sequerah that he checked records at his law firm's office last night before testifying this morning to confirm that a file on Ahmad Zahid's foundation did not exist.
"I checked the office and records last night, we do not have [a file on] Yayasan Akalbudi. We [have] never acted for Yayasan Akalbudi," he said.
The defence has alleged that the funds were put into Lewis & Co, with the firm acting as trustee, for donations given for the purpose of charitable activities undertaken by the accused's foundation.
The witness said that Muralidharan had handled money related to clients and had denied ever receiving any direct instruction from Ahmad Zahid to deposit cheques into Yayasan Al-Falah's account.
Premshangar is the 86th prosecution witness of the case. His partner Muralidharan is expected to take the stand next.
Recalling of witnesses
Earlier in the trial today, Hisyam told the court that in light of the amendments to Ahmad Zahid's charges by the prosecution, they would be recalling the fourth, seventh, eighth, 15th, 18th and 66th prosecution witnesses for questioning.
Hisyam added that they might recall more witnesses to take the stand if they were deemed necessary.
Ahmad Zahid, 67, is facing 47 charges, with 12 of them for criminal breach of trust, eight for corruption and 27 for money laundering involving Yayasan Akalbudi.
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