Holding leaders accountable for financial crimes

Malaysian ex-Prime Minister Najib Razak has begun a 12-year prison sentence after losing his final appeal in a corruption case linked to the looting of the 1MDB state fund, with the country’s top court unanimously upholding his conviction and sentence. 

The 69-year-old former premier was found guilty by a lower court in July 2020 of criminal breach of trust, abuse of power, and money laundering for illegally receiving about $ 10 million from SRC International, a former unit of the government-run 1MDB fund. He had been out on bail and pending appeals. 

The court’s decision caps the stunning downfall of Najib, who until four years ago governed Malaysia with an iron grip and suppressed local investigations of the 1MDB scandal that has implicated financial institutions and high-ranking officials worldwide. Prosecutors claimed that approximately $ 4.5 billion was stolen from 1MDB, a fund that was co-founded by Najib during his first year as prime minister in 2009. Investigators say they had traced more than $ 1 billion of 1MDB money to accounts linked to Najib.

Najib became Malaysia’s first former leader to be imprisoned when he was whisked away two days ago to prison in Kuala Lumpur after the verdict. The five-member Federal Court panel said it found the High Court’s decision was correct and that Najib’s appeal was “devoid of any merits”.

In contrast to Malaysia, in this country corruption by elected representatives and government officials have become endemic to a point that there is passive acceptance of such crimes. The current Cabinet even has convicted financial criminals while many others are accused of similar crimes. 

Prasanna Ranatunga was convicted for extorting money from a businessman over a land deal and was handed a five-year suspended sentence. The High Court found that he had intimidated a businessman and demanded a bribe of Rs. 64 million in 2015. Ranatunga who is now a convicted criminal, and a fraudster continues in Cabinet making decisions on billions of taxpayers’ money.

Tiran Alles, the Minister now in charge of the department of Police had himself claimed that he acted as an intermediary in providing hundreds of millions of rupees to the LTTE in 2005 to ensure a boycott of the presidential election in the areas dominated by the terrorist organisation. He by his own admission not only funded a terrorist organisation that was waging war against the State of Sri Lanka but was monumental in distorting the people’s mandate at a crucial presidential election. The fact that this individual was handpicked by President Wickremesinghe to oversee the Police demonstrates the apathy and impunity with which corruption is treated.

It was also reported recently that several Government officials who had either been found guilty by courts or were prosecuted for corruption under the Yahapalana administration had received tens of millions of rupees as compensation for ‘political victimisation.’ Such executive decisions are making a mockery of the transparency that is required in dealing with public finance by elected and administrative officials.

At a time when the country’s economy is in dire conditions, having convicted fraudsters and numerous other financial criminals within the ranks of the Cabinet and in position of authority within the administration have only augmented the situation with many international agencies such as the World Bank and the International Monetary Fund and bilateral donor nations demanding checks on corruption. 

While it may take a long time for Sri Lanka to see a day when a former leader is convicted of corruption and sent to jail it is imperative that the people keep demanding the end to impunity for such financial crimes.