Ruling in contractor’s false claims case postponed

KOTA KINABALU: The ruling on a contractor, who was charged with deceiving the Accountant-General's Department by submitting false claim documents, was deferred to April 30 this year.

Sessions Court judge Abu Bakar Manat deferred the ruling on the case of Kaslan Jiman, 47, yesterday, at the request of the prosecution.

Malaysian Anti-Corruption Commission (MACC) investigating officer Mohd Faliq Basiruddin informed the court that MACC prosecuting officer Awang Samsul Baharom Bongsu, who handled the case, has a new position as Sabah MACC deputy director (Prevention).

Therefore, Faliq said he received instructions to apply for a month of adjournment in order for the prosecution to file its written submission to the court.

However, Kaslan's defence counsel, Hamid Ismail, objected to the application on the grounds that the case had been almost two years and he had filed his written submission end of February.

Therefore, the prosecution was expected to have replied them latest by the middle of March, which it had not done yet, Hamid added.

Hamid also claimed that there was another MACC case adjourned due to a similar reason regarding written submission and thus, he urged the MACC to make improvement on its part in order to have cases run smoothly.

He further claimed that Sabah MACC lacked prosecuting officers and deputy public prosecutors and hoped that numbers of the officers could be increased to prevent delays in court proceedings due to unreasonable cause.

The judge ordered the prosecution to file their submission latest by April 16 this year and the reply by the defence, if any, to be filed by April 26 at the latest.

Kaslan was arraigned on July 4, 2017 amd had pleaded not guilty to committing the offence by submitting an undated invoice No. RW0413 in the name of Nisha Enterprise and government order P13000085 dated October 22, 2013 to assistant accountant Juslin Lingok, Payment Unit of the department.

The documents were allegedly for works to repair the doors of the administrative office, library and student affairs office of the National Youth Skills Training Institute in Kinarut worth RM19,800, which were not carried out.

The alleged offence took place at the Sabah branch of the Malaysia Accountant-General's Department, here, on October 28, 2013.

Kaslan faces a charge framed under Section 18 of the Malaysian Anti-Corruption Comission (MACC) Act 2009 which carries a jail term of up to 20 years and a fine of up to five times the amount involved or RM10,000, whichever is higher, upon conviction. He is currently released on bail of RM20,000 with RM10,000 deposited in one surety, pending disposal of the case.