Retired officer charged with graft
Mindef cyber warfare chief among three accused of soliciting RM500,000 bribe
KUALA LUMPUR: Three men, including a retired high-ranking army officer, from the Defence Ministry (Mindef) have been charged at a Sessions Court here with corruption involving more than half a million ringgit relating to a maintenance contract linked to the ministry.
Lt. Kol. Che Ahmad Idris, 54; Brig Jen Mohammed Feizol Anuar Ayob, 50, and Lt. Jen (R) Datuk Sheikh Mokhsin Sheikh Hassan, 59, pleaded not guilty after all of their charges were read out, separately, before Sessions Court judge Sabariah Othman yesterday.
Che Ahmad, who is the chief of strategic cyber warfare, was slapped with five counts of bribery.
He was charged with one count of soliciting RM500,000 and a second count of agreeing to the sum from FEHM Entity Sdn Bhd managing director Elias Jemadi Tajudin as an inducement for him to recommend FEHM Entity to be appointed for the maintenance of the ministry’s intelligence system through direct negotiations.
For the third until fifth charges, Che Ahmad allegedly received RM50,000, RM30,000 and RM25,000 from Elias, for the same purpose.
The offences were allegedly committed between September 2019 and April 7.
Feizol, who was charged in his then capacity as the army adviser to the Defence Minister, also faces five counts of his own.
He was accused of corruptly receiving RM10,000, RM50,000, RM30,000, RM20,000 and RM18,000 from Elias between Oct 30, 2009 and June 24.
The monies were said to be an inducement for Feizol to hand over a letter of intent dated Sept 5, 2018 from FEHM Entity to Mindef on a strategic partnership for the maintenance of the ministry’s intelligence system.
Former defence intelligence director-general Sheikh Mokhsin was accused of seven counts of corruption.
For the first and second charges, he allegedly solicited and corruptly agreed to receive RM1mil from Elias as an inducement for him to approve the recommendation of FEHM Entity being appointed via direct negotiations for the maintenance of the intelligence system.
For the third until sixth charges, Sheikh Mokhsin allegedly corruptly received RM70,000, RM26,000, RM100,000, RM70,000, from Elias for the same purpose.
All of the offences were allegedly committed at the Havana Club in Concorde Hotel, an office in Mindef and HairDoc Medical Publika between June 20, 2019 and June 5.
Unrelated to the other charges, Sheikh Mokhsin is also facing a seventh charge where he allegedly received RM50,000 from one Syed Omar Syed Mohamad as a reward for appointing Malvus Sense Sdn Bhd for the procurement, supply, delivery, training and certification of a system in Mindef.
The offence was allegedly committed at Mindef at 2.30pm on June 26.
The court set RM80,000 bail in one surety for Che Ahmad, RM60,000 for Feizol and RM110,000 for Sheikh Mokhsin, and also ordered them to surrender their passports. The case is fixed for mention on Nov 27. Lawyers Gooi Soon Seng, Azrul Zulkifli Stork and P.G. Cyril represented Che Ahmad, Feizol and Sheikh Mokhsin respectively.