KUALA LUMPUR, July 5 ─ P. Balasubramaniam ─ the man behind the now infamous statutory declaration ─ and his family have gone missing.
A family member, R. Kumaresan, lodged a report at the Brickfields police station this afternoon, saying that the private investigator, his wife and their three children have disappeared from their home in Rawang.
This is the latest twist to a case that has all the hallmarks of a spy novel ─ intrigue, political players, murder and salacious details.
The tale began on Thursday when Balasubramaniam produced a statutory declaration. He alleged that his client, Abdul Razak Baginda, told him that Datuk Seri Najib Razak knew Altantuya Shariibuu and that the Deputy Prime Minister had sexual relations with her.
Balasubramaniam was engaged by Abdul Razak to shield him from the Mongolian model who was allegedly harassing him. The political analyst was an advisor to Najib. Altantuya was murdered on Oct 19, 2006 and Abdul Razak and two others are standing trial for her death.
In his statutory declaration, he said that he told police investigators of what Abdul Razak said of Najib’s involvement, but these parts were omitted from his statement. The statutory declaration was prepared by his lawyer Americk Singh.
Yesterday, Balasubramaniam turned up with another lawyer and retracted his statutory declaration and replaced it with a new one. In the new declaration, there was no mention of Najib being involved with Altantuya or even knowing her. He alleged that the first statutory declaration was made under duress.
After retracting the declaration, Balasubramaniam snuck out without answering any questions from the press. His nephew, Kumaresan, said that the private investigator and his family have not been seen since yesterday.
This latest twist is going to make an already messy situation worse and give credence to claims by the Opposition that Balasubramaniam felt compelled to revise his statutory declaration because he and his family had been threatened.
Malaysian Insider
No comments:
Post a Comment