News by Emir Zainul

He said this in reply to Thomas' retort during the cross-examination, as the latter accused Najib of doing nothing when the funds were revealed to be transferred overseas.

Najib said the movement of the money was an operational matter, and that as the Finance Minister and advisor emeritus of SRC, he was only concerned with policy matters.

As such, Thomas alleged that the decisions were made solely on Najib's directives without going through any board of directors.

This is despite attorney-general Tan Sri Tommy Thomas bringing out the KWAP investment paper to the board that initially recommended a RM1 billion cap, followed by minutes of the second meeting by the fund’s investment panel where its chairman Tan Sri Wan Abdul Aziz Wan Abdullah said Najib had told him that “RM2 billion was sufficient”.

He questioned the authenticity of some 15 documents that had been tendered in court, which he initially agreed contain his signature, but now questioned their authenticity.

Replying to questions from his lead counsel Tan Sri Muhammad Shafee Abdullah, the former premier said at that time, there were massive floods happening in the east coast states of Peninsular Malaysia, especially in Kelantan.

"I cannot explain this. I am utterly shocked that the bank deals with Jho Low although the power was only given to [former SRC International Sdn Bhd managing director] Nik Faisal Ariff Kamil. I have never allowed Jho Low to deal with the bank over my banking accounts and I was not informed [about] this," said Najib.

Najib said he believes that Azlin may have been told about the additional monies from fugitive financier Low Taek Jho, who is better known as Jho Low.

He was reading out his witness statement in the High Court yesterday, where he also refuted earlier testimonies saying that he would give directions to the board through SRC’s former chief executive officer and managing director Nik Faisal Ariff Kamil, who was the sole link between the two parties.

During his examination-in-chief by defence lawyer Rahmat Hazlan today, Najib testified that King Abdullah had donated US$800 million through a series of transactions from Tanore Finance Corp into his AmBank account in early 2013, as a "gift that I can spend at my absolute discretion".