‘Monster’, ‘young boy’: ex-UKSB admin explains code names for Zahid in ledger

A former administrative manager at Ultra Kirana Sdn Bhd (UKSB) told the Shah Alam High Court today that the words “monster”, “young boy” and “yb” in the company’s ledger referred to former deputy prime minister Ahmad Zahid Hamidi.

David Tan Siong Sun, 47, said this during examination-in-chief by lead deputy public prosecutor Raja Rozela Raja Toran, when he was referred to the ledger in Zahid’s corruption trial.

The ledger contains the details of payments made by UKSB to several individuals between 2014 and 2018.

When Raja Rozela asked Tan whether he named Zahid in the ledger, the witness replied: “No.”

Tan, the 17th prosecution witness, said that he used several code names such as “z”, “zh”, “yb”, “young boy”, “mon” and “monster” for Zahid.

“The reason I used the code name ‘monster’ was because at (the time) I entered the ledger, I was eating the Mamee Monster snack,” he said.

The 15th prosecution witness, former UKSB director Harry Lee Vui Khun, had earlier told the court that “KJ” and “bomoh” were among some of the words recorded in the UKSB ledger, which was presented at the trial of the former deputy prime minister.

Tan said he also used code names because he was worried that the ledger might be exposed to other people.

Raja Rozela: Does anyone (else) know about the code names?

Tan: Nobody, only me.

When reading from his witness statement, he said he kept records of all the payments made to Zahid from 2014 to 2018 for his personal record because the amount of cash involved was huge.

“I prepared a ledger using Microsoft Excel on my personal laptop. I’m not an accountant by training, so the ledger was just a simple record of money in, money out,” he said.

He added that the main entries in the ledger were the amount available for each month, the amount withdrawn, and the name or nickname of the intended receiver.

“The individuals named in the ledger include ministers, politicians and government servants. Usually, I would key in the entries daily but on some busy days, I would write down on a piece of paper first before keying in the details in the ledger later in the day or the next day,” he said.

Zahid, 69, faces 33 charges of receiving bribes amounting to S$13.56 million from UKSB for himself as then home minister, to extend the contract of the company as the operator of the one-stop centre service in China and the foreign visa (VLN) system, as well as to maintain the contract agreement to supply the VLN integrated system to the same company by the home ministry.

On another seven counts, he was charged with obtaining for himself S$1,150,000, RM3 million, €15,000 and US$15,000 from the same company which had official links with his official duty.

He was charged with committing all of the offences at Seri Satria, Precinct 16, Putrajaya, and Country Heights Kajang between October 2014 and March 2018.

The hearing before judge Mohd Yazid Mustafa continues.