Anwar's ex-driver says he did not write letter

Anwar's ex-driver says he did not write letter

KUALA LUMPUR (Agencies): The former driver of Malaysia's sacked finance minister Anwar Ibrahim said on Thursday that he did not write the letter accusing Anwar of sodomizing him.

Azizan Abu Bakar told the capital's High Court that Anwar's main accuser, Ummi Hafilda Ali, drafted the 1997 letter which was later sent to Prime Minister Mahathir Mohamad saying his deputy had committed adultery and sodomy, a crime in Malaysia.

"I asked her to put it together because Ummi is very fluent in language," Azizan told the court on his second day of testimony in the corruption and sex trial at the center of civil unrest in Malaysia.

The court is examining four charges that Anwar abused his power last year by urging police to force Azizan and the female accuser to retract allegations of sex crimes by the former minister, who was sacked and arrested in September.

Anwar's lawyers are trying to prove that Azizan and Ummi were part of a plot to smear him and destroy his political career so he could never succeed Mahathir and expose corruption and cronyism.

On Wednesday, Azizan stood by allegations in his letter of August 5, 1997, that Anwar had made him a "homosexual slave" in 1992, sodomizing him against his will in luxury hotels on the outskirts of the capital.

Azizan, cross-examined by defense lawyer Christopher Fernando, said on Thursday that he had written the letter in 1997 of his own free will.

But he acknowledged he had discussed the matter with Ummi, who later sent her own letter along with Azizan's to Mahathir.

"Before that, I discussed with Ummi Hafilda what had happened to me," he said. "At first she wanted to know if her sister-in- law was having an illicit affair with the accused."

He was referring to Shamsidar Taharin, the wife of Anwar's political secretary, Ummi's brother.

In her letter to Mahathir, Ummi accused Anwar of committing adultery with Shamsidar. She later retracted the letter.

A book denouncing Anwar which was published earlier this year, "Fifty Reasons Why Anwar Ibrahim Cannot Become Prime Minister", accused him of fathering a child by Shamsidar.

But the attorney-general recently said that blood tests had proved that Shamsidar's husband was the father.

Both Ummi and Azizan retracted their allegations after they were arrested together on August 17, 1997. The prosecution says Anwar forced police to coax the retractions from them.

In her retraction letter, Ummi said she had met a cabinet minister and Mahathir's closest confidant before leveling her initial accusations.

In his cross-examination, defense counsel Fernando dwelt on the career path of Azizan, who was the Anwar family's driver from 1989 to 1992 and is now a sales and administration executive.

Fernando asked Azizan if he had ever been a director of a company. The witness first said no, then later acknowledged he had served on the board of directors of a company in 1997. But he said he could not recall which months.

"It must have been a very big occasion for you, and you can't remember when it was?" Fernando asked. "No," Azizan said.

"From a driver to a company director, is this not a dramatic change in status?" the lawyer asked. "No," said the witness.

Asked when he stopped being a director of the firm, Azizan said: "If I'm not mistaken, by August 1997." He said he was not paid any fees or perquisites as director.

Earlier on Thursday, Azizan said Anwar had demanded that he deny a homosexual relationship when allegations of sex crimes by the former cabinet minister began to surface this year.

Acrimony in court between the defense and prosecution deepened Thursday as more evidence was piled against Anwar.

The prosecutors accused defense lawyers of stealing court documents from them and even lodged a police report. The police acted quickly by sending officers armed with a search warrant to one of the defense attorney's office on Wednesday.

"You should make a strong statement asking the prosecution not to harass the defense counsel," Haji Sulaiman, a leading defense lawyer told Judge Augustine Paul.

"We are being accused of theft, my Lord," he said.