TO put it bluntly, nobody can stop any political/corporate personality to pursue any form of personal or even extra-marital affair so long as they are able to keep their relationship “under the blanket” so to speak.
But once the dark side of their personal affair gets exposed, they will be robbed of their so-called “human rights” a.k.a. privacy, as in the case of former Astro Malaysia Holdings Bhd group CEO Datuk Rohana Rozhan, 58.
But indeed if the account of ex-Goldman banker Tim Leissner at the 1Malaysia Development Bhd (1MDB) trial in the US that both he and Rohana were having an affair is true, Rohana would not only have concealed her relationship discreetly but was also a party to the mother of all scandals in Malaysia.
As per a Bloomberg report yesterday (Feb 24), Leissner has alleged that he bought Rohana a US$10 mil (RM41.85 mil) home in London in 2013 after she had threatened to expose his involvement with 1MDB and that their decade-old relationship spanned 2003 to 2013.
A pioneer member of Astro since 1995, Rohana was appointed as Astro’s head honcho on April 1, 2011.
“Ms Rozhan was very upset that I was ending our relationship to be with my future wife, with Kimora,” Leissner was quoted as telling the jury, referring to his wife Kimora Lee Simmons.
“If I didn’t buy her a house, she would tell the authorities about my involvement in the 1MDB scandal. She was threatening to expose me. At the time, 2013, I was very fearful of that.”
Leissner, the former chief of Goldman Sachs’ Southeast Asia operation, is the prosecution’s star witness in the criminal trial involving former Goldman Sachs colleague Roger Ng. Leissner had pleaded guilty in 2018 to a count of conspiracy to violate US anti-bribery laws and to conspiring to launder money.
His testimony has sparked the furore of Kepong MP Lim Lip Eng who questioned the Malaysian authorities – from Prime Minister Datuk Seri Ismail Sabri Yaakob to the Attorney-General, the Inspector General of Police, Bank Negara Malaysia (BNM), the Malaysia Anti-Corruption Commission (MACC) and the Inland Revenue Board (IRB) – if any investigation had been carried out on Leissner’s allegations.
Another allegation following Leissner’s testimony that Lim pointed out was that a billion dollars was transferred out from Malaysia overnight and that it had been done because the husband of a top BNM official had received a bribe to make that happen.
Leissner has described in the 1MDB trial that the overnight transfer of the US$1 bil from 1MDB to PetroSaudi as “unprecedented”.
Back to Rohana, nobody know for sure whether she is in Malaysia or where she is residing currently. But if she has a clear conscience, the next best thing for her to do would be to come forward to clear her name lest her reputation would be dealt a severe blow with all types of misperception flying around.
Silence from authorities
Meanwhile, the UK’s Daily Mail reported that Rohana has a London address listed under her name at 42, Montpelier Street (near Hyde Park in the Knightsbridge area) but nobody knows for sure if that is the home Leissner paid US$10 mil for.
Not much has been heard of her since her resignation in Astro took effect on Jan 31, 2019 which was six months after she tendered her notice of her resignation on June 7, 2018 – a day after Astro addressed publicly a customer data leak and posted weaker financial results.
Attributing Rohana’s resignation notice to her intention “to pursue other goals”, the pay-TV operator eventually passed the baton to Henry Tan Poh Hock who was then Astro’s group chief content & consumer officer.
It is to note that the scandal involving Rohana was not well-received among Malaysians with netizens berating her for “profiteering” from 1MDB instead of exposing it to the authorities despite being in the position to do something.
As of 2pm today, Rohana was trending at the number three spot on Twitter, with users calling her using the most unsavoury of names which we do not wish to publish here.
But netizens also took the opportunity to criticise another influential person, Perlis mufti Datuk Asri Zainul Abidin for keeping mum on the corruption exposes involving “elite Malays” while going all out to defend the unilateral conversion of single mother, Loh Siew Hongs’ three children despite being unconstitutional.
Below is a scathing attack levelled against Asri by a fellow Muslim named Sayeed Alif Khan.
“What are you going to do about this? These are Muslims and you postulate yourself as a chosen one to defend Islam. By these acts of blatant corruption, they are ruining people’s lives. Stand up for the ummah (Muslim unity)!” – Feb 24, 2022
