Malaysia’s Najib ‘has no money’ to pay fine for house arrest, lawyer says

Former Malaysian leader Najib Razak has no money to pay the fine to secure his transfer to house arrest, his lawyers have said, as they question the delay in releasing the full details of the conditional pardon granted by Malaysia’s king last week.

King Sultan Ibrahim Iskandar last Friday decreed that Najib would be allowed to serve out the remainder of his sentence at home, on condition that he pay his 50 million ringgit (US$10.3 million) fine.

The decision triggered widespread outrage among Malaysians over the purported preferential treatment for the corruption-tainted former prime minister and a fundraiser launched by his former ruling Umno party to settle the fine.

Najib’s release into house arrest, however, was far from certain as he currently had no means to raise the funds on his own after the authorities froze access to all of his bank accounts, his lawyers said outside the Kuala Lumpur court complex on Friday.