KUALA LUMPUR – Malaysiakini reporter B Nantha Kumar has lodged a police report against a Pakistani foreign worker agent, alleging that the individual attempted to bribe him.
Nantha, who is at the centre of a corruption probe, filed the report at the Dang Wangi district police headquarters at 5pm, identifying the agent as Zahid, the news portal reported.
In his report, he denied soliciting or accepting a bribe from Zahid, asserting instead that the agent had attempted to bribe him.
According to Nantha, Zahid handed him a brown envelope in an effort to persuade him to collaborate with a foreign worker syndicate. “On 28 February at approximately 11.10pm, while meeting Zahid at the Concorde Hotel in Shah Alam to discuss my investigation into the Fly syndicate, he handed me a brown envelope in an attempt to persuade me to work with him in the syndicate,” he stated in his report.
“I took the envelope as evidence that he was attempting to bribe me. This was because I had been asked by a state immigration director to assist the department in gathering any evidence against Pakistani nationals suspected of involvement in the Fly syndicate.”
However, before he could report the bribery attempt to the immigration department, Nantha said he was arrested by the Malaysian Anti-Corruption Commission (MACC) and remanded for four days on allegations of receiving a bribe.
“I deny soliciting or accepting a bribe; rather, Zahid was the one who attempted to bribe me,” he stated in his police report.
The Fly syndicate refers to an operation involving falsified immigration statuses, allegedly allowing individuals who have overstayed or are blacklisted to obtain fraudulent exit and entry stamps.
Nantha also urged the police to investigate Zahid’s background, claiming that the agent had admitted to having been imprisoned in Malaysia for human trafficking offences.
He questioned how Zahid was still allowed to reside in the country under a professional visa if he had previously been convicted.
“My purpose in lodging this report is to request a thorough police investigation into this incident and Zahid’s background,” Nantha added.
He also attached a copy of his Malaysiakini article, published yesterday, in which he detailed the events of February 28.
Nantha was previously accused of accepting RM20,000 from a foreign worker agent in exchange for not publishing two articles exposing an alleged cartel. He was released on Tuesday after being remanded for four days. – March 8, 2025