Isa, who served as Felda chairman from 2011 until December last year, was brought to the Magistrates court here early this morning, where the Registrar of the Subordinates Court of Malaya Zainal Abidin Kamaruddin heard MACC’s application for a seven-day remand.
Isa, who was wearing the orange-coloured MACC lock-up garb, arrived at the court house shortly after 9am. The proceedings ended just before noon.
His wife, Bibi Sharliza Mohd Khalid, and children were also present, aside from friends, which included former Batu Berendam MP Tamrin Ghafar.
Isa, who is also Jempol MP, was represented by K Kumaraendran, Devkumar Kumaraendran, Ridha Abdah Subry and N Sivananthan, while deputy public prosecutor Tengku Amir Zaki represented the anti-graft agency in its application.
According to Isa’s lead counsel Kumaraendran, they had asked for the remand application to be rejected as Isa was suffering from a heart condition.
Kumaraendran argued that Isa was not a flight risk and that there were no evidence by the prosecution that he may destroy documents related to the investigation.
“He has got a heart problem and a medical report by a specialist was submitted to substantiate it,” he told reporters outside the courthouse.
Kumaraendran said the judge indicated that proper medical attention will be given during the remand period.
Yesterday, Isa was arrested at the MACC headquarters in Putrajaya, where he had gone to give a statement pertaining to FIC’s purchase of a hotel in London in 2014.
MACC also raided his house as part of its probe. The anti-graft agency’s chief commissioner Dzulkifli Ahmad confirmed that the raid took place at Isa’s house in Selangor, as part of the investigation into the FIC hotel purchases.
“The raid is a normal procedure in MACC’s investigation, to obtain files or documents related to the case,” Dzulkifli was reported to have said yesterday.
The London hotel referred to is Park City Hotel which FIC acquired in December 2014.
Preliminary investigations by MACC revealed that FIC was believed to have bought the hotel at a much higher price than the market price, resulting in FIC allegedly losing millions of ringgit.
The hotel has 62 rooms and is located at Lexham Gardens within the exclusive district of Kensington and Chelsea.
In June, Isa quit his role as Felda Global Ventures (FGV) chairman and was then appointed acting chairman of the Land Public Transport Commission (SPAD) by Prime Minister Najib Razak.
FGV and Felda too, came under investigation following allegations made by former FGV president and chief executive officer Zakaria Arshad in June.
On June 21, Isa and his wife were called in to give their statements to MACC although no details were forthcoming as to why they had been called in.