Businessman Zarul Ahmad Zulkifli said Lim told him this sometime during the preliminary stage of preparing a proposal for the undersea tunnel project in 2011.

“He (Lim) said that if the state government were to construct a (third) bridge, it would require a lot of federal government approval.

“But for a tunnel, he said that it required less involvement and approval (from the federal government).

“He said that as Penang was (then) an opposition-led state, any approval from the federal government would be hard to obtain,” he told the court during re-examination.

Last month, the court heard that Zarul had informed the state government that the tunnel would be difficult to build.

The RM6.3 billion project, comprising an undersea tunnel and three roads, was mooted by the state government to alleviate traffic conditions on Penang bridge.

Today, Zarul told the court he did not know whether Lim’s state administration made any decision to halt the tunnel project.

He also affirmed that he met the late businessman Ewe Swee Kheng in 2013 to talk about the transfer of ownership of a plot of state land.

Zarul told the court that Ewe was “confident” he would receive the state land, known as Lot 702. Ewe died on Oct 6, 2021, after falling into a swimming pool from his apartment.

Lim is charged with using his position as then Penang chief minister to ask Zarul for a 10% cut of the profits from the undersea tunnel project and accepting RM3.3 million in kickbacks from the businessman.

He is also accused of two counts of dishonestly misappropriating RM208.7 million worth of state land.

The hearing continues before judge Azura Alwi tomorrow.