RAGHAD FIGHTS ONE OF MALAYSIA'S MOST POWERFUL FAMILIES - BUT IS TAIB MAHMUD'S FOREIGN SECOND WIFE REALLY ACTING ALONE? - SHOULD SHE HAVE JUST 'ABSCONDED' WITH THE ALLEGED "BOXES OF CASH" - INSTEAD OF WITH HIM?
‘I only want the best care for my husband’
Toh Puan Raghad Kurdi Taib has ended her silence, saying that she will never place the health of her ailing husband, Tun Abdul Taib Mahmud, in jeopardy.
“It’s time for me to speak up. I have no other intention than to give the best care and protection for my husband,” said the wife of the former Sarawak governor and chief minister in an Instagram post yesterday.
In the post, Raghad said that she did not abscond with her husband as she had permission from the doctor in charge of his treatment.
“Following the doctor in charge, Dr Tan Sian Kong’s clearance for discharge on 3rd February 2024, I informed him of Tun Taib’s scheduled appointment with Dr Rosli at CVS Kuala Lumpur Hospital.
“Dr Tan approved of his discharge and deemed him fit for travel. Dr Tan’s referral letter to CVS Kuala Lumpur Hospital further substantiates the legitimacy of the discharge and planned admission,” she said.
Raghad said all the necessary discharge documents according to the hospital’s procedure had been signed, and all relevant hospital personnel were aware of the discharge.
“In the comfort of his own home, he has 24-hour medical support (including staffed nurses and scheduled doctor visits), necessary equipment, and medication for care and recuperation while awaiting admission to CVS Kuala Lumpur Hospital under Dr Rosli’s care,” she said.
She said claims that she removed medical devices without alerting the staff on duty were untrue.“Requests for assistance in removing medical devices were ignored by hospital staff despite repeated calls for assistance. The false accusations have caused unnecessary stress and confusion,” she said.
“I have filed a police report to refute these baseless claims and protect Tun Taib’s privacy and right to choose his medical care.”
Raghad urged the public to disregard misleading reports and respect Abdul Taib’s right to privacy and informed medical decisions.
Boxes of CASH?!
On Friday 2nd February Sarawak Report issued pictures capturing the wife of the ailing ex-Governor Taib Mahmud, Raghad, apparently directing a massive packing operation in the downstairs area of their Demak Jaya mansion.
Next to a mass of suitcases, rolled up carpets and covered chairs ranged dozens of boxes of a somewhat unusual shape and size for moving chattels.
Carpets and chairs and boxes piled high - some with the official Governor's stamp
Did Raghad have a collection of books that she wanted to take with her somewhere perhaps, since these pictures left no-one in any doubt she was on the move?
It has now emerged that at the time Taib was no longer at the house but back in the Intensive Care Unit at the Normah Hospital – on life supporting medications and connected to tubes and an oxygen mask, according to pictures now circulating that Sarawak Report has only partially displayed.
Ragad herself has confirmed this matter by uploading on to Facebook an alleged snapshot of her husband’s ICU hospital notes dated the afternoon of Friday February 2nd, in which a nurse appears to have expressed concern that a butler had appeared to indicate that Raghad wanted her husband brought home.
Raghad on Facebook has tried to present “proof” she did not abscond her husband from the Normah Hospital against doctors orders.
According to the (unclear) notes uploaded by Raghad, the nurse wrote that the butler had told staff that “Tuan Puan wants to bring patient home” to which staff had made clear the doctors needed to be consulted and that various procedures, including the cleaning of intravenous tubes needed to be performed.
Why this is proof that Raghad did not later remove Taib from the hospital at midnight against doctors’ advice is unclear.
Familiar tiling of the mansion floor according to insiders.
Indeed, despite threats from the Sarawak police about ‘the spread of false news’, it has now been confirmed by the self-same police force that the story later published on Sunday by this site, revealing that police reports were filed in the middle of the night by the hospital to notify his removal by his bodyguards under Raghad’s instructions, was true.
Taib was removed in defiance of Raghad being put on notice by Taib’s sons’ lawyer not to do so without their consent.
It has also been confirmed (as was also first reported by this site) that Taib’s own brother Tufail had filed a separate police report on behalf of Taib’s “real children” and immediate family the following day.
In that report he demanded police take action to investigate and protect the patient and he threatened that the family would ensure that Raghad would be held fully accountable and responsible for any harm caused by her actions to Taib’s wellbeing.
Sarawak Report has it on good authority that mid-afternoon on Monday police duly raided Demak Jaya to be followed into the mansion by Tufail himself.
RM50 Ringgit notes fitted into boxes?
Insiders have confided that for the longest time the children and siblings of Taib have been increasingly banished and kept away from their father’s company, beginning with a rift with his once closest sister Raziah back in 2014.
(Ironically it was Raziah and her husband Robert Geneid who had procured Raghad through a marriage broker as a young bride for Taib prior to the 2011 state elections).
Relations have reached a nadir over recent months as news emerged of documents signed by Taib handing significant amounts of shares and assets to Raghad from the Taib family estate.
The then Governor’s sons have lodged legal action alleging Raghad procured those signatures illegally, whilst keeping Taib himself away from family members as his health began to visibly collapse.
Raghad has remained with Taib for much of the period in Turkey receiving treatment whilst maintaining his capacity remained sufficient for him to remain in office.
That plainly was untrue, and last week Taib was unceremoniously replaced as Governor through an announced appointment of his successor by the departing King in KL.
Demak Jaya? The floor tiles are said to match!
So, what have the police found in those boxes waiting for removal at Demak Jaya, apparently at the behest of the imminently departing Raghad?
More, as yet unproven pictures have started to circulate of alleged security camera footage and photos of those boxes being allegedly packed in the adjacent guards’ area to the hall at Demak Jaya.
If these pictures are correct the contents of many of these boxes are RM50 notes – a haul potentially amounting to several million ringgit.
Some of the boxes shown in the wider hall are decorated with the Governor’s crest of which Ragad had apparently requested more be printed – a request refused after Taib was removed from office. Other boxes are merely plain with no such ‘official protection’ against inspection.
Whether these all still remained in the mansion by the time of Monday afternoon’s arrival of the forces of law and order is yet to be confirmed. Likewise, it is yet to be confirmed whether any of these dozens of regular shaped containers were indeed performing the purpose of storing layer after layer of unexplained cash.
If so it will not be the first time the Taib family have dealt in large transfers of cash and Raghad will doubtless have an explanation for such a form of transport in this digital age.
However, there is only one acceptable step for the police to take over these boxes whatever they may contain, particularly in the middle of the ferocious family dispute that has now overflowed into the courts.
This is to freeze all such items and all Taib’s assets, including those purportedly handed over to Raghad in recent months, and to put them under lock and key.
Second wives, siblings, children, step-children are all now set at each others’ throats (as so long predicted) over the vast fortune acquired through an abuse of public office over four long decades by this finally departing and once all powerful figure.
Yet the people of Sarawak know quite well that all this wealth belonged to them and ought to be returned, along with all the foreign properties and shares and privatised public assets grabbed over the years by Taib Mahmud. - Sarawak Report
My Family Intend To Hold Raghad Fully Accountable! - Police Raid Demak Jaya!
As Sarawak Report had earlier predicted, the extraordinary actions of Raghad Taib,, who arrived at midnight with a team of bodyguards at the Normah Hospital on Saturday to wrench the former Governor off his life support in Intensive Care and return him home against doctors advice, has sparked a crisis in the family, police action and dark talk of retribution.
The hospital had filed a police report expressing its concern that the Governor had been forcibly removed from life-giving care for a brain infection in defiance of legal notice given by Taib’s sons demanding they should be informed of any such decision in advance.
Following the widespread circulation of Sarawak Report’s fact based information based on that police report the Sarawak Police Commissioner none the less released a threatening notice suggesting the “spread of false information” by this blog.
To the contrary, the news sparked more police reports, this time from family members, which confirmed the shocking situation.
Failing Taib Is Being Kept From Own Family
Sarawak Report has now sighted a report made on Sunday afternoon by Taib’s own brother Tufail in which he confirmed he had been passed the hospital’s report to the police by Taib’s younger daughter, Hanifah (an MP), and wished for the police to take immediate action.
Specifically, the complaint confirms that Taib is being kept from his closest family by his second wife and her own relatives and that Taib’s siblings and children (whom Tufail describes as his “real family” are deeply concerned about his welfare.:
Ragad removed and abducted My Brother from the Hospital despite being
advised that My Brother was required to stay at the Hospital for proper and
adequate treatment and that her actions may cause harm to My Brother.
4. My Brother was there fore removed and abducted by Ragad from the Hospital against medical advice. without consulting the ICU medical staff and without consulting and obtaining the approval of my family.
5. None of my siblings nor any of My Brother’s real children know of his currentwhereabouts and the current condition of his health.
6. In light of the above, My Brother’s medical condition and Dr Nazrin’s Police Report,
myself and my family are gravely concerned about the health and safety of My Brother.
7. I make this report for the police to urgently investigate the matter and to
safeguard/protect the wellbeing of My Brother
Police Raid Demak Jaya
Information made available to Sarawak Report has indeed confirmed that accordingly on Monday afternoon at 2.30pm police forces did conduct a raid on the former governor’s riverside mansion at Demak Jaya in Kuching where the patient has been kept.
Leaked photographs have revealed that over the past few days mounds of packing cases had collected in the main hall of that mansion under the direction of Ragad herself, who in possible anticipation of her husband’s demise was apparently seeking to move out along with most of the contents of the house.
Sarawak Report has learnt that two hours after the police took control of the premises Taib’s brother Tufail himself arrived from Sibu.
It is assumed that the rest of the family now have access to the failing Governor, however his condition (two days after he was removed from medications and support in Intensive Care) is unknown.
Nor is the situation regarding the Governor’s second wife whose ongoing feud with all the members of Taib’s original family is now confirmed and out in the open. For months there has been a bitter court battle developing over the division of the family’s wealth.
I Intend To Hold Her Fully Accountable and Responsible
Raghad’s extraordinary actions over the past 48 hours are unlikely to help her cause as Sarawak Report has already observed.
She remains a lone second wife in a foreign land and now the target of a powerful and wealthy family who claim she has cheated them and removed Taib from their care.
The final words of Tufail Mahmud’s own police report make the family intentions absolutely clear in that respect:
“If and in the cvent something happens to My Brother as a consequence of Ragad’s actions, my family and I intend to hold her fully accountable and responsible.”
Ragad faces accusations of having put her already ailing husband in the way of harm against the wishes of his family, whilst piling up her husbands possessions in an apparent preparation to depart with them in anticipation of an unhappy outcome to the situation.
The police commissioner has himself reportedly made that point, suggesting the force is investigating the matter “under Section 336 of the Penal Code” (causing hurt by an act which endangers life or the personal safety of others).
She has reigned Queen of the Governor’s mansion for months and years as the Old White Haired Rajah over-stayed his capacity to do the job. However, those days are over and she faces a tough battle to keep control, let alone to prove that signatures on documents putting chunks of the family heritage in her possession were genuinely his own idea.
If Taib’s family have anything to do with it, it appears that even prosecution looms. Ought she to have left the packing and departed somewhat earlier instead?
Cartoon, courtesy of Lunar Sarawak Police Chief indicates threats against Sarawak Report in the middle of the crisis to rescue Taib
THE SARAWAK CONTINGENT POLICE HAS DETECTED ONE VIRAL POST INVOLVING THE FORMER TYT OF SARAWAK, TUN PEHIN SRI ABDUL TAIB MAHMUD.
THAT HAS BEEN UPLOADED ON SOCIAL MEDIA.
SARAWAK PDRM CONFIRMED HAVING RECEIVED A POLICE REPORT RELATING TO AN INFECTIOUS ISSUE, WHICH IS THE CASE OF CARRYING OUT THE EX TYT TUN PEHIN SRI FROM A HOSPITAL. THE CASE IS BEING INVESTIGATED UNDER SECTION 336
PENAL CODE.
IN CONNECTION WITH THAT, THE POLICE ADVISES THE PEOPLE NOT TO SPREAD THIS MATTER AND NOT MAKE ANY SPECULATIONS. ACTION FOR SPREADING FALSE INFORMATION CAN BE TAKEN UNDER SECTION 500 OF THE PENAL CODE WHICH IS THE OFFENSE OF DEFAMATION AND SECTION 233 OF THE COMMUNICATIONS AND MULTIMEDIA ACT 1998 WHICH IS IMPROPER USE OF NETWORK SERVICE FACILITIES AND OTHERS.
CP DATO’ MANCHA ATA
SARAWAK POLICE COMMISSIONER
(RELEASED ON FEBRUARY 5 2024) - Sarawak Report
Written by ANN, Sarawak Report
Politics Now!
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