Corporate espionage case: Ex-Petronas manager sent upstream performance report to Petros email, witness says

KUALA LUMPUR, July 7 — The Sessions Court was told today that Mohd Khairul Akmal Mohd Jasni, a former Petronas manager, had applied to work at Petroleum Sarawak Berhad (Petros) months before he allegedly leaked the national oil company’s financial and business secrets to the same company.

Petros Human Resource Analyst Nurul Qurratu Aini Laila Junaidi, 40, testified that Mohd Khairul Akmal had submitted an application for the Head Upstream Finance position through its website’s internal system on Jan 24, 2024.

“On March 27, 2024, I contacted Mohd Khairul Akmal via email and telephone to extend a job offer for the position of Head Finance (Gas Aggregator & Sarawak Resource Management (SRM)), with a monthly salary of RM25,000. The scope of duties for the position involved managing financial affairs for SRM and Gas Aggregator,” she said.

She was testifying during the trial of Mohd Khairul Akmal, who faces charges of attempting to disclose the said financial and business secrets to Petros in June 2024.

The third prosecution witness stated that the job offer was made after the interview panel selected Mohd Khairul Akmal as the suitable candidate for the position, as the accused met all the criteria established for the role.

Nurul Qurratu Aini Laila testified that during the process, Mohd Khairul Akmal had requested a salary of RM37,000 per month, but Petros was unable to meet that demand and stood by its original offer of RM25,000.

“The reason he requested a higher salary than Petros’s initial offer was due to his experience in both domestic and international oil and gas operations. After he rejected the offer, Petros did not make any counter-offer,” the witness said.

Separately, Nurul Qurratu Aini Laila said that she knew Datuk Janin Girie as the chief executive officer and Mohd Azha Abdul Jalil as the chief financial officer of Petros, and was aware of their email addresses based on information in the company’s official email system.

On June 25 last year, the first prosecution witness, former Petronas senior manager of Industrial Relations Jumsuri Basri, 48, testified that a review revealed that on June 8, 2024, at 3.19 pm, Mohd Khairul Akmal had sent a confidential document titled “Q1 2024 Upstream Business Performance” via his Petronas email to a Petros email address.

The following day, the second prosecution witness, Petronas general manager Syakirah Mustapa, 51, told the court that Mohd Khairul Akmal had never been permitted to use the report for personal purposes or to share it with third parties, namely Janin and Mohd Azha.

Meanwhile, under cross-examination by Mohd Khairul Akmal’s counsel Louis Liaw Vern Xien, the witness confirmed that the interview panel which selected him as the suitable candidate for the position of Head Finance (Gas Aggregator & SRM) consisted of Mohd Azha and SRM senior vice president Datuk Abang Arabi Abang Narudin.

When asked by Liaw whether, throughout her time with the company, Petros had ever requested confidential information from job candidates during interviews, Nurul Qurratu Aini Laila answered in the negative.

Mohd Khairul Akmal, 41, is charged with attempting to disclose a document titled “Q1 2024 Upstream Business Performance Operational & Financial” to Petros, allegedly obtained during the course of his duties as Petronas Business Unit performance manager, at a condominium unit along Jalan Pinang here, between 3.19 pm and 3.21 pm on June 8, 2024.

He is charged under Section 203A(1) of the Penal Code, read together with Section 511 of the same Code, which provides for a maximum fine of RM1 million or imprisonment of up to one year, while Section 511 carries a penalty of imprisonment not exceeding half of the maximum term provided under Section 203A(1), upon conviction.

The trial before Judge Mazuliana Abdul Rashid resumes tomorrow. — Bernama