Rabu, 24 Oktober 2012

Philosophy Politics Economics

Philosophy Politics Economics

Ismail Sabri Called Me "Bacul"

Posted: 19 Oct 2012 10:09 AM PDT


Barisan Nasional Ministers will stoop to calling names when Pakatan Rakyat exposed their failure to carry out their responsibilities competently, without fear or favour

I read with great amusement that the Minister of Domestic Trade, Cooperatives and Consumerism, Datuk Ismail Sabri called me a "bacul" or coward for submitting a motion to deduct RM10 from his pay to be debated in Parlaiment in the coming weeks.

Datuk Ismail Sabri denied he practised selective prosecution when he chose to persecute Suara Initiatif Sdn Bhd (Suaram) on dubious and unsubstantiated allegations while at the same time allowing Umno-linked companies to violate the Companies' Act 1965 for failing to submit their financial accounts and annual returns, some since 2006.

The fact that these companies failed to submit their accounts for years with absolutely no action taken has never been denied and the proof is available on the website of Companies Commission of Malaysia, under Datuk Ismail's purview.

Even when pressed by MP for Lembah Pantai, Nurul Izzah Anwar in Parliament yesterday during the winding up of the Budget policy stage debate, the Minister had dithered on whether concrete action will be taken against the directors of these companies which flouted the law, including UMNO Members of Parliament, Khairy Jamaluddin and Datuk Abdul Rahman Dahlan, as well as the family members of Datuk Shahrizat Jalil.

However he had the cheek to tell the media, "I hope that Tony Pua will meet me, and he can teach me about procedures. I do not know whether he's a lawyer or not, but if he is not a lawyer, perhaps I can help him to understand the Companies Act 1965."

The Companies Act requirement for financial accounts and annual returns to be submitted annually is understood by all in Malaysia and do not require any "lessons" from the Minister.  These offences are clear breached of Section 169A of the Companies Act, which carries the penalty 5 years in prison and/or RM30,000.

What justifies the motion I had submitted is the damning findings by the recently released Auditor General's Report where the CCM has failed to prosecute directors which have been fined millions of ringgit.  In addition, the prosecution rate was only only 1.5 percent or RM8.59 million worth in compound fines, out of a total of RM554.94 million worth of uncollected compounds in Kuala Lumpur.

The Auditor General also listed an example where  a director who registered a whopping 683 companies and chalked up 135 compounds for a total of RM640,000 in fines without any further actions was taken.

In four other similar cases, the company directors had between 85 and 135 compound fines issued against them, amounting to between RM640,000 and RM490,000 in fines.  Despite the huge sum of compound fines due, the report said, these directors were still actively registering new companies, and without any hurdle.

Hence there is absolutely no necessity to meet the Minister, although I will be more than happy to meet him if he makes the request.  All the Minister needs to do really is to charge and prosecute all companies, including all the cited Umno-linked companies without fear or favour.

Otherwise, Datuk Ismail Sabri has clearly abused his powers to selectively prosecute Suara Inisiatif Sdn Bhd (Suaram) to serve Barisan Nasional's political agenda.  Under such circumstances, a motion to deduct RM10 from the Minister's pay is certainly more than justified.

Mindef - Incorrigible Culprit in Auditor General's Report

Posted: 18 Oct 2012 10:11 AM PDT


The Minister of Defence must be answerable for the incorrigible and repeated breaches discovered by the Auditor-General on an annual basis

It no longer comes as a surprise that the Ministry of Defence is one of the biggest culprits found by the annual Auditor General Report for bad governance in its procurement and projects resulting in billions, if not billions of ringgit of losses to the Malaysian Government.

For consecutive years, the Auditor-General has discovered inexcusable practices of incompetency, mismanagement and possibly collusion or corruption with unscrupulous suppliers and contractors.  They have included maggots and expired food served to our army,

In the report for 2010 for example, the Auditor-General found that the maintenance contracts for the aged AGSVs did not have the necessary expertise to repair the vehicles and late penalties were not meted out to these contractors when they failed to repair the vehicles within the necessary time frame.

The Auditor-General had also criticised the "improper payments" of allowance to the Territorial Reserve Army personnel who according to the records, did not attend the relevant training. He had even recommended that the relevant officers be punished via "surcharge" as permitted under Section 18(b) of the Akta Tatacara Kewangan 1957.

Similarly in 2009, one of the biggest scandal exposed was the construction of a new RM256 million Skudai 7th Brigade Army Camp which was awarded in 1997 but has only achieved 18.3% completion.  This was despite the fact that the contractor, Kausar Corporation has collected their construction fees in full via a land swap deal where the company was already given the ownership of a 153 hectares piece of land.

Kausar was able to pledge this piece of land to a bank for the amount of RM465 million showing that the land which could be worth as much as RM800 million, which is well above the cost of construction of the camp.  Despite the above, to date no action to date has been taken against the developer, including terminating the contract, charging late penalties or reclaiming the land which has been awarded to them.

In the latest Auditor-General Report, the Ministry of Defence has among the transgressions cited, awarded 12 contracts to build living quarters for married military personnel has not only incurred a cost overrun of 84%.  Instead of costing RM1.74 billion, the Ministry paid RM3.21 billion, despite the delivery of shoddy units.  The most glaring aspect of the above lapse, is the fact that only 1 of the 12 contracts was awarded via open tender.

All these offenses are on top of the multi-billion ringgit scandals which have been exposed to date, including the "commissions" paid for the acquisition of Scorpene submarines amounting to more than RM600 million, the increase in the cost of acquiring 6 naval patrol vessels from RM6 billion to RM9 billion or the purchase of 257 armoured personnel vehicles for RM7.55 billion from DRB-Hicom when the latter procured these units, less certain accessories and system software from a Turkish defence company for only RM1.7 billion.

The was also the questionable deal involving the acquisition of 12 "customised" Eurocopters for RM2.3 billion or RM192 million each, when Brazil was able to procure the same helicopter, presumably "uncustomised", for only RM82 million each.  Even the Johor Sultan has chipped in with the criticism that the Ministry of Defence has acquired four Rapid Intervention Vehicles (RIV) for RM2.76mil or RM690,000 each by the Ministry of Defence despite the fact that the Sultan was able to procure a better vehicle for only RM150,000.
Despite the above, the Defence Minister, Datuk Seri Ahmad Zahid Hamidi was only concerned that "the opposition's action aimed at gaining public support for their own political interest could undermine the image of Malaysia's defence among the international community," as reported in the media on 14 October.

The Minister has expressed regret over the opposition using the issue for "political expediency as the general election is approaching, without considering the implications."

The Minister of Defence must not attempt to sweep all the multi-billion ringgit scandals under his watch under the carpet by citing the fear that it will "undermine the image of Malaysia's defence" or question "the capability of our armed forces".

In fact, what we have harped on continuously over these scandals are specifically to raise the capability of our armed forces to ensure that they are better trained and equipped to secure our borders.  Had the above procurements be conducted with billions of ringgit of savings via open and transparent processes, without wastages, mismanagement and astronomical profits for the suppliers, the same billions of ringgit could have been utilised to acquire even more defence equipment for the army, navy and air force.

Given the flagrant breaches in the Ministry of Defence, we repeat our call to the Ministry of Defence to set up a Parliamentary Oversight Committee into Defence Procurement to ensure that our defence personnel will not be shortchanged and to ensure that every sen of our tax-payers' monies are properly spent.  We call upon the Minister to keep his promise to "consider" the above proposal at our meeting held in January this year.

Pay Cut Motion for Minister of Domestic Trade

Posted: 17 Oct 2012 10:13 AM PDT


I have filed today a motion to deduct the remuneration of Minister of Domestic Trade, Cooperatives and Consumerism by RM10.

As highlighted in my earlier press statements, the Minister Datuk Ismail Sabri has abused his powers to selectively prosecute Suara Inisiatif Sdn Bhd (Suaram) to serve Barisan Nasional's political agenda.  The Minister has used the Companies Comission of Malaysia (CCM) to go on a fishing trip to "investigate" an unsubstantiated "misleading accounts" allegation.

On the other hand he has failed to take any against the list of 5 Umno-linked companies we have cited which clearly failed to submit their financial accounts on a timely manner, some since 2007.  The companies and their directors, including Umno Members of Parliament, Khairy Jamaluddin and Abdul Rahman Dahlan, are listed below.  We are convinced that there are perhaps hundreds of other companies which have blatantly flouted the Companies Act 1965 with little or no action taken by CCM.

In fact, the decision to file the above motion is further justified by the findings of the Auditor-General Report which highlighted that the CCM failed to go after directors who owed more than half a million ringgit in compound fines.

An example listed in the report is that of a director who registered a whopping 683 companies and chalked up 135 compounds for a total of RM640,000 in fines, but no action was taken.

The report also listed out four other similar cases where company directors had between 85 and 135 compound fines issued against them, amounting to between RM640,000 and RM490,000 in fines.

Despite the huge sum of compound fines due, the report said, these directors were still actively registering new companies, and without any hurdle.

The irony of the Suaram persecution is the criticism by the Auditor-General that the numbers of cases referred to the prosecution department of CCM were very low.  The cases referred by the KL branch for prosecution came to only 1.5 percent or RM8.59 million worth in compound fines, out of a total of RM554.94 million worth of uncollected compounds.

The Minister must hence answer in Parliament to the sheer lack of competence in the administration of Companies Commission of Malaysia.  Datuk Ismail Sabri must answer to Malaysians why the Umno-linked companies have never been prosecuted by the authorities despite blatant breaches of the law, and yet the Government is seeking to persecute Suaram with highly dubious and unsubstantiated allegations of "misleading accounts".
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