Damning
revelation of bankrupts at the mercy of Little Emperors?
BELOW is a comment from a
Malaysia Chronicle reader on the plight of bankrupts posted in response to the story reproduced.
Judge for yourself the accuracy of
the comments. Perhaps someone with experience and knowledge about discharging
bankrupts can do the honours to enlighten Malaysians of the truth by writing to Malaysia Chronicle?
Monday, 08 April 2013 14:11
First
Dr M, then Muhyddin, now Ghani: Umno goes after Malay ancestral & reserve
land BIG TIME
Written by Chua Jui Meng
THE New Economic Policy (NEP), which was
meant to lift the Malays from the clutches of poverty in 20 years (from 1971 to
1990), was hijacked by Umno to enrich their families and cronies.It has until today sapped dry the bulk of the wealth of corporates owned by non-Malays.
With really nothing much left to grab, Umno is now going after Malay ancestral and reserve lands big time.
The most rampant of land grabs are happening in south of Johor due to Singaporeans’ thirst for property.
Tens of thousands of land owners, the majority of whom are Malays, have been compensated with peanuts and evicted.
Dr M the originator
Malaysians have former Prime Minister Mahathir Mohamad to thank for creating the opportunity for greedy Umno chieftains to “legally seize” whatever land they want in the name of development.
It was Mahathir who, in 1991 used Barisan Nasional (BN)’s brute majority in Parliament to pass by 99 to 25 votes the Land Acquisition Amendment Bill.
The amendments basically gave incontestable power to state governments to seize private land for development by private companies and individuals.
Lands originally acquired for public purposes can also be used for private development.
Before the amendments, land could only be acquired for public purposes or for public utilities like building of roads, schools, hospitals, pipelines, water or power plants, etc.
Muhyiddin, the BIGGEST!
The amendments triggered the start of land grabs in Johor in 1992, with then Mentri Besar, now Deputy Prime Minister, Muhyiddin Yassin seizing 32,000 acres in Johor.
Muhyiddin’s most widely publicised land grab attempt was the acquisition of 6,600 acres in Tebrau through the Johor State Islamic Economic Development Corporation.
Stamford Holdings Sdn Bhd then sued Muhyiddin Yassin, businessmen Yahya Talib and Syed Mokhtar Albukhary, for damages for alleged conspiracy to acquire land with the use of the Act.
The land acquisition civil suit was settled out of court for a total of RM405 million in 1999.
Today, the land grabs in Johor are carried out by Mentri Besar Ghani Othman through his most trusted crony, Tan Sri Dato’ Lim Kang Hoo (LKH), and links with Danga Bay and Kumpulan Prasarana Rakyat Johor (KPRJ). Ghani is KPRJ chairman.
Ghani and his state government are now using the Act to mop up as much land as possible from the majority Malays.
Peanuts and Ghani
The Malay land owners are paid “peanuts” for their land which are then alienated by KPRJ to crony property developers to reap billions of ringgit in profits.
Thousands of majority Malay land owners were and are being evicted to make way for greedy Umno cronies.
LKH’s friendship with Ghani and foray into KPRJ started in 1997 with LKH buying a 25% stake (RM61.2 million) in PLS Bhd – RM15 million in cash and RM46.2 million in debts.
LKH’s buying into PLS is controversial because KPRJ failed to pull out when the share fell from RM12 to RM2.
KPRJ also failed to review the buying price or the terms of agreement before the sale.
Instead, the KPRJ’s went ahead to buy into PLS without any discount.
In 1999, KPRJ sold its Danga Bay land to LKH who was seen as a White Knight for settling KPRJ’s outstanding bank loans.
LKH then seized the opportunity to squeeze more land from KPRJ, with the reason that it had to service KPRJ’s loan interests.
In Round 1A in 2001, KPRJ then sold Danga A (214 acres) and Danga B (135 acres) for only RM200 million to Danga Bay Sdn Bhd when the market price was RM1 billion!
Danga C (524 acres) was also sold Danga Bay Sdn Bhd for RM27 million.
Also in this round of rip-off, Danga D1 (192 acres) and Danga D2 (84 acres) were sold to Swan Atlantic Sdn Bhd and Straits Bay Sdn Bhd for RM7.5 million and RM5.5 million respectively.
In Round 1B, Johor government’s land was sold via privatisation to Danga Bay Sdn Bhd.
Danga E (Lagun Puteri and Pantai Lido) totalling 154 acres were sold at RM128 million when the current market value of the land was RM500 million.
In Round 2 of the rip-off in 2005, six parcels of land (Skudai Kiri, D5, LKIM, Promenade Optima Bistari, D4 and PTB21181/2/3) totalling 485 acres were sold to Danga Bay Sdn Bhd for a measly RM150 million.
Danga Bay Sdn Bhd’s new name is Iskandar Waterfront Development Sdn Bhd. Its original name is Abad Ehsan Sdn Bhd.
A corporate restructuring exercise in early 2012 involving a takeover of Tebrau Teguh Bhd, Iskandar Waterfront Holdings (IWH) is now 60% owned by LKH’s Credence Resources Sdn Bhd and the remaining 40% is held by KPRJ, the Johor state investment agency.
IWH’s latest development was the sale of 55 acres of Iskandar’s Danga Bay to China’s Country Garden (Holdings) Ltd for a whopping RM900 million last December.
According to IWH executive vice-chairman LKH, Country Garden plans to develop a marina and marina club, hotel, serviced apartments, offices and commercial development that will have a gross development value of RM10 billion to RM18 billion.
Have Johoreans benefited?
Johoreans, especially the Malays, need only see what is happening to their former land in Danga Bay, Desaru, Iskandar, Nusajaya and Tebrau, to name a few, to realise how much they have been short-changed for their ancestral land.
Country Garden joins several other developers such as Dijaya Corp Bhd, Brunsfield Group, Australia’s Walker Group, Singapore’s Azea Residences and Umno’s UEM as the few getting a share of Ghani’s gravy train.
In the making is Pengerang where the non-sustainable Petronas Refinery and Petrochemical Integrated Development (Rapid) project is to be located.
Rapid needs only about 6,000 acres but Ghani is using the Act to acquire 22,500 acres!
If Ghani is allowed to continue with Rapid, thousands of villagers, the majority of who are Malays, will be forced out of their land after getting peanuts as compensation.
Schools, mosques and surau, hospitals and clinics, cemeteries century old villages will all be uprooted for property development.
This has been BN-Umno’s land grab modus operandi since 1992.
More misery and land grabs are expected to be launched by greedy Umno cronies if the rakyat, especially Johoreans, continue to give their mandate to BN-Umno to govern.
http://chuajuimeng123.blogspot.com/
Monday, 08 April 2013 15:44 posted
by Sharlz
7 April 2013.
Worldwide today, in the last 15 years, starting from the Asian Economic crisis, many nations have faced melt downs in their financial standing. World ranked banks and insurance companies and mega giant multinationals have faced similar challenges.
Many survived, thanks to the benevolent mentality of the nation’s governance and the wisdom of the populace, who realized that misfortune can strike any country, any institution or any single individual. They are the wise beings who realize that rehabilitation, and not punitive retribution is the contemporary means to resolve issues,
In Malaysia, it’s quite different. The people have great piety to their faiths, generous in rising to good causes and are often gentle in nature. However, they are either not aware or shun away from the brutality being inflicted by lending institutions and the Department of Inland Revenue... Perhaps this could due to prejudice, erroneous perspectives, or just plain callousness.
In Malaysia, as at today, a quarter million persons have been made bankrupt and their dependants are suffering. This number is growing at the rate of 16,000 persons annually - details from http://BrutalityMalaysia.blogspot.com.
I am sure all will agree that an accident, medical failure, loss of employment or a business crash can incapacitate, create insolvency, and there on bankruptcy – all within a year. Thus, please realize that bankrupted persons are not corrupt rogues, white collar criminals, loan sharks or drug dealers. Near most all bankrupts are just ordinary persons coiled in hard times. They are not pariahs, for uncaring hardcore elements to spew their arrogance or contempt
Bankruptcy in Malaysia is a life sentence, because a “discharge is not automatic” even after the legislated 5 years. This situation has created a syndicate of specialized crooks within the department of the Office of the Prime Minister. This department is the Official Assignee’s Office - the department that “manages” bankruptcies in Malaysia. These rogues in this syndicate involve certain lawyers, bank managers and court officials. They demand and extort RM10, 000 to RM20, 000 for a discharge.
The Director General of the Official Assignee’s Office has been vested complete power to discharge bankrupts after the legislated 5 year period. It is being widely felt that he has chosen to focus this power to benefit only Malays and members of the senior ruling coalition, (UMNO) members. Currently a 10 year period or death is the norm.
The excuse for this situation is that the non Malays, have not switched to the legally mandatory identification device, (MyKad) and that “they cannot be traced”. These lucky ones are then discharged unconditionally. This was been confirmed by their acting Director in a press report featured in http://BrutalityMalaysia.blogspot.com
A bankruptcy order comes from courts and involves lawyers and accountants from banks. Strangely enough, in this department, low ranking clerks in the Official Assignee’s Office have been assigned to manage these cases. They have no background in accountancy or law. Even worse, they are persons who cannot even understand the files they are claimed to be “managing, because of their poor or nonexistent command of English.
How then do these mono-lingual “officers” process the now nearly 266,000 current cases in their scope of works? This is a vital point because bank and other financial agreements are normally prepared in English. Even worse, many are racist, sadistic and lazy, and displays of contempt or arrogance to the blighted persons are not at all uncommon...
Visit http://BrutalityMalaysia.blogspot.com. and get the real picture. Know of Nazi-style financial governance by the staff of a wing in the Office of the Prime Minister, Malaysia. They currently choke 241,000 Malaysians and 750,000 dependents (tagging 3 dependents per case).
Finally, please do note that this statistic is increasing at 16,000 annually. The few and rare well meaning staff within the department view the salary they earn as “haram”. They do confess that another 100,000 cases that have been shoved under the carpet all these decades. With this vile situation prevailing, will there ever be closure for the blighted and the persecuted? Is this situation, created by a law enacted in 1957, never ending? Is it because the younger brother of the Prime Minister is the CEO of CIMB – a prime bank in the Malaysian economic scene?
It’s election time. Everyone is in frenzy for political reform. Will the person you elect care for you, or is it going to be another extension to the 57 years of bull crap.
Please do reflect on the wisdom of two great individuals - quoted below.
We hang petty thieves and appoint the great ones to public office – Aesop. Politicians are the same all over. They promise to build a bridge even where there is no river.-Nikita Khrushchev, Russian Soviet politician
I ask righteous people of all faiths - isn’t social reform to aid a fallen populace just as important?
Even violent criminals and murderers are set free after their sentence. Why not a bankrupt?
Thank You.
SHARLZ D
Worldwide today, in the last 15 years, starting from the Asian Economic crisis, many nations have faced melt downs in their financial standing. World ranked banks and insurance companies and mega giant multinationals have faced similar challenges.
Many survived, thanks to the benevolent mentality of the nation’s governance and the wisdom of the populace, who realized that misfortune can strike any country, any institution or any single individual. They are the wise beings who realize that rehabilitation, and not punitive retribution is the contemporary means to resolve issues,
In Malaysia, it’s quite different. The people have great piety to their faiths, generous in rising to good causes and are often gentle in nature. However, they are either not aware or shun away from the brutality being inflicted by lending institutions and the Department of Inland Revenue... Perhaps this could due to prejudice, erroneous perspectives, or just plain callousness.
In Malaysia, as at today, a quarter million persons have been made bankrupt and their dependants are suffering. This number is growing at the rate of 16,000 persons annually - details from http://BrutalityMalaysia.blogspot.com.
I am sure all will agree that an accident, medical failure, loss of employment or a business crash can incapacitate, create insolvency, and there on bankruptcy – all within a year. Thus, please realize that bankrupted persons are not corrupt rogues, white collar criminals, loan sharks or drug dealers. Near most all bankrupts are just ordinary persons coiled in hard times. They are not pariahs, for uncaring hardcore elements to spew their arrogance or contempt
Bankruptcy in Malaysia is a life sentence, because a “discharge is not automatic” even after the legislated 5 years. This situation has created a syndicate of specialized crooks within the department of the Office of the Prime Minister. This department is the Official Assignee’s Office - the department that “manages” bankruptcies in Malaysia. These rogues in this syndicate involve certain lawyers, bank managers and court officials. They demand and extort RM10, 000 to RM20, 000 for a discharge.
The Director General of the Official Assignee’s Office has been vested complete power to discharge bankrupts after the legislated 5 year period. It is being widely felt that he has chosen to focus this power to benefit only Malays and members of the senior ruling coalition, (UMNO) members. Currently a 10 year period or death is the norm.
The excuse for this situation is that the non Malays, have not switched to the legally mandatory identification device, (MyKad) and that “they cannot be traced”. These lucky ones are then discharged unconditionally. This was been confirmed by their acting Director in a press report featured in http://BrutalityMalaysia.blogspot.com
A bankruptcy order comes from courts and involves lawyers and accountants from banks. Strangely enough, in this department, low ranking clerks in the Official Assignee’s Office have been assigned to manage these cases. They have no background in accountancy or law. Even worse, they are persons who cannot even understand the files they are claimed to be “managing, because of their poor or nonexistent command of English.
How then do these mono-lingual “officers” process the now nearly 266,000 current cases in their scope of works? This is a vital point because bank and other financial agreements are normally prepared in English. Even worse, many are racist, sadistic and lazy, and displays of contempt or arrogance to the blighted persons are not at all uncommon...
Visit http://BrutalityMalaysia.blogspot.com. and get the real picture. Know of Nazi-style financial governance by the staff of a wing in the Office of the Prime Minister, Malaysia. They currently choke 241,000 Malaysians and 750,000 dependents (tagging 3 dependents per case).
Finally, please do note that this statistic is increasing at 16,000 annually. The few and rare well meaning staff within the department view the salary they earn as “haram”. They do confess that another 100,000 cases that have been shoved under the carpet all these decades. With this vile situation prevailing, will there ever be closure for the blighted and the persecuted? Is this situation, created by a law enacted in 1957, never ending? Is it because the younger brother of the Prime Minister is the CEO of CIMB – a prime bank in the Malaysian economic scene?
It’s election time. Everyone is in frenzy for political reform. Will the person you elect care for you, or is it going to be another extension to the 57 years of bull crap.
Please do reflect on the wisdom of two great individuals - quoted below.
We hang petty thieves and appoint the great ones to public office – Aesop. Politicians are the same all over. They promise to build a bridge even where there is no river.-Nikita Khrushchev, Russian Soviet politician
I ask righteous people of all faiths - isn’t social reform to aid a fallen populace just as important?
Even violent criminals and murderers are set free after their sentence. Why not a bankrupt?
Thank You.
SHARLZ D
