Najib New Cow

Kuching
Sunday, 12th September 2010


Raja Petra Kamarudin

(Malaysia Today) - Tan Kay Hock is the low-profile controlling shareholder of Johan Holdings Berhad, a public-listed investment holding company. He is also the golf buddy of Najib Tun Razak and this relationship has made him hundreds of millions. Kay Hock recently caused ripples in China when he asked the Chinese for RM500 million and told them that RM200 million is for Najib’s family.

How playing golf with the Prime Minister can earn you billions

For about ten years and over three Prime Ministers, the current Prime Minister included, the contract for the double-tracking electric train from Gemas to Johor Bahru has been ding-donging. Despite what was agreed between the leaders of China and the three Prime Ministers, which was later confirmed by the issuance of a Letter of Intent to China Railways Engineering Corporation (CREC), the government is again backtracking.
Najib now wants to award the contract to China Harbour Engineering Co. Ltd. (CHEC) instead, the company that is building the Second Penang Bridge -- which shot up from RM1 billion to RM4.5 billion and now to RM22 billion (read more on the matter below).

The man behind this is Tan Kay Hock, Najib’s golf buddy. He is brokering the deal on behalf of CHEC.
The Chinese say that Tan Kay Hock is demanding RM500 million from CHEC and he told them that RM200 million is for Najib's family. And this is making the Chinese very unhappy because, in China, both the givers as well the receivers of bribes will be sentenced to death with a bullet in the head plus the cost of the bullet is charged to the family of the deceased.

When the Chinese government offered the Malaysian government a loan to construct the Gemas to JB railway they indicated that CREC should be the contractor. CREC is one of the biggest specialist contractors for electric trains while CHEC has not constructed even one kilometer of electric railway (more details below).
A Letter of Intent had already been awarded to CREC. Now the government wants to cancel this Letter of Intent and issue a new Letter of Intent to CHEC. But for the new Letter of Intent to be issued to CHEC they must fork out RM500 million, which Kay Hock claims RM200 million will be paid to the Prime Minister of Malaysia’s family.

This is not only a violation of the terms of the loan from China but CREC is the company with the experience in constructing electric railways, not CHEC, the company already involved in the construction of the Second Penang Bridge. Added to the withdrawal or cancellation of the Letter of Intent to CREC and a new one issued to CHEC, with a RM500 million ‘price tag’ attached, it puts the Chinese government in a dicey spot when the risk would be a bullet in the head for those who approve the payment.

The Chinese are wondering whether it is worth the risk to pay Kay Hock the RM500 million he is demanding. If the Letter of Intent to CREC can be withdrawn after issuing it, what guarantee is there that the new Letter of Intent to CHEC will also not be withdrawn after they pay the RM500 million?

The Chinese are very aware that Vincent Tan also received a Letter of Approval for his gaming licence, signed by the Deputy Minister of Finance. However, after he paid RM170 million ‘under the table’, Najib denied in Parliament that Vincent Tan had been given a gaming licence and subsequently the Letter of Approval was withdrawn.

KTM is being used as Najib’s new cash cow. The EMU coach was a deal involving Rosmah Mansor (Najib’s wife), Mumtaz Jaafar (Saiful Bukhari Azlan’s ‘godmother’) and Cindy (Desmond Lim's wife). Desmond, in fact, handled the deal where KTM coughed out RM1.4 Billion for coaches that cannot function. According to KTM, the coaches are not even worth RM300 million.

The saga gets more interesting with Najib and Rosmah holidaying in Monaco as guests of Jho Low -- who told everyone that the yacht belongs to the Prince of Qatar. It was later revealed that Jho Low rented the yacht for Euro 90,000 per day to allow Najib and Rosmah to rub shoulders with Hollywood Starlets.

That brings us to a very crucial question. Where did Jho Low get that kind of money? Well, you see, after Malaysia Today exposed Deepak Jaikishan -- Rosmah’s carpetman cum bagman cum toyboy -- she was forced to dump him. So now Jho Low is Rosmah’s new Mister Fixit and Collector of Commissions.
Let us see how the CHEC-Tan Kay Hock saga is played out. Now that the Chinese government knows that we know about the RM500 million deal would they dare still proceed with it? And does Tun Dr Mahathir Mahathir know that Najib has hijacked his pet electric train project?

Mr Tan is said to be a golf buddy of Prime Minister Najib Tun Razak
He is the low-profile controlling shareholder of Johan Holdings, a public-listed investment holding company, and said to be a golf buddy of Najib Tun Razak.

The Financial Times had reported that Tan Sri Tan, 61, was the owner of the 607ha Guiana Island, which is now at the centre of a fraud case brought by the United States authorities against Texan billionaire businessman Allen Stanford. -- The Straits Times (Singapore)

Read: The crooked faces of Najib Altantuya’s Cronies and their Related Companies (http://ckcounterpunch.wordpress.com/2009/04/04/the-faces-of-najib-altantuya-cronies-and-their-related-companies/)

CREC is the third largest civil construction enterprise in the world, and the Asian and Chinese largest railway, road and tunnel construction contractor. It has a leading position in China's construction market, and participates in many large-scale infrastructure projects overseas (especially in countries in the Southeast Asia and Africa). Fortune magazine in the United States reported that CREC ranked 342 in the 500 world's largest enterprises in 2007.

CREC consists of 31 member enterprises including:

- 16 super-large construction enterprises

* China National Overseas Engineering Corporation

* China Railway Resources Co., Ltd.

* China Railway First Group Corporation

* China Railway Erju Group Corporation (China Railway Second Group Corporation)

* Third Engineering Group Co. Ltd

* China Tiesiju Civil Engineering Group Co. Ltd (China Fourth Group Civil Engineering Group Co. Ltd)

* China Railway Wuju Group Corporation (China Railway Fifth Group Corporation)

* China Railway Sixth Group Co. Ltd

* China Railway Seventh Group Co. Ltd

* China Railway Eighth Civil Engineering Group Corporation

* China Railway No. 9 Group Co. Ltd

* China Railway No. 10 Group Corporation

* China Zhongtie Major Bridge Engineering Group Co. Ltd (China Railway Major Bridge Engineering Group Co. Ltd)

* China Railway Tunnel Group

* China Railway Electrification Bureau Co. Ltd

* China Railway Construction Engineering Group

- 3 large or super large surveying and designing enterprises

* Second Survey and Design Institute of China Railway

* China Railway Engineering Consultants Group

* China Major Bridge Survey and Design Institute

- 3 large R&D enterprises

* Northwest Research Institute

* Southwest Research Institute of CREC

* Engineering Machinery Research and Design Institute

- 5 large manufacturing enterprises

* China Railway Shanhaiguan Bridge Group Co. Ltd

* China Railway Turnout Bridge Inc.

* China Railway Bus. Co. Ltd.

* Wuhan Engineering Machinery Works of CREC

* Hengping Trust and Investment Co. Ltd.

Mupok Aku

AGI IDUP AGI NGELABAN

Submarine Deal Resurfaced in France - PM Najib Risk of Being Prosecuted in France

Asia Sentinel
Friday, 16th April 2010

The Submarine that cannot swim....

Murky arms deal linked to international pattern of kickbacks

A potentially explosive scandal in Malaysia over the billion-dollar purchase of French submarines, a deal engineered by then-Defense Minister Najib Tun Razak, has broken out of the domestic arena with the filing of a request to investigate bribery and kickbacks from the deal in a Paris court.

Although the case has been contained for eight years in the cozy confines of Malaysia's courts and parliament, which are dominated by the ruling National Coalition, French lawyers William Bourdon, Renaud Semerdjian and Joseph Breham put an end to that when they filed it with Parisian prosecutors on behalf of the Malaysian human rights organization Suaram, which supports good-government causes.

Judges in the Paris Prosecution Office have been probing a wide range of corruption charges involving similar submarine sales and the possibility of bribery and kickbacks to top officials in France, Pakistan and other countries. The Malaysian piece of the puzzle was added in two filings, on Dec. 4, 2009 and Feb. 23 this year.

For two years, Parisian prosecutors, led by investigating judges Francoise Besset and Jean-Christophe Hullin, have been gingerly investigating allegations involving senior French political figures and the sales of submarines and other weaponry to governments all over the world. French news reports have said the prosecutors have backed away from some of the most serious charges out of concern for the political fallout.

The allegations relate to one of France's biggest defense conglomerates, the state-owned shipbuilder DCN, which merged with the French electronics company Thales in 2005 to become a dominant force in the European defense industry. DCN's subsidiary Armaris is the manufacturer of Scorpene-class diesel submarines sold to India, Pakistan and Malaysia among other countries. All of the contracts, according to the lawyers acting for Suaram, a Malaysian human rights NGO, are said to be suspect.

With Najib having moved on from the defense portfolio he held when the deal was put together in 2002 to become prime minister and head of the country's largest political party, the mess has the potential to become a major liability for the government and the United Malays National Organisation. Given the power of UMNO, it is unlikely the scandal would ever get any airing in a Malaysian court, which is presumably why Suaram reached out to French prosecutors.

"The filings are very recent and have so far prompted a preliminary police inquiry on the financial aspects of the deal," said a Paris-based source familiar with France's defense establishment. "There isn't a formal investigation yet. The investigation will most likely use documents seized at DCN in the course of another investigation, focusing on bribes paid by DCN in Pakistan."

The source said police have confined their inquiry to bribery allegations so far and have not looked into the 2006 murder of a Mongolian woman in Malaysia who was a translator on the deal for Najib and his friend, Abdul Razak Baginda, during a visit to Paris.

There have been numerous deaths involving DCN defense sales in Taiwan and Pakistan. Prosecutors are suspicious that 11 French submarine engineers who were murdered in a 2002 bomb blast in Karachi – first thought to have been the work of Al Qaeda – were actually killed in retaliation for the fact that the French had reneged on millions of dollars in kickbacks to Pakistani military officers.

The Malaysian allegations revolve around the payment of €114 million to a Malaysia-based company called Perimekar, for support services surrounding the sale of the submarines. Perimekar was wholly owned by another company, KS Ombak Laut Sdn Bhd, which in turn was controlled by Najib's best friend, Razak Baginda, whose wife Mazalinda, a lawyer and former magistrate, was the principal shareholder, according to the French lawyers.

"Over the past years, serious cases have been investigated in France by judges involving DCN," lawyer Renaud Semerdjian told Asia Sentinel in a telephone interview. "This is not the first case of this kind that is being investigated. There are others in Pakistan and there are some issues about India. To a certain extent, every time weapons of any kind have been provided, suspicion of violation of the law may be very high."

As defense minister from 2000 to 2008, Najib commissioned a huge military buildup to upgrade Malaysia's armed forces, including two submarines from Armaris and the lease of a third, a retired French Navy Agosta-class boat. There were also Sukhoi supersonic fighter jets from Russia and millions of dollars spent on coastal patrol boats. All have come under suspicion by opposition leaders in Malaysia's parliament but UMNO has stifled any investigation. Asked personally about the cases, Najib has responded angrily and refused to reply.

Despite efforts to bury it, the case achieved considerably notoriety after the murder of Altantuya Shaariibuu, a 28-year-old Mongolian translator and Razak Baginda's jilted lover, who participated in negotiations over the purchase of the submarines. By her own admission in a letter found after her death, she was attempting to blackmail Razak Baginda for US$500,000.

She was shot in October 2006 and her body was blown up with military explosives by two bodyguards attached to Najib's office after Razak Baginda went to Najib's chief of staff, Musa Safri, for help in keeping her away from him. Not long after being acquitted in November 2008 under questionable circumstances of participating in her murder, Razak Baginda left the country for England. The bodyguards were convicted but no motive was ever established for their actions despite a confession by one which was not allowed in court, but which said they would be paid a large sum of money to get rid of her.

The submarine deal was never brought up in court during a months-long murder trial that was marked by prosecutors, defense attorneys and the judge working studiously to keep Najib's name out of the proceedings. A private detective hired by Razak Baginda to protect him from the furious Altantuya filed a statutory declaration after the trial indicating that Najib had actually been the victim's lover and had passed her on to Razak Baginda.

The detective, P. Balasubramaniam, said later that he was unceremoniously run out of Kuala Lumpur. He eventually emerged from hiding in India to say he had been offered RM5 million (US$1.57 million) by a businessman close to Najib's wife to shut up and get out of town. He also said he had met Nazim Razak, Najib's younger brother, and was told to recant his testimony.

In the current complaint in Paris, the issue revolves around what, if anything, Razak Baginda's Perimekar company did to deserve €114 million. Zainal Abidin, the deputy defense minister at the time of the sale, told parliament that Perimekar had received the amount – 11 percent of the sale price of the submarines – for "coordination and support services." The Paris filing alleges that there were neither support nor services.

Perimekar was registered in 2001, a few months before the signing of the contracts for the sale, the Paris complaint states. The company, it said flatly, "did not have the financial resources to complete the contract." A review of the accounts in 2001 and 2002, the complaint said, "makes it an obvious fact that this corporation had absolutely no capacity, or legal means or financial ability and/or expertise to support such a contract."

"None of the directors and shareholders of Perimekar have the slightest experience in the construction, maintenance or submarine logistics," the complaint adds. "Under the terms of the contract, €114 million were related to the different stages of construction of the submarines." The apparent consideration, supposedly on the part of Perimekar, "would be per diem and Malaysian crews and accommodation costs during their training. There is therefore no link between billing steps and stages of completion of the consideration."

As Asia Sentinel reported on April 1, services for the subs are being performed by a well-connected firm called Boustead DCNS, a joint venture between BHIC Defence Technologies Sdn Bhd, a subsidiary of publicly-listed Boustead Heavy Industries Corp Bhd, and DCNS SA, a subsidiary of DCN. Boustead's Heavy Industries Division now includes Perimekar as an "associate of the Group. PSB is involved in the marketing, upgrading, maintenance and related services for the Malaysian maritime defence industry," according to Boustead's annual report.

Originally Boustead told the Malaysian Stock Exchange that the service contract was for RM600 million (US$184.1 million) for six years, or US$30.68 million annually. However, the contract later ballooned to RM270 million per year. Boustead Holdings is partly owned by the government and has close connections with UMNO.

"There are good grounds to believe that [Perimekar] was created with a single objective: arrange payment of the commission and allocate the amount between different beneficiaries including Malaysian public officials and or Malaysian or foreign intermediaries," the complaint states.

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