The Menara Kuala Lumpur Scandal

GLCs are havens of corruption

In the month before the general election when the government was turning into caretaker mode, a profitable public asset, the KL Tower was stripped from public ownership and discretely sold off to private interests.

According to a Twitter account FreeMalaysian, dedicated to highlighting corruption, in the month before the general election, the KL Tower concession was quietly sold off to a company about to be struck off the Registrar of Companies (ROC), Hydroshoppe Sdn. Bhd.

KL Tower is a government asset of Telekom Malaysia Bhd, a government owned company or GLC holding a concession to the tower and the rights to commercial activities therein. KL Tower operations achieved RM66 million per annum before the pandemic, where RM 25 million net profit was achieved. With the pandemic effectively over, those sort of revenue and profit figures are achievable once again.

Ten million shares of Menara KL Sdn Bhd, the concession operating company for Telekom Malaysia Bhd, were sold to Abdul Hamid Shaikh Abdul Razak Shaikh and Nazarina Binti Mohamed Nasir. These two people are the directors of Hydroshoppe Sdn Bhd in a transaction dated 31st October 2022.

Former minister of communications and multimedia, Annuar Musa, who was also sacked last month by UMNO, was the minister at the time this transaction took place. Annuar claims he had nothing to do with the sell off of this public asset into private hands. Annuar further added that Telekom Malaysia Bhd is a public company and not under his authority.

This transaction selling off public assets to private citizens raises a number of questions.

Why would a public asset be sold off without any announcement just before a general election when the executive government was entering caretaker mode?

Why had Telekom Malaysia Bhd made no public announcement?

Why is Telekom Malaysia Bhd selling off a profitable asset?

This on the face of it appears to be a clandestine sale of public assets to cronies before the election. The Telekom Malaysia Bhd integrity officer who was also an officer of the Malaysian Anti-Corruption Commission (MACC), Abdul Razak Deroaf is totally silent on the issue, that should have raised ‘red flags’.

The nominee directors of Menara Kuala Lumpur Sdn Bhd, the concessionaire company, Tengku Muneer Bin Tengku Muzani and Razidan Bin Ghazali indicates that senior management of Telekom Malaysia Bhd were fully aware of the transaction and the implications. Tengku Muneer is Telekom Malaysia’s chief strategy officer, while Razidan is the group chief financial officer.

This is a scandal of the highest order, which shows that cronyism and corruption is rife within GLCs. This is only one case the public has been alerted to. GLCs are havens of corruption.

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