The Malaysian Insight

PUTRAJAYA should come clean whether they had used public funds to help troubled state investor 1Malaysia Development Berhad (1MDB) settle its debts, DAP lawmaker Tony Pua said today.

The Petaling Jaya Utara MP trained his guns at Finance Minister II Johari Abdul Ghani and said he should not “bluff” as there was enough evidence to show that the government, through the Finance Ministry (MoF), had used public funds to settle 1MDB debts in the past.

“Among the clear cut examples are the RM800 million loan from Socso and another RM2.4 billion through the Bandar Malaysia sukuk bond which the MoF have assumed as a result of taking over TRX City Sdn Bhd and Bandar Malaysia Sdn Bhd,” he said.

Pua said MoF has effectively “settled” 1MDB’s RM 3.2 billion debt when it agreed to take over the property projects and assumed the liabilities, as a report by the Auditor-General showed that nearly all of the proceeds of the 1MDB borrowings were never used for the development of the two property projects above.

Another example was fallout of the 60% stake sale in Bandar Malaysia to an Iskandar Waterfront Holdings (IWH) Sdn Bhd led consortium.

He said 1MDB had collected a deposit of RM741 million which was paid upon the signing of the sale and purchase agreement in 2015 but when MoF terminated the sale due to IWH defaulting in the payment, RM741 million was refunded to IWH.

The refund was made by MoF and not 1MDB.

“So his statement was full of lies and did not describe the real situation of 1MDB.

“The minister must think Malaysians are complete and utter idiots in his attempt to cover up the 1MDB scandal,” he said.

Bernama had yesterday quoted Johari as saying that MoF had never given public funds to 1MDB to help settle its debt.

He said he would not know if 1MDB would seek help from the MoF if it was to run into problems in the future.

“But so far they have not come and ask for help. In the future, it will be a different story,” he told Bernama when commenting on a rumour that public funds were being used to resolve 1MDB’s debt.

Pua questioned if Putrajaya will once again step in to help 1MDB settle the outstanding loan with International Petroleum Investment Co (IPIC), after the state investor defaulted in its first payment.

“Government will have to pay as IPIC will go after the guarantor if 1MDB does not pay up,” said Pua.

1MDB has previously written to IPIC to inform the Abu Dhabi-based company that the payment, amounting to US$603 million (about RM2.6 billion), which was originally due on July 31,  2017, will be paid in August 2017 instead.

It was reported yesterday that 1MDB has until August 12 to pay half of the US$603 million debt.

This was the condition for extending the full payment deadline from July 31 to August 31, IPIC said in a short statement to the London Stock Exchange yesterday. – August 9, 2017.