On March 7, Datuk S. Subramaniam and two other MIC leaders won the injunction to stop Samy Vellu, who is Maju Institute of Educational Development (MIED) chairman, from going ahead with a meeting that would have expanded the number of MIED members.
Today, Judge Datuk Mohd Ariff extended the injunction date after fixing March 16 to hear the submissions to disqualify legal firm Kumar and Partnership from representing Samy Vellu, after it was claimed it had access to confidential documents and would face a conflict of interest.
The judge had given an ad interim injunction until March 4, to stop the admissions of new members until the application is fully expounded today.
Besides Subramaniam, former MIC Youth chief A. Vigneswaran and former Kedah state assemblyman Datuk S. Ganesan, who is also a central working committee member, were among those who applied for the injunction.
Samy Vellu’s critics — led by the former MIC deputy president and also those aligned with current party president Datuk G. Palanivel — have accused him of seeking to hijack the MIED, an allegation which the former MIC president has vehemently denied.
His critics further claimed that he was planning to appoint his supporters to the MIED in the now-barred expansion.
Leaders within MIC, including veteran party and MIED members, have openly criticised the alleged plan by Samy Vellu to increase the number of MIED members by at least 10, which could see MIC’s ownership and control dissipate.
In the lawyers’ application, they claimed that Samy Vellu, the second respondent, had planned to increase the number of members to MIED because with the current number of members, he will not get 75 per cent of members’ support to be elected as the chairman to the board.
Samy Vellu, Palanivel, Tan Sri M. Mahalingam, Marimuthu, Tan Sri Dr SK Ampikaipakam, Tan Sri Dr K.S. Nijhar, Tan Sri K. Kumaran and Tan Sri G. Vadiveloo are all currently facing a lawsuit by MIED, which was initiated by Vigneswaran.
Mahalingam and Kumaran are no longer members of the board.
In the suit filed on July 5, MIED claimed that all the defendants had breached their fiduciary and statutory duties, and failed to discharge their responsibilities as trustees and auditors, which caused MIED to suffer huge losses.
It was also seeking an injunction to restrain Samy Vellu from continuing to helm the institute, that he be stripped of his membership in MIED and for him to return all monies or profits made from MIED either by himself or through family members and close friends.
MIED was also seeking a court order to make Samy Vellu compensate for all the financial losses incurred by the institute during his tenure as its chairman as well as damages amounting to RM100 million.
MIED, with assets of about RM1 billion, has been chaired by Samy Vellu since it was established in 1984.
It currently has 34 members who have the power to elect the chairman of the 10-man board of trustees.
MIED is scheduled to hold its annual general meeting in the middle of this year, the first since Palanivel became MIC president last December. - Malaysian Insider
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