By Concerned KTM
CREC or China Railway Engineering Corporation as far as the Double Track project is concerned is represented by interests aligned with (tun) Daim Zainuddin. It is difficult to confirm this but Mr Cai, the long time Country Manager of CREC, has indicated this to several parties. CREC felt they were duped and are now trying to dissociate themselves from Daim and look for new partners both for the double track and also for other railway projects such as the MRT.
Tan Kay Hock, another "sad case', has been lured into this project by Dr Vincent Lim (Badawi's former political secretary) who with the support of Kamal Badawi and possibly Khairy was instrumental in the intrigues that led to Badawi awarding the Second Crossing to China Harbour Engineering Corporation and creating a substantial variation order.
Originally, Vincent Lim proposed China Harbour but this was scuttled by Najib's inner sanctum because of their total disgust with Kay Hock and Vincent. In order to deceive these parties, Vincent with the collusion of the technical consultants then proposed using the name of the parent company of China Harbor i.e China Communications Construction Group (CCCG) and the sister company China Road & Bridge(CRB).
Vincent Lim is a master of deceit and could have been the one negotiating and the one who told the Chinese the story about the payments in order to justify huge commissions for himself. I can only assume that a sizeable portion of this was destined for himself.
The current rumour is that the front runner for the project is a Chinese company China Railway Construction Company (CRCC) represented by prominent Johore interests and belatedly supported by the PRC. It is said that they are in active discussions with Gamuda and IJM.
The Chinese Government has a role in exposing shady operators such as VL who have misled CCCG or CHEC or CREC if the MACC will not step in. Rumour has it that Vincent Lim spends most of his time enjoying the fruits of his Penang Bridge deal in Shanghai and Beijing with occasional trips to see his bankers in Hong Kong.
Have anyone noticed lately how the double track railway impacted the towns it crossed. Almost all the towns it intersected-the town identity and fabric, not to mention the traffic pattern has been destroyed.
ReplyDeleteFor example Alor Setar and Sungai Petani- the town has been divided beyond recognition. People now have to take a longer and torturous route just to get to the other side where once it took just a few minutes (seconds) not to mention spending more time and fuel.
Here is one point that nobody really realised. Why can’t they just raise the track on bridges instead of having car flyovers which divides the town, not to mention the jams caused during construction of the car flyover.
Most towns people I spoke to were complacent and not aware of any public viewing of the project .
I guess this is the true price the rakyat has to pay now as it affects everybody.