Gov't will repay RM143m 1MDB debt due next week

The government will pay the RM143.75 million debt due by 1MDB on May 30 as scheduled, Finance Minister Lim Guan Eng said today.

"There is a back-to-back guarantee by the federal government and we will honour the commitment," he told a press conference.

"We will pay as scheduled," he added.

Lim made known of the RM143.75 million debt on Tuesday.

Yesterday, he said he may decline to ink a document which authorises the Finance Ministry to settle 1MDB's debt if he was not given the true picture of 1MDB's fiscal position by its CEO Arul Kanda Kandasamy.

Lim said 1MDB had been unable to repay its debts since April 2017 and the government had forked out RM6.9 billion since to repay them.

Yesterday, Lim met Arul together with former 1MDB chief financial officer Azmi Tahir and former 1MDB legal adviser Ivan Chen.

Lim had then instructed Arul to inform the ministry in writing on whether the firm could fork out the amount needed to service the debt. - Mkini