Make public statutory bodies’ investment dealings with 1MDB, says PKR

PKR wants statutory bodies with business transactions with 1Malaysia Development Berhad (1MDB) to list down all their transactions with the debt-laden strategic investor. – The Malaysian Insider file pic, May 11, 2015.

PKR today demanded that statutory bodies which had business transactions with 1Malaysia Development Berhad (1MDB) list down all their transactions with the debt-laden strategic investor following reports that pensioners fund KWAP had bought a plot of land at the Tun Razak Exchange (TRX) from 1MDB.

Secretary-general Rafizi Ramli (pic, right) said that the public should know the extent of public funds involved in 1MDB's dealings, and that the deals listed must include bond purchases, loans and land purchases.

The KWAP report comes on the heels of last week’s revelation that pilgrims’ fund Lembaga Tabung Haji had purchased of a plot of land in TRX from 1MDB for RM188.5 million.

"Prime Minister Datuk Seri Najib Razak should also order that the sold land be sold back to the federal government at the same price that was paid by 1MDB to acquire it in the first place," Rafizi said in a statement today.

Tabung Haji bought the land at a price 43 times higher than what 1MDB had paid the federal government for it three years ago, while KWAP is reportedly buying the land at 30 times the original purchase price.

"This easy profit is being used to service 1MDB's debts worth millions that needed to be paid several times a year while the original RM42 billion borrowing from 1MDB remains unaccounted for," Rafizi said.

In 2011, KWAP itself had lent RM4 billion to SRC International, which was then a 1MDB subsidiary, for investments in coal mining in Mongolia. RM3.1 billion of the money has been classified as unspecified investments, SRC's latest audit report said.

SRC has since been absorbed as a fully-owned subsidiary of the Finance Ministry.

- TMI