THE SAGA OF THE NOMINEES OF THE TRUSTEES OF UMNO

Oh, yes, and another question, is it true that Najib is pressuring Umno’s trustees and their nominees to return everything they are holding supposedly on behalf of Umno? And are they refusing to do so? And is this why they want Najib ousted, so that they need not return Umno’s wealth that is under their names?

THE CORRIDORS OF POWER

Raja Petra Kamarudin

There is a joke amongst Umno circles. The Barisan Nasional headquarters gives each of the 222 parliamentary constituencies RM10 million to pay for the general election. That would be paid to the state operations centre and would come to RM2.2 billion.

The state operations centre hands over RM5 million to each of the 222 parliamentary constituencies, which is supposed to cover the cost of the election campaign for the more than 500 state constituencies as well. That comes to RM1.1 billion.

A budget of RM50 is spent per voter for flags, banners, posters, food, mineral water, transport, etc., in each of the 222 parliamentary constituencies and the more than 500 state constituencies under them. That comes to RM500 million.

So, RM2.2 billion is given out but only RM500 million is spent. And that is why the Umno chaps love general elections and by-elections. That is when money flows like water and no one has time to check the accounts and determine whether the money, as the Umno people normally say, would ‘reach the ground’.

It is worse in seats like, say, Cheras, which is under Syed Ali Alhabshee, and which Umno knows it can never contest and even if it did it would never win. Why spend so much money on a losing seat? Better they just keep the money since they know that whatever amount of money they spend they are still going to lose anyway.

That is the trouble with election budgets. An estimated quarter of what is given out actually ‘reaches the ground’. Most of it, to quote Tun Dr Mahathir Mohamad, disappears into thin air.

The other way to finance Umno’s activities and pay for the elections is through projects and businesses. But Umno cannot directly run these businesses. In the past, Umno did do business directly under its own name. In fact, Umno owned quite a number of businesses and companies.

However, all these businesses failed and went bankrupt. The businesses were badly managed and most times those Umno appointed directors and managers robbed the companies and milked them dry. Furthermore, there was the 1988 problem when Umno’s assets and bank accounts got frozen and Umno was in dire straits.

So the new arrangement that Tun Dr Mahathir and Tun Daim Zainuddin set up was to create trustees who in turn appointed nominees and who in turn had sub-nominees to hold Umno’s wealth under trust.

But the trustees could not be trusted and the nominees ran away with the money. In the end the RM100 billion that Anwar Ibrahim said Umno owned, which could actually even be more than that, again, as Dr Mahathir said, disappeared into thin air.

This was a dilemma that Prime Minister Najib Tun Razak faced in the first general election that he had to manage as Prime Minister in 2013. How to make sure that he spent RM2.5 billion and RM2.5 billion instead of just RM500 million actually ‘reached the ground’?

Umno is supposed to own RM100 billion or maybe even double that. The fact that no one really knows whether Umno owns RM100 billion or RM200 billion is because the so-called trustees who are supposed to be holding Umno’s wealth through nominees refuse to declare what the real amount is. If they did then they would have to hand it all back to Umno.

So many of these trustees who held Umno’s wealth through nominees kept quiet. They pretended they do not know how much Umno owns and where that money has gone to. If you check Umno’s bank account the amount is zero. So where is that RM100 billion or RM200 billion or whatever the amount really is?

Only the trustees and their nominees know. Some even say that the trustees themselves do not know the real figure because their nominees are not forthcoming with the information. So not only are the trustees short-changing Umno, the nominees are swindling the trustees as well.

What a mess Najib found himself in when he took over as Prime Minister in 2009. Umno was supposed to be rich but was actually poor. And when the 2013 general election came he had to worry about finding RM2.5 billion to finance the election because Umno’s trustees and nominees refused to hand back what they were holding on behalf of Umno.

Then there was the problem of if you handed over RM2.5 billion to the states, who in turn would hand it to the constituencies, only RM500 million would reach the ground while RM2 billion would disappear into thin air.

I was told Najib discussed this dilemma with Bank Negara and it was suggested that since the money was legally obtained through a donation or donations then it would be safe enough if the money was banked into Najib’s personal bank account. As long as the money could be accounted for there would be no issues.

So Najib did just that. When he received the donation he banked it into his personal bank account. Then he made sure that the money did not disappear into thin air but actually reached the ground. (Ironically, Dr Mahathir himself confirmed this when he complained about how much Najib spent for the 2013 general election).

And that was how the 2013 general election was financed with the full knowledge of Bank Negara, who had to approve such a large sum of money coming into the country in the first place or else the money would not be able to be brought in.

So the issue here would be can Najib reveal who donated that large sum of money? Najib said he was prepared to do so if the opposition, too, revealed where its money came from and who the donors are.

But the opposition would not want to do that. They not only want to protect the identity of the donors but also would not want the public to know how much money they have. So Najib will wait for the opposition to first reveal its source of funding before he reveals his.

The next question that needs to be asked is how much is Umno really worth? Is it RM100 billion or RM200 billion or more? Does Najib even know or are the trustees and their nominees not talking?

And finally, the most important question of all: who are these trustees and nominees and why aren’t they handing back to Umno what they are holding in trust on behalf of the party?

Yes, I think that last question is the more important of the many.

Oh, yes, and another question, is it true that Najib is pressuring Umno’s trustees and their nominees to return everything they are holding supposedly on behalf of Umno? And are they refusing to do so? And is this why they want Najib ousted, so that they need not return Umno’s wealth that is under their names?

Questions, questions, questions…now can we have some answers please!