The negative karma of ill-gotten gains (updated)

My blogger friend Donplaypuks requested that I help publicize the despicable show trial wherein the Malaysian Association of Chinese Comedians aka MACC has been trying to inflict pain and confusion on Rosli Dahlan (right) - a lawyer who got sucked into this mess simply for acting as legal counsel for former CCID chief Ramli Yusoff, who happens to be former IGP Musa Hassan's arch-enemy and rival for the post of Top Cop. Din Merican has done a great job of providing a blow-by-blow account of the grotesque proceedings, having diligently attended every session at court.

There appears to be no end to the disgusting shit flying around the political arena.


Almost 13 years later, Teoh Beng Hock's untimely death while in MACC custody remains unexplained - and nobody has been charged with culpable homicide. The inquest plodded along at snail's pace, making a complete mockery of justice. And even after a Royal Commission of Inquiry was convened as a result of public pressure, it turned out to be merely a delay tactic - because not one of the MACC interrogators has been convicted of being an accessory to murder or even for gross abuse of power.

All those mysterious deaths in police custody - not only A. Kugan's which received wide publicity but so many others (including the shocking case of a 14-year-old boy shot in the back of his head in a late-night car chase) - and not a single PDRM head has rolled, only a couple of low-ranking patsies scapegoated (as usual).

The RM13 billion PKFZ scandal is in danger of being completely covered in cobwebs, now that the man who initiated an official investigation has lost his job as MCA president. True, retired warlord Ling Liong Sik is being trotted out to take the rap, but it remains to be seen how his trial proceeds. Will he bare his soul and help bring his fellow criminal conspirators to justice? It would delight me no end to see the Three Tuns audited and behind bars (instead of hanging around in pubs). You know which three Tuns I'm referring to: Mahathir, Daim and Abdullah Badawi. [Since this was written a far bigger scandal has superseded PKFZ, namely the monstrous 1MDB scam that has left a staggering national debt of more than RM42 billion. Money-laundering investigations are underway in at least 6 countries.]

After nearly 16 years, the ghost of Altantuya still haunts Putrajaya - and MACC, as to be expected, chickened out of its commitment to meeting P.I. Balasubramaniam in London. It's clear as day the trail of serious wrongdoing leads directly to Najib Razak's desk. The macabre Altantuya Affair, intimately linked as it is with the disgraceful Scorpene and Agosta submarines scandal, ought to have terminated the present corrupt regime - because they are all implicated in the cover-up.

And, of course, the entire world is still sniggering at Famous Anus jokes and asking why Anwar Ibrahim appears to have been singled out for the dubious honor of being the only Malaysian to be charged with sodomy - TWICE in 10 years! Let's not even mention the disgraceful farce that has passed for a trial - even if his surprise acquittal on 9 January 2012 was an unexpected U-turn, indicative of conflicts within Umno's top leadership.

Meanwhile the defence ministry nonchalantly carries on with the purchase of all kinds of useless and unserviceable ordnance - all at outrageously marked up prices - while RM300,000 jet engines go missing and yet another Indian gets scapegoated.

All this rampant corruption and injustice hogging the headlines leaves me speechless. What can I say (apart from Tak Boleh lah, Bolehland)?

I have friends who still earn monthly salaries working for BN-owned media (oh sure, your kids deserve the best education money can buy, so they can get well-paying jobs after they graduate with Apco Worldwide, Halliburton, or BP).

As for Vincent Tan's deal-gone-sour with Najib, frankly I don't give a shit. I have no personal bone to pick with Vincent Tan (left), even though rumors are rife that he was instrumental in financing the defection of Hee Yit Foong and the collapse of the Pakatan Rakyat state government in Perak. Just because Vincent Tan looks like a real tough hombre who drives a hard-nosed bargain doesn't mean he deserves to have his bloodline terminated (although I wouldn't protest too vigorously if Vincent and his fellow money-grubbing moguls like Rupert Murdoch swiftly became an extinct species on this planet).

3 years later a banner protesting the gold mine remains in place

Nor do I have a personal grudge against business tycoon Kam Woon Wah, erstwhile MCA secretary-general, whose son Andrew Kam Tai Yeow (left) is the guy behind the revival of the controversial Raub Australian Gold Mining Sdn Bhd (a subsidiary of London-based Peninsular Gold Ltd).

But I met some of the Bukit Koman residents spearheading the campaign against Andrew Kam's highly polluting gold mine outside Raub and was inspired by their courage and resolve to stop the operations against all odds. For a start, the Pahang royal house has shares in the venture, which might explain why the police saw fit to arrest and detain overnight those leading the protest against the toxic gold mine. However, the Bukit Koman residents remain undaunted, though at a loss as to what to do next. Word has it that there really isn't as much gold to be found as the investors had hoped, which could put them out of business sooner than they expect. One can only wish such sociopathic miscreants a spectacular failure.

Local residents point out the toxic gold mine

It's the same old tiresome scenario. Whether the villain of the piece happens to be Union Carbide in Bhopal, BP-Halliburton in the Gulf of Mexico, the Bakun Hydroelectric Project in Sarawak, the Three Gorges Dam in China, Peninsular Gold in Bukit Koman, Lynas Rare Earth in Gebeng, or bauxite mining near Kuantan - it's invariably a conspiracy of already rich folks trying to get even richer at the expense of ordinary citizens with no financial or political clout.

A beancurd factory is located less than 200 yards from the gold mine

What can I do about it - apart from keeping the story in the public eye? Just as I can't persuade billions of humans to turn their backs on fizzy drinks, commercialized football, and their pathological addiction to newspapers and TV, I doubt I can wean people off their compulsion to find gold and hoard it. especially not if their surname happens to be Kam (which, in Chinese, means "gold"). Who cares if toxic chemicals seep into the groundwater and the air is polluted with rash-inducing particles?

General view of Bukit Koman, a village just outside Raub in Pahang

It's painfully embarrassing that we have to suffer the grandiose extravagance of so many royal households - each with its grubby fingers in multiple business pies. Surely anyone receiving a generous allowance for simply existing would be well satisfied and refrain from soiling their hands with dubious and unsavory business ventures? Alas, this has not been the case - at least not since the Mahathir Era. Everybody wants to be another King Farouk or live in ungodly splendor like the Saudi Royals.

It doesn't matter how the money is obtained, how many are made to suffer the deleterious consequences - or what hideous ruin is inflicted on the environment.

Well, I can envisage a time when the only individuals entitled to royalty claims will be those who can produce works of beauty and enduring truth in the form of artifacts like films, music, literature, stimulating dance performances, inspiring murals, public sculptures, and magnificent buildings.

Raub Australian Gold Mining Sdn Bhd is hidden by the tall trees

Those who have accumulated their wealth through logging, mining, drilling, fracking, manufacturing junk, selling weaponry and accepting bribes will be universally marked as criminals and shunned wherever they go. I hope Taib Mahmud and Najib Razak's family is reading this. So be it.

[First published 29 June 2010, reposted 11 March 2012 & 4 April 2016]

The negative karma of ill-gotten gains

My blogger friend Donplaypuks requested that I help publicize the despicable show trial wherein the Malaysian Association of Chinese Comedians aka MACC has been trying to inflict pain and confusion on Rosli Dahlan (right) - a lawyer who got sucked into this mess simply for acting as legal counsel for former CCID chief Ramli Yusoff, who happens to be IGP Musa Hassan's arch-enemy and rival for the post of Top Cop. Din Merican has done a great job of providing a blow-by-blow account of the grotesque proceedings, having diligently attended every session at court.

There appears to be no end to the disgusting shit flying around the political arena.


Almost a year later, Teoh Beng Hock's untimely death while in MACC custody remains unexplained - and nobody has been charged with culpable homicide. The inquest has plodded along at snail's pace, making a complete mockery of justice.

All those mysterious deaths in police custody - not only A. Kugan's which received wide publicity but so many others (including the shocking case of a 14-year-old boy shot in the back of his head in a late-night car chase) - and not a single PDRM head has rolled, only a couple of low-ranking patsies scapegoated (as usual).

The RM13 billion PKFZ scandal is in danger of being completely covered in cobwebs, now that the man who initiated an official investigation has lost his job as MCA president.

After nearly 4 years, the ghost of Altantuya still haunts Putrajaya - and it remains to be seen how MACC is going to dodge its commitment to meeting P.I. Balasubramaniam in London next week. The trail of serious wrongdoing leads directly to Najib Razak's desk. if Bala's lawyers succeed in videotaping the entire interview and putting it on YouTube, it could mean the end of the line for the present regime - because they are all implicated in the cover-up.

And, of course, the entire world is still sniggering at Famous Anus jokes and asking why Anwar Ibrahim appears to have been singled out for the dubious honor of being the only Malaysian to be charged with sodomy - TWICE in 12 years! Let's not even mention the disgraceful farce that passes for a trial.

Meanwhile the defence ministry nonchalantly carries on with the purchase of all kinds of useless and unserviceable ordnance - all at outrageously marked up prices - while RM300,000 jet engines go missing and yet another Indian gets scapegoated.

All this rampant corruption and injustice hogging the headlines leaves me speechless. What can I say (apart from Tak Boleh lah, Bolehland)?

I have friends who still earn monthly salaries working for BN-owned media (oh sure, your kids deserve the best education money can buy, so they can get well-paying jobs after they graduate with Apco Worldwide, Halliburton, or BP).

As for Vincent Tan's deal-gone-sour with Najib, frankly I don't give a shit. I have no personal bone to pick with Vincent Tan (left), even though rumors are rife that he was instrumental in financing the defection of Hee Yit Foong and the collapse of the Pakatan Rakyat state government in Perak. Just because Vincent Tan looks like a real tough hombre who drives a hard-nosed bargain doesn't mean he deserves to have his bloodline terminated (although I wouldn't protest too vigorously if Vincent and his fellow money-grubbing moguls like Rupert Murdoch swiftly became an extinct species on this planet).

3 years later a banner protesting the gold mine remains in place

Nor do I have a personal grudge against business tycoon Kam Woon Wah, erstwhile MCA secretary-general, whose son Andrew Kam Tai Yeow (left) is the guy behind the revival of the controversial Raub Australian Gold Mining Sdn Bhd (a subsidiary of London-based Peninsular Gold Ltd).

But I met some of the Bukit Koman residents spearheading the campaign against Andrew Kam's highly polluting gold mine outside Raub and was inspired by their courage and resolve to stop the operations against all odds. For a start, the Pahang royal house has shares in the venture, which might explain why the police saw fit to arrest and detain overnight those leading the protest against the toxic gold mine. However, the Bukit Koman residents remain undaunted, though at a loss as to what to do next. Word has it that there really isn't as much gold to be found as the investors had hoped, which could put them out of business sooner than they expect. One can only wish such sociopathic miscreants a spectacular failure.

Local residents point out the toxic gold mine

It's the same old tiresome scenario. Whether the villain of the piece happens to be Union Carbide in Bhopal, BP-Halliburton in the Gulf of Mexico, the Bakun Hydroelectric Project in Sarawak, the Three Gorges Dam in China, or Peninsular Gold in Bukit Koman - it's invariably a conspiracy of already rich folks trying to get even richer at the expense of ordinary citizens with no financial or political clout.

A beancurd factory is located less than 200 yards from the gold mine

What can I do about it - apart from keeping the story in the public eye? Just as I can't persuade billions of humans to turn their backs on fizzy drinks, commercialized football, and their pathological addiction to newspapers and TV, I doubt I can wean people off their compulsion to find gold and hoard it. especially not if their surname happens to be Kam (which, in Chinese, means "gold"). Who cares if toxic chemicals seep into the groundwater and the air is polluted with rash-inducing particles?

General view of Bukit Koman, a village just outside Raub in Pahang

It's painfully embarrassing that we have to suffer the grandiose extravagance of so many royal households - each with its grubby fingers in multiple business pies. Surely anyone receiving a generous allowance for simply existing would be well satisfied and refrain from soiling their hands with dubious and unsavory business ventures? Alas, this has not been the case - at least not since the Mahathir Era. Everybody wants to be another King Farouk or live in godly splendor like the Saudi Royals.

It doesn't matter how the money is obtained, how many are made to suffer the deleterious consequences - or what hideous ruin is inflicted on the environment.

Well, I can envisage a time when the only individuals entitled to royalty claims will be those who can produce works of beauty and enduring truth in the form of artifacts like films, music, literature, stimulating dance performances, inspiring murals, public sculptures, and magnificent buildings.

Raub Australian Gold Mining Sdn Bhd is hidden by the tall trees

Those who have accumulated their wealth through logging, mining, drilling, manufacturing junk, selling weaponry and accepting bribes will be universally marked as criminals and shunned wherever they go. I hope Taib Mahmud's family is reading this. So be it.

ALTANTUYA RESURFACES TO HAUNT NAJIB

French Legal Team in Malaysia to Probe Sub Deal

Written by John Berthelsen | Asia Sentinel
Tuesday, 27 April 2010

Massive corruption suspected in billion-dollar deal tied to Prime Minister Najib

Joseph Breham, a member of a French legal team that filed complaints in a Paris court in connection with a potentially explosive scandal over the billion-dollar purchase of French submarines by Malaysia is due to land in Kuala Lumpur today (April 28) to seek further information on the case and to speak with their clients, the Malaysia human rights organization Suaram.

As Asia Sentinel has reported at length, the deal was engineered by then-Defense Minister Najib Tun Razak (right), now Malaysia's Prime Minister, in 2002 and resulted in a massive €114 million (US$151.1 million at current exchange rates) commission for one of Najib's closest associates, Abdul Razak Baginda. The purchase price included two Scorpene-class diesel submarines built by Armaris, a subsidiary of the French defense giant DCN (formerly Direction des Constructions Navales) and the lease of a third retired submarine manufactured by a joint venture between DCN and Spanish company Agosta.

Breham, one of the three lawyers who filed the case with Parisian prosecutors on behalf of Suaram, told Asia Sentinel the French court has opened a preliminary investigation into the matter and that he would be advising his clients on the next steps. Breham said he will also hold a press conference in Kuala Lumpur today to give some details to local reporters. Breham, Renaud Semerdjian and William Bourdon, the lead lawyer, filed the request to investigate bribery and kickback allegations against DCN first in December and filed additional documents in February.

The case has been making headlines in Malaysia - although few in the mainstream media, which are owned by the country's leading political parties -- since the gruesome October 2006 murder of Altantuya Shaariibuu, a Mongolian translator and spurned lover of Razak Baginda who had accompanied him to France on some of the transactions over the submarines. Altantuya was shot in the head and her body was blown up with military explosives in a patch of jungle outside of Kuala Lumpur. Two of Najib's bodyguards, who were directed to intercede with her by Musa Safri, Najib's chief of staff, have been convicted of the killing. Neither Najib nor Musa has ever been questioned by law enforcement officials about the case.

Although records showed Najib was in France at the same time as Altantuya and Razak Baginda, he has repeatedly sworn to Allah that he had never known the beauteous Mongolian. One report filed by a private detective hired by Razak Baginda said she had been Najib's lover first. After she was killed, authorities discovered a letter she had written saying she was blackmailing Razak Altantuya for US$500,000, although she did not say why.

In addition to the cost of the submarines and the whopping "commission" fee, it has now emerged that under the terms of the original contract, the vessels were basically bare of armaments and detection devices. The Malaysian military must pay an additional €130 million to equip them.

"You mean we bought bare metal?" wrote one incredulous and anonymous military official in an email to Asia Sentinel.

The charges go well beyond the Malaysian purchase. Judges in the Paris Prosecution Office have been probing a wide range of corruption charges involving similar submarine sales and the possibility of bribery and kickbacks to top officials in France, Pakistan and other countries. The Malaysian piece of the puzzle was added in two filings, on Dec. 4, 2009 and Feb. 23 this year.

French politicians seem to have a knack for backhanders. On October 26, in a trial that centered on illegal arms sales to Angola, Jean-Christophe Mitterrand, the son of the late president Francois Mitterand, was given a two-year suspended sentence and ordered to pay a €375,000 fine for receiving embezzled funds. The court ruled that he had accepted millions of euros in "consultant fees" on the arms deals between 1993 and 1998. In the dock with him were 42 people accused of selling weapons to Angola in defiance of a UN arms embargo, or of taking payments from the arms dealers and using their influence to facilitate the sales.

The trial, it was said, shined a light into a murky world of secret payments made in cash and discreet deals linking Parisian high society with one of Africa's longest-running wars. But it hasn't shined a light on what happened elsewhere with contracts concluded by the representatives of France, and particularly by DCN.

For instance, 11 French engineers employed by DCN, which peddled subs to Pakistan, were blown up in a bus bombing in 2002 which was first thought to have been perpetrated by Islamic militants. The 11 were in Karachi to work on three Agosta 90 B submarines that the Pakistani military had bought in 1994, with payment to be spread over a decade. According to Reuters, commissions were promised to middlemen including Pakistani and Saudi Arabian nationals. Agosta is a subsidiary of DCN. It is believed that Pakistani military officials blew up the bus in retaliation for the cancellation of the payments.


In the Taiwan case, the French company Thales, formerly Thompson-CSF sold six DCN-built La Fayette-class 'stealth' frigates to Taiwan in 1992 for US$2.8 billion. At least six people connected with the case have died under suspicious circumstances including a Taiwanese naval captain named Yin Ching-feng, who was believed to have been killed because he planned to go to the authorities about fraud connected with the case. His nephew, who was also pursuing the case, a Thomson employee in Taiwan and a French intelligence agent were also among the dead. It gradually emerged that some $600 million in commissions had been paid into various Swiss accounts set up by Andrew Wang Chuan-pu, the Taiwan agent for Thomson-CSF. In October 2008 a French judge finally ruled that no one could be prosecuted because of lack of evidence.

The Malaysian allegations revolve around the €114 million payment to a Malaysia-based company called Perimekar for support services surrounding the sale of the submarines. Perimekar was wholly owned by another company, KS Ombak Laut Sdn Bhd, which in turn was controlled by Najib's best friend, Razak Baginda (left), whose wife Mazalinda, a lawyer and former magistrate, was the principal shareholder, according to the French lawyers.

In the complaints filed in Paris, the issue revolves around what, if anything, Razak Baginda's Perimekar company did to deserve €114 million. Zainal Abidin, the deputy defense minister at the time of the sale, told parliament that Perimekar had received the amount - 11 percent of the sale price of the submarines - for "coordination and support services." The Paris filing alleges that there were neither support nor services.

Perimekar was registered in 2001, a few months before the signing of the contracts for the sale, the Paris complaint states. The company, it said flatly, "did not have the financial resources to complete the contract." A review of the accounts in 2001 and 2002, the complaint said, "makes it an obvious fact that this corporation had absolutely no capacity, or legal means or financial ability and/or expertise to support such a contract."


"None of the directors and shareholders of Perimekar has the slightest experience in the construction, maintenance or submarine logistics," the complaint adds. "Under the terms of the contract, €114 million were related to the different stages of construction of the submarines." The apparent consideration, supposedly on the part of Perimekar, "would be per diem and Malaysian crews and accommodation costs during their training. There is therefore no link between billing steps and stages of completion of the consideration."

Graft in Malaysia’s Defense Ministry

Najib Tun Razak, Malaysia’s defense minister, finds a fountain of cash in military purchases

"Mat Salleh"
24 September 2007
Asia Sentinel

Despite the fact that the country’s borders have been largely secure for 40 years, Malaysia’s Defence Ministry has for decades been available to provide a river of money to defense ministers, the ruling United Malays National Organisation and any of the Sandhurst-educated generals who could get their hands into the till.

But if three separate contracts over the past several years are any yardstick, Najib Tun Razak, who became defense minister in 1999 and kept the portfolio when he became deputy prime minister, appears to have mastered the game far beyond the expectations of any previous defense leaders. Opposition figures say the three contracts, one for Russian Sukhoi jet fighters, a second for French submarines and a third for navy patrol boats, appear to have produced at least US$300 million for UMNO cronies, Najib’s friends and others.

Describing “the mundane but important element of patronage,” Foreign Policy in Focus, a think tank supported by the Institute for Policy Studies in Washington, wrote in a 2005 article that “many foreign arms manufacturers generally used well-connected Malaysians as their lobbyists for contracts. The commission paid to such representatives is estimated to range from 10 to 20 percent.” Even prior to the 1997 Asian financial crisis, Southeast Asia, which hasn’t had an external war in decades but is rich enough to spend plenty on guns, was the world’s second-largest arms market after the Middle East, representing about 20 percent of the world’s purchases.

By the end of next year, Malaysia is expected to have 18 Sukhoi-20MKM jets intended to replace 14 US-made F-5Es, which have been in service for two decades. Two Sukhois were delivered this year, and the Malaysian Air Force also has 18 MiG-29N Fulcrums.

All three of the contracts, which were approved under Najib (left) and have been widely cited by the opposition, fit well into Foreign Policy in Focus’s patronage scale. Bringing the three together, and taking a new look at their associations, is instructive. They have been forced back into public attention by the continuing trial of Abdul Razak Baginda, one of Najib’s closest friends, who is on trial for his life in a suburban high court along with two of Najib’s bodyguards for the murder of Altantuya Shaariibuu, a Mongolian translator who was shot in the head on October 19, 2006, and then blown up with C4 explosives available only from Malaysia’s military.

According to testimony in the trial, Altantuya accompanied her then-lover Abdul Razak to Paris at a time when Malaysia’s defense ministry was negotiating through a Kuala Lumpur-based company, Perimekar Sdn Bhd, to buy two Scorpene submarines and a used Agosta submarine produced by the French government under a French-Spanish joint venture, Armaris. Perimekar at the time was owned by a company called Ombak Laut, which was wholly owned by Abdul Razak.

The contract was not competitive. The Malaysian ministry of defense paid 1 billion euros (RM 4.5 billion) to Amaris for the three submarines, for which Perimekar received a commission of 114 million euros (RM510 million). Deputy Defense Minister Zainal Abdidin Zin told the Dewan Rakyat, Malaysia’s parliament, that the money was paid for “coordination and support services” although the fee amounted to a whopping 11 percent of the sales price for the submarines. Altantuya, by her own admission in the last letter she wrote before her murder, said she had been blackmailing Abdul Razak, pressuring him for US$500,000. She did not say how she was blackmailing him, leaving open lots of questions.

Spending for defense accelerated across the board after Najib, called “the driving force” behind Malaysia’s military modernization program by Foreign Policy in Focus, became defense chief. The shopping list, the think tank reported, “includes battle tanks from Poland, Russian and British surface-to-air missiles and mobile military bridges, Austrian Steyr assault rifles and Pakistani anti-tank missiles. Kuala Lumpur is also negotiating to buy several F/A 18s, three submarines from France and an unspecified number of Russian Suhkoi Su-30 fighter aircraft.

It was the Sukhois that have become the second controversial purchase brokered by Najib. The deal, worth US$900 million (RM3.2 billion), was through a Russian state company, Federal State Unitary Enterprise 'Rosoboronexport' on May 19, 2003. IMT Defence Sdn. Bhd. was appointed the local agent for the Russian company and received 12 percent of the purchase price, US$108 million (RM380 million). The principal figure and chairman of IMT Defence is Mohamad Adib Adam, the former chief minister of Malacca, previous Land and Development Minister and a longtime UMNO stalwart.

The involvement of IMT Defence only became known because in March 2005, a former director of IMT, Mohamad Zainuri Mohamad Idrus, filed suit against several Adib-related companies, alleging that Adib and his sister, Askiah Adam, “wanted to prevent him from exposing the reality of the Sukhoi deal.” In 2006, Mohamad Zainuri lodged a police report alleging that Adib had stolen the US$108 million (RM 380 million) commission that was supposed to be channeled to the company.

According to Mohamad Zainuri’s report, Adib had secretly registered a new company in the federal island of Labuan, Malaysia’s offshore banking center, bearing a name similar to IMT Defence Sdn. Bhd., allegedly in order to channel the commission illegally to the new company. The report was then sent to the Commercial Crime Investigations Department Headquarters. No report, however, has ever been released to the public.

Then, over the last few weeks, a third military scandal surfaced. Malaysia’s Auditor General, in a report tabled in Parliament on September 7, alleged that a contract to build naval vessels given to PSC-Naval Dockyard, a subsidiary of Penang Shipbuilding & Construction Sdn Bhd, which is owned by another UMNO crony, Amin Shah Omar Shah, is near failure.

[Read the entire killer article here...]