| Lim Kit Siang Posted: 04 Nov 2011 11:26 PM PDT
| Nazri talking through his hat! Posted: 04 Nov 2011 11:00 PM PDT By P. Ramakrishnan, Aliran’s President 4 Nov 2011 Nazri has given expression to the saying, "Talking through the hat!" That was what he was doing when he rather foolishly commented on the majority decision of the Court of Appeal which ruled in a landmark case that Section 15(5)(a) of the Universities and University Colleges Act [...] | | PAGE says likely to continue PPSMI struggle Posted: 04 Nov 2011 06:52 PM PDT By Clara Chooi November 05, 2011 | The Malaysian Insider KUALA LUMPUR, Nov 5 — The Parent Action Group for Education (PAGE) will likely pursue its cause to retain PPSMI in schools despite expressing "deep appreciation" to the government for allowing those already enjoying the policy to continue. PAGE chairman Datin Noor Azimah Abdul Rahim [...] | | Appeal against UUCA judgment flies in the face of PM’s political transformation programme Posted: 04 Nov 2011 03:52 PM PDT by Tony Pua MP National Publicity Secretary DAP 5.11.11 The decision by the Cabinet to allow the appeal of the Court of Appeal judgement that Section 15.(5)(a) of the University and University Colleges Act1971 (UUCA) is unconstitutional flies in the face of the Prime Minister's "politicaltransformation programme". After a series of calls for the Government [...] | | The deadly sins of Umno Posted: 04 Nov 2011 11:05 AM PDT — Jacob Sinnathamby The Malaysian Insider Nov 04, 2011 NOV 4 — Every day a layer of deception is peeled away from the men and women who govern this country and who have a choke grip on our fate. The ongoing Parliament session and the reaction to the Auditor-General's Report and the campaign of lies [...] | | Has Muhyiddin performed a “coup” against Najib and other non-UMNO Cabinet Ministers and parties? Posted: 03 Nov 2011 11:57 PM PDT Has the Deputy Prime Minister and Education Minister, Tan Sri Muhyiddin Yassin done a "coup" against the Prime Minister, Datuk Seri Najib Razak and other non-UMNO Cabinet Ministers and parties including MCA, MIC and Gerakan in unilaterally and arbitrarily without Cabinet authority declaring as "final" the decision to discontinue the PPSMI policy on the teaching [...] | |
| Blog@Wengsan...博客@永山 Posted: 04 Nov 2011 09:23 PM PDT |
| MY VOICE FOR NATION Posted: 04 Nov 2011 01:09 PM PDT |
| Philosophy Politics Economics Posted: 04 Nov 2011 09:29 AM PDT
| Another Bailout for Puncak Niaga Posted: 04 Nov 2011 08:20 AM PDT The Government of Malaysia has continued to place the interest of UMNO cronies above that of ordinary Malaysians as it continues to bail out privatized water companies by taking over their debts and granting them additional loans.
Puncak Niaga Holdings Bhd has announced on 1st November 2011 that the Government, via the wholly owned subsidiary of Pengurusan Aset Air Bhd (PAAB) – Acqua SPV Bhd, has agreed to acquire all Redeemable Unsecured Notes (RUNs) with an outstanding value of RM328.12 million. The RUNs are essentially debt instruments issued by Puncak Niaga in 2001.
As part of the bailout exercise, Puncak Niaga gets to defer its annual installment repayment by 5 years to the debtors, now the Government of Malaysia, from the original date of 18 November 2011. There is no other private company in Malaysia, except for known cronies of Barisan Nasional (BN), which can enjoy such preferential treatment.
This is on top of a 20-year RM110 million loan recently granted by the Federal Government to Syarikat Bekalan Air Selangor Bhd (SYABAS) on 17th October. SYABAS is a 70% subsidiary of Puncak Niaga and the loan is meant for a pipe replacement project which is supposed to be within the scope of SYABAS's concession agreement. In the SYABAS loan agreement, the company is not only given a preferential 3% interest, it is only required to commence repayment of the principal installments in the 3rd year of the loan. On top of that the interest accrued on the loan shall only be payable in 10 equal installments commencing 2022 or 10 years after the loan is granted!
The above loan is on top of the "back-loaded interest free unsecured RM320.8 million loan" granted by the Federal Government to SYABAS less than 2 years ago in December 2009. For this loan, SYABAS is only required to commence repayment with amounts less than RM5 million until 2025, with the overwhelming remainder payable only from 2026 onwards! And as the statement implies, the loan is completely interest-free and requires absolutely no collateral from Syabas.
That's not all – Acqua SPV Bhd had acquired all bonds issued by the Selangor state water concessionaires for the amount of RM6.5 billion in May this year. According to the Financial Daily, a market source had confirmed that "in terms of price, the buying back is at 94.49 against mark to market value of only 54.54 at the end of last month". It is bad enough that the Federal Government has decided to bail out the Selangor water concessionaires, but for it to pay a whopping 73.2% higher than the market value of these bonds borders on being outrageous and an abuse of taxpayers' money.
The persistent need to bailout the privatised water companies in Selangor proved the unmitigating disaster of BN's privatisation exercise which only served to profit its cronies and impoverish the rakyat. When these companies were profitable, none of their dividends were accrued to the Government, but when they are unable to repay their mountain of debt it is the BN Federal Government who will come to their rescue with tax-payers' money.
What is worse is the fact that the Selangor State Government had offered both the Federal Government and the water concessionaires a way out with its restructuring proposal where the ownership of the latter returns to the state government in exchange for a resolution of their debt burden. Instead the Federal Government had chosen to back its cronies in the privatised water industry by bailing out these companies without any commitment at all from the latter for a restructuring exercise in the spirit of the Water Services Industry Act 2006.
Now that these companies have been granted reprieve from their debt obligations, there will be no urgency on their part to resolve the restructuring imbroglio. As a result the losers will be the rakyat who will not only suffer from the risk of higher water tariffs in the future from these private water companies, but also having to bear the burden of paying for the very expensive bailout of the very same companies.
The reckless abuse of tax-payers' funds must stop or the risk of Malaysia's "bankruptcy" as warned by Datuk Idris Jala as a result of unsustainable debt and deficit will only become a certainty. | |
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