[ Laman Ehwal Semasa ReformIS ]
Date: 14 Sep 1999
Time: 07:01:22
Remote User: -
[the-malaysian] Tuesday's Issue Of The Malaysian Add Addresses
Mahathir pours acid on the arsenic Bernama today filed a story entitled, "ANWAR'S ALLEGED ARSENIC POISONING A WELL-PLANNED PLOY, SAYS DR M".
Speaking at the opening of a sports complex in Kuala Selangor last night, Dr Mahathir Mohamad said his Anwar Ibrahim carefully planned to disclose his alleged arsenic poisoining during the Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation Leaders' Summit in Auckland to gain international attention.
Mahathir alleged Anwar also chose to make the announcement when some 1,500 delegates of the international legal fraternity were in Malaysia to attend the 12th Commonwealth Law Conference. He said the disclosure was made at an opportune time to arouse the anger of his supporters to riot and to hate the government.
Once again, it is curious that the test results have been accepted by Dr Mahathir and his associates; they appear to be so sure that the results are accurate that they are not even bothering to await confirmation from the Hospital Universiti Kebangsaan Malaysia.
Instead, they only choose to question the timing of the announcement. In doing so, they are telling lies, hoping that lies, repeated often enough become accepted as the truth, in accordance with the dictum of Hitler's propaganda chief Goebbels.
The issue of the timing is a non-issue. Once again, it is necessary to repeat the chronology. The sample was sent on August 18, the test was conducted on August 26, the results were issued on September 8 and became available to Dr Wan Azizah on September 9. They were brought to the attention of the court on September 10. There was no delay; there was no thought of timing.
Further, if indeed Anwar wanted to time the announcement for international impact, he couldn't have chosen a worse time for it. As Dr Mahathir, Rafidah Aziz, Abdullah Badawi and Mustafa Mohammed have complained so loudly, APEC was only interested in East Timor.
Correctly so, East Timor has dominated the news, pushing the Anwar poisoning story into relative obscurity. If Anwar wanted to have maximum impact, he would have delayed the report till a later time, say when Dr Mahathir goes to the UN. Now that would be really embarassing.
By the way, acid on arsenic produces arsine gas -- a highly toxic gas which kills, and kills quite indiscriminately.
The BN's priorities: friends or rakyat? Penang is one of the prime tourist destinations in the country, one of the most educated states in the country, with a citizenry that is more vocal about its grievances. Yet Penangites have to live with woes that should not be.
Ask any Penangite and they will likely tell you that floods are a much more common occurrence nowadays. Not only are they more common, they also appear to be more severe.
Such floods are a bane on people's lives and property. It would appear rational that priority should be accorded to solving, at least mitigating, the problem. It would appear to be one of those public projects that can usefully be speeded up not only as a boost to public spending to help economic recovery, but also in fulfilment of the BN's promise of a better quality of life.
But two statements yesterday reveal exactly where the BN's priorities lie.
Deputy Housing and Local Government Minister Peter Chin said that the government is expected to revive next year the special financial allocations for repairs and upgrading of drainage and irrigation canals in flood-prone areas.
These allocations were scrapped two years ago because of the economic downturn. Unlike other projects, however, it was evidently not 'mega' enough to be revived. So, when government boosted its spending, the allocations for drainage and flood mitigation for Penang were not revived.
In any event, it is not even guaranteed as the deputy minister said the ministry planned to apply for the allocation from the Treasury, meaning it is not already in the pipeline.
Further, this would depend upon local authorities to forward their flood mitigation project proposals to the ministry to get financial allocations.
Meanwhile, spending on the second link to Penang is going ahead despite the fact that traffic volume on the bridge is still running below projections of the toll concessionaire owned by Intria Bhd.
Now that is a 'mega' project worth upwards of RM2 billion.
According to Works Minister Samy Vellu at a press conference yesterday, "the idea of having the new link is to help reduce the exceeding traffic volume on the Pulau Pinang Bridge." Yet, Intria Bhd, the toll-concessionaire reports that its toll collections are less than projected because of reduced volume as well as the use of discount coupons.
At the same press conference, Samy Vellu announced that Intria had been assigned to study the design plan for the second link.
Going by past practice, this virtually assures Intria of the project should it go ahead. This confirms an earlier report in The Malaysian that the second link would be injected into Intria as part of a bail-out plan for the company. In that report, The Malaysian also suggested the possibility that the Penang Water Board would also be injected into Intria.
Intria is currently saddled with huge debts on which it has defaulted. It will need about a RM500 million cash injection to stay afloat.
Intria is 42 per cent owned by Mekar Idaman which is 45 per cent owned by UEM which is owned by Renong which is owned by Halim Saad, a Daim protege.
Recently, it was reported in The Edge that another Daim associate, Samsudin Abu Hassan, has made a financial restructuring proposal to take over Intria. The take over will reportedly involve a consortium including Kejora Harta, the Penang Development Corporation and Yayasan Bumiputra Pulau Pinang. Kejora Harta is now owned by Samsudin. The proposal is said to have the support of the Penang state government.
In the meantime, just to help things along, the Works Minister also said, "But at the moment, we have to do something about the present bridge to ensure its safety."
So, the government has agreed to replace 20 cables on the Pulau Pinang Bridge within the next one or two months to ensure public safety.
The government? Isn't maintenance the responsibility of the concessionaire?
Whatever the case, evidently the government has funds and the sense of urgency for the cables on the Penang bridge but not for the water woes of Penangites. Worse, their water woes in the future might not just be the water from up above, but the water coming through their pipes.
It looks like it matters whether one is just an ordinary citizen or an associate.
Whose guidelines? Tomorrow, September 15, Renong will hold a signing ceremony for the RM8.4 billion bonds to be issued by PLUS. Proceeds from the bonds will be used to settle Renong's and UEM's debts. UEM's debts were largely incurred early in the financial crisis as a bail-out measure for Renong.
Both companies went into default on their debts in October 1998.
As backing for the bonds, UEM will pledge to PLUS shares in the company, while Renong will pledge its assets.
Renong holds a 37 per cent stake in UEM, and UEM holds a 32 per cent stake in Renong. PLUS is wholly-owned by UEM.
The government's Corporate Debt Restructuring Committee announced the bond issue in March.
The PLUS bonds are seven-year zero coupon bonds with a yield of 9.4 per cent.
Curiously, Danaharta, in its operating guidelines for corporate debt stated in no uncertain terms the following: "No zero coupon structure should be entertained. All financial instruments offered should have a reasonable yield that is commensurate with the cashflow of the borrower."
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