The drug menace ..

Malaysian Authorities should come down hard on drug traffickers. News during the past few years tell us about tourist bringing in kilos of drugs into the country either for local consumption or as transit points for other countries. The drugs are brought in from Singapore, Thailand, or from the coastal waters, or even through the KLIA. Recenty there was a spate of drug smuggling by Africans and Iranians. These so called tourists bring in kilos of the drugs with the obvious intent of distributing them in the country.

The death penalty does not seem to deter these damn tourists who continue to smuggle drugs into Malaysia. The authorities should impress upon potential smugglers that the moment they are caught, they shall be hanged.

Update 28/09/10 02:00 hrs: I picked this up from the local Malay paper yesterday that 9 Iranians have been apprehended by the authorities for bringing in drugs through the KLIA. The method they used was by swallowing the drugs, a futile act that was easily detectable. The authorities say that so far 135 Iranians have been caught trying to smuggle drugs into Malaysia and 99 of them were caught at the KLIA. Don't these Iranians realise that they shall be hanged when found guilty.

I like the no-nonsense way China handles people involved in drugs or corruption. They are simply shot.

Two days ago, one newspaper carries the story of a truck driver, Lee Yong Toe, who was just acquitted by the high court in Kuantan in a non prima facie case yet again. He was in fact charged with trafficking 753.359 kilos (3/4 of a metric tonne) of metamphetamine that was stated to be worth a whopping RM 270 million. The driver and 2 others were caught by the Police in May 2009. Another accomplice escaped.

But why the judge acquitted the man was due to the incompetence of the prosecution since, for one, it failed to produce 2 important witnesses (who were apprehended by the Police at the same time and, for another, some 40 kilos of the drug were stolen by the Police officers themselves. The presiding judge was so riled up that such criminal lapse on the part of the Police that was supposed to secure the storage of the drugs in their custody that he reckoned the officers ought to be charged with criminal behaviour. Instead they were lightly punished by the Police department.

In matters like this, the prosecution team would be hard put to convince anybody, let alone a learned judge, that the driver was guilty of trafficking when even the 10 police officers, including a chief inspector, involved in the theft could also be charged with drug trafficking.

I don't trust PNB going into property...

Today, I hear of a plan by PNB to go extensively into the property market not only in this country but also overseas. Now, when I invest in PNB, specifically in the ASB, I have always believed that the PNB management is investing in strong public companies listed in the local share market, for that was the the original aim of the PNB. By investing in shares of these companies, PNB receives yearly dividends which are distributed to its shareholders who are in fact the unit holders. So successful is ASB over the years giving no less than 8 % dividend that PNB created a number of other investment schemes such as the ASN 2020, .............

In order to tap for more money, PNB created schemes that allow non-bumiputra unitholders to participate. Non bumiputra unit holders, particularly the Chinese, usually snap up the units once the scheme was open to them, believing that they are getting more dividends than if they had placed their money in fixed deposits. So far, this has been true.

PNB is therefore now sitting on a pile of cash that it does not know what to do with. It has gone out of its original aim by delving into the property market, starting with the bailing out of UEM just after the Asian financial crisis. So far, it has not disclosed how much it has paid to UEM to take over vacant possession of the land on which Merdeka stadium and stadium Negara are sitting on. The PNB Chairman, in an effort to explain to the public why PNB acquired the property (it was done in a hush-hush manner until blurted out by some politicians), attempted to rationalise by saying that PNB bought the 2 properties for their heritage and historical values even though they were not even 6o years old at that time and certainly were not more than a 100 years old to qualify to be of heritage and of historical significance. The Chairman has conveniently forgotten that originally UEM was to destroy the stadiums and, in place, build a commercial complex on the land.

Since then, I don't know how much property has been acquired by PNB. I once read sometime ago that PNB has entered into some joint-venture development on some land in Kuala Lumpur. Assets acquired by PNB in the past are not mentioned in its online portal. There's nothing on the latest story of the property transaction in Brisbane ...... (I have to re-check this).

Touted as the biggest property sales in Australia this year, I read today that PNB is investing (or going to) some RM 838.19 million (AUD 287 million) to acquire a property in Brisbane, Australia called Santos Place which comprises a 36 storey building of 34,338 square metre in area, 95% of which is tenanted. According to the promoter of the sales, by investing in the property PNB stands to gain some 8 % a year in yield as compared to in Malaysia which is 6 to 6.5 % per year. According to one news, Australian property investors are short of cash to outbid PNB. [This immediately tells us property investment doesn't bring in quick cash. The traditional institutional investors in Australia are not getting their cash returns on their past investments and that's why they don't have any money now].

PNB should be wary of going into property. It's easy to buy a property but extremely difficult to sell it. [Ever experience buying and selling a property in Malaysia - anywhere even in hot areas like the KLCC in Kuala Lumpur. Its easy to buy an apartment, or an office unit, or a house; but just try to dispose off your property and you'd get all sort of problems]. The cash is not quick in coming unlike having shares in public listed company. Once an investor becomes a registered shareholder, he would get his cash upon dividends being distributed, usually at least once a year, if not more frequently. An investor in shares knows exactly how much he's going to get as the dividends are announced months before they were given out. Not so with being a shareholder of an overseas property, tenanted or otherwise. The rentals are not given month to month as one would get when renting a house in Malaysia, but are subject to withholding tax, maintenance and administration fees and other whatnots that the so-called 8 to 9 % yield that you expect in return for your investment, you would only receive a disappointing 0.5 to 1 %.

Update 19/10/2010: I just heard that PNB intended to be involved in a 100 storey high rise building on the land surrounding the Merdeka Stadium and the Stadium Negara, the properties that they bought from UEM when UEM was in difficulty to develop the area.

The project, called the Warisan Merdeka, is to cost RM 5 billion and comprises a condominium and a shopping complex. The 2 stadiums are to be left intact to show us that they are heritage buildings. The RM 5 billion is the current estimate. [I am worried that as usual in Malaysia the final cost might turn up to be double or triple the current estimate].

The question is where is PNB going to get the money ? I certainly hope that it is not intending to hijack from the billions that are kept in Amanah. If it does, then it is wrong. If it says it shall borrow from the banks, it still has to repay the bank with interests and whose money is it going to use to repay the bank. Definitely the money is not from the government since where is there any money from the government other than the token sum needed earlier to kick start the Amanah Saham scheme. The news report said the directors of PNB had approved the project, but did they consult the unitholders whose money is the fund likely to be used ?

The MalaysianInsider, one of the bigger blogger websites in Malaysia, had raised the question of funding to the CEO of PNB, to which the CEO apparently declined to reply. The CEO merely described that the 100 storey building would even surpass the Petronas twin towers in height, that it would be completed in 2015, that properties around the building would increase in value, and PNB's investment in the project would provide a return of 8 to 10 percent. [The CEO has apparently forgotten that, not so long ago, PNB claims that it expects a return of 8% when it acquire a property in Melbourne Australia for RM 840 million which was better than if the money had been invested in Malaysia that yields a miserable 6 to 6.5 percent. But now he says that this project yields 8 to 10 percent].

Now it comes out of the horse's mouth that the land on which the two main properties sat was bought for RM 310 million from Danaharta. The CEO did not mention whether the 2 main properties were inclusive in the sales. [I remember the whole Merdeka complex including the land were given in exchange to UEM for footing the bill to construct the RM 880 million ringgit sports complex in Bukit Jalil for the Commonwealth Games. Was PNB then given a hefty discount ?] As the story slowly unfolds, today I come to know that the size of the land that PNB bought was 36 acres, of which some 17 acres are already being occupied by the 2 stadiums. The Warisan Merdeka project would be on the remaining 19 acres of land. The whole 36 acre was purchased at a price of RM 220 per square foot in 2000 and now PNB says that it's worth RM 800 per square foot. Fantastic ! Now PNB would say that it is making a very handsome 400 % profit ! What foresight !

Apparently, when questions were raised about the rationale for the construction of the Warisan Merdeka project, the Prime Minister Najib Razak denied that he (or the Malaysian Government) was involved and that it was all proposed by the PNB people. This make me mad because whatever money that's supposed to be given out as dividends would be diverted into funding the project or repayment of loans for the project. Rather than being a shareholder of shares in listed companies, PNB is now going to own a lot of properties; in fact being directly involved in the actual business itself.

Update 21/10/10: Where did I read that the CEO of PNB himself, Hamad Kama Piah, said that he won't touch the unitholder's funds in the Amanah Saham schemes to build the 100 storey building. The funds either come from PNB's profits for the past many years, or from borrowings, meaning even the interests on the borrowings would not be taken from the unitholders money. Good, now we know. The question now arises is how did PNB make profits before when whatever profits that PNB made should be franked out in the forms of dividends to the unitholders.

Update 22/10/10: At last somebody had criticised PNB on where it gets its profits other than from the RM 115 billion of investors money. A PKR member of Parliament by the name of Mahfuz Omar said that PNB would have to scrimp on the dividends in order to help fund the RM 5 billion project. [Mind you, PNB is already spending some RM 840 million to buy Santos Place in Brisbane Australia]. I know that PNB profits could only have come from the difference in the buy/sell transaction of the units amounting to 5% or 5 sen and from rental incomes of their properties e.g like the Darby Park. PNB gets nothing from the ASB unitholders since transaction of units does not entail any fee.

Update 02/11/10: The CEO of PNB, Hamad Kama Piah, keeps saying that he will not touch the unitholders funds nor the taxpayers money to build the Warisan Merdeka. He proudly boasts that PNB has its resources to fund the project. Many have wondered how PNB has got the money in the first place. My guess is that PNB has over the years squirrel away part of the dividends and has built substantial cash reserve to buy property as for example the Santos Place in Brisbane Australia for nearly RM 840 million. What I fear is that, firstly, the proposed RM 5 billion cost would double or triple by the time the project is completed; secondly, the project benefits a few people (the politicians and their cronies) and finally, the project runs the risk of being involved in scandals by which time billions of MYR will have been drained away. We have seen this before and we will see this again.

still under construction .....

People do get away with murders, ...

Crimes are on the increase. That's what I read about in the newspapers and the internet. Politicians talk about it, the police admits to it and want to do something about it while the public are scared stiff of it. Why, today I read of a body being found in a gunny sack, while not a few days ago, a decomposing body was found in a bush somewhere. The few murders that got reported today or yesterday, however, pales in comparison to the quadruple murders of cosmetics queen Sosilawati and her 3 associates by a couple of Indian lawyers in Banting. The Malaysian public, in particular the Malay public, were horrified to discover that such gruesome murders could be perpetrated in this country. Not even the Mafia could have committed such a murder on innocent people.

But this is not what I want to talk about. What I want to mention is about justice that apparently is not properly served. Today, the case of 2 Indonesian maids being abused by their employers, was resurrected by someone by the name of Zainal Hassan in an UM article.

One maid by the name of Mantik Hani died as a result of physical abuse by her Indian employer called Murugan who was found guilty and was sentenced to be hanged. He has since been waiting for the hangman. Another was a maid by the name of Nirmala Bonat who was physically abused by her Chinese employer called Yim Pek Hwa, an ex-airline stewardess. Yim was found guilty in the lower court and sentenced to 18 years jail but later, the sentence was commuted to 12 years jail by the higher court. Yim Pek Hwa was first remanded by the police on May 2004 and in spite of being found guilty , has spent only one day in jail. The case is under appeal. [Following the appeal, what I am afraid of is Yim may get away with it]

Not a few days ago in Penang, I read of a 27 year old person Loh Eng Hin who was set free by a a lower court judge for a crime which was nonetheless as serious as murder because the crime carries the death sentence. The Police found a pistol (Taurus PT 92AFS), a hand grenade, and 52 assorted rounds of ammo in the man's house in Ayer Itam, Penang. The man has no license to be in possession of items that obviously are classified as weapons. When brought to court, the man was not guilty as the judge deemed that the prosecution had insufficient evidence to prove that the weapons were in the man's possession and therefore had no prima facie case.

Here is another joker of justice. Some 4 years ago, 3 Malay men were caught in Penang for having 4.731 kg of cannabis. The judge let them go just because the Police had no prima facie case against them. What the police failed to do was to submit as evidence the original reports on the drugs from the Chemistry Dept. Instead, the DPP submitted copies as evidence which were not acceptable by the presiding judge. [I smell something fishy here].

What I am afraid of with regard to the Sosilawati murders is that the culprits might get away with it. Just towards the end of Ramadhan, the Malaysian nation was shocked to hear of the most gruesome murder ever perpetrated in this country. Not even the Mafia or the communist terrorists of yesteryear have ever committed such killings as violently cruel and gruesome as this one.

A couple of Indian lawyers together with 6 others, all of whom have been apprehended, murdered a Malay millionaire business woman and her 3 associates. The 4 apparently went to see the lawyers for some business, somehow lured to the lawyer's farm in Tanjung Sepat, Banting and were assaulted, murdered, (some say their throats were slit) and their bodies burnt like in funeral pyre, and their ashes scattered in nearby rivers. What I am afraid is a farcical miscarriage of justice when the culprits are brought to court. The case will drag for years and years until one fine day in the distant future when people have forgotten about it, the presiding judge might just dismiss the case as one that has no prima facie and let the murderers free. And the culprits, being Indians, might slip quietly to India to live happily ever after.

Update 23/09/2010: I am afraid the Attorney-General today, in asking the Police to include reports on several past reports of missing persons connected to the 2 murderous lawyers brothers, would complicate the subsequent court trial on the Sosilawati murders. The defense team would have an unfair advantage over the prosecution team. The defense lawyers would see to it that the hearing becomes so complex that the judge or panel of judges, shall be hard put to follow the thread of the trial that will, as I have mentioned earlier somewhere, drag on for years and years until, finally we hear of no prima facie case. What was stated in the local news are surely harbingers of the trial outcome which could again be an instance of justice delayed is justice denied. If I were the AG, I shall treat Sosilawati murders separate from the cases of missing persons, and quickly the crimes to the 2 lawyers brothers and his henchmen.

The Malaysian Ringgit ...

Is the Malaysian Ringgit getting stronger as some of the news media seem to tell us. Almost always in the exchange rate column in any newspaper, one reads that the MYR "strengthens" and "firms up" and so on and so forth. Now and then, the MYR naturally "weakens".

The strengthening seems to be more frequent than the weakening. But when looked closely, the fluctuations are based on the USD which is a currency that should be valueless now because there is nothing in the US to back up its currency, except for its money printing machine.

In the past year, the sterling pound (GBP) and the Euro have lost some 20-35 percent of their values compared to the MYR. But this is understandable because Britain's economy is sufferring from a severe recession while that of Europe is due to the economic problems in Greece, and the PIIGS country (Portugal, Italy, Ireland, Greece. Spain). But when you look closely again, the MYR has not improved over the S$, the AUD, the Baht, the Yen, or the Yuan, or even the Rupiah and the Peso. And lately, the GBP and Euro are gaining strengths to the extent that I fear their exchange rates would revert to the status of year 2007 when to buy the GBP and the Euro, Malaysians have to pay RM 6.99 and RM 5.01 respectively.

The only currencies that never seem to lose their values and instead perpetually gaining strengths are the Yen and the S$.

Just to remind myself on the history of the Malaysian Ringgit (MYR), at one time its rate was RM 2.50 to the USD. At the height of the Asian financial crisis when the MYR was attacked by a bunch of financial terrorists led by US George Soros, the MYR weakened to as low as RM 4.96 to the USD. To prevent further attacks on the Ringgit, then Malaysian PM Mahathir Mohammad fixed it to RM 3.80 per USD. It stayed at this rate for some time until 22nd July 2005 when it was allowed a limited float amongst other regional currencies. Since then, the Ringgit slowly improved until today when it takes RM 3.12 to buy one USD. When will it go back to old rate of RM 2.50 to one USD ?