REPOST : Diplomatic incident brewing: Mahathir declares Raja Petra a liar,AG NSW and his department insist that RPK is a credible source of information about Mahathir

by Ganesh Sahathevan

Readers of this blog and its related Realpolitikasia blog will recall that a Department Of Justice NSW,Australia, document considers this article to be credible:

Ganesh Sahathevan, RPK, Clare Brown, Ginny Stein and the blood money trail.
The story by one Raggie Jessy Rithaudeen states that all the above named and others at the Australian Broadcasting Corporation were paid by Malaysian Prime Minister Mahathir Mohamad millions of dollars to fabricate stories about the 1MDB theft by former PM Najib Razak.


The Thirdforce website is co-hosted on the Malaysia-Today website, which is published by one Raja Petra Kamaruddin who is known as RPK.RPK published the above story on his own website.


Last Friday PM Mahathir told reporters in Malaysia:
“Raja Petra Kamarudin is a liar and you still believe him......”

The  Department Of Justice NSW, and its Minister, the Attorney General NSW Mark Speakman SC  have refused to retract their reliance on the Malaysia-Today/Thirdforce article, despite the obviously false claims in the article, which also claims that Mahathir's payments to the ABC are part of a conspiracy which involves Tony Blair, Donald Rumsfeld, George Soros and he.

Mahathir calling RPK a liar sets the Department,its minister the AG NSW,and the Federal Government on a diplomatic collision course with the Malaysian Government.

Not a bad effort for a state government department whose minister is MP for a constituency better known for its surf.

END         

SEE ALSO

Bizarre blog claims used to deny man right to practise law

Mahathir flags frostier Australia-Malaysia relations

Tun Mahathir Mohamad, Malaysia's former prime minister. Picture: Sanjit Das.

• EXCLUSIVE

  AMANDA HODGE

  SOUTH EAST ASIA CORRESPONDENT

  
• 12:00AM MARCH 23, 2018
• NO COMMENTS

Australia’s famously prickly relationship with former Malaysian leader Mahathir Mohamad might not be less tempestuous a second time around with the 92-year-old now seeking re-election as the opposition candidate, and flagging concerns over Canberra’s “Pacific solution” for asylum-seekers and warning “I am not a nice person”.

Only weeks from a likely election battle, Dr Mahathir conceded bilateral relations with Australia are better under current Prime Minister Najib Razak — whose scandal-plagued government is accused of trying to secure re-election through unfair boundary ­realignments and voter incentives — than they were during his 22 years as leader.

Dr Mahathir, who frequently sparred with Australian journalists and was memorably branded a “recalcitrant” by Paul Keating for boycotting the 1993 APEC summit because he favoured an ­exclusively Asian caucus, said ­Malaysia would continue to enjoy good relations with Australia if he was re-elected leader.

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But, he said: “It would depend on the situation. I don’t like the way some new immigrants are being treated, the way some boatpeople are being sent to the Pacific Islands, kept there and actually imprisoned there.

“Does it mean I should not say it? I would speak the truth. I don’t try to win support by being very nice. I am not a nice person,” he said with a smile.

On the question of Australia joining ASEAN, which arose ­before last weekend’s Sydney summit when Indonesian President Joko Widodo said he would welcome their membership, Dr Mahathir, 92, said that while “geographically” it made sense for Australia to join the 10-nation group it might not be a good cultural fit. “In terms of sentiment, culture, there is a need to understand East Asian culture on the part of Australia. Some Australian leaders are quite insensitive.”

Dr Mahathir quit Malaysia’s ruling UMNO party in 2016 after speaking out over the alleged misappropriation of more than $US4.5 billion from 1MDB, a state development fund chaired by Mr Najib that the US Department of Justice has described as the worst case of kleptocracy it has seen.

In January he announced a previously inconceivable alliance with the opposition coalition led by his one-time deputy and political nemesis Anwar Ibrahim, who is serving a second prison term on politically motivated sodomy charges and is due to be released in June. Both men have said the ­alliance was driven by an urgent need to topple Mr Najib and UMNO, the party that has formed every Malaysian government since 1957.

Under the partnership, Dr Mahathir will stand as prime ministerial candidate for the opposition Pakatan Harapan and if elected, seek a royal pardon for Dr Anwar on his release so that he may take over the premiership.

“I will not be a passive seat warmer,’’ he said. “The reason why they (opposition) chose me is because of my past ­experience. I know what to do in the first 100 days of becoming prime minister. I have to democratise the country again. I have to limit the powers of the prime minister’s office, restore the rule of law.

“All these things I can do in a short time. The big problem comes with the money (Najib) has borrowed, money the country can never repay. The central bank says the debt is more than 800 billion ringgit ($264bn). That will be ­difficult to tackle but I know where some of the money is.”

While his promises to restore democracy have raised some eyebrows in Malaysia, including among opposition politicians jailed for civil dissent during his premiership, Dr Mahathir insisted yesterday: “I am not a dictator.

“When I was in government I did not exercise the kinds of ­powers that Najib does. He does not respect the rule of law at all or the constitution,’’ he said.

AMANDA HODGE

SOUTH EAST ASIA CORRESPONDENT

Amanda Hodge is The Australian’s South East Asia correspondent. Based in Jakarta, she has covered war, refugees, terror attacks, natural disasters and social and political upheaval from Afghanistan to Sri Lanka... Read more

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PM Mahathir need only look to AMMB and ANZ in his quest to recover all monies stolen by Jho Low-More on what else Malaysia should do, but is not ....

by Ganesh Sahathevan 



This writer reported recently that it does not look like PM Mahathir's government is interested in doing anything on its own to help the effort, which to date has been driven by the US Department Of Justice, of recovering the money that PM Mahathir says Jho Low stole from 1MDB.

That story was concerned primarily with some USD 1 Billion held in Singapore,which came out of KWAP.

Meanwhile, it does not appear as if the Malaysian Government and 
its agencies have done anything to secure the evidence of AMMB Holdings Bhd's investment banking division's collaboration with Jho Low which netted him some USD 126 Million.Bloomberg reported on 24 January 2019:

Authorities are probing a 5 billion ringgit ($1.2 billion) bond sale in 2009 by Terengganu Investment Authority, or TIA, a sovereign wealth fund that later became 1MDB, according to people familiar with the matter. Investigators believe that $126 million of illicit funds -- which Low and his associate Eric Tan have been charged with receiving -- came from the deal arranged by AMMB Holdings Bhd., known as AmBank, and involving companies in Thailand and Singapore, said one of the people.

The above investigation should have led to a long overdue raid of AMBank, and seizure of all relevant records.It should have also led to an equally overdue investigation into ANZ Banking Group Ltd's part in the 1MDB theft. The inaction does not reflect well on all involved in the 1MDB investigation, and charged with the recovery of the stolen assets.


END 

Reference 

Deafening Silence Out Of Australia Over 1MDB's Connection To Top Bank ANZ

• 25 January 2019
 
• 16

Today the Bloomberg news service released details from Malaysian investigations into a matter long suspected by observers of the 1MDB scandal, namely hanky panky surrounding the original bonds raised in May 2009 by AmBank to launch the fund’s forerunner the Terengganu Investment Authority (TIA).

Those bonds worth RM5 billion ($1.2 billion) were originally sold by the sovereign fund at a considerable discount of 13%, despite an usually attractive high rate of interest.  That meant a considerable loss to the fund and many have questioned whether intermediaries had stood to benefit.

The advisor to the fund was PM Najib Razak’s proxy Jho Low and today’s leaked information to Bloomberg has apparently confirmed an extraordinary pattern of dealmaking by AmBank on the bonds that enabled Jho to skim a whopping $126 million from the fund out of those sales.

Thanks to close orchestration by a number of parties, which appears to have included banking officials, 3.8billion ringgit of the original TIA notes were sold to a Thai company called Country Group Securities at a discounted rate of 87 ringgit for 100 (the remainder of the issue was bought by a Singapore company and the bank itself at the same discount rate).

Yet, within 24 hours all these bonds had been resold by those parties for a fat profit, according to documents obtained by investigators.  AmBank apparently assisted in arranging those instant resales for 100 ringgit to 105 ringgit to local investors.

Following which, lo and behold, Country Group issued a third-party transfer instruction to AmBank to pay $113 million of the windfall to a Singapore company named ACME Time, which Sarawak Report has already identified as being under the control of Jho Low through his proxy Eric Tan.  A further $12.6 million was paid to ACME Time in July 2009.

AmBank, which had bought RM500 million of the bonds at the same discount was also in position to have made a similar huge sum, which must certainly have generated good bonuses. RM700 million went to the Singapore company.

So, unless the Bloomberg story is entirely false, despite providing the most likely explanation for the strange pattern of sales, AmBank was involved every step of the way and also involved in the profiteering. It makes its position every bit as awkward as that of Goldman Sachs, which performed a similar role during the later bond issues by 1MDB leading to investigations by the FBI leading to criminal charges from Malaysia as well.

ANZ Bank Is Largest Shareholder of AmBank

This is not the only embarrassing 1MDB related matter that has entangled AmBank. The bank was also the key player in the buy out of UBG by a bogus subsidiary of 1MDB’s first bogus joint venture partner, oil firm PetroSaudi thereby netting healthy profits for Jho again, who had invested in the Chief Minister of Sarawak’s family company.

During that sale Sarawak Report has detailed how faced with political pressure the bankers involved overlooked time and again glaring irregularities, including the fact that the so-called PetroSaudi subsidiary that was allegedly buying UBG was in fact an entirely separate bogus off-shore company trading off an identical name.

None of this could have escaped the scrutiny of the hierachy of AmBank in KL, particularly given the massive sums involved. These were the top deals at the bank at the time. And it is this fact that demands an investigation and explanation from the Australian financial regulators known as  ASIC, because the majority shareholder of AmBank is the leading Australian bank ANZ.

Sarawak Report has already pointed out along with others that all the top ranking officials stationed to managed AmBank in KL were on secondment from ANZ’s Sydney headquarters, a matter advertised as a badge of strong managment by the then Head of ANZ, Mike Smith, who had presided over the expansion of ANZ into Southeast Asia.

Mike Smith, like Goldman Sach’s Lloyd Blankfein, surprised many by taking an early departure from his Chief Executive’s post, just as the 1MDB issue started to hot up around his bank. A number of other key Australian executives have also moved on to greater things, including the former AmBank Chief Financial Officer, who has taken up a leading job in another financial group. The AmBank CEO of the time Ashok Ramamurthy relocated back to Sydney early.

However, despite persistent and compelling information that all such senior officials in KL along with ANZ’s own top brass had to have known about the massive transactions and also the huge sums that later poured into Najib’s own personal account at AmBank, there has been no announcement of an official enquiry by ASIC or investigations into malpractice.

Mike Smith’s successor as CEO Shayne Elliott told Australian MPs when questioned that ANZ’s seconded staff in KL had no duty to report back to ANZ or apparent duty to maintain standards of due diligence, despite ANZ’s largest single 20% shareholding in the bank:

“Once those employees are seconded there, they essentially sever their ties with ANZ almost 100 per cent,”

That claim by the bank’s head honcho was made in October 2016, since when the full nature of the scandal has become increasingly and unavoidably clear. Other banks have been investigated, punished, fined by different regulators and Goldman has apologised and admitted money was misappropriated from the bonds it raised.

Sarawak Report has also showed that ANZ’s own PR has contradicted the claim about the severing of ties:

“Mr Ramamurthy will also report to ANZ” – not so ‘severed’ after 
all!

The Australian prime minister at the time of the 1MDB misappropriations, Tony Abbott, tweeted his disappointment that Najib Razak (whom he described as a ‘good friend to Australia’) was defeated on May 9th.

However, Abbott’s successors ought to wake up to the fact that matters have moved on and slowly and inexorably investigators from the new government of Malaysia are turning up the details of exactly what happened at AmBank during the course of the 1MDB scandal.

That looks likely to include ANZ’s role in the affair and in any cover-up conducted by the Australian bank, including failures – deliberate or otherwise – on the part of the Australian regulators.

Malaysia-Singapore Water Agreements: Singapore research reveals factors that have not been considered by Malaysia when determining price of raw water

by Ganesh Sahathevan


First see

Singapore ,1 MDB,a change of leadership & the water agreements: A public admission from Singapore that the water agreements are not sustainable

And now, new research from Singapore, which analyses economic  returns  to Singapore arising out of the exercise of the agreements, not previously considered in explicit terms, and ignored by both sides when the price of raw water was negotiated: 

Water Research

Volume 157, 15 June 2019, Pages 310-320

Non-market value of Singapore's ABC Waters Program

Author links open overlay panelMd SayedIftekharabJoostBuurmancTommy KevinLeecQihuiHedEnidChend

https://doi.org/10.1016/j.watres.2019.03.004Get rights and content

Highlights

•

Information on the economic value of the Active, Beautiful, Clean (ABC) Waters Programme in Singapore is lacking.

•

Non-market valuation study on ABC Waters conducted for the first time.

•

People are willing to pay (WTP) for ABC Waters design features.

•

The WTP is higher for respondents living in private residences with ABC Waters certificates.

•

There is clear impact of using a virtual reality app on the people's WTPs.

Abstract

Water sensitive urban design is being promoted in many countries. In Singapore, the Active, Beautiful, Clean (ABC) Waters Programme is a long-term strategic initiative of PUB, Singapore's National Water Agency, to improve the quality of water and urban liveability. While there are some estimates of the bio-physical and ecological benefits of the ABC Waters Programme, information on its social or non-market values is lacking. Using choice experiment datasets this study explores whether people express preferences for ABC Waters features. It also examines whether there is any difference in preferences between respondents living in developments with and without ABC Waters certification, and between respondents living in public and private housing. It is found that respondents living in private housing have substantially higher willingness to pay for ABC Waters features compared to the respondents in public housing. The differences between respondents from certified and non-certified projects were found to be mixed. Such information would be useful to tailor the design of the ABC Waters program. Finally, the potential impact of using a virtual reality tool to present information in a choice experiment towards people's preferences is explored. Application of a virtual reality tool has reduced the proportion of protest voters and increased people's willingness to pay for ABC Waters projects. Thus, this paper contributes to the growing literature on the implications of providing information visually in non-market valuation surveys.

END 

Australia's DFAT & legal establishment attack Mahathir; Australia now forced to accept radioactive and plastic waste from Malaysia

by Ganesh Sahathevan

Reported in Mining News:

Rare earths miner Lynas Corp (ASX: LYC) said Tuesday it intended to relocate its contentious processing plant from Malaysia to one of two preferred sites in Western Australia, where its Mt Weld mine is located.

The company, the world's only major producer of rare earths outside China, said the A$500 million-plan ($346 million) aims to boost production, appease Malaysian regulators and fend off takeover attempts.

Reported in The Australian

Mislabelled Australian plastic waste is understood to be among a number of shipments of foreign domestic rubbish to be sent back by the Malaysian government following an official investigation into waste smuggling.

Malaysian Environment Minister Yeo Bee Yin is today expected to reveal details of an official investigation into the “mislabelling” — or smuggling — of ­foreign waste into the Southeast Asian nation, months after the government shut down more than 150 illegal plastic waste sorting factories.

It is understood several containers of domestic rubbish could be returned in coming weeks, causing further national embarrassment amid an increasing focus on Australia’s role in the global waste scandal.

All this follows continuing attacks on Mahathir by Australia's Anwar Ibrahim leaning Department Of Foreign Affairs, and anti-Mahatir legal establishment.See

Lessons from Turrle Beach and ABC's Embassy for DFAT as it continues its attacks on Mahathir

END 

See also

Tuesday, March 26, 2019

Wesfarmer's Lynas takeover: Betting on Mahathir's demise, and a Anwar Ibrahim-Najib Razak Lynas friendly government.

by Ganesh Sahathevan

Mr Anwar Ibrahim (left), who was pardoned and released from his five-year jail term for sodomy on May 16, said he had received two calls from ousted former premier Najib Razak on the night of the election.PHOTOS: REUTERS, AFP

Much has been said about the sovereign risks attached to Lynas Ltd's business operations in Malaysia, which Wesfarmers Ltd seems happy to assume as part of its proposed acquisition of Lynas.

Lynas was on safer ground when Malaysia was still ruled by former PM Najib Razak.The election of Mahathit Mohamad as prime minister has introduced uncertainty; even though Mahathir himself is said to be supportive of Lynas' business in Malaysia, the election in May last year has brought

into power a number of parties who have consistently opposed Lynas' in Malaysia.

At 94 Mahathir's demise due to death or ill health is highly probable, and if as many in Australia expect the so-called Prime Minister in waiting Anwar Ibrahim replaces him, Wesfamers may well be then subject to a more friendly regulatory regime in Malaysia due to two reasons.

First, Anwar is expected to form an alliance with Najib to secure his position as prime minister, and secure a succession that would favour his family. Second;Anwar is considered a friend of Australia ,while Mahathir is not;and in that context can be expected to do what he can to ensure that Australian interests in Malaysia are protected. An ageing Anwar is fast running out of of friends overseas,and can be expected to do what he can to keep those he has.

Therefore, Wesfarmers may well be betting t on Mahathir's death; buying low now when Lynas remains under a cloud;and expecting that the value of its investment will rise rapidly once Mahathir is gone,and Lynas is returned to the position it was in when Najib was prime minister. Lynas' operations are located in the State of Pahang,which remains a Najib stronghold.

END

Posted by Unknown at 7:00 PM