‘Govt decision huge relief for EPF members’
KUALA LUMPUR: The government’s decision not to sell its stake in PLUS Malaysia Bhd has come as a huge relief, particularly to the millions of the Employees Provident Fund (EPF) members.
Reactions to such a keenlyawaited news perhaps were best summed up by Member of Parliament for Sekijang, Anuar Abdul Manap, who said: “I can almost hear the 14.5 million EPF members heaving a sigh of relief that EPF investment in PLUS will remain intact.
“The government is right in retaining the ownership of PLUS simply because it is a strategic national asset and steady dividends from the highways’ operations flow down to EPF members,” he said.
Government-linked entities UEM Group and EPF own 51 and 49 per cent, respectively, of PLUS.
Toll operator Maju Holdings Sdn Bhd kicked up considerable excitement in the local market when it announced its RM36 billion plan to take over PLUS last month. The company has also sweetened the offer by promising “no toll hike” for the next 20 years, when the concession agreement ends in 2038.
But in Parliament last week, the Finance Minister said in a written reply that the government had no plans to let go of its stake to Maju Holdings, which is owned by Tan Sri Abu Sahid Mohamed.
Yet another factor to be considered is the new operator’s ability to manage PLUS, given its position as the backbone of the nation’s highway system and a strategic national asset.
It said this was vital to ensure that the government wouldn’t have to bail out PLUS in the event of economic shocks and uncertainties in the foreign exchange market.
“The government takes a serious view of the financial standing of private entities such as Maju Holdings, especially in financing this corporate exercise,” Parliament was told.
This clear-cut political will of the government is clearly a game-changer in itself, given some bitter lessons learnt from the past, especially the privatisation of steel maker Perwaja and Malaysia Airlines more than 20 years ago.
In both cases, the government had to inject massive funds on several occasions to bail them out from insolvency. Several economists have also expressed strong reservation about the “no toll hike” carrot being dangled with the takeover bid.
Prof Tan Sri Dr Noor Azlan Ghazali said the bad experience of the past when the government decided to part with strategic national assets should not be repeated.
Universiti Kebangsaan Malaysia vice-chancellor Dr Noor Azlan said as the nation’s communication backbone with a crucial and much larger economic role, PLUS should remain in government hands and not be subject to any takeover by a third party.
Anuar also alluded to the government’s move announced in the 2018 Budget for the abolition of tolls at four highways, of which three belonged to PLUS.
“This is a very bold move by the prime minister. This is made possible because PLUS belongs to the government via Khazanah and EPF.
“In fact, even the compensation to be paid out for the abolition of tolls at these three highways will be ploughed back to the 14.5 million EPF members by way of dividends,” he said. Bernama