‘Govt had to transfer Telekom, TNB shares’
KUALA LUMPUR: The government was forced to transfer its shares in Telekom Malaysia Bhd and Tenaga Nasional Bhd to Bank Negara Malaysia at the nominal value of RM1 per share in the early 1990s, said Second Finance Minister Datuk Seri Johari Abdul Ghani.
This was to cover for Bank Negara’s losses of RM31.5 billion from foreign exchange (forex) speculative activities in 1992 and 1993, Johari said in an open letter to former prime minister Tun Dr Mahathir Mohamad yesterday following the latter’s blog post.
Johari said the shares were revalued by the central bank at RM22.10 per Telekom share and RM19.30 per Tenaga share.
Bank Negara had to dispose of its Malaysia Airlines shares to a third party at RM8 per share and Malaysian International Shipping Corporation Bhd shares at RM10 per share to Kumpulan Wang Amanah Pencen to realise a profit.
He said these findings were highlighted in an internal audit report prepared by Bank Negara’s auditors dated Jan 21, 1994.
“Because of the scale of these foreign exchange speculative activities losses, the government was forced to transfer its shares in Telekom and Tenaga Nasional to Bank Negara at the nominal value of RM1 per share.
“Bank Negara had to dispose off its Malaysia Airlines shares to a third party at the price of RM8 per share and MISC shares at RM10 per share to Kumpulan Wang Pencen in order to realise the gain.”
Johari said if these forex losses were not real, the government would not have taken these drastic actions to cover the Bank Negara losses at that time.