‘BUCG held less than 1% in SPV’
Wee: Lim must explain the 10% share as claimed
KUALA LUMPUR: Datuk Seri Dr Wee Ka Siong is questioning whether Beijing Urban Construction Group (BUCG) has ever held a 10% share in the special purpose vehicle (SPV) for the Penang undersea tunnel and three main roads project.
In yet another episode of the project saga, the Minister in the Prime Minister’s Department pointed out that searches on the Companies Commission of Malaysia (SSM) showed that BUCG only held less than 1% – 0.00571% to be exact – in the SPV, before it was eventually dropped from the project.
Dr Wee wants Penang Chief Minister Lim Guan Eng to explain this as the Penang state government had claimed that BUCG had a 10% equity in the SPV for the RM6.3bil project.
“Since he signed the contract, did he discover that throughout the entire process, BUCG did not own 10% shareholding?
“Based on information obtained from the Companies Commission, BUCG only accounted for 1,000 out of the 17,500,000 shares in the SPV on May 11, 2016, or a measly
0.00571% of the entire shareholding. It is lower than 1%, let alone 10%.
“I would like to ask Lim, when did BUCG’s shares ever account for a 10% stake in the SPV?” he pointed this out at a press conference in Wisma MCA here yesterday.
He said BUCG was originally part of the SPV, which was named Consortium Zenith BUCG Sdn Bhd.
The Chinese company was later left out of the project following a fatal crane accident in Kuala Lumpur on Aug 25, 2016, he added.
Dr Wee added that another search on SSM a year later on June 14, 2017 yielded the same result on the shareholding, although the SPV had at this point been renamed Consortium Zenith Construction Sdn Bhd.
The shareholding had changed in the next search on SSM on Jan 16 this year, with BUCG officially dropped from the SPV, he added.
Meanwhile, Dr Wee said he was shocked to hear Lim say that what he said before the inking of the agreement on October 2013 was “not as important or relevant” compared to the contractual agreement.
On whether he would engage Lim in a debate over the mega project, Dr Wee said he was up for it if Lim wanted to, but he predicted Lim would say no.
Earlier yesterday, Dr Wee issued a statement repeating his challenge to Lim to prove that China Railway Construction Corporation Ltd (CRCC) was still the master contractor of the said mega project.
He dared Lim to instruct the SPV to provide documented proof of pay- ments made to CRCC since the contract signing in 2013.
He added that the SPV should also show proof of what was CRCC’s exact role in the mega project over the past five years.
“Penangites also have the right to know if the SPV still fulfils the RM381 mil minimum paid-up capital to even qualify for the tender.
“With Guan Eng saying that CRCC was never a shareholder despite what he had said before and following the withdrawal of BUCG from the project, the state government has essentially awarded a RM 6.34bil project to an 82-day-old company with a paid-up capital of only RM300,000 at that time,” he said.
In 2013, Lim’s open letter, published in Buletin Mutiara’s March 16-31 edition, stated that the state government had awarded the tender to Consortium Zenith BUCG, an SPV company set up by a joint venture among Construction Zenith and CRCC along with BUCG, Sri Tinggi Sdn Bhd and Juteras Sdn Bhd.
There was also a chart in the letter which stated that the paid-up capital of the consortium was RM4.549 bil.