Loan sharks bug defaulter’s ex

Woman and her mum targeted after hubby goes missing

KUALA LUMPUR: A woman is in trouble with loans sharks who are going after her over a RM700,000 debt owed to them by her former husband.

Tan Lee Yin, 38, from Batu Pahat, said she divorced her husband, 41, two years ago due to his gambling debt and even made this public via a Chinese newspaper.

Despite this, she said the loan sharks were still hunting for her.

“They are even troubling my mother,” she said.

Tan said on July 25, five men went to her mother’s house in Parit Sulong, Johor, in a black MPV and demanded the total sum of RM700,000.

Tan said her father installed a CCTV at the home the next day for safety.

“But the loan sharks came again that afternoon, left their contact and asked to negotiate,’’ she said, adding that her ex-husband’s whereabouts was unknown.

Tan, who has two children, said she could not take it anymore and lodged a report at the Kluang police station on July 26, but the ah long told her they were not worried about the police.

“They said if anything happened to them, we had to watch out. I am so afraid that I do not even want to go out of my house.

“Please, let us go. Find him (her husband). Don’t disturb my family members anymore,” she appealed after meeting MCA Public Services and Complaints Department head Datuk Seri Michael Chong at his office here yesterday.

Tan said the ah long kept returning to her mother’s house until Aug 2.

“They pasted photocopies of her Mykad on streetlamps, accusing her of being a con woman,” she said.

Chong said the ah long splashed red and blue paint on July 27 and Aug 2 on Tan’s mother’s house to intimidate the family members.

He urged the ah long to leave Tan and her family members alone, adding that they had nothing to do with the debt.

Meanwhile, Chong said there were 231 cases of loan sharks harassing victims so far this year with a total of RM21.2mil involved.

The bulk of the cases involved the Chinese community, with 172 cases reported.

He said there was a rise in cases involving loan sharks after the recent FIFA World Cup.

The one they want: Tan holding up an advertisement she placed in a Chinese paper and a picture of her ex-husband during her meeting with Chong at Wisma MCA.