SAVE RIVERS lodges police report against IHA and Sarawak Energy

Bruno Manser Fonds

The International Hydropower Assocation’s World Congress to be held in Kuching, Sarawak/ Malaysia, from 21 to 24 May 2013, is beginnig badly.

Peter Kallang, an important indigenous leader from Baram, Sarawak, has been barred this morning from a pre-congress workshop organized jointly by the International Hydropower Association (IHA), the World Bank, the International Finance Corporation (IFC), the Asian Development Bank (ADB) and the Inter-American Development Bank (IDB).

Despite having paid the horrendous IHA World Congress’ registration fee of USD 1750, Mr. Kallang was stopped this morning from boarding a bus to the International Hydropower Association’s pre-congress workshop at Sarawak Energy Bhd’s office. The reason given to Mr. Kallang was that he had written critical letters to the International Hydropower Association’s chairman, Richard Taylor, over the IHA’s cooperation with the regime of Sarawak Chief Minister Taib Mahmud and the association’ss policy to exclude affected indigenous people from the congress.

Sidelined Sarawak reps demand seats in Najib’s Cabinet

DEBRA CHONG

Najib speaks during the announcement of his new Cabinet line-up at his office in Putrajaya May 15, 2013.

Overlooked lawmakers in the Barisan Nasional’s (BN) East Malaysian vote bank say they should also be aboard Datuk Seri Najib Razak’s Cabinet, believing they had earned full ministerial positions after their victorious run in the May 5 polls.

Some 40 branches of Sarawak’s SPDP said they will petition the prime minister to consider allocating to them at least one ministerial seat and one deputy minister post, believing Najib’s decision to have been an oversight as the party had netted four federal seats for the Barisan Nasional (BN).

TI divided over Taib’s dam congress

Keruah Usit

The anti-corruption NGO Transparency International, or TI, faces an internal split over its support for the World Congress of the International Hydropower Association (IHA), to be held in Kuching, Sarawak from May 21 to 24.

Transparency International-Malaysia (TI-M) secretary general Josie Fernandez (right) toldMalaysiakini that she and other Malaysian members were “disappointed and embarrassed that TI is a sponsor of the World Congress hosted by Sarawak Energy Berhad (SEB), a public company controlled by Abdul Taib Mahmud, the Sarawak chief minister who is being investigated by the Malaysian Anti-Corruption Commission (MACC) on allegations of grand corruption.”

SUPP’s deregistration ‘very real’

Joseph Tawie

Rumours are rife that Wong Soon Koh’s faction in SUPP is looking at a number of options in the event the party is deregistered.

Is 54-year-Sarawak United Peoples Party (SUPP), which began as a party for working class Chinese here way back in 1959, facing the ROS axe?

Bengoh state assemblyman Dr Jerip Susil seems to think the possibility of this happening is “very real”.

Susil is a SUPP assemblyman aligned to Senior Minister Wong Soon Koh’s faction within the party. Wong’s faction had disputed the party’s tienniel delegates convention and the presidential elections held in December 2011

Dayaks push Najib for more

FMT Staff

Speculations are rife that chief ministers of both Sarawak and Sabah are lobbying for a bigger representation in the federal cabinet.

Sarawak’s predominantly Dayak community delivered to Prime Minister Najib Tun Razak 25 parliamentary seats in the tumultuous general election on May 5 and the general consensus here is that its loyalty and contribution must be acknowledged by the top leadership, not just in words but in full-fledged ministerial posts.

Sarawak has 31 and Sabah 25 parliamentary seats. Both states collectively delivered 48 seats to Barisan Nasional’s 133 tally which aided their contentious retention of the federal government.

Najib and Anwar turn up the heat in Saratok

Kow Gah Chie

The sleepy town of Saratok – some 60km south of Sarikei – experienced a starstruck weekend due to the appearance of both BN chairperson Najib Abdul Razak and PKR de facto leader Anwar Ibrahim.

The duo were here to pour fuel into an already heated battle shaping up between BN’s William Mawan Ikon, the favourite to win, and PKR candidate Ali Biju, who is one of Sarawak PKR’s latest poster-child.

Ali Biju was a virtual unknown in Sarawak politics until he miraculously defeated long-time Krian state assemblyperson Peter Nyarok Entrie, the Sarawak Progressive Democratic Party (SPDP) deputy president, during the 2011 state elections.

PR wants ‘Allah’ Bibles returned to prisoners

Joseph Tawie

Political parties in Sarawak have also been urged to state their stand on the seizure of bibles from the Sibu prison.

The issue of “Allah” and the Malay Bible is far from over. It has cropped up again when prison authorities seized hundreds of Malay and Iban-language Bibles with the word “Allah” from a prison in Sibu over the past few weeks.

This has not gone down well with the Christians who make up 44% of the state’s population.

Smoking Gun! The Company That Links Taib To The Hong Kong Timber Kickback Scandal

Sarawak Report

The name of the company is Natalite Investment Limited and it is based in Hong Kong.

We can now reveal, after extensive investigations into the papers of Ross Boyert, the former manager of Taib’s US property company Sakti International, how Natalite Investment Ltd links the Chief Minister to the Japanese timber kickback scandal, which he has consistently denied.

Natalite Investment Ltd is one of a web of companies originally ‘owned’ by one Shea Kin Kwok, who came to fame in 2007 as the ‘owner’ of Regent Star, the company that was receiving millions in kickbacks from Japanese shipping companies in Sarawak.

Let’s ‘Ubah’, urges wounded land rights defender

Keruah Usit

Video Link  “This is my message. We must all change, open our eyes now. Think about it. All of us have suffered. Our land, our world has been taken away, not just in Melikin, but everywhere, in Sibu, Kapit, Sri Aman, Batang Rajang, Baram.

“All of it has been taken by other people. It’s because of this that we, the people, suffer,” said Surik anak Muntai, an elderly defender of native customary rights (NCR) to land in Sarawak.

Surik, 66, had his right forearm and both legs slashed with machetes by four men on March 15, as he waited for his wife and son outside Sekolah Sungai Menyan, Serian, located just over an hour’s drive from Kuching.

Witty game changer?

Amir Ali

It appears there is a huge gap between Pakatan’s ability to manipulate to its advantage the situation and BN’s obvious disparage limitations in that aspect.

The opposition has grown witty and is toying around with the Barisan Nasional in a strategic game changing battle that is slowly drowning the ruling coalition, which clearly shows the limits of Prime Minister Najib Tun Razak.

Pakatan Rakyat has played BN on both Anwar Ibrahim’s poser over Perak and Chua Jui Meng’s sudden disappearing act, to the extent that both personalities must be rolling with laughter over their breakthrough strategies.

Tycoon dodges millions in land tax

Mark Baker

One of Asia’s richest tycoons has avoided tax on tens of millions of dollars in profits from Australian property deals over the past two decades.

Onn Mahmud – brother of the billionaire chief minister of Sarawak – has used an elaborate global financial network to export his earnings from a portfolio of Sydney commercial and residential properties worth an estimated $100 million.

In one deal, Mr Onn sold an apartment development site in Sydney’s Potts Point for $15.5 million in 2007 – realising a profit of $10.8 million. A former senior business associate of Mr Onn said no capital gains tax was paid on the deal and all of the proceeds were transferred to a trust based in the Cayman Islands tax haven.

Najib: Larry not a BN-friendly candidate

FMT

The BN chairman also dismisses talk that the Sarawak Workers Party is a BN affliated party.

Najib Tun Razak said today the Sarawak Workers Party (SWP) did not have the blessing of the Barisan Nasional (BN) to contest the Lubok Antu parliamentary seat in the 13th general election.

SWP’s claim of having fielded its president, Larry Sng, as a BN-friendly candidate in the seat was not at all true, said the prime minister.

‘Who killed Altantuya?’ billboards demolished

Joseph Tawie

DAP’s Chong Chieng Jen says the billboards were put up to send a simple but clear message to Najib Tun Razak.

Three billboards with the words “Siapa bunuh Altantuya” that were erected in strategic points in conjunction with Barisan Nasional chairman Najib Tun Razak’s visit to Kuching today have been demolished.

DAP Bandar Kuching candidate Chong Chieng Jen said the billboards were torn down by Kuching South City council’s enforcement officers last night.

Chong said the billboards were erected because the Altantuya Shaariibuu murder case continues to remain a mystery.

Sarawak CM’s brother avoids millions in Oz land tax, says newspaper

MI

Sabah Chief Minister Musa Aman and Deputy Prime Minister Muhyiddin Yassin wave Barisan Nasional flags during a pre-election campaign in Keningau in Sabah, February 22, 2013.

The Sarawak chief minister’s brother, Onn Mahmud, has been using the Cayman Islands tax haven to avoid tax on millions of dollars in profits from property deals there over the past 20 years, Australia’s The Age reported today.

The daily reported that Onn used an elaborate global financial network to export his earnings from a portfolio of Sydney commercial and residential properties worth an estimated A$100 million (RM311.8 million). A recent report also said many Malaysian tycoons and politicians have offshore accounts in the tax havens.

Onn Mahmud Is Flushed Out In Australia!

Sarawak Report

Crooked behaviour from Sarawak’s ‘leading family’ shames anyone who votes for them.

Australia’s respected Sunday paper The Age is bristling with headlines about Chief Minister Taib Mahmud’s brother Onn today.

“Tycoon dodges millions in land tax”, “Dubious dealings” and “Catch him if you can, the mysterious disappearance of Malaysia’s second richest man” are the titles for a series of detailed exposes about Onn, who was Taib’s key business nominee for several years, before being exposed as the recipient of millions in kickbacks from Japanese timber exporters.

The Old Man is losing his cool it seems.

Being Vernon

The cracks are beginning to show. Taib is losing his cool in public, which is rare. Very rare.

So what does this indicate? Body language experts can read all sorts of into this sudden behavioural pattern change; from the super-cool and super-confident Taib to a now agitated Taib, retorting back to even the journalist doing his job! But it does not take body language experts to deduce that the once indomitable and formidable strongman of PBB is now succumbing to the intense pressures from within and without.

Taib Panics And Offers Headmen A Living Wage!

Sarawak Report

Inside his Rolls Royce – fear is opening Taib’s tight purse….

What better sign of BN’s panic that they may lose this election than the frantic handouts and sudden promises of ‘projects’ that we have been seeing this week?

In 2008 the average election bribe that BN paid to poor rural folk per vote was a mere RM10.  Yet this week the timber tycoon MP Tiong Thai King was going round offering a fat RM1,000 each!

So, now people are starting to learn what these politicians can really afford and why it pays to stand up to the bullies in BN.

Princess Jamilah In Business Exporting Hardwood From Sarawak To The USA!

Sarawak Report

Shipping out Sarawak’s timber

Taib Mahmud has vehemently denied that his Canadian daughter Jamilah and his other family members do business in Sarawak.

However, we can show that for decades they have been exporting hardwood straight from the jungles of Sarawak to the USA!

Also involved in the family export ring are Taib’s brothers Onn and Tufail, his late wife Leijla and his son Sulaiman.

MACC has no comment on Taib’s ‘naughty’ remark

Hazlan Zakaria

The Malaysian Anti-Corruption Commission (MACC) continues to maintain a wall of silence over criticism levelled against it by a chief minister that it has been “naughty and dishonest” in their investigation of the senior BN politician for alleged graft.

“I don’t want to comment on that,” said the commission’s investigation director Mustafar Ali (right) when approached by Malaysiakini on the sidelines of the Corporate Governance Symposium 2013 in Kuala Lumpur today.

‘Sarawak gov’t should also apologise over video clip’

Dukau Papau

Sarawak PKR today demanded that not only Chief Minister Abdul Taib Mahmud’s cousins should apologise for their demeaning and insulting remarks against the Dayak community, but also the state government for its cruel and mindless acts against the community.

Norlia and Fatimah, the daughters of former chief minister Abdul Rahman Yakub had insulted the Dayak community with their derogatory descriptions in a covertly recorded video by London-based Global Witness.

The two sisters were alleged to have uttered that the Dayaks are “squatters” living on state land and that they have “low intelligence” which allow them to be easily exploited by businessmen.

“Princess” Jamilah! – More On The Taib Royal Family

Sarawak Report

Furs and diamonds – do they make a Princess?

Sarawak Report can reveal that Taib’s eldest daughter, Jamilah, was dubbed “Princess Jamilah” while still at college in Canada, on account of her fabulous wealth.

Fellow students at the Ottawa’s Carlton University were so amazed at the teenager’s conspicuous wealth, her designer outfits and grand accommodation, that they jokingly gave her the royal title.

The disclosure, which was made to Sarawak Report by former student contemporaries of Jamilah, adds to the Taib family pretensions to royalty that just won’t go away.

How we reared a little demon called Taib

Pak Bui

Taib has been demonised: he is the distillation of all our anger and discontent. But he is a symptom of a deep-seated cancer.

According to conventional wisdom, without Taib, Sarawak would be richer, happier and more harmonious. As with any oversimplification, this is partly true.

But Taib did not come to power, and dominate Sarawak for 32 years in a vacuum.

There was, of course, misguided support for his uncle Abdul Rahman Ya’kub and Taib himself, from Tunku Abdul Rahman and Umno, certainly. There were long years of Umno oppression during Mahathir’s reign, that helped to prop Taib up.

Don’t believe BN promises, natives told

Joseph Tawie

Thus far the Sarawak government has failed to meet promises made to resettle natives in Batang Ai and Bakun, says a local NGO.

Sungai Asap, where 10,000 natives of Belaga were resettled after they succumbed to the promises of the Sarawak administration in regards to the Bakun Dam is almost empty these days.

About 7,000 settlers have left the resettlement scheme in search of a better living elsewhere.

What will it be for BN — Ibrahim Ali or 1 Malaysia?

JAHABAR SADIQ

The Barisan Nasional (BN) has unveiled a centrist manifesto that fits its 1 Malaysia philosophy but Tun Dr Mahathir Mohamad’s endorsement of Datuk Ibrahim Ali as a coalition candidate would appear to be at odds with the concept.

The stout Perkasa chief has been anything but centrist or even 1 Malaysia in his approach to push for Malay rights at a time when BN chairman Datuk Seri Najib Razak has been advocating a gradual economic liberalisation and equity for Malaysians.

But why would the country’s longest-serving prime minister, who spoke in 1991 of a future Bangsa Malaysia plump, for an ethno-centric Ibrahim(picture), who ran on a PAS ticket in Election 2008 only to turn pro-Umno after winning the Pasir Mas seat?

Sarawak government bond in 2011 mispriced by RM480m

P. GUNASEGARAM

A Sarawak government 15-year bond issued in June 2011 was considerably mispriced to get as much as 20% or some RM480 million of the bond value of RM2.4 billion upfront, sources said. This mirrors similar mispricing in bonds issued by 1Malaysia Development Bhd or 1MDB.

KiniBiz reported the mispricing of 1MDB bonds by as much as RM4 billion in a series of articles last week.

A check by KiniBiz shows the Sarawak bond, arranged by Goldman Sachs, was issued in three tranches by Equisar Sdn Bhd, a unit of the Sarawak state government, for money to be used  for investments in strategic development projects in the Sarawak Corridor of Renewable Energy (SCORE), the Tanjung Manis Halal Hub and the development of the biotech sector.

Taib Family Company Loaned RM1.9 BILLION By Development Bank!

Sarawak Report

Sparkling profits – daughter Jamilah Taib (left) and sister Raziah Mahmud are two of the family shareholders in Kumpulan Parabena, parent company of KP Mukah Development

A loss-making Taib family company with share capital of just half a million ringgit was granted almost RM2billion in loans last December by the Malaysia Development Bank (PBMB), which is run by the Ministry of Finance using public money.

The astonishing revelation is made all the more shocking by the fact that the Sarawak Chief Minister himself has a substantial shareholding himself in the obscure company, KP Mukah Development, which only registers half million ringgit in assets.

Is Taib Mahmud above MACC, Najib?

DAP KIT

Party supremo Lim Kit Siang said the Sarawak chief minister’s response yesterday was a slap in the face for caretaker Prime Minister Najib Razak’s purported fight against corruption.Abdul Taib Mahmud’s claim he will not cooperate with the Malaysian Anti-Corruption Commission’s (MACC) probe against him shows he is not only above the MACC, but the prime minister as well, the DAP says.

Najib needed to act on the matter to prove his anti-corruption credentials that he promised to uphold in signing the Transparency International-Malaysia (TI-M) Election Integrity Pledge on Feb 20, Lim said in a statement today.

Taib says Global Witness video expose was ‘sneaky’

ZURAIRI AR

Taib has said that he will not co-operate with the MACC regarding graft allegations against him.

Tan Sri Taib Mahmud has challenged Global Witness to debate him on the issue of illegal land deals in Sarawak, and accused the international environmental activist group of having a hidden agenda by visiting Malaysia’s biggest state in a “sneaky way”.

He has also suggested links between Global Witness and opposition parties.

Choice of candidates to decide Miri seat

Philip Kiew

THE meagre crowd of about 150 people who turned up for a DAP ceramah in Senadin, Miri, on March 18 was a big surprise to everyone in the city.

Public talks held by the opposition party had always drawn huge crowds — usually in the thousands.

Another DAP public talk at the Miri Waterfront Commercial Centre the following night drew only about 300 people.

By contrast, similar gatherings organised by the party in Lawas, the heartland of Barisan Nasional, a few days later attracted more than 1,000 people.

Vote buying will be rampant, says Sarawak PKR

Dukau Papau

Sarawak PKR expects millions of ringgit to be poured in certain constituencies where its candidates are popular, to influence voters against them.

“I anticipate a lot of cash will be distributed not only in Saratok, Lubok Antu, Baram, but also in Limbang and other constituencies where we are very strong,” said Baru Bian, state PKR chairperson after a state PKR committee meeting.

Bian, the Ba’Kelalan state assemblyperson, alleged this was his experience in the last state election in his constituency.

Taib: I won’t cooperate with naughty, dishonest MACC

Hazlan Zakaria

Sarawak Chief Minister Abdul Taib Mahmud has today accused the Malaysian Anti-Corruption Commission’s (MACC) investigation of himself for graft as “victimisation”, reserving his cooperation as he believes that they have been “naughty and dishonest”.

“They (MACC) don’t deserve my cooperation because they have been naughty… and they have not been honest,” he said when met after attending the BN supreme council meeting in Kuala Lumpur today.

However, he stressed that he is not afraid of being investigated by the anti-graft body.

Might as well dissolve MACC after Taib snub

The Malaysian Insider

Naughty seems to be the byword in Sarawak.

The long-serving state chief minister Tan Sri Abdul Taib Mahmud used that word today to describe the Malaysian Anti-Corruption Commission’s (MACC) for its investigations into alleged graft in timber land awards.

“They don’t deserve my cooperation because they have been naughty… and they have not been honest,” he told reporters in Kuala Lumpur.

The MACC probe was launched after an environmental activist group released a video documentary alleging the state Barisan Nasional chief to have received millions of ringgit in kickbacks over land deals that have denuded the Borneo state.

Sabah and Sarawak rainforest graft focal point in GE13

Niluksi Koswanage, Reuters

The island of Borneo may be all that stands between Prime Minister Najib Abdul Razak and an unprecedented election defeat within weeks for his ruling coalition.

Borneo’s two Malaysian states – Sabah and Sarawak – have been a bastion of votes for the National Front coalition headed by Najib’s party, the United Malays National Organisation (Umno).

The two states, among Malaysia’s poorest despite vast natural resources, kept the National Front in power in 2008 even as a groundswell of support for the opposition deprived the government of its iron-clad two- thirds parliamentary majority.

That could start to change. Allegations of corruption in recent months have dogged the chief ministers of both Sabah and Sarawak, long-time rulers who hold vast sway over some of the world’s largest tracts of tropical forests.

Sin City: ‘The jurisdiction of choice by people like us’

Tan Wah Piow

Singapore is “the jurisdiction of choice by people like us”. This boast by rogue lawyer Alvin Chong of Sarawak, caught on video by journalists from London-based Global Witness posing as investors interested in land deals, has gone viral.

The “people like us” presumably include the minions and their corrupt politicians in Asia, as well as tax dodgers and criminals who erstwhile had sheltered their ill-gotten wealth in Switzerland.

The stealth video exposes not just the rampant corruption in Sarawak, it also highlights how virgin forests are stolen from the people, and the arrogant contempt for the indigenous people by the perpetrators of such crimes. Viewers are universally shocked by the revelations.

From Global Witness to Eco Crime Watch: In The Palm of His Hand

The Editor

( Video Link inside ) As the controversial  Global Witness ‘sting’ video continues to gather steam in Sarawak, US online news channel Eco Crime Watch has broadcast a remarkable feature on alleged Taib corruption in the Malaysian state of Sarawak in Borneo.
Watch Episode 2 by US journalist Bill Paul, speaking to the Chief Minister of Sarawak Taib Mahmud, former UK Prime Minister Gordon Brown, founder of Sarawak Report and Radio Free Sarawak Clare Rewcastle and Bruno Manser Fonds Director Dr Lukas Straumann, at Crime Watch

Watch this Video on Hornbill Unleashed: In the Pum of His Hand