THE Securities Commission (SC) should swiftly investigate the authenticity of a damming whistleblower’s account by a Cahya Mata Sarawak Bhd employee which is making its round in the social media vis-a-vis the online news resource Sarawak Report.
In a gist, the whistleblower revelation has shed light into allegations of insider dealing and conflicts of interest which led to deputy group chairman Datuk Seri Mahmud Abu Bekir Taib going on voluntary leave with effect from April 22 to facilitate investigation.
The event which has its origin in the group’s whistleblower channel also involved the company’s former chief information officer (CIO) Karl Vink @ Khalid Abdullah, an Australian national.
Interestingly, the board of the Sarawakian conglomerate which is closely linked to the family of Sarawak Governor Tun Abdul Taib Mahmud has welcomed back Mahmud with open arms on May 6 after having found the latter innocent of an allegation of conflict of interest made against him and Vink.
Nevertheless, Cahya Mata has disclosed that this is in relation to the award of a contract by CMS I-Systems Sdn Bhd, a wholly owned subsidiary of the company, to Vienna Advantage GmbH.
“The accusation is that the hiring of Vienna Advantage and the secretly connected CSF Advisers (consultancy firm) has proven to be a costly failure that shareholders in this public company must now face the burden of,” exposed Sarawak Report.
“As of now, Mahmud appears to have been let off scot free to continue to manage the company despite being the beneficiary of the millions wasted on the companies he owns.”
The online news resource further urged the SC to step in to protect the bulk of innocent investors.
This is given it has received “a further devastating whistleblowing letter” which exposed the astonishing decision of the company’s board to ignore devastating findings in its own report and to pre-empt its touted independent enquiry.
This is with regard to Vienna Advantage Asia which is owned by Vienna Advantage Gmbh and Silver Linings Systems (SLS), and how the companies are linked to both Mahmud and Vink:
- Mahmud is the majority shareholder of Silver Lining Systems;
- Silver Lining Systems is the majority shareholder of Vienna Advantage Asia;
- Karl Vink in his capacity as CIO of Cahya Mata recommended Vienna Advantage’s ERP (enterprise resource planning) system; and
- Mahmud was chairman of the Digital Transformation Committee that approved the implementation of the Vienna Advantage’s ERP system.
According to Sarawak Report, the project incurred losses of RM7 mil when Cahya Mata decided to terminate the ERP system after the issue was brought to the public domain by the whistleblower.
As they say, the ball is now in the court of Cahya Mata’s 77% shareholders (the remaining 23% of shares are owned by Mahmud’s own family) who will be convening at the company’s annual general meeting on May 31 (Monday) to determine the company’s future fortune.
At 4.25pm, Cahya Mata was up 4 sen or 2.58% to RM1.59 with 3.19 million shares traded, thus valuing the company at RM1.71 bil. – May 24, 2021
