I can’t believe my eyes and ears. Did Samy Vellu just twisted his words  and blamed the loss of MAIKA shareholders on NESA’s injuction against  the sale of OAC for RM129 million? For many, many years, RM100 million did not give any returns and suddenly, a suit filed by NESA Coperative on 30th August 2007 is blamed for inability to reimburse the shareholders? What about the gap between 1986 and 2007 (a gap of 22 years? – where’s the profit/dividend, where the AGM reports? where’s…so many things?). Even if declared 10 sen dividend per year…

The press conference article appeared in Malaysiakini:

… As for Subramaniam, Samy Vellu accused him of holding up the sale of insurance company Oriental Capital Assurance Bhd to resolve the Maika Holding’s crisis.

Subramaniam is the head of Nesa Cooperative Bhd which purportedly took the injunction to stop the sale of the cash cow, an issue, Samy Vellu said, has been a thorn in the party’s ties with the Indians.

Samy Vellu who appeared annoyed, said the injunction prevented Maika Holdings from selling it to a prospective buyer who had since withdrawn his bid after the injunction was not lifted by Nesa Cooperative.

“The buyer had even given Maika Holdings a grace period of 10 days to get the injunction withdrawn and even paid a deposit of between RM13 million and RM14 million but the injunction was not withdrawn (by Nesa Cooperative),” he told reporters at a function in Kuala Lumpur.

He said since Subramaniam was the chairperson of Nesa Cooperative, the company’s action could indirectly be attributed to Subramaniam.

“Without him, I don’t think this (the injunction) would have happened,” he said.

Samy Vellu said he had tried to be “friendly” with Subramniam “but there was no solution on sight for the Maika Holdings sale.”

He lamented that the action by Nesa Cooperative had prevented Maika Holdings shareholders from getting back their money and now he had to take a bank loan to pay some of the shareholders who wanted their investment back.

“I feel sad for the shareholders some of who are very poor and they wanted the money,” he said, adding that if the sale had gone through, the shareholders numbering over 60,000 would have got back their initial investment and bonus shares.

And this press conference by Samy Vellu with Palanivel next to him was shown  on TV3 Buletin Utama just now.

Read excerpts from a letter published in Malaysiakini (Feb 12 2008) below:

X

… Maika Holdings raised RM108 million in 1981 from Indians, especially rural folks from the lower- and middle-income groups. These people were told to use their life savings – and even sell their jewelry – to invest in Maika Holdings because they were told the company would give them returns that were 10 to 20 times their initial investment. This, of course, is sweeter an offer than any licensed bank could make.

Samy Vellu, whose rhetoric needs no introduction, managed to fool these mostly not-so-well- educated individuals into parting with their money.

If you ask anyone who was in MIC at that time about how they organised groups of people to go out there to convince the masses to part with their money, you will be surprised. They even went to the extent of telling would-be investors to sell their properties and cattle to invest in Maika Holdings.

In other countries, this would have been considered a huge financial scandal, not just because of the amount of money involved, but because of the number of people involved in fleecing equally vast numbers of poor and less-educated citizens.

The RM108 million then had a buying power that was 10 to 15 times its value today. In today’s terms, it would be valued between RM1 billion and RM1.5 billion. Shortly after the initial investments were collected, the recession in the mid-1980s enabled the cash-rich Maika Holdings to go shopping for properties and collect fantastic deals.

If those properties were still in the hands of Maika Holdings, the company would be worth some RM3 billion to RM5 billion today. But those properties were sold at below-market prices through shady deals in which more money was transferred under the table than through actual and legal sales agreements.

Some of us may also remember the Telekom shares scandal, in which Maika Holdings was extended an offer to buy Telekom shares during its initial public offering (IPO). But Maika Holdings did not buy the Telekom shares. Instead, Samy Vellu bought them through his personal company, because Maika Holdings, supposedly, did not have the money to do so.

Maika Holdings could have made RM30 million, but this opportunity was hijacked by the sole defender and representative of the Indian community.

Telekom was only the first privatised government department. Since then, many other government agencies and departments have been privatised. As with Telekom Malaysia, shares were offered to Maika Holdings, but the offers were hijacked over and over again by Samy Vellu and his gang.

Using the Maika Holdings money, the gang bought into well-run companies and turned them upside down by appointing their own people to run these companies, squandering away the profits with luxurious parties and lavish parties, and, finally, by closing down these companies. They plundered in epic proportions.

To date, Maika shareholders have received almost nothing for their investments. The Maika Holdings scandal has cost many their life savings, property, opportunities to send their children for advanced education and so much more.

Recently, during a political speech, Samy Vellu announced that he will return RM1.30 for every RM1 invested in Maika Holdings and set a deadline of 100 days to do so. At the end of the deadline, however, he conveniently turned around and said that he has nothing to do with Maika Holdings because Maika Holdings is a business enterprise and he is only the president of MIC.

The managing director of Maika Holdings, Vel Pari, the son of Samy Vellu, then said that he did not know of any such deadline and, as such, is not bound to honour any kind of commitment.

Those who had the courage to go to Maika Holdings’ annual general meeting last year were met by thugs who intimidated and harassed anyone who raised questions about the management.

NESA filed the suit due to the way the AGM was held. Read about it here and see pictures of an injured man at the shameful AGM here. You can read more on the AGM at this website. Also read this article in Aliran magazine.

Due to the injuction (for TWO long years, what  have the MAIKA leadership been doing? Never discuss with NESA?), nothing seemed to happen. There were claims by Samy Vellu that that those who turn up at MIC HQ will be reimbursed by him but did it materialise?

Due to the delay of two years, Salcon, the company that wanted to buy MAIKA cashcow OAC pulled out.