[Rencana ini memaparkan bagaimana politik Umno sudah membuat banyak syarikat koporat menjadi kacau-bilau. Bandingkan nasib Tajuddin Ali yang cekap dan berdedikasi dengan nasib Tajuddin Ramli yang menjaga eMAS pun rugi kerana otak di kepalanya sudah jauh terterbang. Halim Saad dan Renong pula bukannya menambahkan kekayaan untuk dirasakan oleh semua rakyat, tetapi Renongnya memecah rekod untuk menjadi syarikat yang PALING BANYAK BERHUTANG.

Di negara luar mereka yang menyusahkan syarikat tidak disimpan lama-lama. Malah jika syarikat mundur sedikitpun CEO nya terus ditukarkan. Lihatlah pengurusan syarikat IBM dan Apple. Paling kurang mereka mencari CEO yang lebih hebat lagi, seperti HP yang memilih seorang wanita! Hasilnya HP menjadi semakin pintar dan lebih mengancam.

Di Malaysia mereka yang menjahanamkan syarikat dan bank sengaja dibiarkan. Akhirnya Perwaja lingkup dan BBMB tertelan. Petronas mengeluarkan bon kerana malu hendak menggunakan istilah hutang! Penyiasat BMF dibunuh dan bukti penjenayah BBMB sengaja dibakar seperti bukti video Vijandran dan diari Mustakizah yang dikapak ngeri. - Editor (maaf terlebih kerana sedikit geram)]

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Investors lose faith in Malaysia

By Sheila McNulty

Published: January 16 2001 23:33GMT
Last Updated: January 16 2001 23:48GMT

Malaysia began last year with what analysts saw as a real opportunity to restore confidence in the corporate sector.

But the government balked at sales to overseas companies and used taxpayers' money to bail out debtors, leaving many investors downbeat about prospects for reform.

That pessimism is illustrated by the waning interest of portfolio investors. Chong Yoon Chou, director at Aberdeen Asset Management Asia, says: "A market that used to have up to 18 per cent weighting in most funds [before the Asian crisis] is now totally ignored."

Hopes for Malaysian corporate restructuring were first raised - and then dashed - last April when Time Engineering prepared to sell a 20 per cent stake in Time dotCom, its telecommunications unit, to Singapore Telecommunications.

The deal would have signalled a willingness to bring foreign expertise into strategic sectors, thereby boosting competitiveness.

But the Malaysian government blocked it on nationalist grounds, leaving Khazanah, the state investment company, to come up with funding for Time. The company, part of the politically-linked Renong group, has yet to find a strategic partner, and its listing is kicking off only now, after being postponed three times. This has delayed much of the restructuring of nearly M$5bn (US$1.31bn) in debt.

That debt is part of the M$28bn in borrowings with which Renong, Malaysia's largest industrial conglomerate, emerged from the regional financial crisis as the country's biggest corporate debtor. Renong has become a yardstick by which analysts gauge Malaysia's corporate development. The group has outlined several plans to restructure, none of which has been carried out in full.

Late last year United Engineers Malaysia, the country's biggest construction company, agreed to buy the assets of Renong, its parent, to advance the group's restructuring. Analysts criticised this as a bail-out for Renong, which was waiting for a high price for assets that an observer admitted might never come. Adding to analysts' disappointment was UEM's decision to extend the deadline of a share option deal to give Halim Saad, its executive vice-chairman and Malaysia's best-known Malay businessman, an extra five months to come up with the money.

Mr Chong notes that such machinations within Renong would once have prompted a chorus of complaints from investors. "When you're heckling, at least you're paying attention. The fact that people aren't scrutinising and debating the current crop of restructurings shows you how ignored Malaysia is," he says.

As deals were made and then remade within the Renong group, the government helped engineer a rescue of Proton, the national carmaker.

Petronas, the cash-rich national oil company, bought Proton from Hicom Holdings, its indebted majority shareholder. Then the authorities delayed opening Malaysia's car market to regional trade partners.

Mohamed Ariff, executive director of the Malaysian Institute of Economic Research, believes Proton will not succeed on its own. But its survival is personally important to Mahathir Mohamad, the prime minister, who conceived the national car to drive industrialisation. And so the government has kept its wheels spinning.

"There is no political will to bring about serious economic reforms," says Mr Ariff. "As long as Dr Mahathir is around, he would want to postpone them. He will try his level best to keep things as they are; any change will be read as a failure of Dr Mahathir's policies."

The government did not respond to requests for a response to criticisms of its policies.

Those policies have centered, during Dr Mahathir's 20 years in office, on transforming Malaysia into a developed nation by 2020. That drive was halted by the Asian crisis.

Dr Mahathir's go-for-growth policy has been criticised as frivolously expansive, particularly given the massive debt taken out to fund it. "Malaysia Inc" - the cosy symbiosis between government and a core group of business tycoons that enabled Malaysia to push through projects such as the Petronas Twin Towers, the world's tallest buildings - was criticised for promoting cronyism.

At the same time, the affirmative action policy providing advantages to the majority, but economically weaker, Malay race, to provide a stable backdrop for development has been criticised for breeding inefficiencies and complacency. Most of the high-profile government bail-outs have involved entrepreneurs promoted to the heads of strategic companies through affirmative action. "The government may not be able to afford another round of rescues," Abdullah Ahmad Badawi, deputy prime minister, recently said.

"I am well aware of the rumblings and discontent among the professional business community that the government should not continue to protect those who have blatantly mismanaged their corporate empires and have repeatedly come back crying for help. I am aware that these criticisms are being made by Malaysians themselves, and I am aware that many of these criticisms are valid."

Indeed, the opposition capitalised on these criticisms to gain ground in the 1999 general election and has been widening its influence as foreign investment has been slow to return to pre-crisis levels.

Gan Kim Khoon, head of research at Arab-Malaysian Securities, says: "A lot of foreign investors are still staying away from Malaysia. Many are still hoping for signs of corporate restructuring before they return. Unfortunately, that is not happening yet. You may see sporadic cases, but maybe not across the board."

One such "sporadic case" is Public Bank, which was prompted by shareholders to withdraw plans to become a holding company. Those plans had astounded foreign investors who had long considered it one of Malaysia's best-managed banks. "It does give you that glimmer of hope that there is quality management in there," Mr Chong says.

The uncertainty is whether it will be put to good use. Last year's ousting of Ahmad Tajudin Ali as head of Tenaga, Malaysia's national power company, shocked the market, which had been impressed by his managerial abilities. Analysts assumed - despite official denials - that he was the victim of a politically linked management shake-up. Investor objections led Tenaga to offer him his job back, but he declined.

As 2000 drew to a close, investors were hit with what many consider the year's most disappointing corporate decision. After raising the cap on foreign ownership in Malaysia Airlines in what many hoped was the prelude to a sale to a strategic partner, the government bought back the airline.

It paid M$1.79bn in a deal analysts said amounted to a bail-out of Malay tycoon Tajudin Ramli, a merchant banker-turned-entrepreneur with close ties to the government. The price - which matched that paid by Mr Tajudin for the 29.09 per cent controlling stake in 1994 - was more than double the current market value. Mr Gan remains "cautiously hopeful" the government will find a foreign partner to revitalise MAS this year. He also holds out hope for Time dotCom to find a partner and list shortly, following this month's publication of its prospectus.

But observers note that in recent weeks, the government has been busy taking over the assets of two unprofitable light rail transit operations - one from Renong and the other from a consortium that includes the main state pension fund. And Dr Mahathir has sounded sceptical of admitting foreign investment: "We have to see the conditions they would insist upon should they buy into MAS."

Mr Chong says Malaysia used to charm investors with its potential, but no longer: "People just want something to be signed, sealed and handed over."