Thesun 2008-11-17 Page01 No More Secrets

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No. 4640 PP 2644/12/2008 (020369)

Monday November 17, 2008

Ron’s back at his best: pg36 Fergie

TELLING IT AS IT IS

» ‘Social contract important to all races’ pg4

www.sun2surf.com

» Singing Fathers pg21

Penang bridge comes alive ... Some 16,000 participants from 38 nations converged for the Penang Bridge International Marathon yesterday morning, the first time the annual event was fully organised by the state government. Athletes from Kenya took the lion’s share of prizes at the run, bagging top spots in the main full and half-marathon races. The event had been called off by the federal authorities after the March 8 elections, prompting the new state government to take upon itself the organising of the marathon over the 13.5km bridge. In the full marathon, the men’s open was won by Kenya’s Benjamin Kiplimo Meto.

Zeti on UN task force to examine global financial reform KUALA LUMPUR: Bank Negara Malaysia Governor Tan Sri Dr Zeti Akhtar Aziz has been appointed to a high-level task force being set up by the United Nations (UN) to examine the possible reform of the global financial system, including the International Monetary Fund and the World Bank in the wake of the current economic turmoil. Zeti has been holding the post of Bank Negara governor since 2000 and is the only woman in Asia and among very few in the world to be a top central banker. In announcing the full composition of a high-level task force he is setting up, United Nations General Assembly President Miguel d’Escoto said Joseph Stiglitz, who won the Nobel Prize for Economics in 2001 and is a former chief economist at the World Bank, will chair the panel known as the Commission of Experts on Reforms of the International Monetary and Financial System, Bernama reports. “The task force will suggest steps that member states can take to secure a more stable global economic order,” he said in a statement issued by the UN News Service. Many economies are either into recession or are slipping into recession as a result of the financial crisis brought on by the subprime credit crisis in the United States. Others in the panel include another Malaysian, Jomo Kwame Sundaram, the current assistant secretary-general for economic development in the UN Department of Economic and Social Affairs (DESA), who at one time was lecturer with Universiti Malaya and Universiti Kebangsaan Malaysia. Japan’s Eisuke Sakakibara, who once was dubbed “Mr Yen” and is currently professor at Waseda University in Tokyo, is also in the panel. When d’Escoto announced the formation of the panel last month, he said that “there is growing recognition that the current turmoil in the financial system cannot be solved through piecemeal responses at the national and regional levels but requires a coordinated effort at the global level.” Meanwhile, world leaders meeting in Washington have pledged to rescue global economy (see page 9 for report).

Entertainment

No more secret GOVT DECLASSIFIES HIGHWAY CONCESSION AGREEMENTS, BUT NONDISCLOSURE CLAUSE CAN BE SPOILER

by R. Nadeswaran & Terence Fernandez

([email protected])

K

UALA LUMPUR: The government has declassified toll concession agreements. This means the contents of the contracts, which have for long been speculated as one-sided agreements benefiting toll concessionaires, will no longer be classified as official secrets. Sources said that with the decision, made at a recent cabinet meeting, having or having knowledge of the contents of these agreements no longer constitutes an offence under the Official Secrets Act (OSA). However, this is where the good news stops, as the ball is still at the feet of the toll concessionaires. Although the agreements no longer fall under the OSA, a nondisclosure clause in the agreements prevents them from being made public. “Therefore, it is now up to the companies to waive their rights under the clause to make them public,” said a source.

Although the accounts, including the profit and loss statements of all these companies, can be collated from filings to Bursa Malaysia or the Companies Commission of Malaysia, many are said to be reluctant to make the concession agreements available for fear of the lop-sided clauses becoming public. For example, according to PLUS Expressways Bhd, which controls 85% of concessions, its concessions are worth RM8.7 billion. Apart from PLUS, concessionaires include Penang Bridge Sdn Bhd, Besraya (M) Sdn Bhd, Elite, Grand Saga Sdn Bhd, Kesas Sdn Bhd, Litrak, New Pantai Expressway Sdn Bhd (NPE), Konsortium Lebuhraya Butterworth-Kulim Sdn Bhd and Sistem Lingkaran Lebuhraya Kajang Sdn Bhd (SILK). The government’s decision, a source said, was based on the fact that it feels citizens have an inherent right to know where and how their tax monies are being used and the non-disclosure clauses have been widely interpreted to mean that the contracts are skewed in favour of the concession companies.

“While the government had to fulfil its obligations, it felt the tolls were a burden to the people and that they be fully aware of the commitments,” said one source. Prime Minister Datuk Seri Abdullah Ahmad Badawi had as far back as February last year opined that the agreements should be disclosed to the people. However, his then works minister Datuk Seri S. Samy Vellu had consistently used the OSA to enforce the non-disclosure clause and even suggested that opposition leaders who were in possession of the agreements be prosecuted. He also decreed that periodic toll increases were included in the concession agreements without providing details or reasons for the existence of such terms. Samy Vellu’s successor and former deputy, Datuk Mohd Zin Mohamad, has however taken the approach of revisiting agreements with highway concessionaires with the possibility of reducing toll rates. “Toll reduction is one of the possibilities after all the studies.

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