PUTRAJAYA: The Defence Ministry (Mindef) has lodged a report with the Malaysian Anti Corruption Commission (MACC) involving two out of 16 land swap deals carried out by the previous administration which had incurred the government losses of over RM500 million.
The Special Duties Officer to the Defence Minister, Mohd Nasaie Ismail handed over the report on the Hutan Melintang army camp in Perak and Paloh army camp in Johor to the graft-busters at its headquarters here today.
The report was by the Governance, Procurement and Finance Investigating Committee headed by former Auditor-General Tan Sri Ambrin Buang on the land swap deals.
In the report, Mohd Nasaie said there were significant political involvement and negligence as well as mistakes in governance under the previous government on these two projects.
This incurred great amount of losses to the government and compromised and threatened the importance of the national defence strategy, he added.
He said the two projects were swapped with Kinrara Army Camp land in Selangor and Rasah Camp in Negeri Sembilan, which was also taken over by private company.
“The construction of Paloh and Hutan Melintang camps were not part of the Defence Ministry or the Eleventh Malaysian Plan.
“However, instructions were issued to build these two camps for political reasons. It was the ministry’s plan to build a camp in Port Dickson, Negeri Sembilan as a replacement for the Kinrara Camp, however, it was cancelled and replaced with the Paloh camp which is located in the Sembrong parliament in Johor.
“It is a similar case with the Hutan Melintang camp in the Bagan Datuk parliament, which was not slated under the Eleventh Malaysia Plan.
“There is also evidence of political interference and the direct involvement of the Election Commission (EC) to transfer and increase votes of army personnel and their families in both parliaments,”he added.
In previous news reports, Defence Minister Mohamad Sabu said that the land swap deals had resulted in over RM500 million in losses and leakages.
He added that the projects involved 1,186 ha of land belonging to the Defence Ministry valued at RM4.75 billion, with project costs of RM4.88 billion.
Mohd Nasaie also said there are also doubts in the prices of both lands which were sold to private companies to build these camps.
“There are also inconsistencies in the price tag set by the previous government under the leadership of former prime minister Datuk Seri Najib Razak and his deputy Datuk Seri Dr Ahmad Zahid Hamidi.
“The Kinrara camp land, which was valued at RM758 million by the Valuation and Property Services Department (JPPH) was sold for RM500 million.
“While the 62-acre Paloh camp was sold for RM10.47 million, 43 per cent higher than the value set by JPPH which was RM7.28 million.
“It is strange that the government at that time which claimed that it was short of resources adopted the land swap methodology to carry out Mindef’s projects and bought land higher than the market price,” he added.
Mohd Nasaie also said the projects have been instructed to start construction even before the deals were finalised and signed by both parties.
He added that both these projects had put the safety and interest of the army personnel at stake and efforts to strengthen the military was also disregarded.
“The military needs the Port Dickson camp because the existing Rasah camp is in a dilapidated condition.
“Army personnel were also abruptly transferred to the Hutan Melintang camp even before the camp obtained the certificate of completion and compliance.
“The main goal of strengthening the army in the west coast of peninsular Malaysia by transferring personnel from Tambun and Kamunting Camps were also cancelled.
“The Hutan Melintang camp only housed a small number of the soldiers from the army regiment (askar wataniah),” he added.