RM689mil contracts for Taib family companies

KUCHING: State owned Sarawak Energy Berhad (SEB) has allegedly channelled RM680 million worth of contracts to Chief Minister Taib Mahmud’s family-linked companies since 2009.

Swiss-based NGO, Bruno Manser Fund (BMF) claimed the three recipients of these enormous contacts were Cahaya Mata Sarawak (CMS), Sarawak Cable and Naim Holdings.

Channelling these SEB contracts to the Taib family was its “handpicked’ Norwegian CEO Torstein Dale Sjøtveit, who joined the company in 2009.

This revelation comes on the eve of the controversy-ridden International Hydropower Association’s (IHA) conference tomorrow.

Sjotveit, who was recently appointed to the board of the IHA, is seen as Taib’s henchmen here and the “executor” of his ambitious plan to build 12 mega dams in Sarawak in addition to the white-elephant Bakun Dam.

Last week, 600 Penan natives appealed to the Norwegian King to recall Sjøtveit. Also the same week SaveRivers Network, a coalition of conservationists and individuals, urged the IHA to call off its conference which they claimed Sjotveit was using to secure a ‘back-door’ endorsement of Taib’s plans for the construction of these dams.

Calling for Sjoveit to step down from IHA as it was a “conflict of interest”, BMF director Lukas Straumann said: “The extent of conflict of interest in Sarawak’s energy sector is shocking.”

“It is particularly disturbing that the Taib family is directly benefiting from the displacement of indigenous communities.

“(Mr) Sjøtveit should step down immediately for unduly favouring the Taib family and also his superior, the Chief Minister’s cousin Hamid Sepawi.”

(Hamid is the Naim Holdings chairman. He is also the SEB chairman)

Strauman also called on the Malaysian Anti-Corruption Commission (MACC) and Norway’s financial regulators, Økokrim, to investigate these contracts.

“We expect (these) prosecutors to implement the relevant anti-corruption legislation (in their respective countries),” he added.

According to Straumann, Sjotveit had been more than generous with these companies.

Contracts to Taib’s son

The BMF report revealed that Sarawak Cable is chaired by Taib’s son Mahmud Abu Bekir Taib.

The company allegedly received three contracts for power transmission lines linked to SEB hydropower projects, worth RM237 million.

In 2010, Sarawak Energy sold its profitable subsidiary, Sarwaja Timur, to Sarawak Cable, securing the Chief Minister’s son another RM13 million (US$ 4.3 million) in public contracts.

It also noted that CMS, which is flagship of the Taib business empire, received RM23 million contracts from SEB in 2012 for the construction of a resettlement site for indigenous Penan communities displaced by the Murum dam project.

Naim Holdings was granted RM209 million contract to build power transmission lines to Bakun dam in 2009.

In March 2012, Sarawak Energy commissioned Naim to construct the resettlement site for indigenous Penan communities displaced by the Murum dam for a total of RM197 million. -FMT