On 6 March 2018, I asked the Minister of Finance
…menyatakan berapa syarikat daripada 8 yang telah menunjukkan minat telah menyerahkan tender atau cadangan muktamad dalam tender projek Bandar Malaysia. Bilakah keputusan tender tersebut akan diumumkan?
Once again, the Finance Minister responded that 8 companies had “expressed interest” in the project and that the result of the tender exercise would be “announced soon”.
When the RFP was first announced in May, 10 months ago, the new Bandar Malaysia chairman and MoF Secretary-General Irwan Serigar Abdullah said that the tender deadline would close on June 30 and the final decision would be made by July 14, 2017.
On August 23, Tan Sri Irwan said that 6 companies had ‘expressed interest’ and had visited the site. “We took them for a site visit and they need to submit their proposal by the end of this month,” he said.
The Malaysian Reserve then reported on October 31 that Tan Sri Irwan said the announcement for the master developer would be “coming soon, coming soon”.
On November 8, I had asked the Minister of Finance to state how many companies had submitted finalised proposals for the Bandar Malaysia project. He had then responded that 8 companies which had met the criteria had “expressed their interest” in becoming the master developer.
Dato’ Seri Najib Razak’s latest reply completely failed to answer my question. I did not ask “how many company ‘expressed interest’ in the project”. I asked how many of the 8 companies which have ‘expressed interest’ have submitted a bid.
It cannot be more obvious that the Prime Minister is completely avoiding the question because as of today, no company has submitted their bids. Worse, Malaysians have been told by the Bandar Malaysia Chairman that the much-awaited announcement would be “coming soon” since July last year!
The failure of the Ministry of Finance (MoF) to find a new Master Developer for Bandar Malaysia after abruptly terminating the earlier RM7.41 billion agreement with the Iskandar Waterfront Holdings consortium exactly a year ago proved the utter failure of Tan Sri Irwan.
Malaysians now fear that like the Tun Razak Exchange (TRX) which now is effectively developed by MoF, after being forced to buy back 51% of the Signature Tower project from the Indonesian developer, the MoF would also be forced to fund the development of Bandar Malaysia on its own to bailout 1MDB, the original project owner.
We call upon the Finance Minister to give Tan Sri Irwan Serigar a new deadline by the end of this month to secure a new Master Developer to fulfil his promises to the people. If the Treasurer-General fails once again to deliver, he should be removed from his position as Bandar Malaysia chairman, and a new more competent replacement be found.