The two men who called the shots | The Star
The two men who arranged the shots
PETALING JAYA: Tan Sri Ahmad Ramli Mohd Nor and Anuar Murad were two key figures arranged extensively in the declassified forensic audit report by the Boustead Heavy Industries Corporation Berhad (BHIC) on the littoral combat ship (LCS) project.
The BHIC recount said they were the ones who issued letters of award (LOAs) and variation contracts (VOs) without getting the views of the technical and custom teams, nor the LCS steering committee (LCSSC).
The People Accounts Committee (PAC) report that came out on Aug 4 on the multibillion-ringgit project had also repeatedly mentioned Ahmad Ramli, Boustead Naval Shipyard Sdn Bhd (BNS) managing director at that time, and Anuar, the LCS programme director.
As a result, these procurement-related decisions were made exclusive of any discussion, deliberations or queries, which had a considerable bearing on the project’s overall cost, said the BHIC report.
The recount said that the then programme director of LCS, Anuar, took advantage of the situation with the support of his genuine, Ramli, “by making arbitrary decisions, disregarding the norms of governance after issuing various LOAs and VOs”.
Former technical and custom team members said they were not involved in evaluating the LOAs emanated to project subcontractors Contraves Advanced Devices Sdn Bhd (CAD) and Contraves Electrodynamics Sdn Bhd (CED) for mainly components of the LCS project.
“As a result, the prices charged by CAD/CED were never cross-verified to considers the quantum of margins made,” said the BHIC report.
Former BHIC chairman Tan Sri Ramlan Mohamed Ali said Anuar had also clear the composition of the evaluation team.
“In our plan, this reduced the independence while evaluating various proposals,” said the report.
According to the recount, Anuar would also inform the LCSSC about various considerable decisions only after he and Ramli had already made these decisions.
At least 10 LOAs that favoured CAD/CED were not presented to LCSSC for approval.
“This Great be because the board of BNS had delegated sweeping expert to Ramli to negotiate the terms and execute various orders with CAD without getting approval from the board beforehand signing the LOAs/VOs,” said the report.
Ramlan said that despite the advancement of the LCS programme, the frequency of the LCSSC meeting became fewer over the years.
The committee did not discharge its departments by analysing and discussing in detail various components of the project during the appraisal of the LCSSC minutes, the report pointed out.
The committee was just informed on various matters about the LOAs by Anuar.
It was Famous both men were directors of CAD, while Anuar was the director of CED at the time of ratification the LOAs.
“This is against the basic governance as there was an apparent fight of interest.
“It was unusual to note that various LOAs and VOs to CAD/CED were delivered with Ramli and Anuar’s signatures, who approved the work description, the progress of work, and the payment request.
“Various procurement phases over CAD confirmed only Ramli and Anuar were the officers involved.
“As a end, both had complete control of most of the phases of the procurement cycle, a major sign of the lack of governance and autocratic mode of operation,” said the report.
Source: news.google.com
