Sime Darby must do these

 

We hear some things aired in public to justify the losses. But not much is revealed. There seems to be another facet in the art of elegant silence. It is the art of saying a lot of things but revealing nothing. A lot of thunder emitting, but very little rain to cheer the barren corporate land scorched by Sime Darby.

The whole team of people assembled alongside with Musa Hitam the other night at the Sime Convention Centre should be fired and sacked. Each should be given the two swords to commit Hara Kiri. Begin with Musa Hitam first.

The public isn't going to be mollified and satisfied with an assurance that something is being carried out; that there's work in progress etc and a work committee consisting of individuals with impeccable credentials are inside the work group to ensure even handedness and complete transparency and uprightness.

That means nothing other than another form of CYA ruse. We were even told that Musa Hitam made a trip to Qatar to discover himself what's going on. He didn't find anything amiss so it seems because nothing happened following his visit other that some meekly audible of something being said by external auditors. In any case, Musa's overseas excursions often amount to nothing other than giving this former DPM a holiday.

It is no use too to report what Andrew Sheng said, looking stoical and detached, that risk management is not a perfect game. We all know that, the Class F contractor understands risks better than Andrew Sheng. Have Andrew Sheng replaced if all he can offer, is some wishy washy talk about risk management and all that. We don't want that, we can read things said about managing risks. We wanted to have things put right- not some artful justification of Sime's losses attributable to deficient understanding of risk management. It seems only Zubir Murshid in Sime Darby who doesn't understand risk management. All the rest do, because they were not asked to go on a leave of absence.

I call on the government to have the entire board of directors go on a leave of absence. I publish here a comment by a commentator who goes by the name Askar Tua, here as to why, the entire band of negligent brothers must go.

Musibah dan kerugian yg melanda Sime Darby ini amat memalu dan mendukacitakn.Memalukan kerana ianya berpunca daripada keputusan dasar yg amat tidak bijak kerana mengambongkan tiga syarikat yg tersendirinya cukup berdaya maju dan telah banyak membuat untung,menjadikan syarikat itu terlalu besar sehingga sukar diurus dan dikawal dengan berkesan oleh CEO yg tidak cukup berkaliber dan berpengalaman.Dan tidak pula dipantau secara efektif oleh Pengerusi dan ahli-ahli BODnya.Mendukacitakan kerana kerugian itu melibatkan wang rakyat dan mungkin ianya akan menjejaskan pendapatan pemegang-pemegang saham PNB tahun ini.

Oleh kerana Pengerusi dan seluroh ahli BOD ada peranan dan tanggungjawab didalam penyeliaan dan pemantauan terhadap perjalanan dan pentadbiran syarikat itu,mereka juga sepatutnya,dengan sukarela meletak jawatan.Jika mereka tidak bertindak demikian sudah tentunya mereka itu akan dikira sebagai orang yg tidak bermaruah,tidak ada harga diri,integriti dan tidak berperinsip.Mereka akan hilang kredebiliti dan status sebagai gentlemen.

It is a gross failure on the part of Sime Chairman and the BOD to provide effective supervision.

There was a pathetic CYA ruse to suggest that Zubir tolerated the massive losses in the Energy and Utilities Division to protect the previous head of the division. Are we hearing right in this? A Corporate Samaritan? A successor going all out to protect the good name of a predecessor? That's not the rule of CYA is it? So is Zubir asked to go for a leave of absence for not playing the game of CYA? He isn't one of us after all these years. After all the champagne and caviar on the jet stream, he wasn't converted into a thieving bastard like us.

Usually a successor will want to obliterate any legacies of the previous man. I find this argument very imbecilic as many of Sime Darby employees would volunteer to say that Zubir Murshid is one heartless bastard and an MF to boot! To impute a sense of a caring soul in Zubir Murshid is very deceiving. You mean to tell us, losing over RM 1 billion is ok because, we care for one miserable soul?

There was also a very infantile argument suggesting that one reason why Sime got into this trouble is because the board of directors is made up of old people. That to overcome this weakness in order to propel Sime forward is to inject young new blood into its BOD and by extension, the management team. Zubir is said to be 52 years old, while the rest of the board, including Musa are ageing fossils. What kind of argument is this and if it comes from those wizened analysts out there, which universities taught you this line?

What the board requires is not young or old members- what it needs are people of integrity and commitment to doing good business.

The very first step which Sime must take is to demand the resignation of the entire board of directors and call in the financial Ghostbusters to dissect every minutiae of transactions carried out by the 4 business units.