Samling Connection

Samling at ‘Epicentre’ of Sub-prime Crash!

Friday, September 3rd, 2010 GM

Samling - extracting the wealth of Sarawak

Samling, the giant logging company owned by the timber tycoon Yaw Teck Seng and favoured with numerous timber licences by the Chief Minister, Abdul Taib Mahmud, was at the heart of the housing bubble that led to the sub-prime mortgage crisis and the world economic crash, according to our exclusive research.
We have established that Mountain House, a major new-town development in San Joaquin California, currently labelled as the ‘epicentre’ of the housing crash, was a Yaw family project.
How US ‘Dream Homes’ became ‘Mortgage Nightmares’
Started in 2001, Mountain House was originally advertised as “The Town of Tomorrow” and ”The American Dream Made

Samling - Investing in Mountain House, California

Reality” with houses selling for over $800,000, mainly through sub-prime mortgages.  But, in the aftermath of the crash, the part-built project has been abandoned by the original developer and the town has been identified as the most “underwater” community in America, with over 89% of the properties now worth far less than the amount of money borrowed to buy them.
The prices of these houses are now half what they were in 2006, leaving buyers in a repossession nightmare.

From environmental devastation in Sarawak to economic devastation in the US

Dream homes dived from over $800,000 to under $400,000

Samling’s extraordinary involvement at the centre of the world’s greatest financial scandal was the culmination of years of massive investment in real estate across the United States, according to our research.  This investment came out of the profit from logging in Sarawak under heavily criticised permits granted by the Chief Minister and Resources Planning Minister, Abdul Taib Mahmud.
Following last week’s condemnation of Samling Global by the Norwegian Government as an ‘unethical’ company, involved in ‘illegal logging’ and ‘environmental devastation’ in Sarawak, we reported how a Yaw family subsidiary, CSY Investments, had passed two multi-million dollar mansions to the Taib family in Seattle, in what appeared to be an unrecorded property tranfer linked to a US $1 dollar Quit Claim deal.
‘Unethical’ and over in the US

Sunchase specialise in 'Master-Planned Communities' created from 'distressed real estate assets'

We can now further reveal that CSY Investments formed just part of a multi-million dollar web of Yaw-owned companies in the United States, primarily involved in property development.  These companies were subsidiaries and affiliates of SunChase Holdings Inc, a California registered company incorporated in 1988 by Chee Siew Yaw, a son of the Samling boss.

With Chee S Yaw as its original President and Chief Executive, SunChase Holdings has been involved in a number of massive land-deals across the USA, including  “the largest real estate partnership ever formed with the U.S. Government”, according to its own publicity. 
The registered shareholder of SunChase Holdings was, until recently, Universe Limited, a Liberian company, which according to an investigation by the US Securities and Investment Commission (SEC), was ”controlled by Hiew Tek Seng and the Yaw family, all citizens of Malaysia”.  The   companies and subsidiaries linked to SunChase Holdings are mainly operated out of Phoenix, Arizona.

Chee S Yaw - youthful entrepreneur with deep pockets

Deep pockets that fuelled the Housing Bubble
SunChase Holdings has clearly been exceptional among United States development corporations in possessing an extraordinary level of shareholder capital from the very beginning.  Straight after graduating from California State University,  Sacramento, with a BSc in Real Estate, Land Use and Finance in 1986, the youthful Chee S Yaw immediately demonstrated his access to enormous sums for investment.
One his first subsidiary ventures was Trimark Communities LLC, set up in July 1988, with himself as President.  This became the company behind the disastrous Mountain House town project.  Documents released by San Joaquin County state that between 1990 and 1992 Trimark bought over 70% of the 7.8 square mile site outright and began seeking approval for an approximately half billion dollar development project comprising the largest housing scheme in California.

Business Partner - The US Federal Government

Approval was finally granted after two decades of lobbying and in the face of lawsuits filed by the State Department of Fish and Game over environmental concerns (environmental battles being nothing new for  Samling).  Meanwhile, SunChase had impressed the authorities with numerous other grand-scale projects in which it played the main investor. The company claims it specialises in building ‘large-scale, master-planned communities’ and ‘managing distressed real estate assets’ (repossessed property).
In particular SunChase emerged as the top bidder for Resolution Trust Corporation (RTC) land auctioned off by the  US Federal Government in the aftermath of the Savings and Loans crisis of the late 80s.  The National Land Fund set up partnerships between the Government and private investors to take control of  billions of dollars worth of ‘distressed real estate assets’ offloaded by troubled lending companies, usually at rock-bottom prices.  Sunchase was the biggest private investor in the scheme, obtaining $2 billion of assets, according to the company.
A Federal Audit Report issued in 1999 confirms,  ”In April 1993, the RTC selected SunChase Holdings, Inc., as the winning bidder for five of the six pools of assets offered in the National Land Fund I initiative”.
Indeed, Sunchase currently boasts:

 ”The company is proud of its heritage as the managing general partner in the National Land Fund, the largest real estate partnership ever formed with the U.S. Government”.

American Dream turns to a nightmare with Samling

Computer generated - the commercial centre not yet built

Mountain House finally gained planning permission on the basis that it promised to create a sustainable, self-contained new town that would create sufficient jobs for its inhabitants.
The original county Master Plan promised affordable housing to meet the Bay Area housing crisis, together with retail and business outlets.  But from the start sceptics pointed out that the project looked more like a ‘get-rich-quick scheme’ by the developer with little provision for real employment.
Indeed, the promotional material by Trimark Communities clearly targeted the aspirations of middle-class Californians looking for grander accommodation in an area of housing shortages.  The company marketed Mountain House, as the American Dream in the Town of Tomorrow, promising traditional-style, detached houses built around 14 separate ‘village’ settings, each with a school, leisure centre, open spaces and commercial heart for business enterprises.  Although the San Joaquin authorities had understood that houses would be priced around an affordable $200,000, the demand for grander homes and the availability of dubious lending mechanisms and sub-prime loans meant that prices before the crash in 2007 were topping four times that amount.

Road to nowhere - Mountain House, Samling's California New Town

Within weeks of the crash all had changed. 16,000 houses were supposed be built, providing accommodation for 44,000 people, in the most ambitious development project in California for decades, but as the lending market collapsed, the Yaw family pulled out. Trimark Communities was dissolved in California and Chee Siew Yaw has returned to the Far East, claiming that he divested all his US interests in 2006.  As a result, Mountain House has been left part-constructed and famous for being the repossession capital of the USA.
The main losers in the disaster have been the thousands of buyers who lost their their homes and the California Public Employees Retirement Scheme (CalPERS), which had invested heavily in the project on behalf of its future pensioners. CalPERS  is believed to have lost $926 million of the value of its orignal $1.2 billion investment in the project.  Those people who have remained in Mountain House have found themselves paying huge mortgages on low-value properties in a part-built town. According to one description:

 ”Landscaped lawns face fields of weeds. Sheep graze on the future golf course. While two schools [out of  a promised 14] have been built and a third is under way, there’s just one retail business, a convenience store. The closest supermarket is five miles away. A multimillion-dollar bridge — designed to link the southern and northern halves of town — has been fenced off. It’s our bridge to nowhere”.

Bridge to nowhere

So, like the indigenous people of Sarawak, the people of Mountain House are now living with the devastation wreaked on their lives by Samling.  According to one, ”all they did was build as many houses as they could as quickly as possible to cash in on profit before the bubble burst”.

Samling back in Sarawak
In 1991 a study by the World Bank concluded that only a fraction of the possible revenue that could have been raised from timber was coming to the State of Sarawak.
The problem was described as a major ‘leakage of public resources’, which explains why the people of Sarawak have received few benefits from the loss of their valuable rainforest and remain among the poorest in Malaysia.  Chief Minister Abdul Taib Mahmud has signally failed to rectify this problem of disappearing assets, meanwhile Samling has developed the resources to become one of the major players in United States real estate.

Beaten unconscious and left pregnant - this teenage victim blames loggers

The company has been notorious for its ruthless and unsustainable practices in Sarawak, as detailed by the Norwegian government report.  Licensed by Taib, it has ripped out vast tracts of the world’s most ancient rainforest, leaving the indigenous people with little or no compensation.

These forced acquisitions of Native Customary Rights Lands have recently been ruled illegal by the Federal Malay Court, but neither the company nor the Chief Minister Taib Mahmud have chosen to notice.
Just this week Samling demonstrated familiar ruthless tactics when managers were reported to have threatened native leaders to withdraw the numerous complaints of rape against women and young girls in the company’s concession areas, or else they will end all transport links.  Taib’s government has likewise refused to investigate the reported crimes, despite widespread evidence and several independent reports.

Road blockades are no match for Samling as they target the last remaining trees in the 130 million year old rainfores (the oldest and most bio-diverse in the world)

Lately, the company, backed by armed police, has torn down  more road blockades set up by the beleaguered Penan tribe (who are Asia’s last jungle nomads) in an attempt to protect their few remaining square miles of virgin forest and key hunting grounds.  Samling are now boring into the region, which the Penan recently proclaimed as a protected Peace Park
Finally – Sterling Pacific Assets
Interesting questions still surround the transfer of the Yaw holdings in the United States. Following Chee S Yaw’s pronounced divestment of his US assets, Sunchase Holdings was transfered to the current ownership of Sterling Pacific Assets Inc (California).
Yet Sterling Pacific Assets was already part of the SunChase Group and had previously been described as ” an affiliated professional services company” in Sunchase promotional material. The 100% shareholder of Sterling Pacific Assets of is one of the SunChase’s own company Directors, William A. Pope, who joined the Management Team in 1990, two years after the Yaw family established the company.  Nevertheless, the SunChase website currently implies that it was he who formed the company. 

Lost rainforests of Sarawak

Notably, in spite of the takeover, SunChase Holdings Inc is still run out of the same offices and by the same Management Team established by Chee Siew Yaw before his abrupt departure in 2006.  The circumstances that enabled a member of the Management Team to buy out such an enormous multi-million dollar company remain unclear.
Sarawak Report and doubtless the people of Sarawak, would be interested to know whether the Yaw family do in fact retain an interest in SunChase Holdings in the USA.  Given the controversy surrounding the legality of the timber licenses issued by the Chief Minister, there is the likelihood that future enquiries that might result in the restitution of some of Sarawak’s lost profits from its many timber concessions.  SunChase Holdings in the United States might be a good place to start looking.
Sarawak Report

It's OK Title withdrawn

Dr Ling respects Selangor ruler’s decision to suspend state title

By Asrul Hadi Abdullah Sani

September 03, 2010

Dr Ling waves to supporters at the court today. — Picture by Jack Ooi

PUTRAJAYA, Sept 3 — Tun Dr Ling Liong Sik said today the Selangor Ruler has the prerogative to suspend his state title. The Sultan of Selangor suspended the state titles awarded to the former MCA president and ex-Port Klang Authority (PKA) general manager Datin Paduka OC Phang pending the conclusion of their ongoing court cases over their roles in the Port Klang Free Zone (PKFZ) scandal.
The decision to suspend their datukships was made after consultation with the Dewan di-Raja Selangor on August 19.
Dr Ling said he was not saddened with the Sultan’s decision.
“That is his datukship, so he can give and take back anytime he wants. I respect that. I have no feeling. It is his right, so no feeling. You have feeling when people take away what is not theirs, so this is no problem,” he told reporters at the Session Court here.
Dr Ling was awarded the Darjah Kebesaran Dato’ Paduka Mahkota Selangor (DPMS) which carries the title “Dato” in 1992, while Phang was granted the Darjah Kebesaran Dato’ Sultan Salahuddin Abdul Aziz Shah (DSSA) with the title “Datin Paduka” nine years ago.
However, Dr Ling, who was awarded the Seri Setia Mahkota (SSM) by the Yang di-Pertuan Agong in 2004, will still be able to use his “Tun” title.
The suspension of the titles will be reviewed after their court cases and if they are acquitted of their charges, the Selangor state secretary said in statement on September 1.
The former transport minister was charged under sections 418 and 417 of the Penal Code on July 29 with cheating the government by misleading the Cabinet, then helmed by Tun Dr Mahathir Mohamad, on the land acquisition for the PKFZ project.
The PKFZ project was mooted during his term as transport minister and the cost of the project, initially estimated at less than RM2 billion, more than doubled to RM4.6 billion by 2007.
The total bill for the project is expected to swell to as much as RM12.5 billion due to interest costs from deferred payments, if the trans-shipment hub fails to perform.
If convicted, Dr Ling faces up to seven years in jail and a fine.
MI

Cabinet Papers be Declassified First

Dr Ling wants PKFZ Cabinet papers declassified

UPDATED @ 11:41:47 AM 03-09-2010

By Asrul Hadi Abdullah Sani

September 03, 2010

Dr Ling wants Cabinet documents related to the PKFZ to be made publicly accessible for his trial. — file pic

PUTRAJAYA, Sept 3 — Lawyers for Tun Dr Ling Liong Sik today asked for Cabinet documents on the Port Klang Free Zone (PKFZ) scandal to be declassified and the trial to be moved to Kuala Lumpur from here.
The former transport minister’s lawyers said this today when Putrajaya Sessions Court judge Suzana Hussin set the case to be mentioned on November 30.
Wong Kian Kheong, one of Dr Ling’s lawyers, said the documents were necessary for the defence to prepare its case.
“The defence needs documents such as the minutes of Cabinet meetings, Cabinet committee meetings and post-Cabinet papers under the Official Secrets Act (1972).
“We need to declassify the documents in order to prepare the necessary defence arguments,” Wong told the court.
He said the defence needs to interview the witnesses in both of Dr Ling’s charges in the presence of the investigating officer.
Dr Ling was charged on July 30 with concealing the fact that the Finance Ministry’s valuation and property service department had valued the land for the troubled port project at RM25psf for a repayment period of 10 years, or RM25.82psf for a repayment period of 15 years, including interest chargeable for the repayment period.
He was charged in the Putrajaya Sessions Court under section 418 of the Penal Code with “cheating with knowledge that wrongful loss may be caused to a person whose interest the offender is bound to protect”.
He is alleged to have committed offence at the fourth floor of the Prime Minister’s Office in Putrajaya between September 25 and November 6, 2002. The charge carries a maximum seven years’ jail or a fine, or both, upon conviction.
Dr Ling also faces an alternative charge, under section 417, of cheating the government by misleading the Cabinet on the land acquisition for the same project, at the same place and time.
Under the alternative charge, he is liable to a jail term of up to five years or a fine, or both, upon conviction.
Wong also requested for an early mention date for the case.
“I have applied for an early mention date as my client is a retired deputy minister and minister and has been a long-serving public servant,” he said.
However, deputy public prosecutor Dzulkifli Ahmad argued that it was impossible to have an early mention date.
“We have no objection to an early mention but we feel that it is not possible because we need time to act on the several applications by the defence,” Dzulkifli said.
He added the prosecution will only declassify the confidential documents if they are used in court.
Dzulkifli also confirmed that the prosecution had received the defence’s application to transfer the Kuala Lumpur High Court on Wednesday.
MI

Up to Dr M to judge

Dr Ling says guilty if Dr M says so

By Asrul Hadi Abdullah Sani

September 03, 2010

Dr Ling (centre) leaves the court after today’s hearing. — Picture by Jack Ooi

PUTRAJAYA, Sept 3 — Tun Dr Ling Liong Sik declared that he would definitely be guilty as charged for cheating in the Port Klang Free Zone (PKFZ) scandal if his former boss Tun Dr Mahathir Mohamad says so. Dr Ling, the former transport minister in Dr Mahathir’s Cabinet, said today he was thankful to the former PM for his “generous” offer to testify in his PKFZ cheating trial.
The former MCA president said his ex-boss’s testimony was important because he chaired Cabinet meetings.
“I would like to say thank you very much to him because that is very generous of him because he was chairing the Cabinet meeting and I am being charged for cheating the whole Cabinet so all these witnesses are very important,” he told reporters at the Sessions Court here today.
Dr Mahathir has said that he will testify in the former transport minister’s trial if the court subpoenas him.
The former PM had also pointed out that Dr Ling is innocent until proven guilty.
Dr Ling said that if Dr Mahathir testifies that the Cabinet was cheated, then he would indeed be guilty.
“If they bear witness that they were cheated then I am guilty. If they bear witness that I cheated then there is a case for trial,” he added.
Dr Ling, 67, is charged with cheating the government by misleading the Cabinet helmed by Dr Mahathir on the land acquisition for the PKFZ project.
The PKFZ project was mooted during his term as transport minister and the cost of the project, initially estimated at less than RM2 billion, more than doubled to RM4.6 billion by 2007.
The total bill for the project is expected to swell to as much as RM12.5 billion due to interest costs from deferred payments, if the trans-shipment hub fails to perform.
He faces up to seven years in jail and a fine under the Penal Code, if found guilty.
The friendship between the two doctors dates back to the 1980s when Dr Ling helped hold the ruling Barisan Nasional (BN) together as the MCA president while Dr Mahathir struggled to unite the splintered Umno. Both retired from Cabinet the same year — Dr Ling in May 2003, and Dr Mahathir five months later.
Dr Ling also dismissed speculation that he has been made a scapegoat for the scandal.
“When you are in the palace of justice, don’t talk about scapegoat,” he said.
Last year, The Malaysian Insider reported that Dr Ling had told the Public Accounts Committee (PAC) probing the scandal-ridden PKFZ that it was Dr Mahathir who oversaw the project’s land valuation.
In the verbatim of the PAC meeting procedures, the former MCA president pointed out that the costing and valuation of the land was determined by the Valuation and Property Services Department which was chaired by Dr Mahathir, who was the then finance minister.
“Our job in Ministry of Transport is to only state the fact that we want the land. Costings, valuations and all that, it is not the function of the Ministry of Transport. We do not have a valuation department.
“Costings and valuations is a question for the Treasury to deal with. They have the Valuation Department and everything is there, not in Ministry of Transport. I think [it was] Tun Dr Mahathir who chaired it, and he was the finance minister also. He saw it very clearly. That was the fact of the case,” Dr Ling said in the verbatim report.
MI

Malaysian Government Contracts

Are Malaysian GLC contracts worth the paper they are signed on?

September 03, 2010

ANALYSIS, Sept 3 — One mega suit filed against Petronas and another potential billion ringgit legal wrangle against Sime Darby Berhad will address an issue which could have far-reaching consequences for Malaysia: just what value do government-owned companies place on contracts and legal agreements.
The outcome of both cases will be watched closely by foreign investors at a time when the flow of foreign direct investment is slowing and investors are becoming more queasy about putting money into a country which seems trapped in a quagmire of racial politics. The last thing an investor will want to deal with is a system where legal agreements are treated in a wanton fashion.
The sanctity of a contract is the foundation of the Kelantan state government's petroleum royalty case against Petronas. It is notable that the state government did not sue the federal government or other oil majors involved in extracting oil from its offshore.
It only named Petronas as the defendant. The reason: Petronas is the signatory of all oil contracts with the Kelantan state government, as it is with other states in obtaining exclusive rights to exploit oil resources onshore and offshore in all states in Malaysia.
It is these agreements which formed the basis for Petronas paying Sarawak, Sabah and Terengganu oil royalties. These agreements with the states and the Petroleum Development Act 1975 are based on two simple facts: the ownership of all petroleum onshore and offshore is owned by Petronas and in consideration, the national oil company will pay the states 5 per cent royalties.
The background to this give-and-take approach is the dispute that arose between the federal government and the Sarawak government over the question of oil royalties.
Sarawak claimed that oil obtained offshore belonged to Sarawak and royalty should be paid to Sarawak, exclusively. Sabah adopted the position of Sarawak. To break the impasse, the federal government appointed the late Tun Dr Ismail Ali and Tengku Razaleigh Hamzah to come up with a new national petroleum policy.
Against this backdrop, the Petroleum Development Act was drafted and passed.
On May 9 1975, Petronas entered into agreement with Kelantan where it agreed to make cash payments yearly amounting to the equivalent of 5 per cent of the petroleum obtained onshore and offshore Kelantan. In consideration of Petronas agreeing to make cash payments, it was granted exclusive rights and privileges of obtaining petroleum in the state under the Kelantan Grant.
As such, under the PDA, Kelantan Petroleum Agreement and Kelantan Grant, Petronas is obliged to make cash payments twice a year for all oil obtained offshore Kelantan.
But the national oil company has refused to make any cash payments. Its lawyers and the Attorney-General are likely to rely on the same argument they put forward when refusing to pay the Terengganu state government its share of oil royalties in 2000 — that the state is only entitled to petroleum extracted three miles from the shore.
This is a curious position to take given that there is no mention of three miles or any offshore boundary in any of the agreements. It is also a curious position given that oilfields in both Sarawak and Sarawak are hundreds of miles offshore, and both states enjoy a steady flow of oil royalties. And to compound this curious position, Petronas paid oil royalties to the BN-controlled government for about two decades for oil exploited many many miles off Terengganu and only ceased when the state fell into the hands of PAS.
In fact if there is one pattern of consistent behaviour involving Petronas, it is this: that states under the opposition have had a tough time getting the national oil company to honour legally-binding and clear agreements it signed with them.
Quite clearly, if Petronas tries to wriggle its way out of meeting its legal obligations to its own flesh and blood on some flimsy reason, then surely it will raise the question on how much weight the national oil company places on legal agreements? And the answer to this major question will have implications for a company which has operations in many countries.
The same issue of the sanctity of legal contracts also forms the central issue of a simmering problem between Sime Darby and its joint-venture partners. Since being appointed the acting head of the conglomerate, Datuk Bakke Salleh has been going through the operations of the fallen national icon.
He is thinking of unwinding and re-looking property joint ventures. The Star, quoting reliable sources, says that Bakke and his team are looking at the joint ventures with the Sunrise Group and Brunsfield.
Problem is that the noises emanating from Sime Darby seems to indicate that unwinding or ending joint ventures are unilateral decisions, to be made by one party to the detriment of another. Instead of sabre-rattling, perhaps Bakke — who has had little experience in running a listed vehicle — should show some humility and discuss with his joint-venture partners if they are willing to re-look or re-visit their agreements.
It is the sensible thing to do because making threatening noises is unlikely to scare Sunrise, Brunsfield or any other joint-venture partner. It is also the smart thing to do because trying to get out of a legally-binding contract is just not done by a national icon, fallen or not.