This article first appeared in The Edge Financial Daily on July 2, 2019
KUALA LUMPUR: The Dewan Rakyat erupted in chaos yesterday over Lembaga Tabung Haji’s accounts, as opposition lawmakers claimed there was a misrepresentation of numbers and demanded a royal commission of inquiry (RCI) to be set up to look into Tabung Haji’s financial standing.
The episode began when Minister in the Prime Minister’s Department Datuk Seri Dr Mujahid Yusof Rawa told the Dewan that Tabung Haji recorded a 22.14% year-on-year decrease in operational expenditure (opex) in the first quarter ended March 31, 2019 (1QFY19) to RM204 million from RM262 million the year before.
The minister said this was due to steps taken to cut Tabung Haji’s spending, which include the renegotiation of contracts.
The answer was jeered by opposition members of parliament, including Datuk Tajuddin Abdul Rahman (BN-Pasir Salak), who implied that the lower opex may have something to do with pilgrim headcount, and asked Mujahid to reveal the total number of travelling pilgrims this year as opposed to the headcount last year.
“How many pilgrims [this year]? Tell us,” shouted Tajuddin, but was ignored by Mujahid.
The matter escalated as former chairman Datuk Seri Abdul Azeez Abdul Rahim (BN-Baling) joined the fray and repeated Umno’s call since last year for an RCI to be conducted on Tabung Haji’s accounts.
“Is there proof that [former] chairman (Abdul Azeez) stole Tabung Haji’s money?” he shouted to Mujahid, referring to previous allegations by the current administration that he misappropriated Tabung Haji’s monies when he was leading the pilgrim fund.
“Are you afraid of setting up an RCI? If you are afraid, don’t be a minister,” he added.
In 1QFY19, Tabung Haji made RM440 million on revenue of RM623 million, with net assets recorded at RM1.2 billion.
In November last year, Abdul Azeez was implicated in one of two police reports by Tabung Haji, which alleged that RM22.12 million from Yayasan Tabung Haji (YTH) was disbursed for activities with political inclinations under a programme in 2017.
Abdul Azeez, alongside three others, were then trustees of YTH. On Dec 4, 2018, he argued that RM7 million of the monies highlighted was in fact sourced from Tabung Haji’s profit from investments and not from depositors’ funds.
Pilgrim quota unchanged
Meanwhile, it has been reported that Tabung Haji had kept its 2019 pilgrim quota unchanged from 2018 at 30,200 individuals, with 10,000 more placements requested vide a letter from Prime Minister Tun Dr Mahathir Mohamad to the Saudi government.
In explaining Tabung Haji’s operational savings earlier, Mujahid said among the old contracts the pilgrim fund had renegotiated included the supply of IT infrastructure supply, where RM9.3 million was saved per year.
“We also reduced operational spending and procurement by the headquarters and branches nationwide by introducing centralised procurement that allowed us to save RM2 million per year,” said Mujahid.
Other efforts, Muhajid said, include cutting spending on events by RM1.5 million per year, to refinance key projects and cut the interest charges on some of them to 1.9% from 3.7%, and to cancel non-beneficial initiatives or those with low potentials such as investment in ATM machines.
Mujahid was responding to a question by Datuk Seri Anwar Ibrahim (PH-Port Dickson) on the operational savings achieved by Tabung Haji so far.
Tabung Haji issued its lowest-ever hibah of 1.25% for its 9.2 million depositors for the year 2018, compared with 4.75% for 2017, and an additional 1.25% for those who did not perform hajj that year.
The pilgrim fund underwent a restructuring after the new government found that it had total assets of RM70.3 billion with total liabilities amounting to RM74.4 billion in 2017, which translates into a deficit of RM4.1 billion.
Under the Tabung Haji Act 1995, it is not supposed to pay out dividend when its asset value drops below its liabilities.