KUALA LUMPUR (Feb 28): The Employees Provident Fund (EPF) has denied that billions of ringgit have been siphoned off in dealings with several parties as claimed by the online blog Sarawak Report.

“As such, no transfer of bonds nor funds of any kind to any of the aforementioned companies, parties or individual could have occurred as alleged,” the EFF said in a statement today.

Any schemes in such nature would not pass its “strong and robust governance framework”, added the fund.

Sarawak Report claimed that it had sighted numerous documents which revealed that a group of operatives had allegedly been siphoning funds from agencies linked to the Malaysian government such as the EPF to fund election expenses.

The blog alleged that the EPF transferred Malaysian public bonds worth RM10.6 billion to Limage Holdings SA supposedly owned by Hungarian Gyorgy Matrai.

The EPF, however, stressed that it has “never had any dealings nor entered into any agreements of any sort with Limage Holdings SA, Limage Southwest Holdings, the individual known as Mr Matrai nor any parties as stated by the Sarawak Report.”

However, the agency said it was made aware of the existence two fake letters in 2015 and 2016 relating to the name of companies and individuals mentioned in the Sarawak Report post, and said that it has made police reports accordingly.

"In particular in August 2015, a letter of indemnity addressed to Matrai alleging that EPF was made known about the agreement between EPF and Limage Holdings. As this was clearly a falsified document, the EPF lodged a police report on Oct 28, 2015,” EPF said.

The fund was also made aware of a letter of award (LoA) for a TripleNiceTales Sdn Bhd to develop an “Integrated Medical City” project for EPF.

“As there were third parties misusing the EPF name and suspicion of fraud involved, the EPF lodged a police report on 26 February 2016 stating that the EPF has no knowledge nor involvement in the transaction referred to in the LoA,” it added.

The EPF made a third police report on Jan 23, 2017 after it was made aware of “the involvement” of Ladylaw Securities Pte Ltd and director Nic Manikis — a company Sarawak Report said was involved in linking EPF and Limage. The EPF has no knowledge nor was involved in any investment transactions with the two, it said.

“Before any investment decisions are made, our governance process requires all proposals to be subject to stringent risk assessment and due diligence by management,” said the EPF.

“All approvals must go through the Management Investment Committee for endorsement before being put up to the Investment Panel for final approval. The Investment Panel comprises industry professionals, senior members of EPF management, Bank Negara Malaysia and the government.

“The EPF remains steadfast in fulfilling our mandate to protect and safeguard our members’ savings,” it added.