KUALA LUMPUR: The Securities Commission Malaysia (SC) said it will review on the corruption and bribery allegations against the two low cost carriers -- AirAsia Group Bhd and AirAsia X Bhd.
“The statement of facts in the case of Regina vs Airbus SE discloses several allegations against AirAsia Group Bhd and AirAsia X Bhd.
As both are listed on Bursa Malaysia, the SC will examine the allegations and review all available evidence to determine if there is any breach of securities laws,” said the SC chairman Syed Zaid Albar said in a statement issued this afternoon.
Under s317A of the Capital Markets & Services Act 2007 (CMSA), a director of a public listed company (PLC) who does anything with the intention of causing wrongful loss to the PLC or its related corporation, commits an offence which is punishable with imprisonment and fine, according to the chairman’s statement.
The SC statement came on the heels of the news that the aerospace corporation Airbus had allegedly bribed two executives at AirAsia Group and AirAsia X US$50 million (about RM204.8 million) to secure contracts to supply aircraft to the two low cost carriers.
Yesterday, Malaysian Anti-Corruption Commission (MACC) chief commissioner Latheefa Koya revealed that the commission is already investigating the matter and it is in touch with the UK authorities.
Latheefa pointed out that MACC is empowered and has the jurisdiction to investigate any act of corruption committed by any Malaysian citizen or permanent resident in any place outside of Malaysia.
AirAsia group has denied the corruption and bribery allegations against the two airlines. The group said it was neither involved in any way whatsoever with the UK Serious Fraud Office (SFO) investigation of Airbus nor given any opportunity to provide any information or clarification to the SFO.
“AirAsia vigorously rejects and denies any and all allegations of wrongdoing,” the group was quoted by Bernama as saying yesterday.
It highlighted that the entering into of each aircraft purchase agreement was never made by any single individual decision, but instead arrived at through careful evaluation, deliberation and the collective decision of the board members after taking into account technical specifications, aircraft flight performance and operating economics.
The UK court documents sighted by theedgemarkets.com stated that in the nine years between October 2005 and November 2014, AirAsia and AirAsia X ordered 406 planes from Airbus, including 180 aircraft secured during the indictment period by way of improper payment (made by EADS France SAS, later Airbus Group SAS), and the offer of a further improper payment.
The court document stated that the funds were used to sponsor an unnamed sports team jointly owned by two individuals identified as AirAsia Executive 1 and AirAsia Executive 2, but was legally unrelated to both airlines.
“The improper payment consisted of US$50 million (and Airbus employees also offered but did not pay an additional US$55 million) paid to directors and/or employees of AirAsia and AirAsia X airlines as sponsorship for a sports team.
“The sports team was jointly owned by AirAsia Executive 1 and AirAsia Executive 2 but was legally unrelated to AirAsia and AirAsia X. The additional improper payment was prevented by the October 2014 freeze on payments to BPs [business partners],” said the documents.