Empty words of “no more delays in LCS project” are not good enough – what are the new milestones for the delivery of the six LCS, will it be during the 13th Malaysia Plan 2026-2030 when the first Letter of Intent (LOI) was issued as far back as the 9th Malaysia Plan?

Empty words of “no more delays in the littoral combatant ships (LCS) project” are not good enough.

The first of six LCS was scheduled to be delivered in April 2019, and by now, we should have five LCS (with the sixth to be delivered by June next year but absolutely no construction had been done on it yet) to protect the safety and security of Malaysia.

Now we are left naked as the Royal Malaysian Navy (RMN) has been denied the six LCS since 2019.

Although the Boustead Naval Shipyard Sdn. Bhd. (BNS) chief executive officer Azjar Jumaat said that there would be “no more delays in the LCS project”, what are the new milestones for the delivery of the six LCS – will the six LCS be delivered in 13th Malaysia Plan (2026-2030) when the first two LCS were scheduled to be delivered to RMN in the 11th Malaysia Plan?

The RM9 billion LCS project is one of the biggest failures of defence procurements in history, as the Letter of Intent was issued as far back as the Ninth Malaysia Plan on 15th October 2010.

BNS has terminated the sub-contracts to Contraves Advanced Devices Sdn Bhd (CAD) and Contraves Electrodynamics Sdn Bhd (CED), both of which acted as middle-men to purchase equipment from original equipment manufacturers (OEMs) to build the vessels, but have the OEM agreed to supply the equipments as promised in the various contracts they signed with CAD or CED?

Azhar should not indulge in meaningless statements, as saying that the BNS does not foresee the termination of the CAD and CED will delay the project, when the project had already been delayed for an inordinate length of time.

I call on the Parliament Select Committee on Agencies Under the Prime Minister’s Department to meet urgently and summon the Malaysian Anti-Corruption Commission (MACC) Chief Commissioner, Azam Baki to explain why the MACC had failed to take action against anyone for the RM9 billion LCS scandal although he had the benefit of two reports on the LCS scandal – the Special Investigation Committee on Public Governance, Procurement and Finance the LCS (JKUSTUPKK) headed by then auditor-general Ambrin Buang and the report of the forensic audit of the LCS procurement (2011-2014) carried out by Alliance IFA (M) Sdn. Bhd. at the behest of Boustead Heavy Industries Corp Bhd (BHIC) – which contained a myriad of possible charges on corruption, abuse of power, breach of trust, malpractices and cheating.

Azam had more than two years to act on these two reports on the LCS scandal, which were served on him as if on a golden platter, but there had not been a single action by the MACC in these two years.

The PSC on Agencies Under the Prime Minister’s Department should summon Azam to explain why and present a report to Parliament when its reconvenes on Oct. 3, 2022.

This is all the more pertinent as the three charges against the former BNS chairman, Ahmad Mohd Nor last month predated the LCS scandal and had nothing to do with it, but concerned other defence procurements.