SARCASTICALLY, Malaysia is one notch better than renowned illusionist David Copperfield in making big items ranging from the Statue of Liberty to elephants, planes, and trains disappear so to speak.

While the youngest person to be admitted to the Society of American Magicians at the age of 12 made those items vanish when they truly existed before the audience’s eyes, the Made-in-Malaysia illusion has it that those items “vanish without even been there in the first place”.

Let’s get serious.

Apart from the ‘missing’ six littoral combatant ships (LCS) whose RM9 bil fiasco has been likened to “Another 1MDB” by the New Straits Times leader page yesterday (Aug 10), it is worth re-capping that the Royal Malaysian Air Force (RMAF) had almost succumbed to the Malaysian illusionary art in its procurement of six MD530G light scout attack helicopters.

Manufactured by MD Helicopters – a unit of US aerospace giant McDonnell Douglas – the choppers had been ordered in 2016 by the Defence Ministry (MINDEF).

The terms of the contract stipulated that the helicopters also known as “Little Birds” are slated to be delivered in two batches – the first two by July 2017 with the other four scheduled to arrive by December 2018.

MINDEF, then headed by Datuk Seri Hishammuddin Hussein, had ordered the helicopters following a demonstration at the 2015 Langkawi International Maritime and Aerospace (Lima) exhibition.

According to the Free Malaysia Today (FMT) news portal which questioned the whereabouts of the six helicopters in May 2019, the proposal was submitted to former prime minister and finance minister Datuk Seri Najib Razak for approval.

The company appointed to supply the choppers was paid 35% of the contract value amounting to some RM113 mil. As there was no proper due diligence, MINDEF was not aware that the company had previously been terminated as the local agent for MD Helicopters due to failure to meet financial obligations.

“This was very irresponsible because it opened up the government to the risk of financial losses and a failure to obtain the helicopters,” a source had told FMT.

As if incessantly throwing caution to the wind, the RMAF had also raised concerns over the ability of the MD530G which ultimately fell on deaf ears. This is very much expected (as in the case of the LCS procurement) given the acquisition was accorded the green light through direct negotiation, hence the deal was exempted from undergoing value management checks.

To cut a long story short, the much-delayed six MD530G light scout/attack helicopters only arrived on Malaysia shores on Feb 28 this year – almost five years behind time (the first two was scheduled to be delivered by July 2017).

There is little wonder that Malaysia had scored a low 45% and received a D rating in the Government Defence Integrity Index (GDI) for 2020 as per released by Transparency International Malaysia (TI-M). The D rating indicates weak institutional resilience to graft. – Aug 11, 2022

https://focusmalaysia.my/malaysias-mastery-of-illusion-art-is-one-rung-better-than-david-copperfields/