By Parliamentary Opposition Leader, DAP Secretary- General and MP for Kota Melaka, Lim Kit Siang, in Malacca on Monday, 27.5.1986:
Has Tan Koon Swan’s $5 million post-dated cheque to Multi-Purpose dated 19th May been cleared?
On 18th May 1986, at the press conference after a dialogue with Koperasi Serbaguna Malaysia (KSM) liaison committee members in Kuala Lumpur on the Multi- Purpose Holdings problems, the MPH spokeman Datuk Oon Seng Lee confirmed that Tan Koon Swan had replied $18 million on May 7, while the balance of $5 million was by the way of a post- dated cheques for 19th May 1986.
It is over a week, and there is widespread talk that this $5 million post-dated cheque had not yet been cleared. The Multi-Purpose Board of Directors should not keep mum, but must explain to the MPH shareholders and the public the true picture.
If this $5 million cheque of Tan Koon Swan had been cleared on May 19, then the Board should openly acknowledge it; and if not on May 19, then state the date the cheque was cleared. This is only fair to Tan Koon Swan, otherwise he would have the carry the ‘black kwali’ of not yet having this outstanding $5 million I cleared.
If this $5 million cheque had not been cleared, then the shareholders and the public are also entitled to an explanation.
It is significant that the MPH Directors have up to now been very silent as to why they should make Tan Koon Swan bear the personal responsibility of paying the $23 million from Multi- Purpose for the Pan EL rescue, bid in last November in Singapore, when this was a decision of the entire MPH Board.
Why is Kee Yong Wee, for instance, keeping quiet on this issue, for he was a member of the MPH Board for the whole of 1985. Surely as a close comrade-in-arms, Senator Kee should go to the personal aid of Tan Koon Swan in ‘repaying’ this $23 million, in sharing the burden on a 50-50 per cent basis.
After the arrest of Tan Koon Swan in Singapore for 15 charges of abetment of criminal breach of trust, fraud and stock manipulation in the Pan EL case, MCA leaders talk about setting up a Defend Tan Koon Swan fund. What was happened to this Defend Tan Koon Swan Fund? Surely, if Tan Koon Swan is not legally responsible for the $23 million lost by Multi- Purpose in Pan EL in Singapore, MCA leaders and members should rally to the help of Tan Koon Swan to help him in sharing this ‘moral responsibility’ by raising $23 million to ‘repay’ Multi- Purpose: if the MPH Board is not prepared to bear responsibility- whether legally or morally.