by Parliamentary Opposition Leader, DAP Secretary-General and MP for Tanjung, Lim Kit Siang, in Penang on Friday, February 25, 1994:
Samy Vellu is the last Minister who is qualified to advise the Telekom employees to give up their just fight to participate in the Employees Shares Option Scheme (ESOS)
The Minister for Energy, Telecommunications and Posts, Datuk Seri S. Samy Vellu, is the last Minister who is qualifier to advise the Telekom employees to give up their just fight to participate in the Employees Shares Option Scheme {ESOS}.
Instead of advising National Union of Telekom Employees (NUTE) and the 28,000 non-executive Telekom employees who had been denied the right to participate in ESOS, Samy Vellu should have championed their cause in the Cabinet and ask the Government to allocate another 30 million shares from the government stake in Telekom – the Government still owns over 75 per cent of Telekoms.
In fact, Samy Vellu should have instituted an inquiry as to why the 28,000 non-executive Telekom employees were denied their share in the 29.5 million Telekom shares under the ESOS, as they -were all distributed to the 3,000 executive employees including 300 lots to the Telekom Executive Chairman, Tan Sri Rashdan Baba, himself; This is one of the abuses of privatisation which the Minister concerned has promised Parliament would not be allowed to take place!
Samy Vellu’s advice yesterday to the Telekom employees to accept the offer of ‘two months’ bonus and a half month’s ex-gratia payment as Telekom Malaysia had no more shares to offer is most shocking.
The first question is what is the Minister’s stand on the denial of the ESOS to the 28,000 non-executive employees whether it is right, and if not, what is the remedy proposed by Samy Vellu.
The typical reaction of the Telekom employees to Samy Vellu’s statement yesterday is to ask Samy Vellu not to treat them as if they they are estate workers, but to respect them as skilled workers.
Samy Vellu’s stand is also very surprising when early this week, the Minister for Human Resources, Datuk Lim Ah Lek, had promised to bring up the issue of a fair distribution of Telekom ESOS to all Telekom workers at the Cabinet.
Is Samy Vellu sending a message to the Telekom employees that he is opposed to the Cabinet intervening in the case, or the extension of the ESOS Telekom shares to the 28,000 nonexecutive Telekom employees?