Public Accounts Committee urges Khazanah to expand abroad

KUALA LUMPUR, Aug 11 — PAC chairman Datuk Seri Azmi Khalid has asked Khazanah Nasional to look outside Malaysia for potential investments opportunities that would turn it into a multinational giant.

“We have observed that that 88.3 percent of Khazanah's investment is in the country. We want that to change and Khazanah ought to broaden its horizon and be a multinational corporation," said Azmi after chairing a PAC committee meeting today.

He also said that that Khazanah’s expansion would also help prevent the corporation from monopolising businesses within the country.

Azmi also said that among the key actions decided upon at today’s meeting was that ailing companies owned by Khazanah were to be restructured.

Azmi, who is also the Padang Besar MP, also said that the PAC would be visiting the MRR2 site tomorrow morning. He said that the committee had yet to be briefed by the Public Works Department.

Meanwhile, Bernama reports that the PAC repeated Prime Minister Datuk Seri Abdullah Ahmad Badawi's call last week to Proton Holdings Bhd to get itself a strategic foreign partner to continue to compete in the world market.

Chairman Datuk Seri Azmi Khalid, said that although Proton's performance had improved, the call for a strategic partnership should be considered to help build up the national car producer's capacities.

"If Proton wants to compete in the world market, Khazanah Nasional and the government must find a strategic partner to expand its business and to become a major power in the world's automobile producing industry," he said at a press conference following the PAC's meeting at the Parliament here today.

Proton is one of the 50 companies under Khazanah Nasional.

Abdullah, when launching Proton's Technology Week earlier this month made the call to Proton to consider a foreign partnership.

He had said that Proton would need to further improve its quality and services to buyers.

The PAC meeting, the first this year, was chaired by Azmi for the first time after he was elected chairman in March. He takes over from Datuk Shahrir Samad, who is now Minister of Domestic Trade and Consumer Affairs.

Further on the Proton partnership suggestion, Azmi said that although the issue was not new, PAC was looking at it from the context of a more global appeal for Proton in the future.

"There was an earlier call for Proton to find itself a strategic partner but then it stopped...We (PAC) feel that it will be better for the future of Proton if it joins forces with a company that can provide it the synergy it needs to move and penetrate the international market with a larger (production) volume.

He said that the call was also in line with current development in the automobile world where many automobile companies have taken the move to merge in their efforts to raise their production and compete at global level.

There are only 12 automobile manufacturers in the world now compared with 60 companies 20 years ago, he added.
PAC, however did not name any particular company as a potential partner for Proton.

"We are not making any suggestion, it is up to them to think about it," he said.

-TMI