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The National Feedlot Centre in Gemas, Negri Sembilan. — file pic

KUALA LUMPUR, Feb 26 — The National Feedlot Corporation (NFCorp) continued today to deny any criminal breach of trust (CBT) in its loan agreement with the government, even accusing the police of “unfairly” pre-empting the charge.

In a statement here, the company even sought to question the motives of CCID director Datuk Syed Ismail Syed Azizan for recommending CBT charges against it yesterday, claiming the police had failed to understand the case’s “dynamics of the facts and the law”.

“NFCorp therefore wishes to enquire the police if, in their investigations, they had paid enough consideration to the fact that there is total lacking of the elements of dishonesty in this case, which is a primary ingredient of CBT and cheating?” the firm said in the statement.

Syed Ismail yesterday confirmed that the police are to recommend that the Attorney-General’s Chambers charge NFCorp directors with CBT.

NFCorp, which operates the national cattle-farming project, is chaired by federal minister Datuk Seri Shahrizat Abdul Jalil’s husband, Datuk Seri Mohamad Salleh Ismail. Their three children also hold executive posts in the company.

The NFC hit the headlines after it made it into the Auditor-General’s Report last year, and has continued to hog the limelight after it was linked to Shahrizat and her family.NFCorp has been accused repeatedly by PKR of siphoning off funds meant for the cattle-farming project and channelling them towards unrelated expenses like the purchase of several luxury condominium units in Bangsar and Singapore and land in Putrajaya as well as to fund personal umrah trips.

The company has also been accused of using part of the RM250 million government soft loan for companies owned by Shahrizat’s family members that are unrelated to the cattle-farming scheme.

But in its statement today, NFCorp denied these allegations and reminded Syed Ismail that the “so-called unrelated companies” of NFCorp “were always meant to be the subsidiaries of NFCorp”.

“The CCID, according to statements given by (NFCorp) directors to the authorities, is aware of the 2009 proposal by NFCorp to the government to novate the loan agreement so as to rationalise the structure of NFCorp to bring in all associated companies and assets within the hold of NFCorp so that the government loan be better secured.

“The fact that the directors of NFCorp sat on the board of these associate companies prove exactly the point of the attempt to rationalise the above said structure,” the company explained.

“According to (NFCorp’s) counsel, a loan document is never a document of the nature of a trust.

“If the loan is used for a different purpose (which is not the case here), it is therefore at worst, a breach of the loan agreement for which a civil remedy has been inbuilt in the loan agreement ... it is not a criminal matter,” NFCorp added.

As such, the company said the fact it wanted to rationalise its various associated companies immediately demolishes any perceived intention to commit CBT.

“In the last three-and-a-half months, the directors, management and staff of NFCorp had extended its fullest cooperation to both the police and the MACC wherein especially the directors had been subjected to intensive interviews.

“NFCorp will continue to extend its cooperation to ensure that the truth prevails,” it said.

Info : News