Exclusive Taibs Foreign Property Portfolio
Published by Sarawak Report, June 15th, 2010 GMT.
Twin glass towers and a swish shopping complex at Preston Square in downtown Ottawa form just part of an enormous foreign property portfolio controlled in Canada by the family of Sarawak Chief Minister, Abdul Taib Mahmud, according to our exclusive investigations.
These buildings alone are worth at least one hundred million dollars and generate a healthy rental income from some of Canada’s top corporations, including Xerox, Adobe and Sun Life, who rent office space and retail outlets. Numerous Canadian Government Ministries are also listed at the building.
The Preston Square development lies at the centre of the major Canadian property empire run by the developer Sakto, which was founded in the early 1980s by Taib’s college-aged son Mahmud Abu Bekir Taib, his daughter Jamilah and his brother Onn Mahmud. It continues to be managed as a ‘family business’ by his now son-in-law, a Canadian, Sean Murray.
Read more here: http://sarawakreport.org/2010/06/exclusive-taibs-foreign-property-portfolio/
Shady Truths In 'Fancy' Sarawak
Published by Free Malaysia Today, 20 June 2010.
Government of the day is arrogant beyond words. Pray the people would be awaken to their voting rights.
ReplyDeletehttp://malaysia-today.net/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=32754:dont-vote-for-opposition-tribal-leaders-warned-&catid=19:newscommentaries&Itemid=100131
(Bernama) - Any tribal leader who supports the opposition in the next Sarawak state election will face immediate termination of service as the action is a very serious misconduct, said Sarawak Infrastructure Development and Communication Minister Michael Manyin.
"Tribal leaders are the government's agents in developing local communities and are not supposed to go against the government," he said at a ceremony to present appointment letters to Bidayuh and Melayu Temenggong (paramount leader) of Samarahan, here today.
http://sarawakreport.org/2010/07/saktisakto-another-taib-exclusive/
ReplyDeleteTaib company history in the USA
Also like Sakto, Sakti is currently managed by Sean Murray, husband of Jamilah Taib, who is the daughter of Abdul Taib Mahmud, Chief Minister of Sarawak (salary 20,000 Malaysian Ringgit per month). Sean Murray was re-named Hisham Murray when he converted to the Muslim faith on his marriage to Jamilah, but never uses this name in his business or social capacities outside of Sarawak.
Hisham (Sean) and Jamilah Murray
However recent court documents deposited with the San Francisco Superior Court show that the company has always belonged to the Taib family. Sakti makes several key acknowledgements in its deposition to the Court, which are therefore incontestable. The company admits that Sakti was incorporated in California in 1987 and that it was initially managed by Mahmud Abu Bekir Taib. The documents state “The Defendants [Sakti International Corporation] admit that beginning September 10, 1987, Sakti’s designated Chief Executive Officer, Secretary and Chief Financial Officer was Mahmud Taib”.
Previous revelations in Sarawak Report have proved that Mahmud Taib, the eldest son of the Chief Minister, was also an original Director of Sakto in Canada, formed in 1983, along with his sister Jamilah and their uncle Onn Mahmud, the Chief Minister’s brother.
http://sarawakreport.org/2010/07/where-are-the-answers/
ReplyDeleteHowever, so far, the Chief Minister has failed to respond to our allegations or to answer two questions, ‘Where did the money come from?’ and ‘How much of this property does he beneficially own?’.
Indeed, the Chief Minister has made only one significant response to our well-documented exposes. This week he forbade all newspapers in Sarawak to publish news about the lavish riches enjoyed by himself and his family. Such an act merely shows the extent of his dilemma and his embarrassment. Clearly he cannot deny the Taib family ownership of the properties in question, because it is all documented in official registries in different countries, which are available on-line to the public. He has therefore only silence and suppression to turn to in order to hide his embarrassment.
This is a sign of weakness and failure in an old man. Surely he knows that everyone in Kuching is talking about his greed? Does he plan to ban all conversations including the phrases ”Chief Minister” and “unexplained wealth” in the same sentence?
Meanwhile, he continues to support the ill-treatment and attacks by logging companies and police against native peoples who are trying to protect their rightful lands from rapacious timber and plantation companies. He is doing this even though the Malaysian Federal Courts have upheld that ownership of Native Customary Rights Lands cannot be removed by the State.
http://sarawakreport.org/2010/07/boy-racer-for-chief-minister/
ReplyDeleteThe disclosures about Rahman Taib (as he was known in the US) come in an on-line article for the Bugatti Review by Kevin C Limjoco, who was a college friend of Rahman’s in San Francisco and a member of his fast set in the States. Taib’s younger son clearly acted the part of a multi-millionaire playboy during his period in San Francisco, according to this and other reports, and was a notorious fast car fanatic. Conversely, business associates say he failed to show any business acumen when put in charge of the Taib property company in the US, Sakti International... The article in the on-line ‘Bugatti Review’ gives a telling insight into how the Taib family are regarded by onlookers abroad, namely as jett-setting multi-millionaires akin to Arab Princes or Sultans of Brunei. On one occasion, it is known that in a fit of passion, young Rahman even smashed up one of his classic cars, a million dollar Bugatti, with a fire extinguisher. However, his father clearly forgave the incident as he subsequently recalled his son to Sarawak, where he inherited his father’s seat in the Federal Parliament and was recently appointed Deputy Tourism Minister, a job he has now mysteriously abandoned.
http://sarawakreport.org/2010/07/oxford-demonstration-against-taib/
ReplyDeleteIf the people of Oxford had not heard of Abdul Taib Mahmud, Chief Minister of Sarawak, until today, they certainly know all about him now. His visit, tied to Sarawak’s heavy sponsorship of the Said Business School’s ‘Inaugural Global Islamic Branding and Marketing Forum’, was supposed to buy him credibility. In the event it ended up as a public relations disaster, as his reputation preceded him and was stuck up on banner headlines by protesters outside.
Even though it is the sleepy summer holiday period, a colourful crowd of demonstrators descended on the School to express their outrage that the University should have welcomed such a man and accepted such dubious sponsorship from the Timber Industry of Sarawak. The local press was soon on the scene, followed by Malaysian news teams, who had clearly been brought along to puff up the Chief Minister’s profile. Even the flunkies could not ignore a demo like this and they were soon filming, taking notes and conducting interviews.