More than 500 companies are now on the Malaysian Competition Commission (MyCC)’s radar because they are believed to have formed a ‘cartel’ to bid for government project tenders.
It is alleged that the company owners would marry four wives to build an empire as this allows them to use their wives and relatives’ names as proxies.
According to a report by Sinar Harian, the Chief Executive Officer of MyCC, Iskandar Ismail, shared that these companies involved were detected trying to manipulate tender offers.
“Among the modus operandi is that there people would conspire with each other and submit tenders en masse… for example, 50 companies (will send tender bids) at a time. After that, they will fill in the form together, and go for site visits together, if the letters have spelling mistakes, all the forms will have spelling mistakes because they use the same template,”
“So these people will ‘determine’ who is the winner (by agreeing on the tender price) and then distribute it among themselves as if the government tender is their ‘property’,” he said.
Apparently, these company owners would also use their wives’ family member’s names as proxies as well.
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“There are (company owners) who marry four wives so that they can build a company empire where company A will be held by the first father-in-law, company B will be held by the second father-in-law, company C will be owned by the sister-in-law, company D will be held by their nephew, other companies are held by the wives,”
“It seems that they can create an empire with 50 companies, for example, bidding together,” he added.
He explained that the government is opening tenders to qualified parties with the aim of getting the best company that offers quality services at reasonable and competitive prices.
But, the actions of this company cartel have created an illusion as if their offer is the best, thereby affecting the opportunities of other companies that are truly capable.
What do you think about this? Do feel free to share your thoughts in the comment section.
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