Dr Hj Ismail Pg Hj Damit

Bandar Seri Begawan - The former development minister Pengiran Dr Haji Ismail elected to give sworn evidence from the witness stand under oath yesterday in a high profile, on-going corruption case against him as the High Court ruled there was a case for him to answer.

The ex-minister read out a 15-page statement under oath in court testifying against the evidence adduced by the prosecution in the corruption trial.

The former minister who was first charged for alleged corruption in May 2004 together with a Brunei based Malaysian contractor Wong Tim Kai pleading not guilty is denying all charges.

Wong who skipped bail in mid trial and disappeared leaving the former minister to face the charges alone is now wanted by the police.

The fact that the ex-minister's defence has been called yesterday means that the court has found some evidence to suggest that he has committed some of the alleged offences he is now facing.

However this does not mean that the court has concluded that Pengiran Dr Ismail has done anything wrong.

But it does mean that the ex minister has to explain in court certain points that rose in Brunei's longest corruption trial involving millions of dollars.

After the whole of the evidence have been heard the court will decide whether the former minister has committed any offence mentioned.

In the middle of the longest trial in Brunei the former Chief Justice Dato Mohd Syeed quit and a new judge Gareth John Lugar-Mawson, Judicial Commissioner, was appointed.

Ahmad Basuni Abas, assisted by Lt Col (Rtd) Harif Ibrahim and Ridzlan Ibrahim, represented the defendant in the High Court.

Pengiran Indera Wijaya Pengiran Dr Haji Ismail stated his roles and responsibilities whilst in office as the minister of development and Istana Project Supervisor, as well as prior duties and positions in the Public Works Department in his statement in court yesterday.

In his lengthy defence that ex minister began by saying that, "As a Minister of Development, I was to implement and supervise the national development of this country and development of its infrastructure in accordance with the National Development Plan. This included implementing the national housing projects for the landless citizens of Brunei Darussalam.

"This was and is still being carried out. Providing housing for the landless citizens is to carry out the wishes of His Majesty the Sultan as he made this a priority in the Independence Day speech in 1984. Being a minister, I was also accountable for the decisions and policies of the departments under the Ministry of Development.

"In my role as the IPS, I carried out the command of His Majesty the Sultan. I was initially to supervise all projects in relation to the construction and maintenance of Istana Nurul Iman and Istana Darul Hana. It then expanded to the construction of Istana Nurul Izzah and other palaces belonging to members of the royal family. I obtained direct instructions from His Majesty in carrying out and supervising such projects. I would brief His Majesty from time to time on the progress made on the projects he commanded, in my audience with His Majesty Most of these were personal in nature.

"There would also be occasions where His Majesty would instruct me to implement projects designated under IPS but for the public benefit and utilities. Funding would either be from His Majesty personally or His Majesty would command me to obtain funding from the Ministry of Finance. These projects normally were not included in the National Development Plan or its budget or in any departmental budget under the Ministry of Development.

"Those projects commanded by His Majesty which were designated as IPS and personally funded by His Majesty included the Jame `Asr Hassanil Bolkiah Mosque in Kampung Kiulap, the Tahfiz Institute for Quran Reading (a school for memorisation of the Quran) in Jalan Tutong and the Sultan Haji Hassanal Bolkiah Foundation Building in Bandar Seri Begawan (Yayasan Sultan Haji Hassanal Bolkiah Commercial Complex). It included the Yayasan's main office at Jalan Kumbang Pasang. There were also the construction of kindergarten, primary and secondary schools under the personal funding of His Majesty through this Foundation and designated as IPS projects. Engineers and relevant departments under PWD would be involved as implementers for these Foundation projects.

"Apart from these projects, there were also housing projects designated under IPS upon the command of His Majesty. These included the Kampung Bolkiah 'A' and Kampung Bolkiah `B' at the water village. These projects were for the construction of houses and the villages' infrastructure, which were financed privately by His

Majesty, in order to provide housing for the citizens of the water villages whose houses were destroyed by major fire outbreaks. In most cases, there was urgency for the construction of such houses.

"There were also housing projects for the poor and Muslim converts in the interior parts of Belait, Tutong and Temburong Districts which were funded by His Majesty and implemented by PWD.

"To carry out such projects properly and on timely basis, and due to their urgency, selected and able contractors were shortlisted by the implementing engineers and quantity surveyors from PWD. The selected contractors were invited to quote. Their quotations were then negotiated. The PWD implementers would then submit their comments and recommendations for my consideration. I then gave my recommendation to obtain the approval from His Majesty. There would be instances where the quotations and recommendations would be rejected if I found out that the contractors were overburdened in other projects.

"Once approval was given by His Majesty, the contract between the successful tenderer would be signed. As there was no standard form of contract for IPS, the standard form of contract for PWD was used but I signed in my role as IPS.

"In some cases, although the project was designated under IPS, the funding would be from the Treasury under the Ministry of Finance. For example, in the case of the construction of the Office of the State Mufti and its convention hall, His Majesty commanded the construction of the Office of the State Mufti when the office of the State Mufti became separated from the Ministry of Religious Affairs. This was not in the national development plan or under any departmental or development budget.

"It was made an IPS project by command of His Majesty. His Majesty commanded that funding would be from the Ministry of Finance. Based upon such command mil when the tender had been accepted, I wrote to the Ministry of Finance to request funding to be made available. Other project similar to this was the Royal Regalia Building, Bandar Seri Begawan in which PWD architects were involved in the design of the buildings and other engineers from PWD and the DES or other consultants as implementers. Another example was the construction of the Istana Nurul Izzah.

"There were also instances where private consultants were engaged to design and implement projects under IPS. An example here would be the construction of Istana Nurul Izzah. This was an IPS designated projects where private consultants were engaged as implementers without the involvement of PWD. The option whether to involve PWD or private consultants depended upon the command I received.

"I also carried out and supervised projects under the command of HRH Prince Jefri Bolkiah which were designated under IPS upon his command as he was then the Minister of Finance. An example of this would be the relocation of the Narcotics Control Bureau Headquarters from Jalan Rakis in Bandar Seri Begawan to the present site in Kampong Tungku. The relocation was made in order to develop the former site occupied by the Narcotics Control Bureau Department to construct government rest houses for foreign dignitaries, which is now known as Assara'a located along Jalan Kumbang Pasang. The relocation and construction of the Narcotics Control Bureau Office used private consultants as implementers due to the urgency of the project. To my knowledge HRH Prince Jefri Bolkiah paid for this project.

"Other examples of IPS designated projects under the command of HRH Prince Jefri Bolkiah were the construction of the Tungku Link Road, the coastal protection project along Jerudong Beach, the Ong Sum Ping blocks of condominium and the electrical power stations in Jerudong, Berakas and Gadong. In all instances, for projects to be designated under IPS, I informed, sought consent and approval from His Majesty.

"There were also other residential projects designated under IPS but funding came from other members of the royal family and implementers by private consultants. I supervised those projects and submitted progress claims from the private consultants and contractors awarded with the projects direct to those members of the royal family who commanded me to supervise and implement them.

"In the case of government funded IPS project, the vote number would simply state "IPS" and reference to my letter to the Ministry of Finance would also be quoted for the purpose of processing payments.

"The Kampung Tungku Housing Scheme for the landless citizens had been a priority of the government and in particular His Majesty. I was concerned on the large numbers of approved applicants on the waiting lists for the housing scheme. Compounded by it, I was also concerned on the slow rate of houses being constructed. The applicants were either from the water villages or other areas all over the state. The budget allocated for the Department of Development was never sufficient and to apply for the department or the development budget would take time to process. I was given the statistics and numbers of approved applicants and the waiting list from the Department of Development. In order to speed up the construction of those houses without the delay in applying for fund and the ensuing tender process, I submitted my recommendation to His Majesty to appoint contractors already on those sites to carry on with the construction of houses on the remaining plots of land available.

"Therefore, for Kampung Telisai and Mata Mata, Syarikat Pembangunan Haji Ibrahim PPW Hj Mohammad who was the contractor on site was recommended to proceed construction on the remaining plots. Galfar Construction Sendirian Berhad was recommended to proceed on Package 4 and TED Sendirian Berhad was recommended to proceed with Package 3 at Kampung Tungku. Both TED and Galfar also were contractors on site in Kampung Tungku and had also agreed to reduce their prices. I agreed to award in that manner as the rate of construction for Galfar was a bit slow and could not catch up with TED. My reasoning to recommend contractors on sites to be awarded the tenders were to speed up the construction without undue delay in tendering exercises, to save some costs on mobilisation and getting the same rates for the existing houses being constructed based on their existing contracts.

"To go for an open tender would take time and I was not sure whether the budget to be submitted by the Department of Development through PWD would be approved and allocated by the Ministry of Finance.

"This situation happened at Kampung Lambak Kiri. The Department of Development had submitted its tender recommendation to award the contract to TED being the lowest but was put on hold by the State Tender Board due to unavailability of budget. At that time the construction of the Sultan Haji Hassanal Bolkiah Foundation Complex in Bandar Seri Begawan was in progress and displaced some residents from the water villages surrounding the area and also those affected, by the fire outbreak in the same area. I conveyed to HRH Prince Jefri Bolkiah about the lack and delay in getting more government funds to finance the construction of these houses.

"I believed HRH Prince Jefri was sufficiently informed of these delays. HRH Prince Jefri then agreed that he would pay for the project and to designate it as under IPS. Since TED was already the recommended contractor previously for Lambak Kiri, they were then awarded the contract to construct the 33 houses and eventually another 27 houses. By awarding it to the contractor on site for the 27 houses, this would have better coordination and the rates for the houses could be agreed using the existing rates quoted by the contractor and accepted by the State Tender Board for the adjacent site.

"Their progress claims were submitted to me and after certification and verification by the implementers at PWD, I would then submit the claims to HRH Prince Jefri. Whenever I submitted the claims, they would normally be compiled with claims from other contractors doing other IPS projects. I would personally submit all the claims and explain to HRH Prince Jefri regarding the progress claims on those projects. He would then instruct his office to issue his personal cheque in one lump sum amount for all those claims I brought along. My office would then write to Citibank to request the issuance of Manager's cheques to pay each contractor based on the amount claimed. Once my office received the Manager's cheques, each contractor would then be required to sign an acknowledgment form as receipt for those cheques from 1PS.

"In relation to Lot 701 Drainage and Roadworks Project, I remember there was an application for a better and wider access road from the Sultan Haji Hassanal Bolkiah Highway into the Lot 701 Kampung Kiarong and for the provision of improved drainage along the access road. At that time, there was a small narrow road and there was no departmental budget for its improvement. I became aware that the landowner of Lot 701 was HRH Prince Mohamed Bolkiah who requested for the access road through the developer of his land. I came to know that Wong Tim Kai and another person were the developers and TED was the contractor involved in building the shophouses. I informed HRH Prince Jefri about the lack of fund at the departmental level to improve and widen the access road and the associated drainage along the access road and of the request made for it. HRH Prince Jefri then agreed to fund for the access road and its improvement: I did inform HRH Prince Mohamed Bolkiah about this.

"For better coordination, I instructed the Department of Roads to obtain quotation from the contractor on site of Lot 701 with a view to negotiate on the tender for the drainage and access road work. Upon looking at the submission from the Director of Roads, I agreed with his recommendation and noted that they had negotiated the amount and informed them that this would be privately financed, meaning the fund would come from a private source, namely HRH Prince Jefri Bolkiah. So all claims .would be submitted to me before I submitted them to HRH Prince Jefri.

"When the first variation order was recommended, again I agreed to it. I sought HRH Prince Jefri's approval on this. He gave his approval for the work to be done and for the financing. When work was about to be completed, I became aware of the public complaints about the heavy congestion along Jalan Kiarong to Jalan Dato Ratna. At that time, the road was narrow and heavily congested when traffic was coming in and out from Kampung Kiarong. Kampung Kiarong was by then a densely populated area where there was and still is a housing complex owned by Her Majesty and occupied mostly by doctors and personnel of the RIPAS hospital. A sister of His Majesty the Sultan also resides in the area. The heavy traffic was compounded with the traffic going to and from the Gadong wet market as well as the Primary School located towards Jalan Babu Raja. I asked the Department of Roads to obtain quotation from TED in order to improve the situation as they were doing the drainage and road Works along Lot 701. Based on the comments from the Department of Roads, I agreed for the improvement To arried out by TED being the contractor on site doing the Lot 701 drainage and roadwork. I again obtained approval from HRH Prince Jefri to proceed and for funding, which he agreed.'

"This continued in respect of variation order numbers 3 to 5. Variation Order No 3 came about when the Department of Roads itself realised that the balance of Jalan Dato Ratna should be improved up to Jalan Babu Raja. I agreed with their recommendation. In respect of the private parking at Lot 4520, I was approached by the then Deputy Minister of Defence and the military aide-de-camp of His Majesty, who requested me whether a car park could be constructed at his house, being the official residence in his capacity as the Deputy Minister of Defence and a `cheteria'. His `cheteria' title "Yang Amat Mulia Pengiran Sanggamara DiRaja" reflects his duty and responsibility on the security of His Majesty. A `cheteria' is a position bestowed to a person whose function is to assist the viziers in the royal palace. He had obtained approval from HRH Prince Jefri already. I informed HRH Prince Jefri to confirm about this and he had no objection for the work to be included in the variation order and payment would be from him. I knew for a fact then that His Majesty and other members of the royal family frequently visited him.

"There was also the water supply problem to the Sixth Form Centre in Gadong where the water came from the Kiarong Reservoir which traversed Jalan Dato Ratna. Pipe laying was required to improve the water supply and I agreed with the recommendation from the water services on the quote from TED. My ministry did receive urgent request from the Ministry of Education to solve the total lack of water supply to the surrounding areas and most importantly, the school. HRH Prince Jefri again agreed to finance this after I informed him. The same situation arose when the triple culvert was required to be installed to avoid flooding in variation order No 5. To me, all the works formed an integral part in the roads improvement around the area. As far as I can remember the street lightings along the access road of Lot 701 was installed by a company, Amedeo Corporation Sendirian Berhad, without the involvement of the Department of Electrical Services.

"In all instances, I informed and obtained approval from HRH Prince Jefri about the required funding and also on the need to carry on with the additional works ie variation order 1 to 5 and the required funding. All The claims were submitted to him and payments made by his cheques. It was only towards the early part of 1997 that HRH Prince Jefri commanded me to submit that claims for the remaining payments to the Ministry of Finance in respect of the payments for TED for the drainage and roadworks at Lot 701 and its variation orders and also other IPS projects that he had personally agreed to finance.

Mufti Earthworks this was a project commanded by His Majesty under IPS. The implementers from various disciplines of PWD and DES were formed in a project management team (PMT) to assist me in designing, preparation and evaluation of the tender and the supervision of the project.

"I was a member of the main committee overseeing the main planning and implementation for the construction of the Office of the State Mufti and the convention hall. However, for the design and time line for each programme in the main project for the construction of the said building, the main committee relied on the PMT to come up with the schedules.

"I saw the tender recommendation from the chief quantity surveyor and when I became aware of the arithmetical error by TED and its intention to withdraw, I requested the team to meet up with TED to consider its intention to withdraw. To me their quote would be acceptable as it was the lowest. The programme, although would take 12 months, it would not affect other works being carried out and the overall completion time for the whole project.

"In an earlier meeting with the PMT, our concern was that no overtime work should be carried out due to the sensitivity around the area. The earthworks would involve transporting earth elsewhere. Cleanliness and minimum sound pollution emanating from the area were important aspects to be taken care of due to the sensitivity of the surrounding areas.

"When TED confirmed their original tender amount and agreed to absorb the arithmetical error, I agreed to award the Mufti Earthworks contract, as it was the cheapest and their time difference to complete the work was still within the acceptable limit.

TOL Industrial Land Application "Being the Minister of Development, it was common for me to receive complaints or requests for services that could be rendered by departments under the Ministry. Sometime in 1991,I was given a copy of the rejection letter from the Land Office regarding TED's application for a TOL industrial site. I could not remember whether it was extended to me by Wong Tim Kai or by a representative of TED. I extended this to the Permanent Secretary for his action with my views. I was informed by the permanent secretary that TED would be given 1.3 acres after their appeal.

"At a later date, I indicated that I had no objection for more land depending on its availability.

"By 18th April 1994, I received an appeal letter from TED detailing further on its application and its history. It was only by June 1994 that I managed to enquire on the appeal. I passed the appeal letter to the then Public Relations Officer at the Ministry. I was then informed of the meeting organised by the relevant officer by end of June 1994. I also included another application for TOL land in the meeting where the applicant, Osmani Osman, wrote to me informing his prolonged predicament where the Land Office would not approve his TOL application unless he had an approval from the Ministry of Education to run a school and the Ministry of Education would not approve of his school unless he had a site or TOL land.

"Upon perusing TED's application and reports, there was justification for approving a bigger plot but in that meeting I told the officers that there should be better coordination between TCP and the Land Office in their assessment for allocation. I approved for the allocation of five acres, subject to available land. I see this as an exercise of my authority in TOL industrial matters. I also left this to those departments to coordinate. All applications with full details should have been forwarded to me for my consideration in the first place.

"After the meeting, the new permanent secretary was briefed on how TCP and Land Office had previously handled such matter and he came out with a letter to the various departments ie the TCP and Land Department calling for better coordination and how applications should be considered in order to speed up the process of approval and also the process of cleaning up the unsightly environment. All along I had been entrusted with authority to deal with TOL Industrial applications.
Construction of house on Lot 30823 "Lot 30823 Kampung Pengkalan Gadong was a parcel of land I bought for my wife. It was vacant then. Wong Tim Kai wanted to purchase it as the next plot had been purchased by his friend. I did not want to sell it. He proposed to construct a house on the land and rent it from me. I agreed after looking at his plans and agreed on the proposed rental.

"Before the construction started, I was told the cost of construction was $520,000.00. Upon completion, I then called Wong to my house to pay for this and used the cash money given to me by HRH Prince Jefri Bolkiah to pay Wong to the amount of $500,000.00 after agreeing on a discount of $20,000.00. My wife assisted in counting the money when we gave to Wong. I must have misplaced the receipt as it was a plain piece of paper that my wife gave to Wong to acknowledge receipt of the money. This was sometime in 1993. I did not remember where I kept the receipt when the ACB came to search my house in 2001.

Purchase of Unit 9 shophouse "I was offered this shophouse when it was nearing completion. It occurred to me to give this to my daughter as a form of an investment for her as she was graduating. I told Wong that I would rather purchase it if there was a ready tenant whose rental would then be able to pay for the loan that would be taken to finance the purchase. My daughter signed the necessary sale and purchase agreement and applied for the bank loan. I paid B$300,000 in cash to Wong in my house as the initial payment. Wong acknowledged the payment on a plain piece of paper. I must have misplaced the receipt. I paid Wong using the money given by HRH Prince Jefri Bolkiah to me over the years. The balance would be paid by way of a bank loan under my daughter's name.

"My daughter submitted the loan application and after executing the security documents required by the bank, we left it to the bank and its lawyers to deal with the release of the loan as payment to Wong on the balance of the purchase price. I executed as a guarantor for the loan. I knew that the rental proceeds from the shophouse would be sufficient and could be used to pay the monthly instalments.

"I did not know that it was only until 1999 that the balance was paid or released by the bank. The bank did not inform my daughter at all about this matter or ever cancelled the loan. There was no notification at all why the bank did not release the balance of the purchase price after my daughter signed the required documents."

In relation to the development project at Lot 33999, Kampung Katok, the defendant Stated: "This was intended to be a personal venture whereby I would purchase the land and Wong would develop it. A bank loan would be applied in order to purchase and develop the land. The repayment for the loan would be from the sale proceeds of the houses constructed on the land. At first, the loan was taken from Malayan Bank but the development was not carried out on time due to the long process it took to change the land condition from agriculture to housing so as to enable the proper housing construction to proceed.

"The loan was then transferred to Baiduri Bank. I gave Wong Tim Kai the required power of attorney over the whole land to develop and sell whatever houses were constructed on the land. I stood as a guarantor for $1.3m over the loan. I gave Wong Tim Kai the Power of Attorney over the first 18 houses sometime in 1997 in order to obtain the banking facilities. Eventually, I also gave power of attorney over the remaining six houses in the venture to Wong Tim Kai sometime in 1999. Again this was to secure the banking facilities with Baiduri Bank. Therefore I do not have any more share on the houses and the development project.

"When His Majesty enquired about the guarantees given by Wong Tim Kai for the loan in his letter to me, I asked Wong why he stood as guarantor to the loan. Wong told me it was normal banking requirement. I then immediately told Wong to withdraw his guarantees. I remember giving His Majesty the list of projects and values of contracts awarded to TED in reply to His Majesty's letter. If I remember correctly, this was presented after the list had been prepared, in one of the audiences I had with His Majesty.

"This venture was in my personal capacity and not in my capacity as Minister or IPS. I was aware TED was one of the many contractors that had dealings with departments under the Ministry. I never let my personal dealings affect my working relationship. At any event, I also stood up as a guarantor to the loans. The land was under my name and was legally charged to the bank.

"I did not use the monies given by HRH Prince Jefri in dealing with Lot 33999 as my understanding was that the proceeds of sale of houses constructed on the Lot could cover the repayment of the bank loans. I had given irrevocable powers of attorney over the whole parcel of land to Wong and all the houses thereon The cash gifts from HRH Prince Jefri that I kept in the safe deposit box of HSBC were accumulated over the years from the late 1980s to the late 1990s. HRH Prince Jefri would normally hand out such gifts in envelopes bearing his crest containing few hundred thousand dollars each time on occasions such as Hari Raya. I used some of the cash for major purchases such as paying for the construction of the house on Lot 30823 and partial payment of the shophouse unit 9. Some of the cash found in the envelopes bearing the royal crest were gifts from Her Majesty on various occasions.

"I never intended to award those contracts to TED nor approve the TOL land on sinister motive apart from carrying out my duties to ensure that projects were done expeditiously and competently by relying on competent contractors and to ensure the response of the Ministry in providing various services and its discharge of responsibilities to the public and any clients efficiently without undue delay. All along from the beginning, my priority was to serve His Majesty and his government to the best of my ability and be responsible to the tasks entrusted to me."

The trial continues today. -- Courtesy of Borneo Bulettin

Comments (1)

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written by XoneX , November 19, 2009

Wow.. cash gift? I wish I could have some of the gift for my micro business so I can start my business properly

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