The Malaysian Anti-Corruption Commission (MACC) is reportedly investigating another Kuala Lumpur City Hall (DBKL) senior officer, this time for alleged corruption in contracts involving the crematorium in the city.

According to a report in the Metro section of The Star today, the official is in the City Hall’s Engineering, Mechanical and Electrical Department, and had reportedly awarded two contracts between 2015 and 2016.

One contract is reportedly for the maintenance of the facility’s seven cremation burners for RM7 million for three years, while another contract is for adding another six burners to the under-utilised crematorium, at a cost of RM10 million.

“MACC initiated the investigation as it deemed the contract value was exorbitant and that DBKL was being overcharged by 1,500 percent, based on the market rate.

“Contractors were also said to have submitted inflated invoices for unnecessary maintenance works.

“DBKL was being billed about RM2.3 million a year for the maintenance of the burners,” the report said.

The Star said local funeral service companies have quoted between RM21,500 and RM30,000 per year as the average annual cost of maintaining a cremation burner, while the Petaling Jaya Municipal Council spends between RM100,000 and RM200,000 a year to maintain its three burners.

In contrast, the DBKL is supposedly being charged RM329,000 a year to maintain each burner.

The daily quoted unnamed sources, supposedly from MACC, claiming that DBKL has withheld payments to the contractor for several months pending an investigation, while MACC integrity unit officers attached to DBKL have taken away files and questioned at least 10 officers to assist in the investigation.

All in department have been questioned

It also quoted MACC officer Zulkifri Abdul Manaf as confirming the investigation against the senior officer, and that everyone in the department has been questioned.

“Yes we are investigating right now.

“But we are not going to make any further comment yet as it will jeopardise our investigations,” Zulkifri is quoted as saying.

As for the contract for six new burners, The Star quoted an unnamed source as saying the contract was suspended after it was brought to the attention of Federal Territories Minister Tengku Adnan Tengku Mansor.

“In 2010, the government had spent more than RM13 million to install seven burners.

“With seven burners, the crematorium was only performing at 70 percent capacity. We certainly do not need more,” the source is quoted as saying.

The MACC has previously arrested a DBKL director holding a ‘Datuk Seri’ title and detained him from Aug 16 to 22, for alleged graft and money laundering.

On another matter, The Star reported that Bank Rakyat chairperson Abdul Aziz Zainal has been released on bail today, following the expiry of his remand order.

Abdul Aziz was arrested and had nearly RM1 million in his back account frozen on Aug 29 in relation to an MACC investigation into tenders issued by the bank.

One was for a tender to revamp the bank's system and another was a RM15 million tender to publish a book about a national leader, which never materialised.