COMMENT | The latest information to come out on the MySejahtera scandal is that the company with which the government is negotiating to continue the services of the app, MySJ, agreed to pay RM338.6 million for the rights to the intellectual property associated with the app in October 2020. The intellectual property and software licensing scheme will last for some five years.

According to the report in Code Blue, the app developer is Entomo Malaysia Sdn Bhd (formerly KPISoft Malaysia Sdn Bhd). The information comes from court documents whereby P2 Asset Management Sdn Bhd, a MySJ shareholder, in an action dated Nov 24 last year is suing Entomo, Revolusi Asia Sdn Bhd (another MySJ shareholder) and MySJ for alleged breach of a share sale agreement.

So the government has no plans to sell the MySejahtera app to the private sector, according to Health Minister Khairy Jamaluddin. The latest development predates his statement, but obviously something is terribly wrong.

While Khairy has taken the political stance to refute opposition leader Anwar Ibrahim’s statement that a sale was made, the fact remains that a contract is being directly negotiated for the continued provision of services for the app.

Now, we know why the government is not selling the MySejahtera app - it does not own the intellectual rights to be able to sell it anyway but MySJ is buying it and the government is apparently paying it to buy it from the original developer, now called Entomo, plus of course the usual margin. This is a classic case of middlemen patronage business and politics.

We come to the first hole in Khairy’s explanation...