I refer to the amazing but true daylight robbery allegedly committed by two suspects in Sabah.

The Malaysian Anti-Corruption Commission (MACC) may be coming out of this smelling of roses, but what about all the other supervisory and oversight process, did none of them work for six years?

How on earth can two guys be solely responsible for awarding RM3 billions worth of contract over a six-year period and no alarm bell rang until now? Didn’t any other state bodies or supervisory oversight function noticed? Or is this the norm and more of this will be uncovered by MACC in due course. No one in the department noticed the opulence? Third party non-sibling contractors who were shut out of the tender process did not highlight this to anyone?

This incident sounds like a story of a kleptomaniac African state and not Malaysia where so many oversight bodies exist both at state and federal level

Most worryingly and telling is what were the banks doing in not reporting these massive cash withdrawals? Surely the millions of cash were withdrawn from bank account over the counters or discreetly inside special room and the banks in this strict regulatory environment would have noticed the usual activity and alerted the relevant authorities. Someone did not do their job is it?

If I were to withdraw RM100,000 in cash now from banks they will ask me all sort of question, fingerprint me, send me for medical check-ups and ask for my Standard 3 exam results and all. Yet, no one did anything for millions of cash withdrawn? If the cash did not come from the banks, where did it come from then?

Allegedly more than 100 land titles were seized. When you but land and property, the Inland Revenue Board (LHDN) will be notified and a lot of questions will be asked if you are selected for an ‘audit meja’ routine. Here no one suspected anything? Massive amounts of cash must have changed hands and no one highlighted this?

Surely the state land office should have noticed the series of land transaction belonging to the same group of people? Nothing reported?

Many professional parties such as accountants and lawyers would have been party to various transactions; did they not report anything under the Anti-Money-Laundering Act (AMLA) requirements?

The alleged culprits and wives had luxury cars and handbags being paraded around, unless of course they just bought them and kept in their homes, so none of the other government officials noticed this opulence and reported to the relevant parties at least their suspicion?

This victory looks good on MACC but looks like a total failure of government governance and oversight process. Just two persons of a state body managed to hoodwink everyone for six years? Blimey.

While investigating this major victory, the relevant bodies including the MACC and Auditor-General’s Department must thoroughly review the process in these funds allocation and tender process so that lessons can be learnt and loopholes plugged. Please don’t appoint a RM2 company to undertake the review, get the best forensic crime experts so that they can get to the bottom of this and taxpayers are not swindled on this scale ever again.

The responsible authorities should also charge all those involved if there were dereliction of duty and failure to report, even if they did not gain a single sen from this daylight robbery.