A Datuk Seri in the Prime Minister's Department, together with his company, and another director, have agreed to pay RM620,500 as settlement following allegations that he duped a Johor based company to engage in a non-existent sand-mining venture in Selangor.

The settlement was recorded between the plaintiff Nice Garden Sdn Bhd, and Infra Penaga Sdn Bhd, together with its directors Datuk Seri Hasan Ayoub, and Adnan Shah Che Yusoff, before Kuala Lumpur High Court judge VT Singham today.

Nice Garden lawyer Mohammad Fauzi Abdullah confirmed the settlement was agreed today and the three defendants are to make three staggered payments before the end of August.

In addition to this, the three defendants were also ordered to pay total costs of RM20,000.

Another defendant, Abdul Samad Othman, a director of Infra Penaga, was not represented earlier and his settlement with the plaintiff is still pending. He was represented by lawyer Ahmad Fariz Mohamed, in today's proceedings.

Justice Singham fixed Aug 11 for case management for Abdul Samad's matter with Nice Garden.

On June 29, it was reported that the parties could not agree on a settlement as Nice Garden wanted one lump sum payment while Hasan, Adnan and Infra Penaga applied to make three staggered payments.

Fraudulent misrepresentation

Nice Garden, in its statement of claim, alleged Hasan had duped the company into paying RM250,000 into his account sometime in April last year, for a joint-venture in a 50ha sand mining project in Mukim Tanjung Dua Belas, Selangor, approved by the Department of Environment.

It claimed Hasan had represented himself to be a special officer to the Prime Minister.

The Johor based company alleged fraudulent misrepresentation, and cheating of government department documents, when they found the alleged approval by the DOE was false.

Nice Garden alleged a joint venture was agreed between it and Infra Penaga in an agreement dated Aug 20, 2010, and signed after a RM250,000 payment.

The project failed to kick-off after several months. Nice Garden then sent a letter on Aug 23 to the DOE to verify if the project had received approval. Four days later, the DOE replied that it had not.

This resulted in Nice Garden lodging a police report and filing for legal action.