The Umno Youth community complaints bureau will provide 10 lawyers for the 8,000 people who participated in a gold investment scheme through Genneva Malaysia to get back their investment from the company through civil action.

NONE Bureau chairman Khairun Aseh ( right ) said the legal aid would be provided free and urged the investors concerned to come forward with details of their investment.

He said the 8,000 investors were divided into two groups - one group who had paid money to the company but had not received their gold while the other group comprised those who had handed over gold tothe company but had not received payment.

"We will make claims to the company and not to Bank Negara Malaysia (BNM). This is a civil action so that the investors will get back their money invested as soon as possible," he told reporters after one hour of meeting with officers from the BNM Special Investigation Unit, here, today.

Yesterday, in a joint statement with the Royal Malaysian Police, Domestic Trade, Cooperatives and Consumerism Ministry and Companies Commission of Malaysia, BNM said that following raids conducted with several enforcement agencies since October on companies suspected of carrying out illegal gold investment schemes, it was found that Genneva Malaysia was one of the companies and that it was problematic.

The preliminary accounting report shows that Genneva Malaysia's operations suffered a big loss this year and it has liabilities worth over 10 times its assets.

On his meeting with BNM, Khairun said he learnt that the investigations were going on smoothly and denied that there was VIP interference in the investigations.

- Bernama