The Public Accounts Committee (PAC) will meet for two days beginning tomorrow with a number of top government officials over the Port Klang Free Zone (PKFZ) scandal.

However Transport Minister Chan Kong Choy will not be among those summoned to answer questions despite being among the main figures in the RM4.6 billion development project.

In Chan's place tomorrow will be his secretary-general, Zakaria Bahari.

Other key officials summoned are Valuations Department's director-general Abdullah Thalith Md Thani and Securities Commission chairperson Zarinah Anwar.

The Auditor-General Department's top man, Ambrin Buang, is slated to meet with the PAC on Wednesday.

The meetings will continue where PAC left off more than two weeks ago when it met with senior officials of PKFZ Sdn Bhd and its owner Port Klang Authority (PKA).

PAC deputy-chairperson Tan Seng Giaw said the top officials will delegate the task of answering the committee's questions to their deputies if they are not able to make it themselves.

Commenting on Chan's absence in the meetings, Tan said this was understandable in view of the committee being under the chairmanship of a member of the ruling government.

"This is the reason why something like the PAC should be chaired by somebody independent of the government," said Tan, who is himself the deputy chairperson of opposition party DAP.

"If it were up to me, I would haul up the minister, but it's not. I would like to know a lot of things, but the chairperson is the 'primordial force' behind the committee," Tan said further.

"The PAC is only as good as its chairperson," added the Kepong member of Parliament.

The powerful committee is headed by Johor Bahru MP and Umno Supreme Council member Shahrir Abdul Samad.

Questionable land purchase

PKFZ - modeled after the highly successful Jebel Ali Free Zone in Dubai - was conceptualised as the region's hub of choice for the export and transhipment of goods.

Both PKFZ and PKA, however, have been embroiled in controversy after reports emerged pertaining to a questionable land purchase , cost-overruns amounting to RM2.3 billion, and conflict of interests , and other irregularities.

Chan's role in the affair, in particular, has been questioned following the claim, among others, that his ministry - upon the advice of a senior PKA official - had issued a letter of support for the issuance of bonds to raise funds for PKFZ's development.

Following the issuance of the letter, a ratings agency had issued an 'AAA' rating to the bonds, which raised it to the level of bonds guaranteed by the government. Bonds with government guarantees are usually only issued by the Finance Ministry.

The matter is said to be under the probe of a special committee headed by the chief secretary to the government Mohd Sidek Hassan.

Chan is also said to have pressed Finance Minister Abdullah Ahmad Badawi to appoint a certain Damansara-based consultant as PKFZ's independent quantity surveyor (IQS) after the Finance Ministry had already rejected the appointment of the same consultant.

The consultant - which had previously been under the employ of Kuala Dimensi Sdn Bhd, the property developer and investment firm behind the sale and development of PKFZ - was eventually appointed as the IQS of PKFZ.

Others can answer

When contacted, PAC chairperson Shahrir said Chan was not needed to answer questions himself as others in the ministry will be able to do so.

"Why do we have to go up to as far as the minister when there are other officials who can answer questions?

"We will only ask for the minister when the others are not able to answer," said Shahrir.

Shahrir also dismissed the need to summon the principal financial official for PKA in view of the fact that another finance officer had in the last meeting already answered PAC's questions on PKFZ.

Addressing claims that the principal finance officer had been "put in cold storage" due to her questions over irregularities in the PKFZ project, Shahrir said he would conduct the inquiry as he sees fit.

"You do your investigations, I'll do mine," said Shahrir.

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