THE new administration is trying to put Khazanah Nasional Bhd (Khazanah) back on the right track and Prime Minister Dr Mahathir Mohamad does not see any problem with him chairing the sovereign wealth fund.

Dr Mahathir said he had started Khazanah and stressed that he is only the chairman and not the chief executive officer.

“We are trying to change Khazanah and concentrate on certain issues.

“Most of it I know, and I in fact, was the one who started Khazanah, so we want to put it in the right direction.

“What’s wrong with me chairing it? I’m not going to be the CEO. I’m not going to be paid RM7 million,” he told reporters at Parliament after Pakatan Harapan’s presidential council meeting today.

Earlier today, the Centre to Combat Corruption and Cronyism (C4) had called on Putrajaya to rethink its move on appointing Dr Mahathir as the chairman of the board of directors of Khazanah Nasional.

Its executive director Cynthia Gabriel said that it raises serious questions about the statutory governance structure and good governance practices within government-linked investment companies (GLICs) and not just government-linked companies (GLCs).

On Monday, the Prime Minister’s Office announced Dr Mahathir as the new chairman for Khazanah while Economic Affairs Minister Azmin Ali was named as one of the directors.

Three other new directors are Mohd Hassan Marican, Dr Sukhdave Singh and Goh Ching Yin, while the managing director will be appointed at a later date.

Last week, Khazanah confirmed the resignation of all its board members, who comprised of Azman Mokhtar, Md Nor Md Yusof, Mohamed Azman Yahya, Mohammed Azlan Hashim, Raja Arshad Raja Uda, Andrew Sheng Len Tao, Nazir Abdul Razak, Nirmala Menon and Yeo Kar Peng.

The Malaysian Insight had previously reported that the board members had submitted undated resignation letters to the Ministry of Finance Incorporated (MoF Inc). – August 2, 2018.