OUTSTANDING salaries for August and September, including compensation claims for more than 800 former employees of Utusan Melayu (Malaysia) Berhad will only be paid out once the company has settled its debts with creditors, said a spokesman for the company liquidator.

“We will maximise what we sell. We will try to obtain the highest bid to repay the company’s debt,” said Zulkarnain A. Rahim from UHY Advisory (KL) Sdn Bhd.

In his briefing at Utusan headquarters today, Zulkarnain said UHY would sell what assets it could by open tender, a process that would take at least five months.

He said the liquidator would advertise for tenders within 21 days in local newspapers, then select the highest bids.

According to Zulkarnain, the liquidator’s priority is to ensure that Utusan’s secured debt is settled first, with the balance used to pay the company’s arrears of salaries and compensation.

“However, if the company’s liability exceeds the value of the assets, there will be no remuneration to the employees,” he added.

Meanwhile, employees who signed up for the voluntary separation scheme (VSS) will only be paid once the company has paid for the termination of staff members.

Zulkarnain noted UHY Advisory is not able to implement any of these measures as of yet because the company is only the temporary liquidator.

Utusan staff can attend a meeting at the newspaper’s headquarters in Kuala Lumpur on November 6 to vote on whether to continue using UHY or to appoint another permanent liquidator.

The newspaper’s National Union of Journalists Malaysia (NUJ) branch chairman Mohd Taufek Razak described today’s briefing as “frustrating”, saying nothing was accomplished.

He added it was unfortunate that the former executive director of Utusan Melayu Wahid Idris, acting as company representative, clarified that the Utusan’s liabilities exceeded its assets.

“We understand that our debt is RM400 million, while assets are only around RM350 million.”

“That is worrying for the staff, because if that was really true, it would mean that we would not receive any compensation,” he told reporters after the briefing.

He said the NUJ would look into the matter and would appoint a watchdog as a proxy for the union to monitor the asset sales procedure.

An estimated 1,500 former newspaper company employees from around the country were present to hear a briefing that began at 3pm and ended about three hours later.

Attendees were asked to fill out the balance sheet claims for outstanding wages, termination compensation, and other miscellaneous claims as early as 10am.

Also provided at the gathering were manned counters with offices from the Social Security Organisation (Socso), the Credit Counselling and Debt Management Agency (AKPK), and Jobs Malaysia, offering financial management assistance and job vacancies.

Utusan officially ceased operations on October 9.

About 800 employees have been let go, 11 months after nearly 800 others agreed to leave by VSS.

The group published Utusan Malaysia, Mingguan Malaysia, and Kosmo!.

The company’s winding up came a day after it announced that it would relinquish 70% of its holdings in Dilof to Aurora Mulia Sdn Bhd, which is linked to tycoon Syed Mokhtar Albukhary. – October 30, 2019.