Prime Minister Tan Sri Muhyiddin Yassin today affirmed that Tabung Haji (TH) is “not controlled by non-Muslims” as alleged by several quarters during the previous Pakatan Harapan (PH) administration.
He was responding to a parliamentary question by Datuk Seri Mujahid Yusof Rawa (Amanah-Parit Buntar) who is also former Religious Affairs Minister in charge of TH.
Mujahid had asked the prime minister to clarify the state of TH’s assets and whether it is true that TH is being controlled by non-Muslims.
“The latest position of Lembaga Tabung Haji assets as of June 30 as announced in the TH performance report is RM78 billion, with surplus assets against its liabilities of RM1.9 billion.
“In line with the implementation of the TH restructuring and recovery plan, non-performing assets were moved to a special purpose vehicle (SPV) company, namely Urusharta Jamaah Sdn Bhd (UJSB), which is fully owned by the government under the Finance Ministry Incorporated.
“Therefore, TH is not being controlled by non-Muslims,” Muhyiddin said.
In a separate written reply to Datuk Seri Hasan Arifin (Umno-Rompin), who asked about TH’s revenue in 2019, Muhyiddin said a good performance was recorded.
“For the 2019 financial year, which is still under audit, TH generated RM3.2 billion through fixed-income asset investments, which produced RM1.6 billion or 51 percent of overall revenue.
“Property investment and equity contributed RM0.5 billion, while Islamic money market instruments generated RM0.4 billion in 2019,” he said.
Gun trained at Guan Eng
Under the Harapan government, certain quarters had blamed DAP, notably former finance minister Lim Guan Eng, for purportedly interfering with Tabung Haji operations.
DAP was accused of harbouring an agenda to dilute the position of Islam and the Malays.
In February, before the Harapan government collapsed, Tabung Haji had announced the transfer of four of its hotels to Urusharta Jamaah.
They were among 29 assets owned by Tabung Haji which had incurred losses.
Subsequently, in June, Umno Youth had called on the PN government to set up a royal commission of inquiry (RCI) on the operations of Tabung Haji.