By Stephanie Jacob
Tan Teng Boo
Tan Teng Boo has called City of London Investment Co Ltd’s explanation to why it is opposing the reappointment of icapital.biz Bhd’s director Tunku Abdul Aziz Tunku Ibrahim “inadequate, baseless and utterly weak”.
City of London together with Laxey Partners Ltd have announced that they will oppose the reappointment of Tunku Aziz. The two collectively hold 11.39% in the fund. The duo had submitted their proxy vote to oppose the reappointment just two days before the fund’s annual general meeting on Oct 11, 2014.
Their move was heavily criticised by Tan Teng Boo who is both the fund’s manager and a shareholder. He had questioned the timing, lack of explanation and motives of City of London and Laxey in opposing Tunku Aziz’s reappointment.
In his capacity shareholder, Tan put forward a motion to adjourned the AGM to a later date in view of City of London’s move. The adjourned AGM will be now held on Nov 30, 2014, and Tan has called for shareholders to turn out to make their votes.
He has also repeatedly asked City of London to send a representative to explain their decision despite the fact it is under no obligation to do so. Tan has suggested that it is the morally right thing to do.
In a written response to Tan, City of London explained that they were opposing the reappointment because that they are concerned over the length of time since Tunku Aziz retired from active employment and his knowledge about close ended funds (CEFs) such as icapital.biz.
Tan has since reacted strongly to the explanation. Aside from referring to it as feeble, he has also chided City of London for only addressing the letter to him and not the “entire board, Bursa Malaysia and all 3,400 shareholders”.
Addressing City of London’s explanation regarding Tunku Aziz’s position, Tan said that the issue of specific knowledge of CEFs would apply to all icapital.biz’s directors. Tan also questioned why Tunku Aziz was the only one being targeted.
He said: “being the only listed closed-end fund in Malaysia, it is only logical that none of the directors of icapital.biz have requisite understanding of closed-end funds. Why is there a targeted attempt made by the foreign fund to single out Tunku Aziz? What are City of London’s ulterior motives?”
Furthermore he questioned what City of London’s definition of “active employment” is, and pointed out that Tunku Aziz is the current president of the Malaysian Anti-Corruption Foundation and has been a director of icapital.biz Berhad since 2011.
He questioned the integrity of the foreign investment firm and said “the letter by City of London is a clear testament of the foreign fund’s lack of integrity. By giving such superficial reasons for the opposition of Resolution 4, the foreign fund makes a mockery out of the other 3,400 shareowners.”
Tan suggested that City of London was trying a repeat the attempt it made in 2012 to displace several directors and replace them with nominees of their own. He also asserted that the firm focus on Tunku Aziz is a “classic divide and rule tactic … as they know that the person in Resolution 4 (Tunku Aziz) is not popular with the Chinese investors.”
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