Materia Medica Malaysiana

Bumi firms risk bankruptcy

MANY bumiputra medical supply companies are losing millions of ringgit and risk bankruptcy due to Pharmaniaga Bhd’s failure to meet medical products supply contracts worth RM190mil with the Health Ministry, Utusan Malaysia reported yesterday.

It said the failure could have been caused by lack of transparency in contract distribution at ministerial level, especially involving the bumiputra quota to suppliers registered with Pharmaniaga.

Pharmaniaga, a government-linked corporation and a subsidiary of United Engineers (M) Bhd, was given a RM336mil concession for distribution purposes to bumiputra and non-bumiputra supply companies for the period between 2004 and 2006.

The daily also reported that Pharmaniaga apparently disagreed with the bumiputra supplier list given by the ministry, as it would have an adverse affect on the quota.

The daily quoted a source as urging the Government to take action as it involved the ministry’s authorisation in handling the contracts that were supposed to have been settled by the end of last year.

Approximately RM182mil worth of contracts were allocated to bumiputra companies based on the government’s policy that no less than 60% of government contracts under the concession must be channelled to these companies.

For the period, Pharmaniaga was required to submit a list of bumiputra companies which qualified for the contract to the ministry via its pharmacy department.

“It has been a year and the ministry has still failed to finalise the list following the dissatisfaction by Pharmaniaga towards the ministry’s response on the given list, especially regarding the allocation for bumiputras and non-bumiputras,” a source said.