KUALA LUMPUR, Sept 3 — Tycoon Tan Sri Halim Saad poured his heart out to the New Straits Times yesterday to deny that he was bailed out in the 1997/98 financial crisis from crippling debts in conglomerate UEM Group Bhd and toll road operator PLUS Expressway Bhd, in what is seen as his preparation to regain the blue-chip companies.

The one-time blue-eyed corporate figure told two New Straits Times editors that he would have prospered if state sovereign wealth fund Khazanah Nasional Berhad did not take over UEM and PLUS that were within his Renong stable of companies.

“If I was not forced out, and were given a free hand to manage the group, I would have been able to take advantage of the subsequent improvement in the economic conditions to list PLUS, realise the full potential of the Nusajaya land bank and grow the overall assets and business of the Renong/UEM Group,” he said in the interview with the New Straits Times, the flagship English daily in the Umno-linked Media Prima Berhad group.

UEM and PLUS are now owned by Khazanah which has previously denied it wanted to offload both of them despite unsolicited bids from two groups, one of which is linked to Halim. The other group is led by tycoon Tan Sri Syed Mokhtar Al-Bukhary.

“It’s a weird interview, just out of the blue. Something’s afoot and he looks like he is clearing himself up to regain his business empire,” a government official told The Malaysian Insider on condition of anonymity.

“It looks like he needs to revisit the issue and clear up his reputation,” the official added.

Halim is said to be behind the Asas Serba RM50 billion proposal to take over 25 toll expressways in the peninsula. It has also offered a 20 per cent cut in toll rates as a sweetener to the government which has been under pressure to cut the rates, which are automatically raised every three years.

Asas Serba chairman Datuk Syed Amin Aljeffri had said its plan will ensure the public will not be burdened by toll hikes while the government could save RM114 billion.

The second proposal from Syed Mokhtar is an offer of RM45 billion to take over all assets of highway concessions with a 10 per cent toll reduction across the board. The tycoon’s offer also includes a promise not to increase toll rates in the remaining years of the concession.

It is understood that both offers include possible bonds and funding proposals from the Employees Provident Fund (EPF), which has been used in several take-over bids.

The Malaysian Insider understands that the EPF itself is looking at plans to privatise PLUS but Khazanah is against the idea as it leaves the toll concessionaire at the mercy of government demands to cut toll rates.

“Keeping it public will ensure that the government will not simply ask to cut toll rates as that can affect share price and the bottomline. Taking it private will open it up to pressure as there is no share price to affect,” said a government official familiar with the bids for PLUS.

Halim, however, expressed confidence that he could have done the same as Khazanah if he had kept both UEM and PLUS in the aftermath of the Asian financial crisis.

“There have been certain false statements made against me relating to my put and call option on the Renong shares purchased earlier by UEM. Some went on to say that the subsequent cancellation of the put option by UEM was a bailout of me. I feel the need to correct the misstatements made and shed light on the actual events that took place at the time,” he said in the article headlined “Gross injustice done to me”.

Halim related that he left the Renong/UEM board on October 3, 2001, saying the authorities wanted Khazanah to take over Renong/UEM Group “to prevent a systemic risk to the banking system in Malaysia and to enable a sustained restructuring of the group.”