Sime Prop CEO: Is Hisham Hamdan the choice of Zeti's or Mahathir's?

The rumour Dato Voon Tin Yow of Ecoworld to be Sime Properties CEO with RM260,000 monthly paycheck has subsided.

Under pressure from blogs, online media and socmed, including Dato Kadir Jasin, Tun Dr Mahathir had apparently gave the N.O. few days ago.

Kadir may not necessarily be Mahathir's voice since he is more Tun Daim than Mahathir. A mainstream media reporter confirmed to yours truly their cold treatment towards each other evolves around Economic Adviser, Dr Muhammad Khalid

A new rumour going around is that the new Sime Properties CEO will be Hisham Hamdan. The current acting CEO, Datok Wan Hashimi will remain COO.

Is it the choice of Sime Prop Chairman, Tan Sri Dr Zeti Akhtar Aziz or Mahathir aka Mat Khalid?

Zeti's choice for Jalil Rasheed? 

Mahathir was asked on the appointment of 37-year old Jalil Rasheed as PNB's new CEO to replace Dato Abdul Rahman Ahmad, whose was reassigned as Sime Darby Berhad Chairman.

The day it was announced social media cried nepotism. Jalil is married to Mahathir's grand niece. That maybe the reason he passed the buck to Zeti.

Jalil is CEO of Invesco for South East Asia & Head of Emerging Markets Group since 2013.
Prior to that, Jalil spent 10 years with Aberdeen Asset Management.

Many see him as too young and the Indian Muslim's experiance as only fund manager is not sufficient to  manage RM300 billion of Malay/Bumiputera fund and a large organisation with large companies under PNB.

Will that mean Zeti too is responsible for choosing Hisham Hamdan?

In 2012, this blog criticised Hisham in a posting here. Extract as follows:

Does the name ring a bell?

In case there is a problem with the hard disc in your brain to retrieve the information, Hisham was the failed former Executive Vice President, Strategy and Business Development of Sime Darby.

After a series of failures to takeover IJN, followed by the public uproar against Labu Airport LCC, then unable to turnaround Sime Engineering, Sime Darby cold storaged the trained Chemical Engineer to China for Special Project. See here

He was part of former Sime Darby's CEO, Dato Zubir Murshid team and together with many members of the Board of Directors including Tun Musa Hitam are accountable for the RM1 billion Qatar investment failure. Read details of the projek on Jejak Pujangga here and Bigdog here.

Only an organisation like Khazanah would maintain a reserve team of Executive Directors, Investment to back Ganen using failed executives. The failed executives include Dato Rashdan "Danny" Yusof , the former Executive Director of Mayban Investmnent Banking resigned due to staff uprising against him and failed CEO of MAS, Tangku Dato Azmil.

Like Rashdan "Danny" Yusof, Hisham has problem with his inter-human skill and come off as someone arrogant. IJN takeover and Labu Airport failed because of his inability to fathom the public response and maybe his reluctance to listen to advise from the communications team.

Hisham is seldom lost in details that he couldn't see the critical factor. He could be wasting time in senior management level meetings doing petty checking of calculation formula instead of the bigger level of strategy, implementation development and control and monitoring.

Another one of many cases in Khazanah of former Bankers and Investment Bankers that are so distanced from the world of "real" business but yet wish to manage and head businesses.

Hisham is now only warming up eggs as Director of Valuecap Sdn Bhd. To sent him to replace Ganen, it is like replacing QPR's centre forward with a centre forward from a team from the English First Division League. An equally bad if not worse choice.

After leaving Sime Darby for Khazanah Nasional, Hisham should have changed for the better. Unfortunately, the perception on Hisham has not improved.

A former Sime Darby (then was in one of the three GLC merged into Synergy Drive) is still fuming as he commented, "This Hisham guy is totally useless."

A politician and corporate personality in the news two months ago described him as, "Dah tak de akar rotan pun jadilah.

"Unable to make decision. Lack of leadership. Has the brain but need a lot of coaching to lead GLC company."

Khazanah past incompetence

An experianced and recently retired top executive with experience in various property development companies sent the following message:

Hisham, Danny and Rosman, etc. have common issues. These 4th floor boys, without much experience, thought that their Ivey league certs could do wonders and changed the world. They wasted their time with meetings but did nothing. Put money into Binafikir but nothing came out. Peremba construction bled and died a slow death as they were meeting. 

Apa2 keluaran Khazanah orang Mokh buat aku khuatir. So far nothing good that came out from his people especially from the former 4th floors and Ivey league u graduates. Buat proposal papers and presentations je yg bagus. 

Look what happened to UEM Sunrise. Bila mereka nak gabung both companies, ramai good Malay senior mngmt of UEM Land left. Padahal mereka yg brought up Nusajaya from nothing. 

Bila dah gabung, I guess MCA thro’ Khazanah dictated they wanted certain senior positions for Chinese. Padahal kebanyakan mereka Chikus. Tetiba Manager naik GM. Senior Manager jadi Project Director. PD jadi COO. 

Nasib baik depa experience high rise saja without landed property. Akhirnya Cabut lari masuk Sunway.

Mahathir don't know? 

An UDA officer could only say, "Baru dilantik menjadi Chairman. Belum kenal."

Hisham joined UDA as Chairman in March 2019. It will mean UDA will have to find another Chairman.

With only 5 month as Chairman of UDA, in which the development of Pudu Prison land was out sourced to Ecoworld, what experience does he have in development?

Hisham could be Zeti's choice to cover-up for the disaster of an earlier plan to appoint Voon.

Not so much he is Chinese, his achievement at SP Setia was not seen by other property people as anyhing to shout about.

However, nobody believed Mahathir had no hands and not in the know of Jalil's or any important appointment.

To choose Jalil or Hisham, Zeti could not pass the buck to Mahathir. For one, she will not win in a quarrel with Mahathir. It will open the skeletons in her personel life.

She will have to take up responsibility and use her normal tactic of staying quiet. That is unless the aristocrat intend to infuriate Daim by blaming it on the Doctor Monster.