They Paid Millions for Empty Bricks
How MARA’s Melbourne property scandal exposed crony networks—and how it still haunts us today.
They bought student housing with taxpayer funds.
The result? A scandal that still bleeds shame.
THE SCAM UNFOLDS
Back in 2013, MARA Incorporated under the Rural and Regional Development Ministry paid RM72.6 million for two properties in Melbourne: Dudley International House (a student dorm) and a building on Exhibition Street.
Parliament’s Public Accounts Committee (PAC) later found their combined value to be just RM47.45 million.
Their London play wasn’t any better. Beaumont House, bought in 2014 for RM78.5 million, is now valued closer to RM74.1 million.
None of this was approved by the Ministry of Finance. The ministry refused, but KKDW appealed, and the Economic Council pushed it through anyway.
The damage: overpaid, unvetted, shamefully opaque. And who paid? The rakyat.
WHAT COULD HAVE BEEN
RM72.6 million.
Enough to send a generation abroad. Instead, it bought an overpriced dorm and a scandal.
What if that money had gone to the rakyat?