KUALA LUMPUR – The mother of the late minister Tan Sri Jamaluddin Mohd Jarjis has succeeded in her bid to include three million shares of Rantai Wawasan Sdn Bhd in the list of her son’s estate.
This is after high court judge Datuk Seri Mohd Firuz Jaffril allowed Aminah Abdullah’s application for a declaration that the shares are part of Jamaluddin’s estate, and ordered defendants Nur Anis Jamaluddin and Ikwan Hafiz Jamaluddin to pay costs of RM80,000 to their grandmother.
However, Firuz dismissed Aminah’s application for a declaration that six million shares of Alpine Motion Sdn Bhd and two shares of Ivory Insight Sdn Bhd are part of Jamaluddin’s estate.
The application is related to a suit filed by Aminah against her two grandchildren over their failure to include three companies’ shares, worth RM1.3 billion, in the list of her son’s estate.
Firuz, in his 26-page judgment, said based on the testimony given by the defendants’ witnesses, the court is prepared to accept that the shares of both Alpine Motion and Ivory Insight were purchased for the benefit of the first and second defendants, respectively.
“In 2011 and 2012, they were indeed involved in the operations and management of the two companies under the guidance of their late father. This is not the same as the situation in the case of the Rantai Wawasan shares, which was their very first involvement in the deceased’s businesses officially.”
Despite the inconsistencies in the defence’s case, he said when delivering the decision online yesterday, the basic rule in a civil case is that the plaintiff must prove their case.
“In this regard, the plaintiff failed to prove that the shares of Ivory Insight were paid by the deceased, or that he was the original beneficial owner of the shares. While I do agree with the plaintiff’s submission that the manner in which the defendants presented their defence is far from perfect, this does not mean that the plaintiff has proven her case.
“In my final analysis, I am constrained to find that the plaintiff failed to tilt the balance of probabilities concerning the claim for the Ivory Insight shares against the defendants. To my mind, it is for the plaintiff to prove that it was the deceased who paid for the shares, and not for the defendants herein to prove that the deceased did not pay for the shares.”
As the plaintiff failed to adduce any evidence on the fact that the Alpine Motion shares were paid by the deceased, the court is of the view that the plaintiff has not proven the existence of a trust or a constructive trust, he said.
Aminah was represented by lawyers Pawancheek Merican and Kamar Ainiah Kamaruzaman, while counsel S. Suhendran and Frank Wong appeared for Nur Anis and Ikwan Hafiz.
Aminah, 87, who filed the suit on January 3, 2019, said Nur Anis, 36, and Ikwan Hafiz, 34, as joint administrators of Jamaluddin’s estate, failed to include the three companies’ shares as inheritance in the list of assets in a letter of administration when Jamaluddin died in 2015, and also failed to enter the shares as a liability since July 6, 2017.
In her statement of claim, Aminah said the defendants failed to enter the shares of the three companies as part of the deceased’s estate with the intention to deny her rights and interests as a beneficiary.
She said her grandchildren failed to state the estimated value of the shares, worth RM1,384,312,154, 2½ years after Jamaluddin died in a helicopter crash on April 4, 2015.
Aminah said Nur Anis and Ikwan Hafiz failed to include an apartment, worth RM10 million, in the United States in the list of Jamaluddin’s assets enclosed with the letter of administration, as well as failed to inform her that the shariah high court had issued her the faraid certificate on Jamaluddin’s estate on October 6, 2016.
She is seeking a court order for her name to be included as a joint administrator of Jamaluddin’s estate, given that she is the biological mother of the deceased, and for the two defendants to pay dividends, bonuses and profits from the shares of the three firms. – Bernama, August 14, 2021
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