This article first appeared in The Edge Financial Daily on March 28, 2019 - April 3, 2019

KUALA LUMPUR: Former Felda chairman Tan Sri Mohd Isa Abdul Samad (pic) has withdrawn his discovery application to get all the documents from FGV Holdings Bhd in the suit brought by FGV against him and 13 others over damages in relation to the acquisition of Asian Plantations Ltd (APL) in 2014.

Lawyer Lavinia Kumaraendran, representing Mohd Isa, told The Edge Financial Daily that her client withdrew the application yesterday, with liberty to file afresh if needed.

She said the group’s former business development of downstream cluster vice-president Farisan Mokhtar, and former downstream cluster senior general manager Rasydan Alias Mohamed were also withdrawing their application that was filed to seek for “further and better particulars”.

“Further and better particulars” refer to any additional information required to provide sufficient accuracy with respect to a set of pleaded facts in an earlier document.

“We have agreed to withdraw the application because we are satisfied that they (FGV) have given and furnished all the documents we want.

“We filed the statement of defence just based on Tan Sri’s (Mohd Isa) knowledge without the benefit of any documents. That’s why we filed the application for discovery because we do not want to be prejudiced by not having any documents,” she said.

With the benefit of the documents, Mohd Isa and his lawyers will assess whether there was a need to file an amended statement of defence, Lavinia added.

Lavinia said the case has now been fixed for further case management on April 22 before High Court Justice Azimah Omar, and that all parties are expected to seek further directions from the court, particularly on FGV’s application to strike out the counterclaim filed by five former non-executive directors of the company.

The five are Tan Sri Ismee Ismail, Tan Sri Wan Abdul Aziz Wan Abdullah, Tan Sri Sulaiman Mahbob, Datuk Nozirah Bahari and Datuk Fazlur Rahman Ebrahim.

Besides naming FGV, the five also named 10 individuals — including the company's present chairman as well as non-independent directors and non-executive directors — as defendants in the counterclaim.

The 10 individuals are Datuk Azhar Abdul Hamid, Mohd Hassan Ahmad, Datuk Dr Othman Omar, Dr Mohamed Nazeeb P Alithambi, Datuk Dr Salmiah Ahmad, Datin Hoi Lai Peng, Datuk Yusli Mohamed Yusoff, Dr Nesadurai Kalanithi, Datuk Mohd Anwar Yahya and Datuk Mohamed Suffian Awang.

In their defence and counterclaim, the five alleged that the present FGV board had initiated the civil suit to cover up their weaknesses in managing the company that led to a drop in FGV shares and had alluded the losses were due to the APL purchase.

However, FGV then filed an application to strike out the counterclaim on the basis that there was no reasonable cause of action and that filing the counterclaim was an abuse of the court process.

On Nov 23, 2018, FGV filed the main suit against its former president and chief executive officer Datuk Mohd Emir Mavani Abdullah, Mohd Isa and 12 others including the five for RM514 million and other damages over the APL purchase.

It claimed that the 14 had failed to discharge their respective fiduciary duties, duties of fidelity and duties to exercise reasonable care, skill and diligence with regard to FGV’s purchase of APL in 2014.

Counsels Ang Hean Leng and Andrew Chiew acted on behalf of FGV yesterday.