This article first appeared in The Edge Malaysia Weekly on June 8, 2026 - June 14, 2026

WHEN GIIB Holdings Bhd (KL:GIIB) executive chairman Tai Boon Wee first met businessman Yee Voon Hon in July 2020, he could hardly have anticipated that the relationship would eventually lead to a long-drawn-out court battle that is now in its fourth year.

Yee, who was then involved in GIIB’s glove manufacturing plans before becoming a shareholder of the group’s glove venture, had recommended that an individual named Wong Weng Yew be appointed the executive director of the company. 

Wong was appointed on Feb 23, 2021. Yee’s recommendation was first mooted on Dec 10, 2020 after he and Tai decided to venture into the manufacturing of gloves.  

GIIB, formerly known as Goodway Integrated Industries Bhd, at that time was involved in the rubber business before moving ahead with its plans to diversify into the manufacturing of gloves. 

During the Covid-19 pandemic from 2020 to 2023, Malaysia’s glove industry was booming and many listed companies rushed in to capitalise on the surging global demand for gloves.

On the same day that Wong joined the board, GIIB approved plans to diversify into glove manufacturing through GIIB Gloves Manufacturer Sdn Bhd (GGM). The plan was for GGM to build five glove production lines, to be funded by shareholder advances.

When GGM was incorporated in 2021, the company was 51% owned by GIIB and 49% by Yee.

The contract to build the five production lines was subsequently awarded to Glomaxes Latex Glove Manufacturer Sdn Bhd for RM42.78 million. Glomaxes was partly owned by Yee, who held a 30% stake in the company.

Before long, problems started to emerge. On March 28, 2022, GIIB issued Wong a show-cause letter and suspended him from his executive duties pending investigations into his management and handling of the glove business and certain company accounts. The suspension was later extended while an independent investigation was carried out.

GIIB maintained that the action was necessary to facilitate the investigation into Wong’s conduct as executive director. Wong, however, publicly denied any wrongdoing and claimed that the action against him came only after he had raised concerns about what he described as suspicious transactions within the company.

In a statement issued during his suspension, Wong alleged that he had been treated with hostility after bringing the transactions to management’s attention. He further claimed that the treatment was intended to silence his questions and to damage his reputation.

Wong also alleged that Tai had requested him to approve certain payments despite his suspension.

“In a further affront to good governance, executive chairman Tai Boon Wee directly requested me to approve certain payments, although I was still suspended from duty,” Wong said at the time.

In this dispute, the developments appeared to favour GIIB’s position when a forensic investigation conducted by Ferrier Hodgson MH Sdn Bhd reportedly concluded that there was no evidence of fraudulent transactions or misconduct involving the transactions highlighted by Wong. The findings released in October 2022 were subsequently cited by GIIB to support its position that the allegations raised by Wong were unfounded.

However, the dispute had already escalated over the period.

Earlier, on May 19, 2022, GIIB had terminated Wong’s employment as executive director based on findings by a separate independent investigation. According to the company, the investigation found sufficient grounds to hold Wong accountable for misconduct relating to his handling of the glove project. GIIB said Wong had failed to adequately spearhead and manage the project despite being entrusted with that responsibility.

But in a surprising twist, eight days later, on May 27, 2022, Wong was redesignated as a non-independent non-executive director of the company.

This was despite GIIB alleging that a day earlier, Wong and his associates had circulated certain WhatsApp messages together with court documents to the company’s directors, customers, suppliers, bankers, employees and shareholders.

One of the messages allegedly carried the header: “BREAKING NEWS — Daylight Robbery by Tai Family on GIIB Holdings Bhd and PN17”.

The message further alleged that the Tai family had misappropriated company funds, manipulated accounts and concealed court documents and audit findings from the public. GIIB denied the allegations and claimed that the circulation of the messages formed part of a broader conspiracy to “injure” the company and damage its reputation.

But the damage was done and GIIB’s share price plunged more than 26% the next trading day.

Beyond the boardroom dispute, there was also a disagreement over the glove manufacturing project.

According to a statement of claim filed by GIIB and its subsidiary on June 3, 2022, the group had paid RM20.87 million towards the construction of five glove production lines. The dispute arose after GIIB alleged that Yee had failed, refused and/or neglected to fulfil his obligation to contribute his portion of the investment costs through shareholder advances.

Yee, in turn, allegedly claimed that Tai and his sons, Tai Qisheng and Tai Qiyao, owed him RM4.1 million under a separate personal arrangement reached sometime in 2020. The Tai family disputed the claim.

GIIB subsequently terminated Glomaxes as the project’s main contractor in May 2022 after the venture failed to proceed as planned.

In the lawsuit, GIIB alleged that Wong, Yee and Yee’s parents — Yee Kwek Keong and Yap Kwee Heong — conspired to use Glomaxes as a vehicle to injure the company and cause it financial losses.

The plaintiffs further alleged that the defendants’ actions were aimed at avoiding Yee’s obligation to contribute to the investment costs of the glove manufacturing venture and had caused substantial damage to the group.

GIIB and its 51% owned GIIB Healthcare Sdn Bhd are seeking RM103.58 million in damages from seven defendants for, among others, conspiracy to injure and breach of fiduciary duties. GIIB Healthcare is also 49% owned by Yee. 

Apart from Wong, Yee, Kwek Keong and Kwee Heong, the other defendants are Glomaxes Latex Glove Manufacturer Sdn Bhd, Nicole Ewe Ee May and Michelle Sammy.

The first five defendants are represented by lawyers Tharminder Singh, Jane Chan and Esther Soo, while Ewe and Sammy are represented by Terrence Lee and Avely Tan.

As Justice Datuk Quay Chew Soon presided over the case, fresh allegations emerged in Tai’s testimony on June 3 (last Wednesday), raising even more serious questions.

Taking the stand as a witness in the trial, Tai alluded to “corporate mafia” meddling by Wong and Yee. He alleged that Wong’s lawyer Datuk Chong Loong Men from Messrs Chong + Kheng Hoe, who at the time was not yet on record as Wong’s counsel, had reached out to him on May 1, 2022, to meet up for a settlement.

He said that at the meeting that very day, he was asked to transfer company land to the defendants and shares in GIIB would be transferred to him by the defendants in exchange for the land.

“The offer from him at the time was to ask me to sell a piece of company land and in return, their shares (in GIIB) would be transferred to me,” he said on the witness stand. Tai said that both the land and shares were valued at RM16 million each. 

Tai said he disagreed with Chong’s offer. “I rejected his proposal and he said: ‘If that is the case, I will launch an attack on the company and management’.

Tai testified that this was not the first time he had been threatened. He recalled on the witness stand that during the Malaysian Anti-Corruption Comission’s (MACC) investigations into his dealings, he was told by the MACC officer to go and see one Datuk Seri Andy Lim Kok Han. This was in 2023.

“When I was arrested by the MACC, the officers told me I had to go and meet Chong and one Datuk (Seri) Andy Lim Kok Han, whom I don’t know. 

“It seems that Andy had bought all the defendants’ shares (Yee’s and Wong’s), and he (the officer) told me he was the new shareholder,” Tai said, adding that Lim demanded two board seats from him.

“I told him I had no power for board appointments, [as] all board appointments will have to go through a committee,” he said.

Lim, indeed, emerged as the largest shareholder in GIIB through Yee in 2022. 

Previously,  Tai had disclosed that in February 2021, he sold a total of 44.25 million of his GIIB shares to individuals introduced by Yee, including Wong and several others. The transactions involved 35.63 million shares at 36 sen each and a further 8.62 million shares at 30 sen each, valuing the block of shares at RM15.42 million. At the time, GIIB shares were trading at around 40 sen before declining to 32 sen by the end of February 2021. 

At that time also, Yee only helped to arrange financing for such acquisitions. He himself only appeared in GIIB’s shareholder records with a 2.2% stake, or 7.77 million shares, following the company’s rights issue exercise in 2021. Later on Sept 2, 2022, he emerged as a substantial shareholder after disclosing ownership of 48.97 million shares, equivalent to an 8.28% stake in the company.

Over the following months, Yee steadily increased his interest in GIIB. By the end of 2022, he held 15.42% of the company before raising his stake to 125.93 million shares, or 21.3%, by Jan 16, 2023.

Over the same period, GIIB’s share price fell sharply from levels seen during the Covid-19 glove boom to penny stock level.

Things were getting interesting when Yee exited GIIB on May 19, 2023, after disposing of his entire 125.93 million shares in the company. But on the same day, Lim came into picture after he acquired the exact number of shares through an off-market transaction, emerging as a substantial shareholder with a 21.3% stake in GIIB.

Although the transaction value was not disclosed, the stake would have been worth about RM11.96 million based on GIIB’s closing price of 9.5 sen on May 19, 2023.

Lim is alleged to be one of the main players in the “corporate mafia” scandal. He is named in many high-profile media and investigative reports, including an exposé this year by Bloomberg News, as a central figure in the “corporate mafia” network. Lim and his associates are alleged to have used intimidation tactics and colluded with anti-graft agencies to aggressively take over public companies in Malaysia.

When taking the stand on June 3, Tai added that the MACC officer who had ques- tioned him when he was arrested had forced him to meet with Chong and Lim. He said he followed the MACC officer’s instructions to meet Lim in Publika alone. Tai said that when he refused Lim’s demands at the meeting, Lim took out a gun to threaten him.

“I refused and he showed me his gun and threatened me. This was on June 2, 2023, in Publika,” he testified before Justice Quay.

In his cross-examination of Tai, Tharminder had asked him why he had made no mention of the gun threat in his court-recorded witness statement, statement of claim at the beginning of the trial or any other documents in court.

“Why only now? Why didn’t you say it in your pleaded case or your first witness statement or revised witness statement?”

Tai said: “Initially when I prepared my witness statements I didn’t want to include these threats by Andy and Chong as I feared for my safety, but after the report from Bloomberg on the ‘corporate mafia’, I think this is already widely known, so I think it’s time to reveal it.”

Tharminder said that he was jumping on the proverbial “Bloomberg bandwagon” to malign others.

Tharminder: Can you show me the police report you lodged because your life was under threat in the court bundles?

Tai: I made a police report, but it is not in the court bundle.

Tharminder: Now in 2022, when you were threatened by Chong, where is the police report?

Tai: I didn’t make a police report.

Tharminder: In 2023 you were threatened by Andy and Chong, but the police report is nowhere to be found in the court bundle.

Tai: I made the report but it is not in the court bundle of documents.

The trial is now pending the re-examination of Tai by GIIB’s lead counsel Marcus Lee. The re-examination was originally scheduled for June 4 but was postponed after Lee was hospitalised. 

The matter is fixed for further hearing on July 29, after which the defence is expected to begin presenting its case.

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