Oceanus Group

[Qiaofeng]

Any idea what the Chairman of the Audit Committee do?
I mean do they do any of the things mentioned in the Annual Report?
Does the AC oversee the external auditors?
Any idea his firm provided any accounting related services?

The job of the Audit Committee is described in pages 35-36 of the 2010 Annual Report. As to whether the job was actually done, that is a different question and one that remains unanswered.

Page 39 (Interested Person Transactions) of the 2010 Annual Report mentions that $429k was paid for internal audit services, to "firms which a director has an interest in".

Apart from Lai Seng Kwoon, none of the other directors is described as having an interest in an audit firm. This strongly suggests that SK Lai & Co was again involved.

I wonder whether Mr Lai is able to truly fulfill his duty to the shareholders when he is both a director and a supplier of services. Wouldn't there be a conflict of interest? All the directors were collectively paid $295k for 2010, assuming that only the 4 non-executive directors were paid, then each got $74k on average. SK Lai & Co was paid $429k. Clearly Mr Lai's interest would lie with the $429k he was being paid for internal audit, rather than the $74k he got as a director.

Certainly, as far as internal audit is concerned, the firm that provided this service failed miserably, since it did not ensure that the company was following procedures to match the abalones recorded on the balance sheet with the abalones that were physically present.

If again there is another conflict of interest, here, then he has "serially" abused the system w/o any grave consequences.
This points to a huge gap in the Corporate Governance of not just the companies involved themselves but of the scrutiny and oversight they are subjected to-----i.e. the supervisory and regulatory framework of SGX.
I hope, as I have posted before--- that SGX/MAS investigate the whole thread/link of listcos associated with some of these IDs.