Ong Beng Seng, the billionaire set to plead guilty for his role in a Singapore corruption scandal, will step down as the managing director of the property firm he founded more than four decades ago.
Singapore-listed Hotel Properties Limited said Ong “wishes to devote more time to manage his medical conditions”, according to an exchange filing on Monday. He will also not put himself up for re-election as a board director at the firm’s annual general meeting on April 29.
Shares of Hotel Properties rose as much as 4.7 per cent in Singapore trading on Monday amid a broader market upswing, the biggest intraday gain in more than a month.
The illuminated circuit for the Formula One Singapore Grand Prix night race is seen in 2017. Ong Beng Seng has been credited with bringing Formula One to Singapore. Photo: AFP
The departure is a major transition for the company that has interests in hotels and other developments spanning the globe from London to the Maldives, with little indication so far as to who will succeed him. Ong began Hotel Properties in 1980 and has been a director at the firm since then. During his tenure, the Malaysian tycoon established himself as a high profile and at times controversial public figure in Singapore. His children do not sit on the firm’s board. His brother-in-law David Fu Kuo Chen is a director.
The 79-year-old has been credited with bringing the Formula One night race to the city state and won the rights to the Singapore Grand Prix. But his penchant for wooing the elite has backfired in the past.
In 1996, Hotel Properties was plunged into controversy after offering discounts to two of the country’s top political figures, then-deputy prime minister, Lee Hsien Loong, and his father, Lee Kuan Yew, for luxury flats in the exclusive Nassim Road enclave. Both former long-time prime ministers were later cleared of any impropriety, and neither Ong nor his company were found to have breached any laws or rules.
Ong Beng Seng (second from left) pictured with former government minister S. Iswaran (second from right) in May 2007. Photo: EPA-EFE
More recently, Ong was embroiled in a scandal involving former Singapore transport minister S. Iswaran who was jailed for obtaining gifts from the property tycoon. Ong was charged on two counts and was scheduled to plead guilty in early April in relation to one charge of obstructing justice, with another abetting charge to be taken into consideration in sentencing.
