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• So basically the 4 leased to be had now will come from the allocation that was meant for the cancelled Blackhawks, and the rest will come from aether prolly there will be some horse trading with the others, TUDM, PDRM, MMEA, where TDM/PUTD can eat a bit of their allocations.

  "the purchase of 28 units under a leasing contract worth RM16bil"
  I wonder if its the General or the reporter who doesnt understand what is leasing as there is no such thing as purchase under leasing. At the end it will still be the property of that leasor. If the intent is payment thru installments, its via Hire Purchase loan, not a lease.

  "magic wand to get your assets quickly"
  As I have said before its expected as there arent many users for AW149 and hence unlike current market flooded with used Blackhawks, any such chopper that would fit TDM requirements will have to come brand new from Leo. Thus going lease is redundant and will cost more than outright purchase as Leo will surely charge higher to spec in what we want.

  As I said again, this program isnt to help the enduser but merely a huge crony enrichment program meant to support the finances of PH.

• I would say

  a very big sum of money (16 billion) endorsed by a few

  but a decision not well liked by many

• @joe it is both crony enrichment and cuci fiscal figures program. the whole point is not having these procurements messing up their fiscal records. you can sewa with oe.

• Price including rental, servicing, insurance.......sst......

• @SY
  Money is not unlimited, even if it comes from either left pocket (DE) or right pocket (OE), theres only just so much to go around. Traditionally OE has the large chunk of the defence budget and lesser oversight than DE hence why this crony enrichment lease deal was hatched and managed to push thru via Cabinet route. But then its always been large due to paying out salaries, annulments, & pencen. RM 16 Bil has to come from somewhere and it would be sad if pensioners have to take the cut to fund their mega crony. Made worse this Govt have (had?) ex military in their ranks as well.

• @joe my point was they want to spend but dont want to make the records look bad, basically cheating the system

• Math wise the gov kinda stated the truth.

  if we took polish purchases of aw149 as a basis.then with around 1bil ++ each a year it would take the gov 9-10 years to get all of those helo. Instead of getting it all in one go cum 2027.

  Thought because of inflation it would be difficult to say that you would indeed only pay 9 bil ISH overall with conventional purchases particularly if the inflation get nearer to the leasing interest rate which seems to be at 5%.

  Nor there a guarantee that with outright purchase we would pay the same price as the polish particular as we have a history of paying 200% more then everyone else. Just look at the recent Hilux 50k more overpriced contract.

  Bookeping wise there is such a thing as sewa beli. Any average joe can get one for houses or cars though the interest is on the high side compared to a normal higher purchase. Most people I know use this because their credit score ain't pretty enough to get a traditional hire purchases contracts. For companies with higher purchase one would need to record both liabilities as well as depreciation cost which make the book a bit ugly compared to a sewa beli which you recorded as expenses. For a lot of companies nicely baked book which priorities investors taste like nice gearing ratios and other investment matrix make their stock a lot more valuable despite the higher overall cost of the lease compared to outright purchase or higher purchase.

• Joe, you have to decide what you want. 1) In isolation, it doesn't matter, since the government (past, present and future) will not make available whatever fraction of RM16b to buy 28 helicopters in this RMK nor in the next RMK. Period. One will have to wait a long time before a firm order of this size is made. This is a case of I put up the money, it's not enough or crony capitalism. I don't put up the money its bad policy. Sure, it is more expensive than buying, which leads to the next point. 2) What has been the problem in developing a local defence industry? Lack of recurring contracts. Start-stop procurement such that no company will build the industrial base just to sustain a 3 or 5-years contract - you need multi-year sustained orders to build up the industrial base, not one-off contracts. Luckily Weststar is not some RM1 setup yesterday company. Whether it will grow to become a national champion, we don't know but it has 15 years of sustained cashflows to do so, something BNS did not have after the 6 Kedah Class NGPV. If Westar becomes a self-sustaining national defence champion in 2035 with expansive domestic and foreign contracts, then what? Still crony capitalism or good policy? Sure we don't know if it will succeed in 15 uears time, which leads to the third point. 3) Defence procurement is part of the NEP. It is also the basis for all the nonsense ICP requirements. Suppose the government decided no ICP required and buys direct from the vendor, the government will still have to appoint a local "agent" to front the deal. Could the leasing be cheaper if AugustaWestland directly bided for the contract? Most likely. Could the Hiluxs' be cheaper if bought directly from Toyota (i.e., UMW)? Of course, but it can't be done because of policy. It LUNAS instead of the government was leading the LMS 2 procurement, one can be sure the cost would have been higher than what it is. Anything can be cheaper without intermediaries but is Joe willing to open up defence procurement? Sure, RM16b is no small sum. But considered in isolation, when was the last time any government ponied up the money to buy 12 helicopters let alone 28? If this is the only way money will be made available, so be it. Better to have 28 flying helicopters than 0 phantom stealth helicopters. That is the reality in Malaysia. Make a stand on whether the current procurement policies for defence should be changed. From solely a defence perspective (not politics), the government is willing to spend money for 28 helicopters - including nearly doubling the Air Force's rotary fleet. No factor, will take it.

• “As of now, the parameters remain unchanged, with the project valued at RM200mil, and we require a five-year lease for four aircraft"

  Buying outright the exact same Blackhawks are much more cheaper than leasing it for 5 years.

  Portugal paid RM219.7 million for 6 including training and maintenance for 5 years (RM36.6 million each)

  PUTD 5 year lease for RM187 million (RM46.75 million each)

  A difference of RM10.15 million each.

  https://malaysiandefence.com/portuguese-af-fire-fighting-black-hawks

• @Kel
  "Still crony capitalism or good policy?"
  Tell that to Deftech, it was sustainable & even expanded as long as they got the contracts. What now? Same thing will happen to Weststar except they do have GLC & private aviation side income.

  "Sure we don’t know if it will succeed in 15 uears time"
  Its the same reasoning we keep doing the same yet keep seeing failures after failures. What will change? Einstein had said something about it.

  "appoint a local “agent” to front the deal"
  Even this is still part of ICP/NEP. If Govt will do away with these, they will also do away with unnecessary middlemen. Its that simple. The LMS2 buy with Turks is one such.

  "Joe willing to open up defence procurement?"
  Its what I had been pushing all these while but your new so I can forgive you not knowing. IMHO its either we scrimp on budget and go direct or go Hail Mary and budget excessively enough for 'local builds' with the inefficiencies & leakages that will entail as long as we throw enuff money to make it success just as SG had done. The half measures we did with LCS & OPV is why both failed.

  "any government ponied up the money to buy 12 helicopters"
  The EC725s comes to mind but lets say we never had to consider often as these are big tickets and the needs for each dont come at once.

  "so be it"
  Not with my taxpayers monies. Nope.

  "That is the reality in Malaysia."
  If this is the reality, we should have just stuck with BN, as least its the devil we knew & loved for 60 years.