KUALA LUMPUR: Datasonic Group Bhd said the ongoing legal suit between its wholly-owned unit, Datasonic Technologies Sdn Bhd (DTSB), and Percetakan Keselamatan Nasional Sdn Bhd (PKN) will not affect its five-year Malaysian passport booklets contract with the government.
In a filing with Bursa Malaysia today, Datasonic said the legal suit was ensued from a dispute between DTSB and PKN, a wholly-owned subsidiary of Fima Corp Bhd, over the pricing of the 13.42 million Malaysian passport booklets supplied from Dec 1, 2016 until Nov 30, 2021.
"The legal suit will not affect DTSB's Malaysian passport booklets contract with the government for the period of five years as PKN is only our appointed sub-contractor for that interim period of six months only," it said.
In the meantime, Datasonic said DTSB would continue to pursue for amicable settlement with PKN, failing which, DTSB would leave it to the court to determine the fair price.
On July 30, PKN launched a legal action against DTSB to claim RM24.98 million over the same dispute.
To recap, Datasonic said DTSB had accepted the letter of award from the Home Ministry to supply about 13.42 million Malaysian Passport booklets to the Immigration Department from Dec 1, 2016 to Nov 30, 2021.
DTSB has agreed to appoint PKN as sub-contractor to deliver the first 1.5 million old Malaysian passport design booklets from Dec 1, 2016 until May 1, 2017, and a copy of the draft agreement was sent to PKN based on DTSB's offered price.
PKN did not agree on DTSB's offered price but continued to supply the old Malaysian passport booklets in which time the pricing for each old Malaysian passport booklet had still not been agreed upon by both parties.
As a result, no agreement was signed but PKN had decided to deliver the 1.5 million old Malaysian Passport designed booklets with full understanding that pricing was to be agreed upon at a future date.
Datasonic said DTSB had commenced producing and supplying the new design Malaysian passport booklets since September 2017.
"The official launch of the new design Malaysian passport booklets from four icons to 12 icons that incorporated the design concept of flora and fauna, batik, songket and five principles of Rukun Negara, which the old Malaysian passport did not have, was done in January 2018," it added.