Swarna Maloney gets in touch with some Touchwood depositors
‘Wanted-by-the-authorities’ Swarna Maloney, former Group Managing Director of troubled forestry firm Touchwood Holdings’, has got in touch with some distraught depositors over the last two weeks.
“She called some of us from (she said) Cambodia and assured us that she will pay the due monies by months’ end,” a depositor who wished to be anonymous told the Business Times. He added that her plan is to raise money by selling Touchwood’s Plantations in Cambodia.
He also said that if she doesn’t return their dues, some of them will take ‘drastic’ measures.
Ms. Maloney and her husband and founder Chairman of Touchwood Holdings, Roscoe Maloney, fled the country last year when it was alleged that they had defrauded the company’s subsidiary Touchwood Private (Ltd)’s depositors.
Another subsidiary, Touchwood Investments PLC’s (TIP) newly-appointed Chairman Lanka Wijendra Kiwlegedara told shareholders at the annual general meeting held last September that he will secure over Rs.3 billion or US $ 21 million within the next few months to the company from various sources including from one of his other business’ that has a footing in the gem and jewellery and from his privately-known investors in Singapore, and Thailand.
The Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) is pursuing the Maloneys on numerous fraud probes, according to SEC officials. “These investigations are ongoing,” Dhammika Perera, Officer-in-Charge/Deputy Director General of the SEC confirmed to the Business Times.