Anwar Ibrahim Reveals Malaysian Pension Fund Lost RM200 Million in eFishery Fraud Case
Malaysian Prime Minister Anwar Ibrahim has addressed the fraud case involving eFishery, an Indonesian agritech startup, stating that nearly RM200 million from Malaysia’s civil servants’ pension fund, Kumpulan Wang Persaraan (KWAP), was lost as a result.
Anwar Ibrahim said KWAP was deceived into investing almost RM200 million, equivalent to Rp 875.9 billion, in eFishery. The fraud took the form of financial statement manipulation by the startup’s management, which also affected other international institutional investors.
“The decision went through an evaluation and governance process, based on the information available at the time, which included verification of financial statements by an internationally recognised certified auditor,” Anwar said in a written parliamentary statement, quoted by The Edge Malaysia on Saturday (18 July 2026).
“At the same time, the investor consortium, including KWAP, also conducted independent due diligence to ensure that all information was complete and valid for investment consideration,” he added.
He emphasised that several leading international institutional investors and technology funds had also invested in eFishery, including Temasek, SoftBank, 42XFund and Northstar.
“Nevertheless, the eFishery investment was a planned fraud, and there was manipulation of financial statements by eFishery’s management,” he said.
In 2023, eFishery was reported to have raised US$200 million in a Series D funding round. Of that amount, US$47.7 million (RM194.35 million) came from KWAP.
Anwar was responding to a question from Subang member of parliament Wong Chen about what accountability measures had been or would be taken against KWAP’s board of directors, investment panel and senior management regarding the approval and oversight of the investment.
Anwar said the investor consortium, including KWAP, had initiated legal action and efforts to recover the funds. He added that KWAP had also carried out a comprehensive review of the investment’s evaluation, approval and oversight processes.
“After due consideration, follow-up actions have been taken in accordance with institutional governance frameworks and principles of accountability,” he said.
“KWAP remains committed to managing civil servants’ pension funds transparently, ethically and accountably. Improvements have been made to strengthen investment safeguards in the future,” he added.