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Chief Executive Officer of Bursa Malaysia Berhad, Yusli Mohamed Yusoff said that the criteria for the 'KLSE Corporate Awards' were all encompassing in recognising and promoting overall exemplary corporate conduct rather than focus on specific traits of corporate behaviour.
"With the introduction of the Malaysian Code of Corporate Governance in 1999, the updates to the Listing Requirements in 2001 and Bursa's continuous efforts which include the Corporate Awards and other monitoring and enforcement actions undertaken, there has been marked improvement in the level of awareness on corporate best practices and corporate disclosure.
"Quite a number of public listed companies have paved the way in moving beyond basic compliance to setting exemplary levels of corporate disclosure, as evidenced in the corporate awards.
"A survey by CLSA, published in April 2003 reveals that Malaysia is one of the markets with most noticeable improvements in Corporate Governance environment. There were overall improvements in transparency, independence and accountability in Malaysia," Yusli said.
Yusli also said that having paved the direction for recognising and awarding companies that display corporate excellence, many organisations have come forward to recognise and award public companies for good corporate best practices.
"The National Annual Corporate Report Awards or NACRA, The Malaysian Business Corporate Governance Awards, the KPMG Shareholder Value Awards are all aimed at achieving similar objectives - promoting corporate excellence through enhancing levels of disclosure and setting exemplary best practices.
"Bursa Malaysia will soon be joining the ranks of a public company, it is not appropriate for us to be judging the corporate conduct and best practices of other listed companies. It is best for such awards to be organised by independent parties.
"The organisations are doing a good job at promoting corporate governance standards and corporate best practices through the various awards and recognition programmes. We hope they will persist with the good efforts and the Exchange will continue to be supportive of such programmes," Yusli said.
