JOHOR BARU, Nov 17 — The Johor state government will conduct a forensic audit on all of its government-linked companies (GLC) soon to find out the cause of high debts and overlaps in business, said Mentri Besar Datuk Osman Sapian last night .

He said for a start, the forensic audit that will employ external auditors, will start with two or three companies, with one of them being the Johor Education Foundation (YPJ) Holdings.

"The Johor ruler Sultan Ibrahim Sultan Iskandar and all state GLC chief executive officers involved have been informed of the decision to conduct the audit exercise,” said Osman after attending the Johor Parti Amanah Negara (Amanah) 2018 Convention in Bandar Baru Uda last night.

Osman explained that the audit exercise was necessary as the state government wants to know why there are incidences such as business overlapping.

"For example, we have the Johor Public Transport Corporation (PAJ) but we still rent buses from another company, while Johor Corporation (JCorp), which PAJ comes under, has their own transport provider.

"The Johor Biotech (JBiotech) project is another example where both YPJ and JCorp have farms but there is no cooperation between each entity where the respective companies send in their tenders separately,” he said.

On the appointment of external auditors, Osman said that it was necessary to know the actual figures of the losses.