Press Digest - Chinese investors crank up pressure on another troubled investment scheme

CONVINCED that they are the victims of a money game scam, some 3,000 Chinese investors of the troubled Richway Global Venture have vowed to get back their money by hook or by crook.
According to a report in China Press today, apart from planning to come to Malaysia to lodge police reports, they are negotiating with a Malaysian debt collecting company to act on their behalf.
A representative of the investors, who are believed to have invested a total of 20 million renminbi (about RM12 million) within three months of the high-yield investment scheme's launch in China in January, has contacted a Sarawak-based debt collecting company online and is willing to offer the company half the amount of money recovered as reward.
This is in addition to a "protect investors' rights" campaign initiated by the victims whereby they are pooling their resources to engage lawyers to write to the Consulate General of Malaysia in Guangzhou for assistance.
Established in Malaysia late last year, Richway presented itself as an agriculture-cum-forex trading outfit, promising investors a monthly interest of 30%, which they did get but for only two months.
The interest payment stopped last month.
A source told the daily that following the arrest of JJ Poor To Rich (JJPTR) founder Johnson Lee and two assistants over the collapsed money game on Wednesday, and reports lodged against Richway, its founder Alex Wong, whom the Chinese investors referred to as "the Malaysian farmer they want to see jailed", has fled the country to avoid arrest.