Tycoon Khoo: Former beauty queen wife ‘very difficult’, bad-tempered
The Malay Mail Online – 3 hours agoRELATED CONTENT
- Khoo denied that Pauline Chai (centre) had always been on good terms with their five …
KUALA LUMPUR, Nov 4 — Tycoon Tan Sri Khoo Kay Peng told the High Court here today that his estranged wife Pauline Chai was a very difficult and bad-tempered woman who would yell at “every small thing”.
The chairman of fashion and interiors brand Laura Ashley also claimed one of their sons called Chai “mentally imbalanced”, while a daughter of theirs complained to him saying Chai had called her “fat and ugly”.
“She’s a very difficult lady,” Khoo testified at the hearing that will decide the jurisdiction of the billion-ringgit divorce dispute.
“Her temper is very bad. She’d yell and scream and shout at every small thing,” the retail and hotel mogul added.
The 75-year-old billionaire also denied that Chai, 68, had always been on good terms with their five adult children, saying they behaved like “enemies” at certain periods of time.
Khoo claimed Chai and their children sometimes did not talk to each other for months at a time.
Khoo ― who runs international investment holding company Malayan United Industries Bhd that has significant stakes in the Corus group of hotels, of which eight are in Britain, and Laura Ashley UK ― also said Chai, who was crowned Miss Malaysia in 1969, did not have any respect or regard for businessmen.
“In her mind, all businessmen are dishonest,” said the businessman.
He added that when he and Chai, who is from Ipoh, married in 1970, she had arrived at his house in Kuala Lumpur with just two bags of “old clothes” and “nothing else”.
Khoo said his family has never stayed together at the couple’s home in the sprawling Rossway Park estate in England.
“Kuala Lumpur has always been our home - the real home,” he said, adding that the centre of his business operations was located in the city here.
According to Khoo, their five children aged between 28 and 43 years are living in separate locations in Canada, Singapore and the UK.
Chai’s lawyer, Edmund Bon, told the court that from 2009 to this year, Chai had spent more than 45 per cent of her time in England, 32 per cent in Canada and only 20 per cent in Malaysia.
An English court ruled earlier on October 17 that England was the more appropriate forum for the case to be heard.
Chai is seeking for the dispute to be decided by the English courts where she stands to gain up to half of Khoo’s estimated £400 million (RM2.1 billion) fortune, possibly the largest divorce settlement in British history.
Khoo, however, is applying to have the case heard in Malaysia, arguing that they were married in Malaysia where he also maintains his official residence. Khoo would risk losing less of his wealth if the trial is held here.
Chai argues that UK is her permanent residence and had cited as proof the collection of 1,000 pairs of shoes she kept at their £30 million (RM158 million) Rossway home in Hertfordshire, England, according to British media reports.
