JOHOR BARU, April 23 — A 24-year-old workshop owner is being hounded by loan sharks to settle the debts taken by his estranged father whom he has not seen for a decade.

Samson Loo Jia Tao said he started receiving the threats from multiple mobile phone numbers about two weeks ago where debt collectors demanded that he pay off all his father's debts, believed to be more than RM100,000.

“In the past two weeks, on average I receive about 30 calls and text messages daily from the loan sharks who threatened me and my family.

“So far the Ah Longs have not acted in any physical manner and have only verbally threatened that they will damage my house in Taman Sierra Perdana and my workshop in Taman Mount Austin.

“However, I am worried as my 55-year-old mother lives with me and is alone most of the time, while my older 26-year-old brother is seldom home due to his work in Penang,” Loo related his troubles in a press conference at the Johor Jaya state assembly service centre in Taman Johor Jaya here today.

He was accompanied by the centre’s complaints and services officer Michael Mok Meng Haw.

Loo, who has not seen his father for the past 10 years, believed that his father’s debt is more than RM100,000.

Besides the threats and harassment from calls or text messages, he added that the loan sharks also used his photos and edited them in Facebook to embarrass him.

“This is quite depressing as such posts on Facebook could tarnish my reputation as a business owner,” he said, adding that he had lodged a report regarding the matter at the Seri Alam district police headquarters last Thursday.

Loo explained that his father left the family home in Shah Alam, Selangor to remarry another woman when he was nine-years-old.

He said that together with his mother and brother, the family then moved to Johor Baru to start a new life about 10 years ago.

“Since then, we have lost contact with my father,” he said.

Loo said the loan sharks claimed that he was made guarantor for his father’s loan and demanded that I pay off the debts.

“There is no documentation of me being a guarantor and I didn’t sign any documents or dealt with any of the Ah Longs involved in my father’s loan.

“Due to the increasingly desperate situation, I tried to get hold of my father's phone number and managed to talk to him last week.

“He admitted to borrowing from loan sharks and had refused to pay due to the escalating interest on the loan that has now doubled,” he said, adding that it was the first time he spoke to his father in 10 years.

Mok, who is also the Johor Jaya DAP branch secretary, hopes that Loo’s predicament can be resolved soon.

He also called on the police to ensure that Loo and his family are safe.

Seri Alam police chief Superintendent Sohaimi Ishak, when contacted, confirmed receiving Loo’s report.