That does sound like a clipping problem to me - the obj sounds to me as if its massive compared to your maya settings. Open the outliner and select the object and scale it down (something like 0.05 in all 3 scales) or add another two 99 to your far clipping plain (9999999).

I have had the same problems from OBJ`s from max being imported. The obj is working or you would not see the wireframe flash.