I Malaysia on Trial

PM Malaysia Najib introduced the 1 Malaysia Policy soon after he succeeded Tun Badawai in an effort to appease the minority races in the country following dismal performance in the last general election. But, it looks like his party members are not totally behind him and are not giving him the 100% support to bring changes and progress to the people of Malaysia.

We have now the 1 Malaysia which I am afraid is likely going to be overshadowed by the Naional Economic Model, NEM, that was announced by the Najib two days ago. In principle, NEM appears to be the logical step to move the country forward.

The NEP had brought about great dissatisfactions among the minority races in the country. Before the NEP came into force, the Government blamed the British colonial master for having commpartalised the three major races along economic lines - Malays relegated to the padi fields and agricultural sector, the Indians as indentured labourers to the railways and the Chinese to the mines and the business sector. After May 13, 1969, it was deemed necessary to redress the economic imbalances among the three races. On this premise, the New Economic Policy was borne to help elevate the living standards of the supposingly poor and backward bumiputras who should be given special privileges in practically all spheres of the socio- economic sectors - from entry into universities to award of business contracts to granting of APs. Besides, all private business orgnisations shall employ at 30% Malays at all levels and allot 30% shares to Malays in all public companies.

Over the last four decades since the introduction of the NEP, over-zealous civil servants aggravated the situation by engaging an overly preponderant number of Malays into the civil, military and para-military service arms. Hence, the non-Malays have to find work in the priviate sector. No wonder these days, the civil service is filled with practically 100% Malays.
So the Malays are so protected and sheltered that they did not have to worry about loss of employment. As a result. many Malays are beginning to realise that they are left so far behind than other races in terms of business, occupational and skill development. Without the clutch provided the UMNO government, the majority of the Malays will find it hard to compete with the other races in the private sector.

Coupled with the crazy religious fanatics, they are stifling the freedom and rights of the Malays - hence so many of them feel reluctant to return to Malaysia after completing their course of studies overseas or try to stay as long as possible by pursuing post-graduate programmes.

Th ever changing educational policy has a great negative impact on human development. Worst of all is the quota system and the dual university entrance assessment system prevailing which has caused great disparity between the Malays and the non-Malays in terms of skills and knowledge acquisition and intellectual development. The standards of the graduates from public universities are shallow compared to those from private institutions. The high degree of unemployment among the Malay graduates speaks volumes of the sad state of affairs.

The Malays are now controlling practically all sectors of the economies; yet, the Government is shamelessly denying this fact. Besides. it is sensitive to negative comments by critiques. The prevailing economic equities held by Malays far exceed in my estimate 40%.

The UMNO leaders continue to hoodwink the public and shelf them from the truths and realities of what seem to be going on through the highly-censored and -controlled media. In the meantime, billions seem to be siphoned out of the treasury through inflated prices in most if not all infrastructural and supply contracts. This is how UMNO find it easy to create millionaires among its cronies.

To what confidence does one have in what the BN is trying to do these days? They talk about 1 Malaysia but its leaders are wanting that attitude and will to make it a reality. They seem to be contradicting one another ever and anon causing so much of confusing among the masses which they are damn good at doing.

Only the next election will tell whether these UMNOputras mean what they say and do what they mean or just remain as NATO.