(Face of Malaysian politicians – look lost when confronted with serious issues and prone to put their heads in the ground hoping the issues will be resolved on their own. Image source: http://www.hedweb.com)
A long time ago, something like this dropped in my email inbox and many of my friends had a good laugh about it.
Many who read such emails remarked that it is no wonder Malaysia is in a serious pile of shit – just look at the level of education that our politicians have. I am not sure whether the information revealed in the said email was true or not but I decided to give the benefit of the doubt.
Hey, having a long list of certificates under your arm-pit does not say much about how well the politicians can run the country. There are other factors involved – one that stands out is management experience.
But then just take a hard long look at Malaysia and where she stands when it comes to other developing countries. Certainly, we are better than countries like Ghana but given the state of things, don’t be surprised when one day you heard Ghanaians saying that “we are still better than Malaysia”.
We are not in the worst situation but certainly, we can do better to get ourselves from the currently sticky areas such as distribution of wealth, unity, fight against corruption, misuse of power, productivity, improvement of the local economy, the influx of foreign investment, freedom of speech, etc.
Sadly we also realised that there is just so much we can do but in reality, we need someone brilliant and with the right willpower to get things connected and move. Sometimes you really need to wonder why Malaysia so is “blessed” with so many politicians with seemingly low IQ and closed minds (despite the politicians’ respectable stature and experience) running the show at the top.
Let’s take one recent example.
Malaysiakini reports:-
”I don’t think we need to react to all these nonsensical reports coming from people who know nothing about the country.
”Maybe, those guys (PERC) are sitting at a table somewhere in a remote corner of Hong Kong,” he (Muhyiddin Yassin) said
But what did PERC say in the first place?
In a report on Malaysia released at the end of January, the Hong Kong-based Political and Economic Risk Consultancy (PERC) warned: “Events of the past month give the impression that pressures are building and the entire situation is becoming much more unstable”. Malaysia was “veering towards instability”
The PERC reported that the impression that Malaysia has given since New Year’s Day was that the situation in the country is becoming increasingly unstable; a group of elite minorities were dominating the national agenda to the extent that it was hurting Malaysia’s attractiveness to investors; and it is “probable” that no other Asian country is suffering from as much bad press as Malaysia.
Among the developments that caught PERC’s attention were the theft of military jet engines; detention of terror suspects from a number of African and Middle East countries; warnings that Islamic militants were planning attacks on foreigners at resorts in Sabah; renewed ethnic and religious “violence” that included arson at some churches and desecration of mosques; and controversy over the integrity of key institutions like the judicial system in the sodomy trial of opposition leader Anwar Ibrahim.
(Source: Malaysian Insider)
PERC did not say Malaysia is unstable but only says that it is “veering” towards instability. For those who do not know, veering is defined as “to turn aside from a course, direction, or purpose” (source).
Perhaps to make things more relevant – it is akin to some people saying that abolishment of illegal Malay hawker stalls veering towards sidelining the Malay community. Things have not happened but if nothing is done to improve on things and educate the relevant people, things may happen, so they say.
And one cannot deny that the recent events mentioned in the PERC’s reports are not something that was cooked up by someone “sitting at a table somewhere in a remote corner of Hong Kong”.
Those events mentioned were REAL and even ordinary Malaysians have their reservations and valid concerns when confronted by events that have been created or continued to perpetuate by the same shameless people.
Take the recent issue of “Allah” – when was the last time we had places of religion attacked in several places? Had the ordinary citizens and cool-headed community leaders not call for calmness and restrained themselves, we would have faced worst things than just having some buildings attacked and burned.
And yes, PERC’s report may not be truthful – it may be missing some key information that, when revealed, will set the records straight.
After all, PERC is just another foreign-based consultancy that looks at the investment risks and strategy in Malaysia and we are not bound rigidly by what they may have written. And PERC may have its own set of rules when coming up with the assessment. But at least have the courtesy of explaining and counteracting the facts, that the Government feels, that was not warranted in the PERC’s report.
But instead, we have a very senior politician in the Government telling off in rather uneducated, head in the ground kind of response that the report was written by someone “sitting at a table somewhere in a remote corner of Hong Kong”, so don’t be bothered!. Another case is this.
The reaction of our politicians helming the administration of this country, such as Muhyiddin Yassin has been so laughable to the extent, Martin Jalleh said this in Malaysian Insider:-
Deputy PM Muhyiddin Yassin tries very hard to make sense of what he says most of the time. When he fails to make sense he makes fun of those whom he criticises.
He then constructs (make believe) his preferred reality of the country and ends up making the fool of himself.
If these are the kind of responses that we expect to see from our politicians whenever Malaysia is faced with negative reports, then all the best to us when investors get spooked and decide to invest somewhere else.
The sooner these politicians wake up to the reality of things and accept that they cannot do things in a cocoon, that whatever that happens cannot be kept in isolation and response from the global community cannot be kept away in ignorance, it is better for us as a nation.
If these politicians cannot display a sense of intelligence, fine with us. At least displays a sense of maturity, failing which, display a sense of humility. No one is perfect but then again, when helming the country, no one is expected to act with a closed mind too.