Is the PM sincere, or just waffling?

Knee-jerk reaction package has been proposed, yesterday, Tuesday 25 March 2008. which is supposed to ease the ever increasing burden faced by low-income poverty stricken Malaysians.

According to media reports Abdullah Ahmad Badawi, now in his second term as Prime Minister, has unveiled a reactive package of measures supposedly formulated to alleviate the intolerable burden of rapidly spiralling costs of basic essentials faced by low as well as middle income Malaysians.

Firstly the government aims to mitigate the impact of rising world prices for lower income households and limit the wastage and losses caused by subsidies.

Secondly, the government would review the implementation of its economic plans to ensure that its benefits would touch the lives of those who needed them the most.

Thirdly, the government would continue its work towards reducing wide income gaps between and within ethnic groups while ensuring fairness for all Malaysians.

Other priority areas for his second term as PM were said to be to drastically reduce crime, step up the battle against corruption, support reforms of the judiciary and ensure a fair number of places of worship for Malaysians of all religions.

Is this more hot air, lies, and play-acting which the public have become so accustomed to hearing and seeing during Abdullah’s first term as PM?

Even if he is being sincere and honest, it a really a case of TOO LITTLE TOO LATE!

In another news report Adbullah admitted he had not moved fast enough in pushing through reforms which he had promised to undertake, and said the result of the general election was a strong message to him, that he had not done so.

Wow at last he seems to realise he was given a hard slap by the voters for lying and being incompetent!

"I thank the Malaysian people for this message. Point well made and point taken," he said .

"During the last elections, we lost the cyber-war. The young people were looking at SMSs, Internet and other tools to get information."

"We did not think that it was important to respond to them. It was a serious misjudgement. It was a very serious mistake on our part."

"It is my intention to respond to the young people and their enthusiasm. We have no other choice but to respond to the message as swiftly as we can.”

It is not only the young people who deserted him and BN, does he realise this fact? Perhaps not!

He said he now intended to implement a bold agenda for addressing the concerns of the people as expressed through the ballot box.

Abdullah said the Government was ready to change and address the people's concerns and grievances.

He said that the Government would work with honesty, integrity and zero tolerance of corruption.

"I believe we have the means to do well. We are working very hard. We are ready to rectify our mistakes. It is important for us to do it," he added.

Well, well, well, a very late, but nevertheless welcome admission of non-performance, tardiness and incompetence, that is somewhat refreshing, but will henceforth see any positive changes, or will we only experience the status quo or just more and more‘talk’?

Decisive, bold, sincere and effective action will be needed, and it must be implemented across the board relentlessly without fear or favour.

Then and only then all Malaysians may see some positive benefits from it.

It is once again TOO LITTLE TOO LATE!

Ab actu ad posse valet illatio

- From what has happened before we may infer what will happen in future

Malaysian Government Imports Food, true or false?

Cut & Paste- Beef? or BULL?

The Star reported on 28 December 2007 as follows:

Under the Headline: “Govt still needs to import food........."

“THE Government will continue to import food if local production and supply are still unable to meet the demand of the country.

Agriculture and Agro-based Industry Deputy Minister Datuk Seri Mohamad Shariff Omar said beef, mutton, rice and vegetables were still being imported from neighbouring countries as the country was still short of being self-sufficient.

He said the country was 72% self-sufficient in rice production and targeted to be at 100% self-sufficient by the year 2010 following efforts to produce 10 metric tones of rice per hectare.

“We are also importing a lot of mutton and beef. Our local breeders are producing only 22% of beef for local consumption.

“We are importing about 23,000 metric tonnes of beef, mostly from India, monthly,” he said when met at his service centre, near Butterworth, yesterday.

Mohamad Shariff said the country was producing only 8% of mutton for local demand and hoped to increase it to 18% by the year 2010.

He said the Government was importing some 4,000 metric tonnes of mutton monthly."

Questions:

1. Does Mohamad Shariff really expect Malaysians to believe that the Government imports this food?

(I doubt it this is true, surely the food is imported by private companies, not directly by the Malaysian Government.

It is of course a fact that the Malaysian Government tries to interfere and control each and every aspect of life in Malaysia, but it seems that now even the food is, according to Shariff, being directly imported by the Barisan National collation Government.

2. Pray tell, where are the Government Run Shops which sell, or perhaps even give away, this imported food?

SAY 'NO' TO BULLSHIT!

Kampai!

Will Malaysians Soon Be Sleeping on the Streets?

In the true spirit of free speech, this letter is posted verbatim.

It has been posted elsewhere, and has been widely distributed by email.

The letter from "Little Bird" is also worth a place here.

“Malaysians May End Up Sleeping in the Street

Sunday, 06 January 2008, by ‘Little Bird’

Indonesia is one of the world's most richest countries in terms of natural resources.

God has blessed Indonesia with gold, uranium, copper, oil, timber, beaches, seas and other wealth.

The land is fertile with abundant rain. Stick a twig into the ground and it grows into a tree. Yet Indonesians sleep in the streets.

Food is expensive. The average Indonesian eats some rice, tempe, tauhu and maybe some vegetables for breakfast, lunch and dinner - everyday. An average Nasi Padang meal for four persons in a single star Indonesian restaurant can cost RM60.00 (160,000 Rupiah).

This is way beyond the income of the average Joko or Ketut in Indonesia.

Why is this so?

The answer is because the ruling elites in Indonesia do not care about the people. They have pillaged the country. They craft policies that only serve to keep the elites in power and the wealthy.

The same thing is happening in Malaysia.

There are also millions of Indonesians who go to school and university but do not learn skills that can help them survive in the real world. They are very poor in European languages like English or Dutch. All their education is in Indonesian. So they cannot keep up with the latest developments and technologies.

They cannot compete. They remain poor.

The children of the elite are sent overseas for their education. An average Indonesian university graduate cannot bring world class skills to his employers. He or she therefore earns a pittance.

This is happening in Malaysia. Bumiputra university graduates only strike it rich if they get Government jobs where they do not do much work but earn a good salary with a pension.

In the private sector they may not get a job or earn only a pittance. That is why 100,000 graduates remain unemployed in Malaysia.

Bumiputra university graduates are turning up for interviews as taxi drivers and shop assistants.

What about those who flunk out after SPM?

They become Mat Rempits. Last Saturday I saw another Mat Rempit get killed at the road races in Shah Alam (near Section 7).

In Malaysia, just like in Indonesia, food is getting very expensive. But the wages and salaries of the people, especially the Malays, is not keeping up with the increase in prices.

Instead of developing the competitive ability of the people, the Government has been using the failed NEP to provide subsidies and dish out money on a plate. Everything is subsidised, even cooking oil, flour, rice, sugar, fuel, etc.

The Government has been providing these subsidies so that the people will keep voting for the ruling party.

So it has never been to the Government's advantage to make the Malays independent.

A Malay who is independent of the Government may not vote for the BN. It is therefore better to keep feeding with subsidies. So, for the past 50 years, everything has been subsidised.

But now with 27 million people in the country of which more than half are Malays, subsidies are getting more expensive.

There is also much much more thievery and wastage by the elites in Malaysia. But there is no bottomless well full of money.

Everything has its limits. The money will soon run out.

Without the subsidies for cooking oil, sugar, flour and petrol, how are the people, especially the Malays, going to survive?

Already university graduates cannot find jobs or compete in the private sector. What happens when the oil money runs out?

What happens when (not if, but when) the Government cannot simply spend billions of oil money to sustain its voting base any longer?

That is when we may see people sleeping in the streets, just like in Indonesia.

If that happens this country will go up in flames. We will all be consumed.

In Indonesia, the Government has not mobilised its hundreds of millions of people (over 250 million Indonesians) with the competitive skills to grow enough food for themselves.

Hence food is expensive.

They do not even have simple survival skills like coming to work on time, organising themselves to do simple tasks, maintaining good hygiene and cleanliness and so on.

They are poorly read and not informed about many things that are going on around the world.

Their Government has failed in all these aspects. Hence the average Indonesian remains poor.

The same thing has happened in Malaysia.

Our young people, especially the Malays, do not possess basic survival skills. We are not talking about competitive skills but just basic survival skills.

The Government is not serious about giving them useful competitive skills either. The Mat Rempits are being glorified by the politicians as saviours of the nation (Mat Cemerlang). Correction. they are drug users, gang rapists, snatch thieves and street fighters.

When an efficient Policewoman called Nooriyah Anvar was appointed
Chief of Traffic Police she went after the Mat Rempits with a vengeance. Does anyone remember her?

She confiscated their bikes on the spot. But soon the Mat Rempits called their political muscle and Nooriyah Anvar was kicked out.

To date she holds the record of being the shortest serving Traffic Police Chief in Malaysia.

She has been replaced by Senior Asst Comm (II) Datuk Hamza Taib.

So the Government is not serious about improving the position of the Malays. It serves the Barisan Nasional Government to keep the Malays down and out. Then the Malays can go to the Government for crumbs.

This way the ruling elites get to keep the whole loaf to themselves. Go and visit Indonesia.

This is what is happening over there. It is happening over here too.”

This is a quite realistic scenario which is not hard to envisage, since everything in the Malaysian garden is not as lovely as it may seem to some.

What do you think?

Is it far fetched, or a reasonable assessment of the current situation in Malaysia?

Sanon!

Subsidies are Oppressive

232 years ago, a Scottish Gentleman wrote a tome, which is still enlightening, relevant and forward looking.

Here in Malaysia, we still have an artificial, skewed economy in which many daily necessities are subsidised, and thus these are unrealistically low priced.

Some think that this is beneficial, but it fact it is detrimental, unhealthy and oppressive.

If wages were fair and equitable everyone could afford to buy goods and services at the market price.

Malaysia needs someone with the foresight and wisdom of Adam Smith - picture to the left- (born 1723, died 1790) to rejuvenate and regenerate the economy into a free market economy, and not as it is now a patronisingly pathetic subsidy orientated one.

Below is a brief outline of Adam Smith’s great work.

An Inquiry into the Nature and Causes of the Wealth of Nations is the magnum opus of Scottish economist Adam Smith; it was first published on 9^th March 1776, during the period known as the Scottish Enlightenment

It is a clearly written account of political economy at the dawn of the Industrial Revolution, and is considered by many to be the first modern work in the field of economics

The work is also the first comprehensive defence of free market policies; it is broken down into five books, contained in two volumes.

The Wealth of Nations was written for the benefit of average educated individuals of the 18^th century, rather than for economic specialists, mathematicians, or academics

There are three main concepts which Adam Smith expounds upon and these form the foundation of free market economics:

· division of labour,

· pursuit of self interest, and

· freedom of trade.

An Inquiry into the Nature and Causes of the Wealth of Nations

Contents:

Introduction and plan of the work

Book I:

Of the Causes of Improvement in the productive Powers of Labour, and of the Order according to which its Produce is naturally distributed among the different Ranks of the People

• Chapter 1: Division of Labour
• Chapter 2: The Principle which gives Occasion to the Division of Labour
• Chapter 3: That the Division of Labour is Limited by the Extent of the Market
• Chapter 4: Origin and Use of Money
• Chapter 5: The Real and Nominal Price of Commodities, or of their Price in Labour, and their Price in Money
• Chapter 6: The Component Parts of the Price of Commodities
• Chapter 7: The natural and market Price of Commodities
• Chapter 8: The Wages of Labour
• Chapter 9: The Profits of Stock
• Chapter 10: Wages and Profit in the different Employments of Labour and Stock
• Chapter 11: The Rent of Land

Book II:

Of the Nature, Accumulation, and Employment of Stock

• Chapter 1: The Division of Stock
• Chapter 2: Money considered as a particular Branch of the general Stock of the Society, or of the Experience of maintaining the National Capital
• Chapter 3: The Accumulation of Capital, or of productive and unproductive Labour
• Chapter 4: Stock lent at Interest
• Chapter 5: The different Employment of Capital

Book III: Of the different Progress of Opulence in different Nations

• Chapter 1: The Natural Progress of Opulence
• Chapter 2: The Discouragement of Agriculture in the Ancient State of Europe after the Fall of the Roman Empire
• Chapter 3: The Rise and Progress of Cities and Towns, after the Fall of the Roman Empire
• Chapter 4: How the Commerce of the Towns contributed to the Improvement of the Country

Book IV:

Of Systems of Political Economy

• Chapter 1: The Principle of the commercial, or mercantile System
• Chapter 2: Restraints upon the Importation from foreign Countries of such Goods as can be produced at Home
• Chapter 3: The extraordinary Restraints upon the Importation of Goods of almost all Kinds, from those Countries with which the Balance is supposed to be disadvantageous
• Chapter 4: Drawbacks
• Chapter 5: Bounties
• Chapter 6: Treaties of Commerce
• Chapter 7: Colonies
• Chapter 8: Conclusion of the Mercantile System
• Chapter 9: The Agricultural Systems, or of those Systems of Political Economy, which represent the Produce of Land, as either the sole or the principal Source of the Revenue and Wealth of every Country

Book V:

Of the Revenue of the Sovereign or Commonwealth

• Chapter 1: The Expenses of the Sovereign or Commonwealth
• Chapter 2: The Sources of the General or Public Revenue of the Society
• Chapter 3: Public Debts

'Slainte, here's tae ye' to Adam Smith