Parti Keadilan Rakyat (People’s Justice Party) has a clear and firm stand on the New Economic Policy (NEP). As explained by the Ketua Umum of the Party, Anwar Ibrahim in his 20-page article as well as through his many public pronouncements and ceramah, and further reaffirmed in several Party documents,including the Election Manifesto, we intend to replace the NEP with the Malaysian Economic Agenda.

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Dear Friends,

I would like to personally invite you to our MAJLIS MENYAMBUT KEJAYAAN RAKYAT on 29th March, Saturday, from 4.30-7.30pm at Dewan Hamzah, Klang.

Thank you for your support.

Regards,

Charles Santiago

MP Klang

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Please Take Note of the Following Contact Information

Contact Details for ADUN N46 PORT KLANG (updated)

Pertanyaan / Aduan - 016-2712669

Email Add : badrulhisham1@yahoo.com

BN campaigns hard but reaps poor results

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Malaysia - The ruling coalition, Barisan Nasional, ran massive ad campaigns offline and online during the 13-day general elections campaign, but the messages seemed to have fallen on deaf ears as BN delivered its worst results since the first electoral in 1969.

Transparency International Malaysia estimates BN spent 7.68% of its budget of RM94.8 million on print ads (RM7.3 million). It also estimates that opposition parties, PKR, spent 0.07% of its budget RM36.8 million (RM0.03 million), DAP spent 0.57% of RM19.5 million (RM0.12 million), and PAS did not spend anything on print ads. The estimated advertisement cost is based on normal advertisement rates.

On the eve of polling day, The Sun carried the most Barisan Nasional (BN) ads - 14 pages or up 80% from earlier in the week, according to Media Monitors, a joint project by NGOs to monitor media independence.

The report also stated the New Straits Times and The Star increased the pages for BN ads by 77% and 71.4% respectively. And Utusan Malaysia, the Malay language broadsheet, carried five full pages on that day. Only The Sun published a one-page ad for the DAP, the opposition party.

The ad campaign throughout the election campaign period was supported by full-page messages, in colour, to highlight the achievements of several ministries and agencies, such as the Domestic Trade and Consumer Affairs Ministry, EPF, Felda and Permodalan Nasional Berhad.

BN’s tagline was ‘Only One Choice’. Ads included messages on ‘efficient public delivery system’ and ‘free education’. A full-page ad by MCA with a photograph of a Chinese JPA scholar in Cambridge University, had the caption, ‘2,300 non-Bumiputera students obtained full JPA scholarships to study overseas between 2000 and 2007. A marked increase compared to only 100 students before the year 2000.’ MIC was also not to be left out - its ad carried a single line in bold font ‘Opposition has done nothing.’

Despite this campaign blitz, the BN coalition only won a simple majority as it suffered a reduced majority in several stronghold states and most of their seats to the opposition in key states - Kedah, Penang, Perak, Selangor and Kelantan.

Longest-serving MIC president and cabinet minister, Samy Vellu, as well as key MIC leaders, lost their seats. Majority urban Chinese seem to have snubbed BN too despite the prime minister’s statement that there will be no Chinese representation in the cabinet if MCA and Gerakan fail to deliver seats. The MCA candidates failed to capture seats in Wilayah Persekutuan and Selangor.

Meanwhile, some key UMNO leaders were not spared and lost to first-timers from the opposition. Wanita UMNO number two and former minister for women, family and community development, Shahrizat Abdul Jalil, lost to 27-year-old rookie politician, Nurul Izzah Anwar, daughter of PKR’s defacto chief Anwar Ibrahim.

The internet and blogging had clearly worked in favour of opposition leaders who used it extensively to communicate their messages and expose misdeeds. For the first time ever, a member of DAP will become chief minister. Lim Guan Eng, secretary-general of DAP, will be sworn in as Penang’s new chief minister. Well-known blogger and first-time candidate of DAP, Jeff Ooi, was also voted in as member of parliament.

Malaysia’s forgotten poor failed by policy to boost Muslim Malays

AFP, Nov 4, 2007

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KUALA TERENGGANU, Malaysia (AFP) — Nearly four decades of controversial positive-discrimination policies were supposed to lift Muslim Malays like fisherman Maskan Mohamad out of poverty.

But despite the programme, which has alienated the nation’s ethnic Chinese and Indian citizens, Maskan’s family have empty bellies and little hope as they struggle to survive on a handful of dollars a day.

“All I know is how to fish. My family are all fisherman and even my children are fishermen because we cannot hope for anything more,” says the 62-year-old, who earns about 400 ringgit a month (119 dollars).

That’s barely enough to feed his wife, three children and elderly parents. Maskan’s two teenage sons had to drop out of school at 11, and the whole family labours to process their daily catch.

“The government say they are helping us but I have not gotten much help from them,” he says.

“Where is the government money and projects to help us live a better life, to help my children get jobs and have a better future than me?”

Malaysia’s population of nearly 27 million is made up of 60 percent Malay Muslims who dominate the government, 26 percent ethnic Chinese who are prominent in business, and eight percent ethnic Indians.

Two years after race riots broke out in 1969, the government launched the New Economic Policy (NEP) with initiatives to narrow the wealth gap between the Chinese and Malays.

But by 2004, 8.3 percent of Malays were still living in poverty — earning less than 190 dollars a month — compared to just 0.6 percent of Chinese and 2.9 percent of Indians.

Critics say the main beneficiaries of the policy have been Malay entrepreneurs who cash in on an array of perks including discounts on property purchases and specially allocated government projects.

Meanwhile, the village of Seberang Takir outside the northern city of Kuala Terengganu is home to 20 fishing families leading a hand-to-mouth existence, living in rickety homes that are a patchwork of wooden planks and pieces of tin.

Women in brightly coloured batik work salting fish and shrimp in the hot sun, shrouded in dust from trucks rumbling to a reclamation site where the state government is building a new cruise ship terminal.

The fishing folk are unlikely to benefit. Instead, half the village has been demolished to make way for the new project.

“They now want us to move away from the beach. How can we do that as this is our livelihood? They are not paying us much for this land and they have yet to tell us where we will be shifted to. Is this helping the poor?” asks Maskan.

Terengganu, which until 2004 was held by the fundamentalist opposition Pan Malaysian Islamic Party (PAS), is expected to be a key battleground in national elections likely to be held by early 2008.

One out of every five people in Terengganu lives below the poverty line, and many say they are disappointed at how little the United Malays National Organisation (UMNO) which has ruled Malaysia for 50 years has done for them.

“We really need the government to help us boost our earnings,” says Alias Ismail, 45, whose family makes fish crackers in their simple home in Seberang Takir.

“See over there,” Alias says, pointing to the lights of Kuala Terengganu. “That’s where all the rich people are. We in the villages don’t get any money.”

Some of the fishermen say they support the government’s development plans for the region, but the green-and-white PAS flags that flutter in the windows and doorways of most houses tell a different story.

Development experts say that economic aid is badly needed in rural regions like Terengganu and neighbouring Kelantan, which is the only state now held by PAS.

“There has been a massive structural underdevelopment in the east coast states of Malaysia,” says Professor Shamsul Amri Baharuddin, director of ethnic studies at the Malaysian National University.

“The fact that east coast states have been in and out of opposition hands has meant that there has been very little interest or investment from the federal government.”

The ruling National Front coalition has begun gearing up for the elections, launching a series of big-spending development masterplans across the nation including one for Terengganu and the other eastern states.

But Prime Minister Abdullah Ahmad Badawi has warned that Malays cannot continue to rely on the NEP and government handouts, and that a change in mindset is needed.

“There are no easy ways to succeed in life. Only the educated, knowledgeable and the hardworking will succeed eventually,” he said Sunday, according to the state Bernama news agency.

“I’ve said many times Malays are not stupid or weak,” he added. “I want the Malays to capitalise on the opportunities given to them.”

Slaying an Immortal Tiger: Malaysia’s New Economic Policy

by Azly Rahman

Source Here  (Lim Kit Siang’s Blog)

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The New Economic Policy (NEP) owes it genesis to a vision that sought to redistribute wealth among Malaysia’s races and create a Malay middle class. Today, there are a significant number who believe that most of the benefits have gone to upper and upper-middle class Malays. As a whole, a vast swath of the Malaysian middle-classes remain relatively poor. It is the urban lifestyle has brought this group to such a level - like America’s middle-class, they are riddled with credit card debt and face rising costs of living.

The NEP created the country’s own Rockefellars, Vanderbilts, and Carnegies (dynasties of the ‘old money’), as it continues to create its own versions of Bill Gates, Rupert Murdoch, and Warren Buffet (newer dynasties of ‘new money’). In tandem, there are a growing number of millionaire Chinese and Indians that have benefited from the truncated structure of the NEP.

The NEP has also overseen the growth of a larger class of poor across all ethnic groups too, with Malaysia witnessing the rapid growth of an urban poor who live below the poverty line. Hypermodernity and rapid industrialisation, in the hunt for huge profits through expensive real estate projects have also engendered waves of immigration from Indonesia and Bangladesh, adding to the complex social dynamic in Malaysia’s urban centres.

The NEP was quite ill conceived to begin with, although in fairness, it was not meant to continue indefinitely unlike what one observes today. It was premised upon the principles of ethnic segregation and a leg-up for the most disenfranchised community - the majority Malay-Muslim population. A noble policy then, affirmative action was also the dominant philosophy of human development in the 1960s and 70s.

Today, the NEP can hardly be appended to noble intentions. The only Indian and Chinese individuals that continue to support it are either found in political parties that are aligned to the ruling coalition, the Barisan Nasional or to those Chinese and Indians who rely on government patronage for contracts and tenders.

The state of Malaysian politics continues to worry. Even the Malay middle class - products of the Mahathir development philosophy are now in a state of confusion and contradiction. On the one hand, they have benefited from the policy of affirmative action. On the other hand, they are concerned about the depth of corruption in Malaysian politics and the number of incompetent public servants running the bureaucracy.

Concomitantly, Malaysian governments have successfully developed a strange brew of authoritarianism and contradiction while trumpeting the belief that it is doing fine in the areas of race relations and socio-economic justice. The nature of Malay nationalism is reaching a frightening apex with Malay leaders resorting to Malay nationalism as the panacea of choice when faced against anti-NEP sentiments.

A new philosophy is needed, a new paradigm needs articulation, underpinned by a new economic ethos that will benefit all ethnic groups and communities. All this, in response to a new Malaysian reality that should acknowledge the “non-bumiputras” as the “new bumiputra”. Malaysians should not continue living with the sins of their fathers and continue the archaic legacy of colonialist ideology - divide and rule. Nonetheless, more than just a token act towards placating hitherto “second-class Malaysians”, it is the technological imperatives that will probably force a review of the NEP, if it has not already.

Globalisation and the interface of new mass-reach technologies have redefined the boundaries of social justice. The international community is interested in the story of Malaysia’s NEP, just as Malaysians are interested in the story of the Palestinian question. More than at any other time in this generation, we are in an age where “the center cannot hold”, especially when the spine of its raison d’etre was hosted on the back of information dominance by the state and a social contract that cannot last beyond one generation. One might ask: what are the implications for Malaysian politics and business should the NEP continue in its current form?

Quite simply, the perception of mass dissatisfaction will continue to grow, those marginalised by the system will continue to heckle and the middle class, especially the Malays will continue to protest. Politically, mass mobilisation in support of progressive political groups will increase. The futility of affirmative action and the ideals of equal opportunity will become popular rallying calls of the Malaysian civil rights movement. Citizen journalism will continue to challenge government-controlled media outlets and online platforms like Malaysiakini, Malaysia-Today and jeffooi.com, will probably end up as the first port of call for the news-hungry Malaysian.

The post-Mahathir regime thinks that it can still use the Mahathirist formula of maintaining power and wealth. It does not realise that Malaysians no longer wish to see a 5, or 6 or 7 term Prime Minister in power, as such as how the 22-year Mahathir rule. They want to see a government that serves the people and not one that makes the people modern slaves. They want to see corrupt politicians brought to justice. They do not want a government that is run by arrogant politicians who see politics as a dynasty-building vehicle and a conduit to build up a personal fortune. While the political system perpetuated by the NEP does not necessarily make the latter scenario a given, it has by default, sowed the seeds for it. The NEP is no longer serving the needs of Malaysia. The policy is hopelessly one-dimensional and short-sighted. It may be not be weeded out overnight, but its form can certainly be altered over time. Education is probably the best starting point. Children of poor Malaysians, regardless of ethnicity must be given equal opportunity funding for higher education. Children of wealthy Malaysians and members of the Malaysian royalty should not receive preferential treatment, for obvious reasons.

But there could well be a sliver of hope yet - a sure sign that the Malaysian government is aware of the travails facing the country. The government-driven Iskandar Development Region project may well be more important for Malaysia than ordinary Malaysians envisage. As the laboratory of a “no-affirmative action” special economic zone, its success may well be critical for a thorough review of the NEP, especially if Malay Malaysians do well there.

At heart ultimately in the fight to banish the NEP to the annals of history is a culture of insecurity that Chinese and Indian Malaysians need to appreciate too. As argued by Malay nationalists, the real reason the NEP was implemented in the first place was the economic under-representation of the Malays in Malaysia. Until and unless a new social contract is written, one that is seen not to align disproportionate wealth to a minority, or unevenly among the races - real change for Malaysia, is a figment of imagination. Equal opportunity would mean nothing if a new socio-economic philosophy replaces purported Malay economic preponderance with that of any other race.

A Malaysian Economic Agenda for Penang

Din Merican, March 12, 2008

When the new Chief Minister of Penang, Sdr. Lim Guan Eng, said that the NEP/DEB has “ended” in Penang, his statement hit the front page of UMNO’s Bahasa Malaysia mouthpiece, Utusan Malaysia (March 12, 2008), thereby giving room for UMNO nationalists to launch a vicious attack against the new coalition government.

The Utusan failed to highlight the reality that under Gerakan-UMNO rule for a number of decades, the Malays have been marginalized and remain poor and, except for parts of Balik Pulau, they no longer have land that they can call their own on the island itself. From a society with land, the Malays have been confined to pigeon hole type public flats. In short, the NEP/DEB ended in Penang a long time ago when UMNO failed the Penang Malays.

The NEP/DEB is an affirmative action policy which was introduced in 1970 to eradicate poverty and restructure the economy. Over the years, the UMNO-led BN government used this policy to create an entrenched system of political patronage which benefits a small section of the UMNO connected bumiputra community. It also led to the creation of an “ersatz Malay capitalism” based on patronage, cronyism and nepotism.

KeADILan’s position on the NEP/DEB is clearly stated in our manifesto (KeADILan Manifesto, 2008: A New Dawn for Malaysia): “…the National Economic Policy must be replaced with an economic agenda that seeks to assist and affirm all poor Malaysians, regardless of their race. In this way, in stead of rich elites abusing existing policies to make themselves even richer, Malays who make up the majority of Malaysia’s poor will be fully assisted along side with poor Orang Asli and Orang Asal, Ibans, Kadazan-Dusuns, Indians, Chinese, and so on.

…Affirmative action based on race such as espoused by the New Economic Policy, has been shown to be too vulnerable to abuse and a poor reflection of the reality facing all Malaysians. There are rich Malays, and poor Malays, rich Chinese and poor Chinese, rich Indians and poor Indians and so on”.

Our Economic Agenda’s central principle is that “the right opportunities must be made available to every single Malaysian—opportunities to learn, opportunities to make an honest living, and opportunities to achieve our dreams”. We will defend Article 153 and also the rights of all Malaysians as guaranteed under our constitution.

For the Utusan to play the racial card at this juncture after the severe loss incurred by the UMNO-led Barisan Nasional in the March 8 General Elections is indeed irresponsible and mischievous.—Din Merican

More Here 

Does the NEP really address even the needs of the poor among the Malay Malaysians?

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Penang plans to dismantle the country’s controversial New Economic Policy.

If you want to comment, please go to the AlJazeera YouTube Site.

Malaysian Socialist on Undemocratic Laws

GreenLeft Weekly,  13 March 2008

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Government Election Losses in Malaysia Signal Eruption of Deep Political Crisis

By John Roberts
WSWS, 11 March 2008

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Opposition results in last Saturday’s elections for Malaysia’s national parliament and 12 of its 13 state governments have dealt a sharp blow to the authority of Prime Minister Abdullah Badawi and his Barisan Nasional (BN) government that has ruled the country since independence in 1957.

The opposition parties—the Peoples Justice Party (Keadilan), Democratic Action Party (DAP) and Parti Islam se-Malaysia (PAS)—won 82 seats in the national parliament, up from only 19. BN lost its two-thirds majority for the first time since 1969 and its ability to amend the country’s constitution at will. The ruling coalition’s vote slumped from 64 percent at the 2004 election to 51 percent, and its seats from 198 to 140.

The major winner was Anwar Ibrahim, who, despite being prevented from standing in the election, has emerged as the de facto opposition leader. Anwar was expelled from Abdullah’s United Malays National Organisation (UMNO) by former Prime Minister Mahathir Mohammed in 1998 after bitter differences over the direction of economic policy. His subsequent conviction on trumped-up charges of corruption prevented him from standing for office until next month—one factor in the early calling of an election.

Anwar’s party, Keadilan, increased its seats from just one in the previous parliament to 31, making it the largest opposition faction. DAP holds 28 seats and PAS has 23. It is widely expected that Anwar will enter parliament next month via a by election created by one of his supporters standing aside. His 27-year-old daughter, Nurul Izzah Anwar, who defeated a senior UMNO figure Shahrizat Abdul Jalil, has already indicated she does not want a political career.

Other high profile casualties included Information Minister Zainuddkin Maidin, dubbed the minister for “misinformation”, as well as the ministers for public works, and women, family and community development.

UMNO right-wing allies—the Malaysian Chinese Association (MCA) and the Malaysian Indian Congress (MIC)—suffered badly as ethnic Indian and Chinese voters deserted in droves. The MCA, which has been wracked by scandal, had its seats reduced from 31 to 15. Longtime MIC leader Samy Vellu was thrown out of parliament and the party lost two-thirds of its seats.

The opposition also won five states. PAS not only held and increased its majority in the northern rural Kelantan despite a massive BN campaign. PAS will also provide the chief minister for two other northern states won by the opposition—Kedah and Perak. BN also lost control of the industrial state of Penang for the first time in 36 years and Selangor, the state surrounding Kuala Lumpur. DAP will run Penang and Keadilan will head the Selangor state government. In the capital itself, the opposition won 10 of the 11 seats.

Prime Minister Abdullah appeared shell-shocked on television when he conceded the heavy losses early Sunday morning. The slavishly pro-government press, normally prone to understate any setback, was unable to hide the dismay in BN circles. The local Sunday Star described the result as a “political tsunami”. Abdullah dismissed calls for his resignation and was reinstalled as prime minister yesterday, after the UMNO leadership closed ranks—for the time being.

Abdullah called the snap election one year early hoping to head off widespread discontent over rising prices, corruption, discrimination against the Chinese and Indian minorities and BN’s authoritarian methods of rule. He was hoping to cruise to another easy victory based on an electoral gerrymander, a tightly controlled media, large financial resources and the country’s relative economic prosperity.

While the local and international media have expressed surprise at the results, the first signs of deep-seated popular opposition were expressed in a series of demonstrations in Kuala Lumpur late last year and early this year over electoral reform, discrimination against ethnic Indians and rising prices. Anwar appealed to these sentiments by promising action to bring down fuel prices and to end discrimination against the country’s Chinese and Indian minorities.

Significantly M. Manoharan, one of the five leaders of the communal Indian rights movement (Hindraf), was elected as DAP candidate to a state seat. Manoharan is still in jail after being arrested under the draconian Internal Security Act (ISA) that allows for indefinite detention without trial. His election represented a clear rejection of the BN’s anti-democratic methods and opposition to the MIC and MCA, which have acted for decades as UMNO toadies.

The easy victory of popular blogger and government critic, Jeff Ooi, under the DAP banner revealed the growing importance of the Internet as a source of news and commentary. Blogging and cell phone text messaging have become a popular means for avoiding tight government restriction over political debate.

The UMNO leadership will also be alarmed at other features of the results. More than one third of BN seats have come from the states of Sarawak and Sabah in Borneo. In peninsular Malaysia, PAS and Keadilan have undermined UMNO’s base among the ethnic Malay majority not only in the rural north but in urban areas. According to Ibrahim Suffian, program director of the Merdeka Centre for Opinion Research, Malay support for UMNO in some areas was not much more than 55 percent.

Opposition partiesAnwar declared that the result represented a “new dawn for Malaysia”, declaring: “People want to see justice. I don’t think Malaysian politics will ever be the same again.” At the same time, he warned that the opposition would have to overcome many problems to replace BN.

One of the most glaring problems is the political incompatibility of the largely Chinese-based DAP and PAS which is based on the establishment of Malaysia as an Islamic state. While PAS did not make its demand for an Islamic state part of the campaign, the tensions with DAP have the potential to erupt in the future.

The fact that the three opposition parties formed a coalition reflects growing disenchantment in the ruling elite with the direction of BN’s policies, which have been based on discriminatory policies in favour of Malays, along with national economic regulation and protectionism. Sections of business are increasingly concerned that BN’s crony capitalism is undermining international competitiveness amid growing signs of global financial instability and a US downturn.

Similar concerns lie behind the favourable reaction in the international press to the poll outcome, despite an 11 percent fall on the Kuala Lumpur stock market caused by the political uncertainty. The Wall Street Journal noted: “The election result raised the prospect that Malaysia—one of the world’s most economically advanced Muslim-majority nations and America’s 10th largest trade partner—could become a model of peaceful democratic change in the Islamic world.”

On Monday, the Australian newspaper published an editorial, two news articles and a comment by its foreign editor Greg Sheridan, who hailed the outcome as “an earthquake in Southeast Asian politics” and Anwar as “the most dynamic and charismatic politician in Malaysia”.

As during the Asian financial crisis in 1997-98, sections of international finance capital view the election result as an opportunity to open up Malaysia to investment and Anwar as the politician for the job. In 1998, Anwar as finance minister and deputy prime minister advocated the imposition of the IMF’s economic restructuring demands. Prime Minister Mahathir rejected the plan, imposed currency and capital controls and expelled Anwar and his supporters. Anwar was then arrested on bogus charges of corruption and sexual misconduct.

The first sign of Anwar’s political rehabilitation was the High Court decision in September 2004 to overturn his conviction on the charge of sodomy. The decision followed the retirement of Mahathir in October 2003 and Abdullah’s overwhelming victory in the March 2004 election. After going overseas for medical treatment, Anwar has played an increasingly prominent role in politics, criticising government corruption and preferential treatment for Malays in order to argue for free market policies.

DAP has a similar economic perspective. One of the first actions of DAP secretary general and Penang’s new chief minister, Lim Guan Eng, was to announce an open tender system for state contracts, as opposed to UMNO’s practice of favouring supporters. DAP also intends to investigate the Penang Development Corporation and InvestPenang, government entities that have been accused of acting too slowly. Businesses in Penang, which is the centre of the country’s electronic industry, fear they are loosing out to low cost rivals particularly in China.

Previously, BN governments have reacted to the losses at the state level by cutting off financial aid and investment. To do so in the case of Penang and Selangor, however, would have a crippling impact on the Malaysian economy and BN’s own plans for economic development.

The election loss will inevitably provoke bitter recriminations within UMNO and its allies. Former deputy prime minister and senior MP Tengku Razaleigh Hamzah declared that the government faced an “historic crisis”. The leadership, he said, “must wake from its slumber, face the truth and accept full responsibility for this debacle.” Mahathir, who has become sharply critical of Abdullah, was even blunter. He called for Abdullah’s resignation, and apologised for having chosen Abdullah to succeed him as prime minister.

In 1969, the last time the government lost its two thirds majority, UMNO operatives instigated anti-Chinese race riots that resulted in the death of hundreds and led to the adoption in 1971 of the New Economic Policy (NEP), which preferences Malays in education, business and government jobs. While the political and economic environment is far different from 1969, UMNO, which has been based since its inception on Malay supremacism, has repeatedly resorted to police state measures and communalism to crush any opposition.

An ominous sign was the reaction of Inspector-General of Police Musa Hassan to news of the BN setbacks on Saturday night. He immediately banned any victory celebrations and warned that the ISA would be used to detain anyone engaged in such activities or spreading rumours of rioting.