By Kaki Bedal
An experienced opposition politician has posed this question via a popular anti government portal, asking – Is Malaysia in danger to be the new sick man of Southeast Asia?
He described the political ineptitude and the inability to manage the Covid-19 crisis under the Perikatan Nasional (PN) government.
He gave pointers such as the low foreign direct investments into Malaysia compared to our Asean neighbours.
That the fact that the minister of international trade and industry has not issued any statements to address this issue or counter this negative narrative points point to him being inept at managing his portfolio when he was also the minister of Economic Affairs (MEA) in the Pakatan Harapan government.
That reports on certain multinational companies moving their regional headquarters (HQs) to Indonesia have created the image that Malaysia is no longer an attractive place for foreign investors.
Guess what? Once a propagandist always a propagandist.
This opposition politician has once again fail to reveal his own part in the failure to help the country towards better economic conditions when he himself was a minister not too long ago.
The present PN government only took over from Pakatan Harapan some months ago when Covid-19 has already started biting into the country early last year.
The politician conveniently forgets to state the economic disaster under Pakatan Harapan as the government in 2018 to early 2020, in which he was MITI minister.
Just state one good thing that he had achieved during his ministership.
Looking back at old articles, this one from a mainstream paper probably describes it best, a small truthful part in a long winded praising article about Pakatan Harapan.
“Voters also felt that the new government was constantly assigning blame to the fallen Barisan Nasional government for many of its troubles, and that the coalition needed to move on from this in order to perform.
“During the 19 months it was in power, Pakatan was criticised for many things, including poor communication, U-turns in policies, a failure to institute structural reforms in crucial areas such as education, and in-fighting.
“To be fair, the expectations of the rakyat for the new government, and of a “New Malaysia”, were sky-high after the last general election, and this put the government’s every move under scrutiny.
This naturally led to disappointment among some voters when changes did not take place as fast as they would have liked.”
No wonder Pakatan Harapan itself is a failure.
The politician will not agree easily, of course, but Perikatan Nasional is also a new government who is actually trying to reverse the disaster during Pakatan’s 22 months reign.
Lastly, Mr Politician, you mentioned your rivals weakness etcetera but once again you have not told the public what we are supposed to do to overcome the current economic challenges.
Criticising for the sake of making yourself look good is an old tactic you’re most adept with.
Admit it, you’re just a propagandist, unfortunately you fit this Malay saying – Ibarat meludah ke langit kena batang hidung sendiri.
- The writer is an experienced analyst and media practitioner of nearly 30 years in the industry
