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Thursday, January 8, 2015

BUT HOW ELSE CAN THE CORRUPT MAKE MONEY: The more Putrajaya interferes, the BIGGER the financial mess

BUT HOW ELSE CAN THE CORRUPT MAKE MONEY: The more Putrajaya interferes, the BIGGER the financial mess
There is a Midas touch and there is a touch that turns everything to mud. I am sorry, the latter is the government of Malaysia. I think the government of Malaysia should seriously consider doing less, not more. The less the government does, the less harm and mud it will churn out.
The government has always claimed noble intentions and haunting objectives when embarking on a venture. It wants to do great things for our economy and for our well-being, so to speak. But what do we get instead? The exact opposite! We get more debts, more tax burden, more lawsuits and countersuits, more inefficiency and more distortions in our economy.
Let me show you a few examples. The government wanted to develop entrepĂ´t trade with Port Klang as a transhipment hub. But what we ended up with was the PKFZ fiasco with its unending debts, investigations, studies, court cases and law suits.
The government wanted quality beef supplies at a reasonable price for Malaysians but what we ended up with was NFC, a corporation that did almost everything except the thing the corporation was set up to do. It is now wallowing in countless investigations and protracted lawsuits.
The government wanted strategic investments to quantum-leap Malaysia’s development but what we ended up with was a corporation like 1MDB now saddled with so many dubious dealings and massive debts, as reported. And this is even before the corporation has done anything tangible for Malaysia.
We built airports as if we had unlimited lands and resources. Poor finishing aside, why must we have klia2 when KLIA could be easily extended to cater to the needs of passengers? I guess in Malaysia we build airports to profit contractors and to suit airlines. Changi, Schiphol, Hong Kong and Shanghai are all big airports but I don’t think they have one terminal separate from another at such distance and inconvenience.
By the way, do you know why our KLIA terminal looks so congested? Go to the departure deck and see for yourself: three lanes at the terminal are strictly reserved for VIPs and special people (most the time left unused except for VIP car parking). The rest, the proletariats like us, must struggle and share the remaining three lanes further away from the terminal building. When is this feudal mentality going to stop? Can we all jointly petition the transport minister to open up all the lanes for all?
The government wanted nanotechnology, wafer fabrication, technopreneur, movie and entertainment industries but we have largely ended up with failures almost at every front (check the annual budget and see where the allocations have gone).
Why then must the government do more when it should be doing less? Don’t you think with fewer “ventures” and so-called “strategic investments”, we are actually better off?
The government has been neglecting things it is supposed to do. Off the cuff, I could think of so many things: public transportation infrastructure and system, water resource conservation and management, environmental protection and pollution control, public safety and security, public health and hygiene, waste collection and disposal, education and human resource development, comprehensive revamp of taxation and subsidy system, inflation management, income policies as well as other macro-economic concerns.
Instead, all the government cares about are beef business, port ventures, putting money in Caymans, creating more monopolies (the latest one is MyEG Services Berhad, given the monopoly to handle applications to extend foreign workers’ work permits), approving more toll roads, imposing more restrictions and permits on trade, acquiring more private companies through massive borrowing, issuing more bonds and doing more wheeling and dealing. Seriously, can someone tell me what is so strategic about 1MDB acquiring the energy assets owned by Malaysian firms already domiciled and operating in Malaysia?
Quite clearly, the preoccupation of this government is geared toward helping high net worth and well-connected individuals in the name of trickle-down economics. Felda was set up to help the landless. Instead, it has become a global corporation turning settlers into perpetual landless workers.
Please also look at the overall NEP allocations and programmes. The thrust has always been on creating commercial and business classes, rarely on poverty eradication and income distribution. Hence, the emphasis is always on money-making ventures, property trusts, share ownership schemes, dishing out of contracts and licences for selected “entrepreneurs”, and selective privatisation et cetera. Who, for example, monitors and evaluates the performance of Bumiputra Property Trust Foundation and Ekuinas? Do they serve the purpose of poverty eradication and income distribution? Or are they just money-making schemes using public funds to enrich certain people?
Please, the government of Malaysia: it is not your forte to indulge in sophisticated ventures and investments. Those savvy investment bankers and advisors you employed will either profit from you or swindle you. The moral hazard involved in government ventures is just too colossal for you to produce any decent and tangible results. Leave it to the private sector using its own money and taking its risk to quantum-leap development for this country. Trust me, it will definitely work better than your moronic ventures, one after another. – TMI

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