Malaysians Unplugged Uncensored

Malaysians Unplugged Uncensored
Having read this article by Dr Farish Noor, I can now see the dilemma that is posed in the last article, under the title "the devil you know against the devil that you do not know". I think for most of us who are non-muslim we find it both distressing and laughable, because we who are non-Muslims live our lives for now and on this earth, whereas you Muslims want to live your lives on this earth that will get you to go to the nether world of paradise that may or may not exist; but the irony of our different perspectives is that the view of the Muslims are shaped by leaders who cynically exploit the naivite' of their followers to gain political power to themselves.

I can vouch for this regressive development starting from the riots of May 13th, 1969. In the early days of Malaysian independance, all the races lived harmoniously, and I might add we were happy then; all the races lived happily and there was no talk of Malays being superior to the Chinese and Indians and that the minorities have to differ to the Malays. All these negatives only found currency after May 13th, 1969, like the sudden downpour of a drenching rain, and things suddenly changed for the worse. May 13th started to polarise Malaysian society in a way that we had until then, never exprienced before. Then Mahatir introduced the NEP that was supposed to improve the lives of the Malays at the expense of the non-Malays, but for the life of me, and most of those who can see through the mist of a grab for power by the Malay Elite ( UMNO), we just do not and cannot understand How this NEP has improved the lives of the average man in the street Malay ? Except for the propaganda of the NEP slogan, HOW HAVE THE LIVES OF THE MALAYS BEEN IMPROVED ? I say to my Malay Friends that you have 22 million Malays, please do tell me how many of these 22 million Malays have improved their lot by this NEP propaganda ? I question the true and real success of the NEP because, the government in the name of the NEP have failed to uplift the lives of the majority of Malays living in poverty in spite of the NEP because those who took the reins of driving the NEP abused their constituents' trust; for the most part these so called leaders had no clue what they needed to do to turn a tidy profit for their people. We can glibly say that every one of the projects that were undertaken by the government turned out to be failures. HOW CAN YOU INCREASE THE PIE/CAKE IF YOU DO NOT TURN A PROFIT ? The list of UMNO led government failures is a long one. It is sufficient to ask, HOW IS IT THAT SUCH NATIONAL ASSETS LIKE PETRONAS, EPF etc.... have gone broke ? I believe not one of the huge or mega projects have proven to turn a profit. Therefore, let me ask you this question, IF ALL THESE PROJECTS DO NOT TURN A PROFIT THEN HOW CAN THE MAN IN THE STREET MALAY BE SAID TO BE BETTER OFF ? Who will pay off the man in the street Malay; how does he get more and hence enrich himself if the projects that are said to cook a bigger and better is shrinking by the day ? We just cannot merely say that the average Malay has not done well EVEN with the NEP because there is no proper survey to prove this proposition, but we can say that the average Malay CANNOT BE DOING WELL BECAUSE THE INVESTMENT THAT WILL PAY HIM HAS TURNED OUT TO BE DUDS and therefore it follows that there is no money to enrich the average Malay, and having said that we can reasonably say that he cannot be doing well. HE HAS NO MONEY !

Mahatir has touted that his NEP had benefited the average Malay, and as I have argued above, we cannot say that he is right but as I have argued, we can definitely say that he has to be wrong. However, there are two other arguements that say that Malaysia has NOT PERFORMED UP TO ITS NATURAL POTENTIAL ! I argue that the most obvious mirage that has been touted as success for the NEP is the claim that there are more Malays who occupy important positions in government and there are more Malays who are educated to tertiary level. I can only admit to the fact that there are definitely more Malays who have been awarded "university degrees", but there is a question mark as to their quality. Two factors raise this question, are their degrees of any practical application ? Did they deserve to pass by their performances ?

On this issue, you can say that it is my beef. It is also touted that the NEP has made more Malays do better than the Chinese and Indians; and on this allegation I can say that it is all a matter of smoke and mirrors. Of course there are more Malays than Chinese doing better now as then, but at what expense ? There are now 22 million Malays, 5 million Chinese and 1 million indians; that said of course there are more Malays doing much better than the Chinese because there are more of Malays. Add to that all places in the local universities go to Malays. I believe that the failure of the NEP is the demonstrated by the outward migration of the minority races, the Chinese and Indian component of Malaysia has remained static due to large scale migration. Therefore in a sense the NEP was a success afterall because by the NEP the Chinese have been driven out of Malaysia due to lack of opportunity brought on by pro-active discrimination. It is good in this sense that the Chinese population will decline and Malaysia will again return to the Malays. THIS IS A POSITIVE !