MSLS Forum with Tony Pua and Khairy

MSLS Forum with Tony Pua and Khairy
04 Aug 2008 | Current Affairs, Personal | by admin | 2 Komen

Yesterday afternoon I joined YB Tony Pua and YB Khairy Jamaluddin in a forum that is part of the Malaysian Student Leaders Summit at Nikko Hotel. The forum was called: Subsidies - Necessities or Tongkat Mentality.

As the United Kingdom and Eire Executive Council for Malaysian Students (UKEC) was the organiser of the program, I felt the extra need to fulfill the invitation as I was in the committee back in my second year at university. UKEC’s founding chairman, Allahyarham Adlan Benan Omar and another chairman, Rafizi Ramli played a big role in getting me involved in politics in the first place.

Anyway, back to the forum, my contention is that the drastic oil price hike hurt many ordinary Malaysians. I accept that in the long run, our policies need to be reformed to adjust to the higher price of oil, but we need a long-term, comprehensive policy - not short-term policies like we have right now.

I also defended Datuk Seri Anwar’s promise that the next day after forming government, he will lower the price of oil - repeating Anwar’s explanation in the TV debate against Shabery Cheek a few weeks back.

Tony pointed out how our budget has ballooned in recent years, not so much in development costs, but operating costs. This means that a lot is lost in bureaucracy. Khairy admitted the problem of leakages, but contends that much of the operating costs is needed to run things. I chided Khairy by saying what he calls leakages, I call corruption. I cited Morgan Stanley’s research that we have lost an estimated RM330 billion from corruption over the past two decades. Pemudah itself, a government-linked body, estimates that we will lose RM10 billion from of domestic growth this year.

All in all, it was a good event, and I enjoyed being there. Congratulations to the organisers and students for a well-executed program.