What Anwar’s Malaysian Economic Agenda means for Singapore

By Lim Siow Kuan, Malaysian Correspondent

As the purported date for the takeover of the Malaysian federal government by opposition leader Anwar Ibrahim looms nearer, Singaporeans must be wondering what a Pakatan-led government in Kuala Lumpur have in store for them.

Anwar has vowed to replace the 4 decade old New Economic Policy (NEP) which he claimed benefitted only a select group of well-connected Malays at the expense of the needy with his Malaysian Economic Agenda (MEA) espousing a more equitable distribution of the country’s wealth. In a report published by online news portal Malaysiakini, Anwar Ibrahim reiterated he would dismantle the controversial New Economic Policy (NEP) if he seizes power.

Needless to say, the country’s Chinese and Indian minorities who have long suffered under the discriminatory practices of the NEA rush to throw their support behind Anwar’s Parti Keadilan Rakyat (PKR) en masse. What surprises political observers is that the Malay ground not only accepts but embraces Anwar’s radical concept as well as evident by his resounding victory in the recent Permatang Pauh by-election where 70% of the electorate is Malay.

Will Anwar, once a firebrand Islamic radical and an architect of Malaysia’s Islamization in the 1980s and 90s, really do away with a race-based affirmative action plan which has served his community’s interests over the year ?

While Anwar’s political pedigree as a former Deputy Prime Minister and Deputy President of UMNO may have casted doubts in the minds of his allies (the secular Democratic Action Party and the Islamic PAS) initially, he appeared to have won them over with his consistent message that the time has come for a new dawn in Malaysian politics, one which emphasized on unity, meritocracy and justice.  He inspired many with a proclaimation to be a leader of all Malaysians: “Anak melayu saya, anak cina saya, anak India saya” (the malay is my child, the chinese is my child and the indian is my child)

The reinvention and rehabilitation of Anwar Ibrahim into a Malaysian leader for all Malaysians regardless of race had propelled him to the brink of becoming Prime Minister, a post which has since deluded him since he was sacked from government rather unceremoniously 10 years ago. Riding on mass support from the Chinese and Indians as well as a tectonic shift in the Malay mindset especially amongst the young, his opposition coalition, the Pakatan Rakyat won an unprecedented 82 seats in the March General Election, denying the ruling Barisan Nasional its traditional two-thirds majority in Parliament.

As Malaysia celebrates its 51st Merdeka with renewed hope for a long-waited political revolution, few on both sides of the causeway would have remembered the call for a “Malaysian Malaysia” was first made by Singapore’s Mr Lee Kuan Yew in the 1960s when Singapore was still part of the Federation.

In a speech to the Malaysian Parliament, Lee articulated strongly against a discriminatory race-based policy at the expense of the ethnic Chinese and Indian minority long before the NEP was formulated and implemented in the 1970s and Anwar Ibrahim’s plans for a new MEA:

“Of course there are Chinese millionaires in big cars and big houses. Is it the answer to make a few Malay millionaires with big cars and big houses? How does telling a Malay bus driver that he should support the party of his Malay director (UMNO) and the Chinese bus conductor to join another party of his Chinese director (MCA) – how does that improve the standards of the Malay bus driver and the Chinese bus conductor who are both workers in the same company? If we delude people into believing that they are poor because there are no Malay rights or because opposition members oppose Malay rights, where are we going to end up? You let people in the kampongs believe that they are poor because we don’t speak Malay, because the government does not write in Malay, so he expects a miracle to take place in 1967 (the year Malay would become the national and sole official language in Malaysia). The moment we all start speaking Malay, he is going to have an uplift in the standard of living, and if doesn’t happen, what happens then? Meanwhile, whenever there is a failure of economic, social and educational policies, you come back and say, oh, these wicked Chinese, Indian and others opposing Malay rights. They don’t oppose Malay rights. They, the Malay, have the right as Malaysian citizens to go up to the level of training and education that the more competitive societies, the non-Malay society, has produced. That is what must be done, isn’t it? Not to feed them with this obscurantist doctrine that all they have got to do is to get Malay rights for the few special Malays and their problem has been resolved “

Lee’s fervent belief in a fair and just government for all Malaysians led him to cross swords with several radicals in UMNO leading to the eventual expulsion of Singapore from Malaysia in 1965. Lee made no secret of his bitter anguish and disappointment when Singapore gained independence: “For me, it is a moment of anguish. All my life, my whole adult life, I believed in merger and unity of the two territories.”

43 years later, while the NEP has created a new middle class of Malays in Malaysia, it is not exaggerating to say that Singapore has benefitted from it as well. As a result of marginalization of the Chinese under the NEP which denied their smartest students places in universities and careers in the public sector,  many Malaysian Chinese flocked to Singapore in search of a betterr future to study and work making invaluable contributions to the island’s developement and progress into Southeast Asia’s richest country today quite not unlike the French Hugenots’ migration to Britain in the 18th century.

Linguistically and culturally close to their brethen in Singapore, Malaysian Chinese generally have few problems assimilating into Singapore society with many of them becoming leaders in various fields. Almost half of Singapore’s post-independent cabinet are born in Malaysia including Minister of Finance Goh Keng Swee and Minister of Law E W Barker. Singapore’s current Health Minister Mr Khaw Boon Wan was born in Penang and Ho Ching, recently voted in Forbes as the World’s No 8 most powerful woman, hailed from Kuala Lumpur.

The constant efflux of Chinese from Malaysia to Singapore and other parts of the world had led to decline in the ethnic Chinese population on the peninsula from 30% in 1965 to less than 25% now. What if these Malaysian-born Chinese currently working in Singapore chose to serve their land of birth instead of us ? It does not take an economist to realize that Malaysia will be a more potent competitor to Singapore.

In recent years, Malaysia has demonstrated its desire and ambition not only to catch up with Singapore, but to overtake us as the economic powerhouse in the regioin. The expansive new KL International Airport has already pipped Singapore’s Changi Airport to the title as the world’s best airport, The port of Tanjung Pelapas at Johor has emerged as a potent threat to Singapore’s previously indisputable position as a strategic port of call in the Straits of Malacca.

As Malaysia continues its painful transformation from an agricultural to a knowledge-based economy, the NEP has become its Achille heel in its quest to surpass Singapore. Not only Anwar, but many Malay leaders including the NEP’s chief architect, ex-premier Dr Mahathir Mohamad have realized the increasingly irrevelance of the NEP in today’s rapidly changing world. Young, educated and urbane Malays who are products of the NEP itself have also spoken out against it and appear receptive to a complete revamp of the entire system as evident by Anwar’s stunning electoral gains. The last Malay leader to espouse an equal Malaysia for all races is none other than UMNO’s founder himself, Tun Onn Jaafar. He did not receive any support from his fellow Malays and was consigned to the political dustheap. Anwar Ibrahim may stand a better chance this time to convinced his community that Malaysia is ready for change.

Anwar’s proposed plans to abolish the NEP together with a budget to to cut down the deficit, lower taxes and fuel prices, stimulate investments and adopt open tenders for government contracts will undoubtably enhance Malaysia’s competitiveness and in a way a subtle threat to Singapore’s economic dominance in the region. Carefully and meticulously implemented, it may even stem the present brain drain to Singapore and reverse it. Malaysia, with its plentiful land and relative low cost of living has the potential to offer a higher quality of life than Singapore’s cramped and hectic lifestyle.

While it remains to be seen if Anwar’s repeated claims to topple the Malaysian government by 16 September 2008 will materialize, Singaporeans should start bracing themselves for an impending economic tsunami to arrive across the causeway sooner rather than later. Malaysia has finally come of age after 51 years. The Malays, who have gained the most from the NEP are ready to give up their long assured special privileges in exchange for a more transparent, accountable and efficient mode of governance which will put Malaysia in good stead to challenge Singapore in the long run.