An Afternoon with Tengku Razaleigh Hamzah- final part.

You know Tengku, the unemployment figures are worrisome. Singapore is sending back 200,000 of our workers. Here you have maybe 100,000 or more. Our government don't even have the figures. Then you have to be mindful also of the new entrants into the job market- College and university graduates and those with courses not marketable immediately. You can have an explosive situation in hand. These people have got to live.

What raises the ire of the public is the deception our leaders poured on us. Tell us the bare facts. Because when our leaders sell us an alternative reality, they are only undermining its own credibility. Even more serious, leaders only raise the suspicion that they have no ideas for coping with it. Policymakers in Singapore appear far more alarmed than our own. They didn't mind going public announcing that Singapore is undergoing technical recession. What do we do here? We do the foot shuffle. We beat around the bush.

I know TRH has said this:-

Economic plans should be transparent and discussed openly so that the public and the business community can respond to them. The US stimulus package was debated heavily before it was passed. The world knows what the US, UK, China, Singapore, Australia and South Korea will do in response to this crisis, but not what Malaysia or North Korea will do. We need greater clarity, and quick, transparent decision making. There is no need to politicize growth estimates or to time stimulus announcements as if they were political goodies. This is a rescue we are talking about, and our future is at stake.

 

We haven't been doing enough to increase our productive capacity. I would regard as steps increasing our productive capacity those measures to allow retraining, acquiring value adding skills, new knowledge, way of organising things etc.

I agree when you said Tengku, that maybe we are deluding ourselves as to our productive capacity. Our illusion that we have increased our productivity and working incomes has been masked by an influx of cheap labour. So when these people became economic actors and we are able to export, we think we are productive. So like you have said, cheap labour has become another crutch for us.

The government must exhibit a very standard of professionalism and efficiency. When economics resources are scarce, when we don't have sufficient resources, things will depend of how efficient we are. What do I mean by that?

Look for instance at how the organizational capability of government to learn and re-organize is set up to deal with fast changing economic landscapes. How can the government for instance qualify itself to deal with economic crises for instance? They have not scored well for example when it comes to acknowledging the impending economic crisis. You earn credibility when you project a quality of trust. When people trust you, you earn that credibility. Like you have said, the government's credibility was damaged when it did not tell the public the truth.

The government must restore confidence in the rakyat by showing they know what to do. Your slowness to implement counter measures is not going to convince people that you know what you are doing. If you tie up what you want to do according to political timetables and political expediency, people will catch you out.

I am in full agreement when TRH wrote:-

Government now needs to be smarter, tougher and more responsive than before to engage on equal footing with business. We need leadership to change the operating model of the civil service from last century's centralized planning approach, driven by budgetary plans, to a model of government as facilitator, aggregator and convener of business. Government that targets economic outcomes rather than accounting quotas. We need to demand as much talent and organizational ability in our public service as the private sector does of its own people. Today the quality government is a core component of national competitiveness. However there is nothing strange about the expectation that the civil service should be a high performing organization led by an intellectual elite. It is how the Malayan Civil Service Real confidence is hope based on an apprehension of the truth. It is social capital and trust in society and its future. It is inspired by leaders willing to take us through an unflinching evaluation of where we are today to a vision of what we are capable of tomorrow. It means owning our own story and banking on it.used to operate. Many of us remember it.

I asked TRH on the areas where the government can profitably spend. I said I read in his article mention about how in the 1930's, the Americans built their national highway system and the Germans built the Autobahn. So maybe spending on infrastructure remains an attractive avenue to support economic growth? I once heard you talked about constructing a new highway linking Gua Musang to KL. To me that would integrate rural economy with mainstream economy. Do you still believe in that?

 

I agree with you spending on items with the largest multiplier effects. Infrastructure is one of them. But you must also be mindful of the more significant concept of the long term multiplier. That is nothing less than the improved capacity of the entire system. For that you need to dispense with the business as usual ad hoc pork barrel expenditures. You do public investment projects. But our action must be guided by a vision, designed around a strategy and governed with integrity.

And you mentioned something on housing Tengku....

I don't mean the present housing system like we have at the moment, SPNB and all that. Do something like what Singapore does. Look at how the HDB does its job. People will always need housing and so start a program to bring home ownership to the whole country.

But the mere mention of taking the cue from Singapore raises morbid xenophobia Tengku...I said.

You follow and take lessons from what is good. If it's good and effective why not? It's always for the greater good.

Yes, I remembered you said, of all the national projects we could undertake, few could have such a large social as well as an economic multiplier effect as housing.

Indeed in one of his articles TRH wrote:-

Housing builds powerful social capital and gives substance to citizenship. A national housing project allows us to design entire communities and townships with their transportation, communications, educational and recreational infrastructure with a strong set of standards and social objectives. It lets us plan the housing stock to cater to the lifecycle of home ownership, with a good mix of options for different localities and life-cycle requirements. It is a way to grow racial harmony, build integrated schools, and help the poor without creating a crutch. Let's commit ourselves to having each and every Malaysian family own their own home. This vision is a radical challenge to the nation to do better. It will require extraordinary improvements in our ability to design, construct and finance housing projects. It will require the setting up of a statutory board to oversee housing development, administration and management. As land governed by the State powers, the States will have to implement these projects. This will require, and hopefully force, improved coordination between the Federal and State governments, especially now that we might no longer expect that the same party is in power in both places.

I thought our conversation had ended. I rose to shake his hands and this time, mindful that his advisor had kissed his hands, I did too. Like the gentleman of the Old School of Malay etiquette, TRH quickly withdrew his hands.

Then, he continued sitting down.

It's basically the question of sound leadership. I hope the leaders do their first important function which is to lead.

Tengku, for all our efforts to discuss, to debate and to deliberate on these issues, I still hold to the feeling- that come this UMNO general assembly, UMNO's leadership will be determined in the toilets of PWTC. You know, that's where the ample liquidity is. And the only kind of leadership that comes out from there is a stinking one.

TRH managed a controlled laughter...I like that comparison.