How to FU- foul up

When Tun Razak called a few of his associates over to the house, Najib who was then a young boy was playing upstairs. House was Sri Taman. Najib was a hyperactive boy when young. He would throw small objects such as scissors downstairs and Tun Razak's friends would laugh at his antics.

He was not mindful of what the father was doing. What the father did was call in local talent to brainstorm what to do. In education Tun Razak woul call people like Ainudin Wahid ( the boss of UTM for a long time) Professor Zainal Abidin Wahid, Syed Nasir, Rahman Talib and so forth. They would then plan what to do.

Similarly in economics, Razak would call people like the Kuantan born Thong Yaw Hong, the young Navaratnam to map out economic strategies. Tun Razak employed brainy people like Zain Azrai. He used local talent because these people know local conditions.

And Tun Razak himself thought hard about his vision. He wasn't sparse and miserly on using the grey matter.

Unfortunately Najib didn't learn. He prefers to use APCO for his PR because his media advisers say APCO is good. For business and economic modeling, he uses Mckinsey. Even the NEAC's NEM was crafted by 10 people but heavily flavored with text book business and economic language not any different if we are redaing university books. The only thing good about these entities is the fees they charged. They run into millions.

After reading the thick NEM document by the NEAC, I come away with the conclusion, a few of us can do a better job. Najib should have used talent from the university the father set up- the Universiti Kebangsaaan. Even octogenarian Ungku Aziz can still contribute ideas.

Just who the hell counseled Najib to set up these things?

The greatest danger Najib is facing now, is the disconnect between him and the reality on the ground. This will prove to be his undoing.

What do people think about his pillar of 1 Malaysia? just another slogan to identify his uniqueness. Every PM since Mahathir seems to have one. But Najib sees to have outdone everyone. He has 1 Malaysia, GTP, ETP, NEM, SRIs, NKRAs, NKEAs etc etc. if our leaders mean it's about living together harmoniously, we have been doing that for a long time. As best as we could.

We quarrel only when politicians harped on our differences. Otherwise our leaders go go international when going to bed, they and we do business with each other. Indeed it is a common practice among those in power to take money more easily from others not of the same race. Otherwise we aren't particularly conscious of our racial differences.

The fundamental cause of ethnic frictions is the economic disparities. This leadership hasn't solved the problem of economic disparities since it became a national issue from 1970. That's 40 years.

Just look around us. In 1979 when I started working, the graduate earned probably around RM 1200. Now the starting pay is around RM 2000. It has increase only 2 times. A car costing RM 7000 now costs RM 40,000. That has increased 6 times. A house? What used to cost 20,000 now costs 180,000? The bloody cost of living has outstripped our earning capacity by so many times!. Economics is the main issue. Make us rich, we don't care about the racial differences.

Ok, we want to get to an income level of USD 15-20k. in 10 years. How do we get there? By leveraging on the 8 SRIs- don't laugh. Its acronym time once more. Strategic reform initiatives.

I could almost hear the solemn declaration that we need steely political resolve and will. Well, begin by fortifying the PM's resolve first. He is fast becoming a better flip flopper than Pak Lah. He says the recommendations in the NEM are not finalized yet.

The ETP which was a major show was delegated to the most junior minister. We would have thought, such a program of gargantuan proportions- spending 1.44 trillion over 10 years required the steady hands of the PM himself. Now, we know, if Idris Jala can do the presentation, anyone can. You just have to read the script.

Break logjam of vested interests. Well, let's start with a moratorium banning the participation of the big players for a while. Najib will not dare do this. Even as we write, Syed Mokhtar is writing plans to take over UEM, to take over the RRI land and lands belonging to the government. No open bidding. Desmond Lim the developer of Pavilion was tasked to develop the Sungei Besi after the other brokers found no one had the experience do so. He is also busy writing business plans to take over such things like Bakun and other things. Jho Low and LTAT didn't have the technical expertise to develop real property, so lets call in Cindy and Desmond.

Break the logjam of vested interests by saying, thank you for your kind inputs and now let's open up the bidding. You people have reaped the pre harvests, let others benefit now. but to some people, Najib's re-energizing the private sector means, giving sweetheart deals to selected market players.

If people say this is good economics, please carry on. We shall delight in attacking your deceit.