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Sakmongkol ak 47

ariff.sabri@gmail.com

Wednesday 23 October 2013

Regulatory Capture aka Crony Capitalism UMNO style in action



My DAP colleague YB Tony Pua the Oxford Don Corleone, has once again exposed the shenanigans and financial gobbledygook the BN government does with Puncak NIaga over Syabas. Why is it treating the company with such tender loving care? Maybe some top politicians have shares in the company or are planning some post retirement career with Syabas and Puncak Niaga?
This is one version of the regulatory capture which I wrote about in my previous article.
 I have just written about plugging the leakages. BN is at it again. While paying lip service to the noble aim of income redistribution, it’s entrenching the share of the top 20%. The deal with Rozali’s Puncak Niaga and Syabas is reflective of that.
The top 20% has always took home 50% of the nation’s income since the last 20 years. The aim of policy makers is entrenching their dominant share. It’s the Najib way of thinking- all the other UMNO guys can kill each other to earn a spot in the leadership hierarchy as long as his position is bullet-proofed. The bottom feeders and their champions can shout till blue in their faces about income distribution and economic justice as long as the share of the top 20% isn’t disturbed.
It’s an enriching agenda of the selected few, by the few and for the few. Nothing has changed except a little improvement for the bottom feeders so that they don’t harbour some revolutionary and maybe murderous intentions.
Can we ever believe the statistics from the government now?. Clearly there is a continuing attempt by the government through every legislative trick known and available to conceal information from public spirited individuals. The information giver is now threatened with imprisonment and the information taker is likewise threatened. So how can we now verify the figures from the government?
How come there are no data on the top 5% share on income? The top 20% can easily conceal the fact that 90% of the income in that bracket is cornered by 5%. Rozali Ismail appears to be one of them.
The indebtedness of our students is nothing compared to the sweetheart debt given to the select Malay few such as Puncak Niaga’s Syabas. The BN government just gave Syabas another RM150million soft loan with a 3 year grace period to repay at a subsidized interest rate of 3%. Our students who have just graduated have to pay up immediately on the pain of being blacklisted and bankrupted. The select bumi like Rozali Ismail, because he is one of us, is given unimaginable benefits. 8 months before,  Razali got RM120million.
Maybe as I have said in the earlier article- about the regulatory capture- government people go to bed with the adopted son to negotiate mutual benefits. In 2009, the government gave RM320 million at 0 interest rate and a credit facility of RM110 million in 2011.
Now it seems clear there is some conspiracy to rob the country of our money- the government is giving almost free money to PUncak Niaga whose chairman got RM33 million in fees and bonus recently.  Maybe this RM33 million added to the income of million other Malays allowed Najib to triumphantly declare that the average monthly income of the Malay is RM4457. Tiu Kau!
In 2011, syabas owed the government RM2.9 billion. It was not able to pay. So what did the government do? It took over the loan. Now, if the government can do this, why not retake water supply and distribution in Selangor?  Wind up syabas.
Adding up all these numbers, how much has Syabas taken from us since 2009? RM3.6 billion in taxpayers’ money. Let us remind the BN, this isn’t their father’s money. The father would have died from heart attack at the rate Syabas is bloodsucking our money. Why don’t we allow Syabas and Puncak Niaga to go down under? We are helping the person who caused the water woes in Selangor but are not helping the victims of his philandering spending. The de-privatization of Syabas must be done without any delays.


9 comments:

Anonymous,  23 October 2013 at 18:24  

That is why this useless & corrupted government must be removed ASAP!

Anonymous,  23 October 2013 at 19:53  

Dear Dato Sak

To add insult to injury,
those who drive down the
Guthrie Corridor Expressway
everyday to go to work (like
me) have to look at the
phallic-looking Wisma Rozali !

Phua Kai Lit

Anonymous,  24 October 2013 at 01:09  

1/2

The same gang of political leaders and the complexity of dealings with cronies each complementing
the others in securing more new massive projects, given the leverage to secure massive loans; huge debts written – off ; bailouts using tax payers’ contributions to invest and generate spectacular profits
for themselves and their family members. Others though with liabilities, suddenly reappear as
opportunists to monopolize new mega business opportunities.

When power is unchecked, status and cronyism and corruption are at play, integrity is overlooked and disasters, wastage of funds, resources and mismanagement of finance and human resource are bound to happen.

It is time to speed up microeconomics and macroeconomics simultaneously, outsourcing of jobs must be stopped so that the majority of the ordinary Rakyat Malaysia first and foremost, not foreigners, regardless of race and creed : the middle income group, the low income earners in the private sector and the less privileged can participate in the economic transformation, and free trade market to be gainfully employed with good wages. Foreign experts must come with the credentials of what and how much impact and development they have affected the common people as well, beyond the boardroom in their respective nations of posting.

Malaysian professionals in the private sector should be given more opportunities, independence, extended loan repayment period and leeway to increase their business volume and profits. Then only they can pay better wages to employees. Banking facilities, extended repayment period for loans, skill -training, licensing should be made flexi – easy, fast and transparent in a challenging time with many uncertainties as now worldwide. Massive jobs and huge business opportunities must be navigated to the ordinary Malaysians in the private sector in the free trade and economy transformation. Free trade has many regulatory loopholes and it does not maximize benefits for the majority of citizens. Case study: the USA, the UK and China, Tunisia Spring – wealthy elites, the inequality, the accelerating rate of inflation, loss of jobs, etc.

Anonymous,  24 October 2013 at 01:13  

2/2

The success of all these people in the private sector will sustain and increase tax resume for Malaysia. A contraction or negative economic growth will bring Malaysia to the brink of catastrophe.

Next, Cuepas needs to do more - beyond submitting the demands and the proposals of its 1.4 million members for annual bonus ( civil servants ) and looking into their welfare that is providing them on going soft skills training and development by email. It is an enhanced way of looking into their welfare that is to be competent, more helpful, empathic and courteous in relation to the civilians’’ time constraint when providing services. Civil servants have shown improvement in some departments while others need to buck up.

In the US, the furloughed employees returning to work when the recent partial shutdown of 16 days was called off recorded many of them were relieved.
Neither do we want to be compared to Singapore’s civil servants who think they are little Lee Kuan Yews when dealing with civilians as described by a senior Singaporean journalist in our Star paper recently. By now, if they have read the article, they must have taken cues and work on it.
In preventing the wastage of consultation fees beratus - juta ringgit , the alternative is e - training and development and the elimination of outsourcing have to be efficiently administered swiftly.

And implemented by people with high integrity, expertise, transparency, magnanimous empathy and foresights and good governance from Pakatan leaders and a few from UMNO – BN for the 90percent of the rakyat from Semenanjung, Sarawak to Sabah.
Phenomenal business opportunities must be created to translate into massive job opportunities with good wages to be able to afford paying for the purchase of houses and sustain owning them. Failing it, with the implementation of GST, some may resort to buying or obtaining services austerely, thriftily or even practice swapping items. Worth considering ?

Aisay, where is everyone else ? Migrated ? Vacationing ? At Tropicana Golf ? Jogging, Dreaming Big ? Aisay, we sure can do way better than this, write something or crack a satirical joke ….. Terima Kasih & Salam !

Anonymous,  24 October 2013 at 09:50  

Anon 01:09:

Excellent, we hear you loud and clear. Not vacationing or golfing but observing life of the 40% bottom feeders. To say the least, it is heart-wrenching:
a) a man bicycling for miles, in the hot afternoon sun, trying to flog off some smoked salted catfish packed in plastic bags.
b) two young brothers selling rolled ‘love-letters’ on a Saturday at Rm1.00 a packet and a customer who had just stepped out of a Lexus asking for six packets for Rm5.00.
c) a heated argument between a hawker owner and his wife for giving excess 50 sen change.
d) a man of means hands out a Rm50 note to pay for a 20sen toilet entry fee at 8.00 a.m., and getting in for free.
e) a fruit seller takes time off to go to a government office only to find out that a particular officer had left the office to pick up her child from school.

I could go on and on.

Who will actually take care of these bottom feeders? Pakatan people if and when they get to Putrajaya? I am not sure – see how some Pakatan leaders are already warlords-in-waiting.

Anonymous,  24 October 2013 at 10:20  

Dato, these rascals though that they are smart. In fact, they are the most idiotic people on the face of the Earth.

Who will get to enjoy the money when they become food for the worms? Who do you think will get roasted till eternity in the Hereafter. Imagine, they are willing to suffer endlessly so that their children can enjoy the ill-gotten wealth! Stupid fools, all of them!

Thank Allah that we choose not to steal as stealing is not difficult - anyone can do this.

Anyway, let these rascals enjoy their remaining days on Earth. Soon they will know the folly of their actions.

Psst... they do not know we are smarter than them after all.

Peace.

Anonymous,  24 October 2013 at 19:06  

24 October 2013 09:50

Seen this segment of our citizens' daily struggles. Hence the middle income earners and the 40 percent of our Malaysian bottom feeders must be given the just and liberal opportunities to earn more, thereby assisting the less privileged. And the middle segment not slide into poverty and aggrevate poverty level.

Agreed a few Pakatan leaders dah berbelang, having their sign board as huge as the foot reflexology kind of signature erected and distracting drivers' focus whereas MB Khalid's a medium size plastic banner. Wastage, showy and disfocused !

Many a time, the good helpless people take consolation and trust as said by by Peace " Who do you think will get roasted till eternity in the Hereafter. Imagine, they are willing to suffer endlessly so that their children can enjoy the ill-gotten wealth! Stupid fools, all of them!

Thank Allah that we choose not to steal as stealing is not difficult - anyone can do this.

Anyway, let these rascals enjoy their remaining days on Earth. Soon they will know the folly of their actions. "

They do not do what is commanded, rather do what is not commanded and do not, what is expected of them in assisting others. That also applies to a small percentage - the elites of any faith and ideology. They live supremely and demand all, they have their own perceptions.

The choice of doing good, the best is in ones' free will.

SiangMalam 25 October 2013 at 02:06  

It is quite ridiculous, YB Dato Sak, that the main causes of poor water distribution and constant supply interruptions especially in PR-controlled constituencies like Subang Jaya, USJ, PJ and Pandan, are due to old broken down water pumps and pipe leakages... yet Syabas and Puspel kept blaming dry season and low water levels at the reservoirs... this is indeed really ridiculous.

Why is Syabas and Puncak Niaga so special that they even get hundreds of millions of soft loans from Putrajaya and yet they can't even manage the water business well and yet the CEO is probably the highest paid CEO apart from Lim Kok Thay of Genting Berhad?

SiangMalam 25 October 2013 at 02:11  


If we can just half the RM26 billion per annum lost to corruption and leakages in the annual economy, we can have more hospitals and perhaps provide free medical services to the poor. But this is a dream... we must all make this dream come true in our lifetime.... GE14... its this one or forever we are dead and buried...

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