In 2004, global financial services firm Morgan Stanley issued a report that estimated that over US$100 billion (RM360 billion) had been lost to Malay patronage in the 20 years preceding 2003 (from 1984 to 2003). One economist estimates that in the 36 years of its existence, the New Economic Policy has been used to channel over one trillion ringgit to the Malay community through ASN (Amanah Saham Malaysia), ASB (Amanah Saham Bumiputera) and other related government schemes.
Since 1970, the government has used the NEP to divert education, employment and every other conceivable benefit to the Malay Malaysians. These measures have largely been successful with all the top posts in government-linked companies (GLCs), the government, universities, public-listed companies and practically every single area that the government has any control over being reserved for one race.
No company may be listed with a lower than 30% bumi equity but there is absolutely no problem if it is otherwise. Some industries have a mandatory 51% bumi ownership while others are reserved exclusively for them. Petronas, for example, only employs Malays for its top managerial and executive positions and awards contracts only to Malay Malaysians.
All government and municipal contracts are reserved to class 'F-class' bumi contractors. All the proposed projects under the 9th Malaysia Plan thus far are reserved for 100% bumi-owned companies. Even open tender projects are awarded to Malay Malaysians even if their prices are higher with blatantly inferior materials.
Micro-business loans, business licences, discounts on property purchases, new government employment, even licences for hawker stalls are reserved for one race. The list goes on and on.
Asian Strategic and Leadership Institute's estimate of 45% for bumi share of the nation's equity is opposed to the government's 18.9%, firstly, because the equity value is calculated at par value. For example, if you hold 1,000 Maxis shares of RM5 market value each, the government says that it is only worth RM250 as these shares have a par value of 25 sen each. If you owned a company with a paid-up value of RM2 but conducted business worth millions of ringgit worth of transactions, the government values that company at RM2.
The chief setbacks of the abuses of the NEP are rampant corruption and cronyism, worsening racial polarisation, unrelenting brain drain, warped educational system, thwarted economic competitiveness, ineffectual bureaucracy, retarded economic growth and perverted social values. Such anachronistic and regressive policy has no place in the present globalising world, and for that matter, in any civilised society.
Prime Minister Abdullah Ahmad Badawi recently intensified the imprint of the perverted NEP philosophy by prohibiting inter-religious and inter-racial discourse which would otherwise have contributed to greater understanding and harmony among the races. Consider the hegemony this has created...
The Jasin MP's saga of cheating millions from Customs over timber imports went unpunished. APs are reserved for bumis only and despite the millions that each of them make year after year, a senator's son has the audacity to clone the APs several times and the whole thing gets swept under the carpet.
A Port Klang councilor buys a 43,000 sq ft plot of land set aside for low- cost housing valued at RM1.8 million for RM180,000 and builds a palace without any approval. He gets fined RM5,000 and still has 30 days to submit his building plans. And despite all the bad press this issue got, he is still Selangor's state assemblymen representative and that of his son and daughter-in-law are councilors. The message is clear - power has shifted from the people to the executive.
The whole issue of bumi chauvinism started at last year's Umno assembly when the very vocal Umno Youth leaders stated in short that "It's our turn to be rich." This greed is not going to end. We, as a nation of loyal citizens, have to put a dent into this rubbish for the sake of our children.
We need a change in government. We need a stronger opposition. We need to send a message to the powers-that-be that we will not accept second-class status for our children.
