COMMENT | Just half a year ago, Prime Minister Najib Abdul Razak urged those who were out of a job to resort to becoming a driver with ride-sharing app Uber. He further cited the example of an industrious female graduate who put bread and butter on the table by selling "nasi lemak" (coconut milk rice).

Fast forward to the eve of Hari Raya, and almost dramatically, the Malaysian economy was said to be growing at more than 5.6 percent, and rated the best Asian country to invest in, according to BAV Consulting and the University of Pennsylvania.

Now, something is obviously not right here. When the prime minister is experiencing a litany of alleged corruption and malfeasance scandals, exposed by the Wall Street Journal, New York Times and Washington Post not least, his spinners in Putrajaya and Umno - including Hadi Awang - claimed that there was an "American plot" to bring down the Malaysian government and its ostensible "Muslim or Islamic" leadership.

Two issues arise here: If the Malaysian government and party mouthpieces, including PAS and Umno, ask the people to distrust the American media, why then cite American indices to showcase the growth of the country?

Now, if the reverse is true, that the statistics and revelations from America are indeed valid, why then ask Malaysians to reject them only when the issue revolves around 1MDB?

Obviously, the Malaysian prime minister and his spinners cannot get the facts right, and are nitpicking their way through a heap of ludicrous propaganda materials as they see fit. If there was anything related to corruption or malfeasance, out they went. When the numbers seemed to reflect their own spin, in they came, into the prime minister's speech.

With a prime-minister-cum-finance-minister who cannot get the narrative right, why does Putrajaya even care what the people think?

But then they do. The election is coming. Come hell or high water, the 14th general election has to be called by the middle of 2018. The government can only enjoy a certain margin of advantage, if at all, only by lying through its teeth - the same way it has lied about 1MDB, Felda Global Ventures Holdings Berhad, incoming Chinese investments and even the infamous Saudi donation.

Barring a repeated narrative of falsehoods and deceptions through coordinated fake news dissemination, the prime minister and his cabinet cannot survive.

But what did the prime minister name in his Aidilfitri speech as the "five risks" facing Malaysia?

On geopolitics, Malaysia has clearly lost the plot. Instead of being fair and good to all great powers, Malaysia has become entrenched in China’s corner, at a time when China is behaving aggressively and assertively in the South China Sea.

When the US and members of ASEAN cannot trust Malaysia on our foreign policy - granted our tilt to the axis of Beijing - why does the government even want to mention geopolitics as a national risk to begin with?

Well, Najib had to. If not, he would have risked looking more irrelevant than ever...