‘Greedy scions’ thriving on govt funds
The scions of powerful and famous politicians are ‘a bunch of pirates playing out their rapacious greed’.
With the surrounding controversy now engulfing the NFC, I have come to realize that business people like the children of the ‘Welfare Minister’ thrived on money allocated by the government on very favorable terms.
Mohd Ariff Sabri Aziz, Free Malaysia Today
Last year when reading one of those glossy magazines, I chanced upon an article about some fancy and posh fine dining establishment, having steaks as the principal menu item.
The article pointed out to the achievements of some young entrepreneurs in setting up fine dining and upscale steak houses.
Something that you find when reading what food critics normally say about famous steak establishments like Morton’s for example.
The article tossed phrases such as ‘enervating decor, inspiring ambiance and fine cutlery’ and all that.
The article identified the young entrepreneurs as children to the Minister of Welfare, Family and Community Development Shahrizat Abdul Jalil.
I thought these were heartwarming achievements indeed as I knew of these young people when they were small children.
Rapacious greed
I remember reading further that their supply of beef came from an integrated farm which the family runs somewhere in Negeri Sembilan.
Fantastic I thought, as I took that as a credit to the father of the children who is a doctorate degree holder and who taught at UPM – when it was known as University Pertanian.
He must have majored in some agricultural sciences and the opening of a cattle farm would be a close fit to his area of specialty.
I have every reason to believe as do many Malaysians, that their business, both the upstream (cattle farm) and the downstream part (upscale restaurants) will be a success story.
I held on to my subjective perceptions, until I come to realize that all the beef comes from the National Feedlot Centre (NFC).
I was simply appalled to learn that daily, some 20 cattle are slaughtered to be supplied to the family-owned fine-dining restaurants – Meatworks, Senor Santos and Brawns.
With the surrounding controversy now engulfing the NFC, I have come to realize that business people like the children of the ‘Welfare Minister’ thrived on money allocated by the government on very favorable terms.
Eventually this money misused and misapplied negligently and perhaps even wrongly.
These scions of powerful and famous politicians are just a bunch of pirates having a chance play out their rapacious greed.
They become celebrities on top of that, because the Malaysian public endear themselves quickly to fairy tale success stories.
Blatant unfairness
Our children will not have that chance and free rides as the children of the famous and powerful.
We and our children have to slog it out.
Because of this blatant unfairness and possible misappropriation of funds, the public has got every right to feel indignant over the pompous response of those responsible over the NFC.
Here are the reasons why.
- The National Feedlot Centre (NFC) was envisioned to become a center of production for beef and beef products in Malaysia.
- As a High Impact Project under Ninth Malaysia Plan, National Feedlot Centre project will be instrumental in attaining the 40% self-sufficiency for beef production by 2010.
So how is the record so far?
NFC has failed to do so and while failing at that, has sucked out a lot of our money.
We must feel pained by this failure and must ensure that those responsible for stealing public funds will not think that they can get away unpunished.
The National Feedlot Corporation Sdn Bhd is owned by Agroscience Industries Sdn Bhd with participation from the Government of Malaysia.
Its business is the development of a planned, integrated and sustainable Malaysian beef industry by setting up a fully integrated livestock farming and beef production facility.
How does it intend to accomplish this aim?
It does this by managing the importation of livestock, feedlotting, slaughtering, processing, packing and marketing of beef in Malaysia.
