Kit Siang paints bleak picture on NEP’s failure
Malaysia is more and more like a banana republic with Umno refusing to commit harakiri and instead manufacturing enemies elsewhere
(Free Malaysia Today) – DAP elder statesman Lim Kit Siang urged Prime Minister Najib Abdul Razak, now on a visit to the UN, to take time off during his high-tea with the Malaysian diaspora to answer several questions raised by human rights advocate Zainah Anwar in her regular column in The Star. “The answers will help us decide whether the Malays and Islam are under threat and whether Malaysia needs to be saved. Instead of committing harakiri, Umno was manufacturing enemies elsewhere.”
“Many agree with Zainah that Malaysia was more and more like a banana republic. The Low Yat tension was not the last manufactured racial tension as it was followed by the Red Shirts.”
Lim expressed worry over the prognosis that as desperation over the inevitable closing chapter sets in, there will be more attempts to ignite the fires of racial conflict.
The first question, noted Lim, relates to 40 per cent of Malaysian households earning only RM1,847 a month. “Three other questions relate to the Malays, Orang Asli and Orang Asal making up 75.5 per cent of those at the bottom despite four decades of the New Economic Policy (NEP); 64.3 per cent of them having only SPM qualifications; and making up 90 per cent of unemployed university graduates.”
Another question which must have an answer said Lim, who is also DAP Parliamentary Leader and Gelang Patah MP, is why the Malays, Orang Asli and Orang Asal hold only USD2 billion worth of shares although USD54 billion was pumped into institutions and given to individuals.
