KUALA LUMPUR: An Umno delegate has suggested that the party was now trapped between the devil and the deep blue sea due to Prime Minister Najib Tun Razak's economic policies.
Casting doubts on the Economic Transformation Programme's (ETP) ability to bolster the fiscal growth for the Malays, Federal Territory Umno's Johari Abdul Ghani said the government was now forced to deal with two sides of the same coin.
Heads, the need to maintain Umno's Malay power-base which was demanding that its “given” economic share remained intact and tails, the growing call for economic liberalisation from non-Malay voters.
"Is the government ready to face them?" he asked during the presidential speech debate on the economy at the Umno general assembly here.
Johari's question was a tell-tale sign that some in the party remained unconvinced with Najib's rationale to remove race-based eonomic policies.
There were also doubts that despite the strong assurance by Najib, who is also Umno president, yesterday that Malay economic rights remained unshakable and that race-based affirmative action would carry on in the New Economic Model (NEM), there were no guarantees that it would not be challenged by the non-Malays.
'We've spirit, no network or capital'
Johari, the Titiwangsa Umno division chief, contended that many Malay businesses lacked the capital and capacity to contribute to the RM1.4 trillion in investments needed to push the economy and Malaysia towards a developed nation by 2020.
"How many Malay businesses are there with capital and capacity to contribute to the ETP? Malay entrepreneurs only have spirit but we lack network and working capital to move forward," he said.
The government believes the initiatives laid out under the ETP would lure the private sector into contributing to some 92% worth of domestic and foreign direct investments to the required amount as it aims to transform the government's cash-dependent economy into a private-driven one.
However, economists and the opposition were sceptical that the private sector would bite the bait. Data showed that private investments in the economy remained relatively low with insignificant increase since the past 10 years.
Johari agreed that the government had no choice but to implement the ETP but said the government had not done enough to assist and enhance Malay economic capabilities to compete on a level playing field once the economy was opened up under the NEM.
On a more constructive note, the Umno delegate urged the government to set up a Permodalan Nasional Berhad-like institution but this one would focus on training Malay entrepreneurs and equipping them to face the challenges of a high-income nation.
He also called for an increase in allocation to banks like BSN, Agro Bank and Exim Bank. This was to empower them to fund Malays entrepreneuers venturing into small and medium enterprises, a sector which Najib had indicated would be one of the main drivers of the ETP.
Johari claimed that there was also a tendency to overlook successful Malay businesses on the part of the government.
This, he suggested, could be rectified through the setting up of a comprehensive database of Malay businesses.
"This will be helpful for non-Malay entrepreneurs to find a credible Malay partner with good track record for their business ventures," he said.
No comments:
Post a Comment