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Thursday 26 February 2015

So, let me get this right – it’s haircare over health care?

While the cost of healthcare and education will shoot up after GST, our deputy finance minister is scrambling to place a cap on house call charges for hairdos.

FMT


Tears of joy bathed my cheeks as I felt an immense weight lifted off my chest. Let’s all rise and say “Hallelujah” as the Lord has listened to our prayers.

Our admirable First Lady Rosmah Mansor has gotten a new sidekick who is none other than Ahmad Maslan, the Deputy Finance Minister as they have joined forces for the betterment of mankind (limited only to the lucky citizens of Malaysia).

A few days back, Rosmah lamented that she was being overcharged for her custom made dresses and bouffant hairdo (I’m secretly and inexplicably fascinated by it) and that those days of injustice are over with the implementation of the Goods and Services Tax (GST).

Ahmad Maslan, moved by her plight, has proposed that there should be a price guide for tailors, hairstylists, beauticians, plumbers, electricians and so on in order to curb overcharging in the post-GST period.

Obviously the predicament of our First Lady far outweighs that of the common folk. Nothing happened when the people said a loud and resounding “NO” to the implementation of GST or at least to start it off easy so that we wouldn’t crumble from its weight.

I suppose if it is important, you will find a way and if it’s not, you will find an excuse.

I mean why bother about the cost of health care that keeps snowballing. There has only been a 20-50% increase in the costs which is expected to increase even further this year. Thank goodness only 320 types of medications out of 4,200 are subjected to GST. Never mind the fact that, the same type of medicine produced by a different brand is considered different. Somewhere in the near future people will willingly crawl into their graves rather than hop onto a hospital stretcher. A quick death would seem more welcome than a crippling debt that you will spend all your life trying to pay off.

Why bother about the rising cost of education? It is after all the only means for middle and lower class people to break free from the shackles of poverty especially those without any special privileges that some politician decades ago decided was to be the birthright of a select few.

Nurul Izzah pounced on the news of price guides for house calls like a hungry tigress on a baby gazelle and shot out a statement saying that all it took for Putrajaya to sit up and take notice of our financial woes was Rosmah’s hair.

While I agree with her sentiments, I cannot help but ask myself why is everything politicised? All this has given the opposition fodder to vilify the government and feed us their own propaganda.

While we will no doubt be treated to an impressive verbal sparring in the coming days, nothing will be achieved at the end of the day.

Apparently all we can do for now is sit back and smirk while those with silver spoons stuck in their mouths tell us to tighten our belts.

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