— Jacob Sinnathamby
The Malaysian Insider
SEPT 27 — Prime Minister Datuk Seri Najib Razak certainly talks a good game. It is election season and he needs to win big so everything goes.
Today he talks about how Bumiputera quotas need to go, eventually. No one knows when this eventually will be because as we all know the Umno-hijacked New Economic Policy was extended under pressure from the Umno beneficiaries.
Najib is not the first Umno president to talk about removing quotas or taking away the crutches from Bumiputeras.
Tun Dr Mahathir Mohamad and Tun Abdullah Badawi both mentioned this when they wanted to show Malaysians that they were enlightened leaders and when they were fishing for support from non-Malays before elections.
Needless to say all their “good intentions” never materialised. Once they got the votes, they promptly forgot about taking away the quotas and instead fortified the distortions in the system.
Abdullah talked about open tenders but openly allowed Umno men and cronies to carry on negotiating inflated contracts. It is the same with Najib.
There is no such thing as open tenders today. In fact, it business as usual for well-connected businessmen and Umno warlords.
Anyone who reads news portals will know that the beneficiaries of many of the contracts are well-connected to Umno ministers or other leaders.
Heck, wasn’t it only weeks ago that Najib succumbed to Perkasa and gave a chunk of MRT contracts to Malay businessmen.
The problem in our country is that we have too many false prophets. They always come bearing gifts during the election season.
And you know what they say about false prophets and gifts.