Lawrence Yong
Malaysiakini
Nov 7, 2013
Malaysia will lose its competitive economic edge if its politics continue to cater to racial and religious extremes, a former senior diplomat warned today.
Razali Ismail, who was a diplomat for 35 years before retiring in 1998, warned that although polemics – the practise of one-sided political arguments – was inescapable in multi-racial, multi-religious Malaysia, it must not translate into a welfare state.
“If you just want to be a backwater country somewhere, that’s a different story.
“But we are in a strategic position (for economic growth) …all the differences between us have to be worked out,” Razali said at the Prime Lecture on Culture 2013, where he was invited to speak on “polemical politics” by the Tourism and Culture Ministry.
To emphasise his point, Razali cited that Malaysia’s rivals, such as Singapore, Thailand and Indonesia, already woke up to global realities and are well on their way to fortifying their own economies to attract foreign investments.
During his years as a diplomat, including as ambasadors to several European counctries, he saw almost all countries he served in as seeing Malaysia as a stable country.
However, Razali added, his international friends have of late started to question the divisive goings-on in the country. Continue reading “Racial extremism bad for economy, warns ex-diplomat”