My Say

then you are probably guilty of it. Why does the Deputy PM feel that he needs to defend the Government? Read here.

It’s a funny situation, this. In the first place, if the credibility of the Government had not been in question, then there would be no need to quote World Bank, IMF etc, to try to convince the people that the official statistics are real. The fact that the DPM is on the defensive is a clear sign that the people do not trust the facts and figures released by the Government.

If the Government is really transparent, then why won’t they release the toll agreement?

As they say, you can’t have your cake and eat it, not even here in Malaysia!

If anyone has been reading the headlines the last few weeks, one can’t help but notice that the Malaysian economy has suddenly become very positive. Hence the remark by our PM here.

What with record Foreign Direct Investment, record stock market levels, etc etc, surely we have every right to be confident?

However, if you asked the average man in the street, the picture could not be more different. People are worried about record levels of fuel, toll, electricity, water prices, with no reprieve in sight. The real wage level has been decreasing, as pay packages have not kept up with the ‘real’ inflation. I do not believe that the inflation is less than 4%, as measured by the official CPI.

The beneficiary of the FDIs, stock market etc are not the average wage earning Malaysian, who I doubt have much left to invest in the stock market. Even if they did, they could not afford the prices of the Blue Chip stocks which comprise the official index of the stock exchange.

Pak Lah, our ‘people’ prime minister, should speak to the average Joe before making such statements. Maybe, this is another sign that he has lost touch with his people, if not reality altogether! At least Tun Mahathir never pretended to feel for the people…

I had the misfortune to be involved in an accident recently, which necessitated me to go to the police station. Now, I have had several unpleasant experiences with the police in the past, which I will share at another time.

But this visit would be the first after the launch of the “I’m anti-bribery” campaign. In a nutshell, what this campaign is about: every police personnel would start wearing a badge which says “I’m anti-bribery”. Police patrol vehicles also have stickers with the same slogan. The campaign was in response to the public outcry and general distrust of the police force, which was accused of being corrupt to the core. I was very skeptical of the whole episode, seeing this as another avenue for some “well-connected” person’s factory to produce badges and stickers for the police force at exorbitant prices.

So did my visit prove me wrong? Well, do pigs fly? I cannot believe how openly bribery is practiced, even in the police station. They even have to be ‘bribed’ to do their job, such as take photos and write reports! If you don’t pay them, they’ll make sure that you will have a long long wait. And they do it as if it’s part of their standard operating procedure!

Is there any hope for the police force? Are there any good apples left? If there are, I haven’t come across them…