I came across the following article in my mail. I felt that whoever is the next government of Malaysia, they should set to re educate the Malay community to thrifty and good value of life. Should introduce new measures to let them grow and earn their living like any ordinary Malaysians, with some government asistance. Otherwise, the community will not learn to value whatever they own and would not be willing to plan ahead. Why? Tunggu peruntukan kerajaan mah! Too dependent on aids. Read for yourselves...
*Govt Was Right 35 Years Ago ...By Retired Umno Man
Umno, the Malay Chamber of Commerce, Perkasa, Ibrahim Ali, and what not are shouting, ranting, raving, screaming & hollering about ‘nasib Melayu’ or the plight of the Malays, in particular the Malays of Penang.I don’t know what Ibrahim Ali was doing back in the mid-1970s but judging from the age of many of those others in the crowd I think many of them tak sunat lagi back in the mid-1970s. Tak sunat lagi means you are so young that you are not circumcised yet & your little dick still has its foreskin.
Yes, back in the mid-1970s - 35 years or so ago when I was still in my 20s & not even 30 yet - I was already fighting to improve the lot of the Malays. And 35 years ago those shouting, ranting, raving, screaming & hollering today were either too damn young or were not even born yet. We realised even back then that if something were not done the Malays would be left out. We realised that unless something were done now, 35 years ago, the Malays would be left behind. So we sat down with various Malay leaders & those who walk in the corridors of power - the Prime Minister included - to plan & chart the future of the Malays. And we did this for more than 20 years from the mid-1970s to the mid-1990s before I decided it was a lost cause & that I had better move on to other things.
The problem we faced was as what the then Minister of Trade & Industry, Rafidah Aziz said: Melayu mampu daya maju, tapi tak mampu daya tahan. This came from the Minister herself & means the Malays can be viable but can’t be sustainable. Malays can achieve success but can’t sustain the success. The Minister then revealed details & lamented about all the wealth the government gave the Malays in the form of land, concessions, permits, ‘pink slips’ on new stock exchange listings, and what not, which, if the Malays had kept, would mean the Malays would have far exceeded the 30% target of the New Economic Policy.But the Malays did not keep this wealth. The Malays sold it. The land, concessions, permits, ‘pink slips’ on new stock exchange listings, and what not, were all sold. So the Malay holding reduced & ended up in the hand of the non-Malays. This was what troubled the government, the Malay leaders, those who walk in the corridors of power, and us in the Malay Chamber of Commerce. So they now lament about how left behind the Malays in Penang are.
They should chart the progression of the Malays in Penang from 224 years ago until today & analyse at what point it went up & went down again. Were the Malays driven out? Were the Malays pushed out? Or did the Malays sell out? And why & how did the Malays sell out?There is such a thing called the law of supply & demand. There is such a thing called market forces. There is such a thing called willing buyer, willing seller. When there is a demand there will be a seller. And since there was a demand for land in Penang then for sure the landowners would sell. It is all about making a profit.So Penang developed. It became known as the Pearl of the Orient. So the capitalists moved in, as capitalists always do anywhere in the world where there is money to be made. And the Malays saw the route to easy & quick cash available to them. So they sold their land for a lot of money & moved on to another place where the land was cheaper. Now they could have their cake & could eat it too. They sold their small piece of land in Penang for a lot of money & bought an even bigger piece of land, say in Kedah, for a small amount of money & still had a lot of money left to go to Mekah, send theirkids to university, and what not.
Today, many of those old folks & landowners of the 1960s & 1970s are dead. They are no longer alive. Their land in Penang had been sold off long before they died. And their children & grandchildren no longer own land in Penang. This is because the old folks had sold it off when they were still young or before they were born. Today, the Malays are angry because the land in Penang is owned mainly by the non-Malays. But this is so not because the non Malays stole the land but because the Malays sold it for a lot of money. It is what any property owner would do when the property they bought for RM100 two world wars ago can now fetch RM500k on the open market. Only a fool would turn down RM500k in profit.
The more the Malays scream about being left behind in Penang the more the Malays would look stupid & would be revealing their weaknesses. Back in the 1970s the government already sighed & lamented that come the year 2000, the Malays would still be left with nothing.
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