For quite a while Malaysians have been crying out over the uncontrolled, escalating cost of living. When the opposition political parties joined the chorus or stood up to champion the rakyat’s misery, the government of the day slammed the politicians for misleading the rakyat and “politicising”.
Now Umno’s own veteran blue-chip Tengku Razaleigh Hamzah (Ku Li) has voiced his serious concerns , expressing worries of an imminent economic collapse if the government of the day continues recklessly with its economic and financial agendas.
The man in the street has yelled for long that one cannot any longer have a single decent meal for RM5.00 even at a stall operated by migrant workers. What more take a bus ride or train to and fro work daily; put the kids through school and indispensable tuition classes as schools have failed; pay for their must-have car and housing loans; pay back National Higher Education Fund (PTPTN) loans; and many more yokes.
Amidst talk of a global stock market collapse anytime and given Malaysia’s over-reliance on imported goods - including its staple food rice, what will Malaysians do when the tides hit our dinner table?
We seem to be inundated with politically charged sirens of dog, cow-head, swine and ‘Allah’ issues. And to cap it all we do not seem to see any end to sodomy titillates either. Can Malaysians continue to hood themselves - especially those who will fight tooth and nail to keep BN at the helm?
If we side with the opposition camp’s clarion call for economic reform, we will be branded as “ungrateful”. Now that BN’s own team player has sent out a chilling warning, what would it be if we struggling rakyat join Ku Li’s urging for reform?
Let us talk basics then. What use is it to preach about creating a high income nation of people when the rakyat eat low income food?
Just take the ‘imported’ and ‘AAA’ grade Thai fragrant rice being sold in our supermarkets. The price is way beyond some local and ‘pre-mixed’ grades. Yet, even that imported rice is far below the premium quality of rice that ordinary working-class people in Thailand, Cambodia and Myanmar eat.
Do Malaysians know this? They are eating inferior rice compared to their ‘poorer’ neighbouring countries!
Okay, let us not talk about rice as it may be deemed as ‘sensitive’. So take a look at the kind of ‘imported’ onions being sold all across the country.
One must be blind with ignorance and self-denial or sealed permanently with self-interest to not admit that the quality of these imported onions is way far off those that we could buy less than five years ago.
RM25.1bil remitted by foreign labour
And take into account the RM25.1 billion leaving the country in 2013 remitted by our imported foreign labour. It used to be only RM10.5 billion fleeing from Malaysia in 2009!!
We are talking about only the registered foreign workers’ remittance. What about the easily 1 million more of illegal workers sending back money out of Malaysia?
Not only are we overly reliant on importing food but are also happily letting our money flee from the country in exchange for ‘low-pay’ workers.
No, all these must end somewhere and it better be sooner.
If opposition politicians cry out with concern, BN followers say it is politically motivated and that DAP, PAS and PKR are trying to topple the government.
When the rakyat keep crying out silently as they struggle under the yoke of increasing fuel and food costs, we are told not to be lazy and that we are spoilt with spoon-feeding.
Now that Ku Li himself is warning of a total economic collapse what have the BN leaders got to say? What have the pro-BN followers got to say?
When and how can we Malaysians save ourselves and this blessed nation of this madness or must we continue to write off even Ku Li?