COMMENT Watching recent events and statements by Malaysian politicians, the urgent need for reform in our country risks being undermined by populism on both sides of the political divide as they jostle for votes in the coming general elections.

From the BN, we have seen the free hand-outs of RM100 to every student in the school system without any form of means testing. We have also recently witnessed the extreme form of populism, namely "mobocracy", whereby mob rule can dictate that a perfectly legal and peaceful gathering, Seksualiti Merdeka, be banned by the police.

Pakatan Rakyat has also indulged in populism since they came into power, which makes us wonder about the substance of ‘reformasi'...