Before June 30, 2009, discussion of the 30 percent bumiputera equity rule was taboo in Malaysia or at least considered a ‘sensitive’ issue not to be questioned in any quarter. Anyone pressing for its abolition would have been branded as anti-Malay or as a traitor.

But Prime Minister Najib Abdul Razak changed all this when he announced that the equity rule would be repealed immediately because the guideline of the Foreign Investment Committee (FIC) has outlived its usefulness.