It is not only the non-Malays who are part of the brain drain. Despite the affirmative action policies, Malays are increasingly reluctant to return to Malaysia.

Johan Merican ( left ), the CEO of TalentCorp is wasting his time being part of Najib Abdul Razak’s masterplan to attract Malaysians home. The Cambridge graduate is wasting his talent by being aligned with Najib and Umno Baru. Can he not see and feel that he is sinking in quicksand? If he does not get out of there soon, he will be engulfed.

Last week, Johan expressed frustration that despite the various incentives, including tax exemptions on the cars that the applicants import into Malaysia, only 2,500 of the 1,000,000 overseas Malaysians have returned home.

TalentCorp was set up in 2011 and has been allocated RM65 million to entice Malaysians back. Some people will argue that TalentCorp is grossly overfunded or else, Johan is not doing his job properly, or has got his priorities wrong.

If Johan wants a good reason for the reluctance of Malaysians to return, he just has to look at Shahidan Kassim, Minister in the Prime minister’s Department, who said on March 31 that voting along racial lines will ensure stability in the country.

Shahidan is a typical example of Ketuanan Melayu. All of the people who adhere to the concept of Ketuanan Melayu have the following traits. Boring. Obnoxious. Repulsive. Egotistic. (BORE).

When Opposition MPs admonished Shahidan ( right ) for not understanding the meaning of the one man, one vote system, he told Anthony Loke, the DAP MP, “You need two degrees to compete with me. I have a PhD, so I understand”.

Last week, Shahidan said that Malaysians who maligned the country were “immoral”. According to him, Malaysians should honour their place of residence and also their government. He said, “Morally speaking, this is just something absolutely immoral, whereby one should honour the land that one stands on.”

Isn’t Shahidan the last person to lecture Malaysians on morals? An Asia Sentinel report claimed that Shahidan was allegedly implicated in the murder of an attractive young woman in an apartment in Kuala Lumpur. He was the chief minister of Perlis then, and the case was never satisfactorily concluded.

The erstwhile inspector-general of police (IGP), Bakri Omar subsequently protected the case under the Malaysia’s Official Secrets Act. So, no details were forthcoming.

Johan needs to understand that Malaysians are equally concerned about justice, human rights, the rule of law and democratic principles, as about fulfilling their potential when achieving their ambitions.

Malaysians go abroad, not because they hate Malaysia, but because they dislike the leaders who champion extremists, and who promote affirmative action policies. These leaders are steering the nation to doom. All one has to do is look at the incomplete transparency and the shambolic investigations into the disappearance of the MAS Fflight MH370 to know what the rakyat of Malaysia feels.

Products of an overseas education

Security concerns and social justice are just as worrying as education. Malaysian leaders like Najib, Hishammuddin Hussein and Khairy Jamaluddin were products of an overseas education. Why are they denying Malaysians the right to a good education? Why are some members of the VVIPs sending their, very young children to be schooled abroad? This action shows that they mistrust the education that is available in Malaysia.

In the past few days, we learnt that the Albukhary International University (AiU) in Alor Star, a university set up by Syed Mokhtar Albukhary( left ), would be closed and its 600 students sent to other universities. This ‘waqf’ (eternally charitable) institution offers scholarships to foreign students. Non-Malays find it difficult to get scholarships and yet foreigners are welcome by Syed Mokhtar.

Malaysians would find it difficult to boycott the cronies. Just about everything that the Malaysian eats, consumes or utilises in the way of services, is owned by a Malaysian crony.

Is Johan aware that cronyism alienates people, especially creative people? If you are not a part of the establishment, or if you oppose the establishment, you do not get anywhere in Malaysia.

The various affirmative action plans, have gained humourous pseudonyms. The New Economic Policy (NEP) is better known as the Never Ending Patronage, the New Economic Model (NEM) is the New Endless Manipulation, whilst the Bumiputera Economic Empowerment (BEE) is known as a “Betrayal of trust, Exaggerated sense of entitlement, and Exploitation”.

Sources in London claim that TalentCorp has held many functions, to try to persuade Malaysians to return home. There is always a very generous spread, because TalentCorp is aware that Malaysians will only attend if there is ‘makan’ involved.

Despite the free Malaysian food and talks by various CEOs, Malaysians have not been lured back home and, like the TalentCorp incentives which Johan hoped would motivate the Malaysian diaspora to return, are a waste of time and money.

One person who frequents these talks, said, “Who pays for the expensive venues and makan? Most of the talks are poorly attended and the makan is wasted. Is the Malaysian taxpayer footing the bill?”

Johan may have cited financial considerations, professional opportunities and a comfortable lifestyle as the main reasons for Malaysians to prefer working overseas. The elephant in the room, which many people, especially the ones in government and Talentcorp refuse to acknowledge, is Umno Baru.  

 

Umno Baru specialises in smash-and-grab raids and as Muhyiddin Yassin showed us, last week, when he had his jolly in Dubai, the taxpayer has to foot the bill for Umno Baru’s luxuries.

Our personal safety and the nation’s security are under threat but the people assigned to keep law and order are impotent. The IGP is confused and refuses to act when children are abducted in conversion cases. The MH370 investigations have shown that our skies are open to intruders. A recent kidnapping has shown that pirates operate with impunity off the coast of Sabah.

Umno Baru is in charge of incompetence. Get rid of Umno Baru and a good percentage of these overseas Malaysians will make their way home, without any incentives.

MARIAM MOKHTAR is a defender of the truth, the admiral-general of the Green Bean Army and president of the Perak Liberation Organisation (PLO).