YOURSAY | ‘His mind is stuck in the past. He is fighting an old ghost that no longer exists.’

M'sian solutions don't work for 'economically-backward' Malays - Pejuang

BlueShark1548: Former prime minister Dr Mahathir Mohamad, you and Umno had been given time since Merdeka in 1957 to find solutions for the Malays specifically and the rest of Malaysians, but until 2020 (your vision of Malaysia achieving developed status), you still harp on the same solutions for the Malays.

You had 22 years to achieve your vision and provide solutions for the Malays, what happened? You and your cronies enriched yourselves and wasted billions.

You destroyed our judicial and other institutional foundations, and during your administration, corruption was a way of life for many including those in the civil service and it culminated in the creation of Najib Abdul Razak, your protégé.

Enough, Mahathir, with your talk of solutions! Pejuang would disappear with your demise and would be mentioned in a few lines in the record of Malaysian history.

Unlike the late Singapore leader Lee Kuan Yew, you used your talents and gifts the wrong way and your vision for Malaysia was clouded by race and religion and not for the nation.

In our history, you would be recorded as the most destructive leader. Indeed, you are worse than Najib.

Undecided: The pro-tem Pejuang chairperson also warned that wealth disparity, mixed with an ethnic factor, could lead to racial conflict.

This observation is true about wealth disparity, but the ethnicity will not be a factor if politicians refrain from racial incitement. Compared to the past, there are already many rich Malays to want racial conflict.

The remaining still sizable number of poor Malays will remain poor so long as there are greedy Malay leaders who pay lip service to protecting their interest but line their own pockets instead of using these monies to upgrade the poor.

We had more than 63 years of such deception, including 24 years of your governance as PM, and this is the pathetic result we see in the disparity of wealth between the rich and poor Malays as well as the other races. Only those corrupted by a failed system cannot or refuse to see this.

After all, what better way than to make use of the New Economic Policy (NEP) and its variants for the corrupt and undignified to "steal" the government resources?

Pejuang is not the answer to the woes of the poor Malays or Malaysians.

PurpleHawk0187: Mahathir was the architect of "divide and rule". During my younger days, the racial division was not as evident. We studied together, played together, ate together without a thought about one’s race or religion.

By all means, have a system in place to assist the Malays to better themselves. However, the practice of spoon-feeding for everything has led to racial discord and tensions.

Furthermore, the insistence to persevere with archaic laws that limit the capability of the citizens to air their views and express themselves is disappointing. They are oppressive and belong in history.

The current situation in Malaysia is a shame. I fear that we are on a downward spiral in an abyss leading us straight to oblivion.

Mahathir, you have destroyed our country with your delusion and dictatorial mentality and beliefs. It is time for you to ride off into the sunset.

Greensleeves0822: Even after more than two decades, the old man still sounds like a broken record. He ought to do himself a favour and get a new scriptwriter.

And he thinks that by disparaging the Malays the way he is continuously doing will win him brownie points.

Why is he telling them to their face that they have more problems compared to other races when he knew just who are the ones responsible for the problems?

By putting them down and inhibiting their ability to think for themselves is as good as disabling them for the rest of their lives. And telling them it's not fair to have others do better than them is his way to garner support for his dubious cause and agenda.

He should just retire gracefully and mind his business and let others do theirs.

Asitis: Mahathir's mind is stuck in the past. He is fighting an old ghost that no longer exists. He had been trying the same thing over and over again, hoping that he would somehow achieve a different result one day. This is madness.

It's time for him to acknowledge defeat, step aside and let the younger generation, whose mind is not trapped in the past, to lead the nation forward and away from his toxic legacy of racism and inequality.

OrangTua: If you are a lazy student, you'll never make it into the top class. If you lie, cheat and steal from others, you might be successful for a time, but you will get caught someday.

If you never cut the umbilical cord to your parents and base your total survival on handouts from them, over time, whatever stipend you receive will surely reduce because no cow will produce milk forever. It will also depreciate in value against the rising cost of living.

The only way to offset the effects of a river about to run dry (or cash cow about to die) would be to make something of yourself - the hard and honest way. So whatever life throws at you, you will have the knowledge and ability to bounce back and reinvent yourself.

But of course, if you haven't worked hard, if you've always taken the shortest (and dubious) routes to success, if your living depended on the dying of others, then failure will ultimately become your shadow, no escaping it.

Because nothing can replace the value of blood and sweat, of perseverance, of patiently facing and overcoming challenges.

All of this goes into the building of a person's ability to weather life and to succeed. No short cut can give you this.

YOURSAY | Whose fault for Malays being economically-backward?

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