The Invisible Costs of May 7 For The Nation

In the field of economics, there is a saying that what we don't see with the naked eye is more important than what we can see.

For example, some vandal who breaks a glass window will cause the house owner to give money (say RM100) to the glass maker to make a new window, which triggers a chain of positive economic effects throughout the economy. But the opportunity cost is invisible: what the house owner would have done with the RM100, which he saved for his consumption or investment, if his window had not been broken.

Same truth applies to politics and the recent Perak crisis, what we saw was the Perak Assembly Speaker Mr Sivakumar being forcibly removed by several men at the State Assembly on 7th May. And economics student/writer John Lee has rightly pointed out, what is unseen is the tremendous damage to democracy and respect for the rule of law, the separation of powers enshrined in the constitution.

I think the invisible damage is worse: the use of physical violence on a law-abiding citizen should be condemned by government leaders. If not, then it may be interpreted by the young and politically illiterate as an implicit official sanction of violence for the sake of asserting one person's power over another.

Will criminal violence escalate after this shameful incident? I beseech the authorities to be wise and responsible and express remorse over the violent removal of the speaker instead of trying to justify it.