An Honest Man Digging Through A Mountain Called Malaysia

For the first time, I attended the ETP (Economic Transformation Program) briefing on 19 January at Meridien Hotel by Senator Datuk Seri Idris Jala, Minister in the Prime Minister's Department cum Chief Executive Officer of Pemandu. After two hours, I find him to be quite an impressive man who appears to be honest, smart and committed in driving through the economic transformation program.

... However, if there is one cartoon metaphor that is most accurate in depicting Idris Jala's situation (and I will commission this to some cartoonists if I have not the time to draw it myself), it is this:

With a pick and axe, Senator Jala is digging laboriously a tunnel through a huge dark mountain called Malaysia. Other adjacent mountains like China, Singapore, India also have tunnels but they have already been built and cars are zooming through them at tremendous speed.

At Senator Jala's feet are 4 dynamites which he has forgotten/refused to use. These dynamites are labelled: Abolish NEP, Abolish Cronyism, Bring Back Science and Maths in English, Prosecute and Charge Corrupted Ministers/Tycoons.

The tunnel he hopes to complete is only one third of the actual mountain underpass and it stops at a sign: 2020 ETP target.

Conclusion: He and the PM need to be more efficient and use those dynamites to blow up the way for the enitre tunnel. If he does not hurry and thinks he has until 2020 to finish, other countries like Singapore, Indonesia, Vietnam, China, etc will reach their goals faster than Malaysia. All the stated ETP projects may well create the 3.3 million jobs that is estimated by Pemandu. But these jobs may be largely project-dependent (construction) jobs and not long-term, self-sustainable jobs without the requisite insitutional reforms that Malaysia deeply needs.

Unless he embarks on picking the low hanging fruit and removes the heavy shackles burdening Malaysia, we may be truly stuck in the middle income/half-way tunnel hole. And this mountain underpass is the only hope not only for the economy but for the country and its people.

Real Public Servant-Leaders versus Career Politicians

The ratio between real public-servant leaders who truly serve the well-being of the people and self-serving career politicians who represent the interests of a select group of power interests is 5:95 in Asia.

Globally, the ratio improves to 10:90. Between real public servants and career politicians, there is a huge spectrum starting with category A to E.

A. Leaders who are public servants first, politicians second: Abraham Lincoln, Mahatma Gandhi, Nelson Mandela, Ronald Reagan, Yudhoyono (work-in-progress).

B. Leaders who are politicians first, public servants second: Bill Clinton, Tony Blair, Anwar (the once enigmatic Opposition leader who recently seems to have trouble reinventing his image beyond an Opposition leader with a troubled frown), Deng Hsiao Peng (the only Chinese leader who fell from category A after his role in the Tiananmen massacre), Lee Kuan Yew (who, according to wiki leaks, cleverly distanced himself and Singaporean politicians by calling some Malaysian politicians opportunists and corrupt).

C. Leaders who are good at fooling the public that they are public servants first: Obama (the guy who talked his way into winning a Nobel peace prize without creating peace), Putin (at least to the Russians), Hu Jintao (another leader in a long line of beneficiaries of Deng's pro-capitalism reforms and Chinese nationalism).

D. Leaders who are servants of their inflated egos and  power-driven passions: Mao, Stalin, Hitler, Mugabi, the Iranian demogogue Ahmadinejad, the Burmese generals, the North Korean Kim dynasty.

E. Leaders who try to get into the categories above but will likely be just a footnote in history: Abdullah Badawi (whose real achievement was that he managed to project a nice guy image and keep the extremists in check), Najib (depends mostly on whether he can walk the talk with the social and economic reforms outlined in the New Economic Model, failing which he will be just another face among mediocre career politicians).

Jokes aside, I am convinced there is a huge demand for real public-servant leaders in Asia in view of (a) the acute shortage in supply of such leaders currently and historically (b) Asia's rising prominence in the global economy.

This is why I will offer to my two children, the option of a new career choice: visionary economist prophets for the nations. These prophets will advise kings and presidents on the course and destinies of their nations. Not for the money, the status or the power but primarily because there is a true need for such advisors of leaders to navigate through the treacherous political and economic convulsions of the 21st century.

I can imagine parents asking if these are risky professions: the answer is that there will be no future at all if national leaders are advised by the wrong people. Not only are we faced with economic ruin but devastating earthquakes, tsunamis, floods, famines if nations do not quickly align themselves with God's divine destiny.

Incidentally, after the world economy was resuscitated and went through critical turning points in 2010, I believe we have entered a new era of economic realignments and paradoxes in 2011: countries will be facing social chaos and food shortages while other countries will thrive in stability and prosperity. This widening chasm between the afflicted and the fortunate will sow the seeds of hate among those who refuse to learn from their errors and healing among those who are willing to turn back from their destructive economic, politicial habits.

(In fact, these ideas suggest a research project which I will explore in the coming months on raising our children for the prophetic calling of nations.)