Malaysia and the World

KUALA LUMPUR: Malaysia has it pretty good compared to many other countries in the world, says former Prime Minister Tun Dr Mahathir Mohamad, and Malaysians should beware of politicians promising change because change is not always positive.

“The world is certainly going through terrible times,” Dr Mahathir wrote in his latest blog post.

Dr Mahathir pointed to various issues faced by other countries -- financial and economic problems plaguing Europe and America, political turmoil in the Middle East, violence and natural disasters all over the world – and said “In the face of all these disasters Malaysians can consider themselves fortunate.”

“We do have mild floods, slightly raised temperatures and haze, but they are nothing compared to the disasters affecting so many parts of the world,” he said.

Dr Mahathir said financially and economically Malaysia is doing fairly well.

“The cost of living has gone up a little but people are not starving the way the Africans and some Asians are starving,” he said. “A generous Government is ever ready to extend help.”

Dr Mahathir said the problem is that there are people “who would like us to ignore the fact that we are much better off than most people in the world”.

“They would like to exploit every little misfortune that we may experience.  They would even promise that they can bring about sudden prosperity, give free education, and all kinds of goodies.  But observe the contradictions,” he said.

“They promise the oil-producing states to increase the royalty from 5% to 20%.  Obviously this will result in the Federal Government losing 15% of revenue from oil; and that is a big sum,” he said, adding: “The states gets their royalty based on gross income.”

He continued: “They will do away with road tolls, increase subsidies on fuel and reduce rates and taxes.

“Their proposals will reduce Government revenue and at the same time increase Government expenditure.  This is exactly what the Greek Government did, and the whole country went bankrupt.”

“To be in power for 56 years is a long time.  But look at the progress.  No other developing country has made such progress,” he said.

“Change is not always for the better,” he said.  “Change can make things worse.”

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Source: MOLE