This is a good read in The Economist by Noam Chomsky, a long-time critic of American imperialism, reminding us that every nation ends up with some warped idea of its own benevolence, especially when that country bestrides the world in economic and military power. For a relatively small nation like Malaysia, the lack of ability to project imperial power means that we are removed from such temptations. And yet, even within our own borders, we often act in ways that belie our insistence on a benign and harmonious “Keluarga Malaysia”. Forced labour, killings in police custody, rounding-ups of “illegal” workers and many other instances in Malaysian history seem to suggest that if ever we were offered power at the imperial scale, we would likely also fail to wield such power with wisdom and restraint.
Jeff Bezos, through his private investment vehicle Bezos Expeditions, has made his maiden investment in an Indonesian e-commerce startup, raising the stakes for Southeast Asia as a frontline in the global competition for tech investments. As it is, most foreign investors would flock to Indonesia – for its sheer size within the larger Southeast Asian region – or to Singapore, for its more mature markets and investor-friendliness. In the meantime, Malaysia is adamant in its insistence on ethnic navel-gazing, pleased at being able to play an outdated game of racial one-upmanship. I suppose we deserve to be where we are, if we continue to insist on keeping our heads firmly stuck in the sands of irrelevance.
In the meantime, PM Ismail Sabri is asking us to “forget our differences”, in the spirit of “Keluarga Malaysia”. It will be interesting to see if this call – noble and much-needed as it is – will be translated into tangible policy changes. Having seen the twists and turns of Malaysian politics over the past few decades, I will not be holding my breath.
The Government is tabling a bill to raise Malaysia’s statutory debt ceiling from 60% to 65%, in order to fund stimulus measures to help Malaysians get through the pandemic. I think this is timely, and much needed. What is not clear, however, is whether this is a temporary or permanent raising of the debt ceiling (the title of the Bill suggests that this is temporary, but this is not made fully clear), and whether there is a clear plan for Malaysia to bring its debt levels back down to below 60% once the pandemic is truly over. We must not allow emergency measures to become a slippery slope that drives our nation’s finances into further indebtedness, especially after all the losses that we are incurring over the 1MDB looting.
While the debate in Malaysia’s parliament over raising the debt limit looks to be perfunctory, the United States seems to be spiraling into yet another bout of partisan bickering over its own debt ceiling. Madness? Yes. But this is the blowback that the US political class has purchased for itself when it walked blindly into the morass of the War on Terror, and the disastrous consummation of its flirtation with nativist no-nothingism with the Tea Party that had eventually led to Trump’s presidency. There is always a price to pay when you play with extremism in the pursuit of narrow parochial interests.
Here’s an interesting and totally expected thing that usually happens when you conflate a succession race with a plan to recover from a pandemic: the politics will almost always get in the way. What is Singapore thinking? Like mentioned in the article, this is not something that would have happened during Lee Kwan Yew’s time. Another chink in the armour, then, for the PAP government under Lee Hsien Loong?
Turkey threatens to buy new missile system from Russia: is this the beginning of the end for Turkey’s membership of NATO? And will this lead to even sharper realignment of global geopolitics?
The third MRT line’s alignment has been finalised and awaiting approval. I hope we do get this 3rd line done: Kuala Lumpur needs to step back from the brink of urban car congestion, and embrace more active modes of mobility. The alternative is unsustainable.
Like many of my generation, I have pegged a lot of my self-esteem and self-worth to my work. This is a good reminder that there is so much more to living than just what I do for a living.
