Make public the methodology, data and all reports prepared in connection with Ninth Malaysia Plan corporate equity ownership as never before has Malaysia become such a nation of cynics and skeptics because of the yawning and widening gulf between government rhetoric and reality in the past three years

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Media Statement
by Lim Kit Siang  
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(Parliament, Monday) :  Deputy Prime Minister, Datuk Seri Najib Razak should stop  talking about “the government is prepared to reveal  if necessary” the methodology and data used to calculate the 18.9% equity ownership by bumiputras  but should  proceed immediately to make them public without any qualification, reservation or procrastination.

When Najib said “If there are those who are still skeptical, we can reveal the methodology applied”, is he still looking for excuses to continue to keep it opaque and withhold all the relevant data available to the Malaysian public?

This is the latest test of the government’s commitment to eradicate the  “First- World Infrastructure, Third-World Mentality” Malaysian malaise, instead of just pay lip-service in the past three years to a knowledge economy, information society and “first-class mentality”.

Let the Cabinet meeting on Wednesday make the policy decision to make public the methodology, data and all reports prepared in connection with the Ninth Malaysia Plan corporate equity ownership as never before has Malaysia become such a nation of cynics and skeptics because of the yawning and widening gulf between government rhetoric and reality in the past three years.

If  the Cabinet is not prepared to make such a policy decision on Wednesday, Ministers will have lost the credibility and legitimacy both collectively and individually to talk about an open government, accountability, transparency, integrity and good governance.

The Cabinet meeting on Wednesday will in fact be deciding whether  the Abdullah administration will be  marking  its third anniversary within a fortnight with a  new climax of public disappointment and disillusionment at the failures  of its reform pledges and agenda, reducing the Prime Minister’s National Integrity Plan into a joke and  plunging the country into  new depths of national cynicism and skepticism at the Abdullah premiership and Cabinet.

(16/10/2006)