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Media Statement
by Lim Kit Siang  
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(Parliament, Thursday) :  More than a week has passed since the Cabinet meeting last Wednesday but there had not been an official word  about the controversy over the Asian Strategy and Leadership Institute’s (ASLI) Centre of Public Policy Studies (CPPS) study on bumiputra equity ownership which was to feature prominently at the Cabinet meeting.

Did the Cabinet last Wednesday take a decision to release the methodology and data used for the Economic Planning Unit (EPU)’s figure of 18.9% bumiputra corporate equity ownership or has the whole issue  been swept under the carpet?

The Prime Minister, Datuk Seri Abdullah Ahmad Badawi had said  on his return from Mecca two days before the Cabinet meeting (Oct. 16) that Malaysians have the right to question the government or to seek answers on issues.

He said: “If people question, then we must have answers. We do not have a problem.  If we are transparent, what is the problem?”

A day earlier, Deputy Prime Minister, Datuk Seri Najib Razak said that the government’s methodology to calculate bumiputra equity ownership was no secret and could be disclosed.

Another Cabinet Minister, Tan Sri Muhyiddin Yassin (Agriculture and Agro-based Industries), had also agreed that it was a good idea for the government to reveal the methodology, in response to the call by the Gerakan President, Datuk Seri Dr. Lim Keng Yaik a day earlier that the government release the methodology and data used to achieve the 18.9 per cent figure on bumiputra equity ownership.

Why then the conspicuous and thunderous silence on the part of the Cabinet in the past week on the public release of the methodology and data  used by EPU to compute the 18.9% bumiputra equity ownership and to rebut the 45% figure in the ASLI  report?

(26/10/2006)