Guan Eng minta tutup isu DEB
15/03/2008 8:46pm
PULAU PINANG 15 Mac – Ketua Menteri, Lim Guan Eng hari ini berharap semua pihak menghentikan polemik mengenai Dasar Ekonomi Baru (DEB) sebaliknya memberi peluang kerajaan negeri memberi tumpuan kepada pemerintahan.
Beliau memberi jaminan bahawa kerajaan negeri tidak akan mengamalkan diskriminasi terhadap mana-mana kaum atau melakukan sesuatu yang boleh merugikan rakyat.
``Apa yang penting ialah melangkah ke depan dan melaksanakan pemerintahan berdasarkan ketelusan dengan sumber kekayaan negeri dikongsi secara bersama dengan penduduk Pulau Pinang.
``Kita perlu melangkah ke depan, malah Perdana Menteri, Datuk Seri Abdullah Ahmad Badawi mengumumkan bahawa semua projek kerajaan Pusat di negeri ini akan diteruskan,’’ katanya selepas merasmikan galeri Artistik Malaysia di Jalan Armenian di sini hari ini.
Guan Eng menganggap DEB bukan lagi satu isu kerana kerajaan negeri hanya ingin menumpukan kepada sistem pemberian tender secara terbuka.
``DEB tidak ada isu langsung, sekarang kita hanya nak buat tender terbuka, kalau ini pun dianggap sebagai isu, apa yang boleh saya buat.
``Saya rasa isu ini tutuplah, saya tak mahu komen apa-apa lagi kerana yang penting kita perlu melangkah ke depan,’’ katanya. - Utusan
MUSA SENDIRI TOLAK DEB DI WPI DI JOHOR
Kenyataan Musa tidak telus
BATU PAHAT: Kenyataan bekas Timbalan Perdana Menteri, Tun Musa Hitam yang mencadangkan dasar mengutamakan Bumiputera dalam pembangunan dihentikan bagi menarik pelabur asing ke Wilayah Pembangunan Iskandar (WPI), mengelirukan.
“Kejayaan banyak syarikat multinasional milik Bumiputera mendapat kontrak di luar negara tanpa bantuan kerajaan membuktikan kewibawaannya untuk menyiapkan projek mengikut jadual ditetapkan.
“Kejayaan syarikat Bumiputera melaksanakan pelbagai projek mega di negara ini juga membuktikan bahawa mereka memang berdaya saing, mempunyai merit serta kompetitif,” katanya
Beliau diminta mengulas kenyataan Musa berhubung dasar kerajaan memberi keistimewaan kepada Bumiputera dalam pembahagian ekonomi yang didakwanya boleh menghalang pelabur asing menanam dana di WPI.
“Saya kesal dengan kenyataan beliau yang seolah-olah memperlekehkan keupayaan orang Melayu dan menganggapnya sebagai amat tidak wajar serta boleh mengelirukan orang ramai,” katanya.
Johor is a home ground of 500,000 of the 3.2 million UMNO members. Johor Bahru is the birthplace of UMNO 60 years ago. Musa’s call will not go well with the Malays’ sentiments, especially in Johor. The irony is that, Musa Hitam himself is a Johor Bahru native. He is an English College alumnus. In 1969, he was sacked as a Junior Minister of Tunku Abdul Rahman Putra’s administration and from UMNO because of his ‘ultra Malay’ stance against the the administration’s lackluster attitude towards the needs and demands of the Malays, being gravely under developed.
It seems Musa is a changed man now. Even his one time partner-in-crime Tengku Tan Sri Razaleigh Hamzah says so. Of course, this call by Musa will not earn points from former Prime Minister Tun Dr. Mahathir Mohamad’s sharp political criticisms, expected in Kulai, next week.
There is a suggestion that a special forum be organised soon, to react on Musa’s call. Anyone could guess, it will not be a pretty place for Musa to hear about it.
Malaysia Must End Race Policy in Johor, Adviser Says
By Angus Whitley and Haslinda Amin
March 21 (Bloomberg) — Malaysia should exempt the southern state of Johor from policies that favor the ethnic Malay majority to help attract foreign investors to the area, former Deputy Prime Minister Musa Hitam said.
Policies that give the racial grouping privileged access to government contracts and guarantee a minimum presence in the workplace may deter foreign companies from coming to Johor, said Musa, who is advising the government on the state’s development.
Contract awards “will have to be on merit,” Musa, the country’s deputy leader from 1981 to 1986, said in a March 19 interview. “The Malays will have to face competition.”
Prime Minister Abdullah Ahmad Badawi is seeking foreign investors to help fund a two-decade, 382 billion ringgit ($109 billion) redevelopment of Johor, bordering Singapore. Scrapping the race-based program could lure investors and pave the way for the country to completely drop its 36-year-old policy in support of ethnic Malays, who comprise 60 percent of the population.
“It would be an exit route, politically,” said Manu Bhaskaran, a Singapore-based partner at economic research company Centennial Group. Johor “is an extremely important project. The affirmative action program and all the related problems do turn off foreign investors.”
Foreign direct investment in Malaysia in 2005 dropped to 15 billion ringgit from 17.6 billion ringgit in 2004, according to the government’s department of statistics. Last year’s figures haven’t been released.
Wealth Imbalance
The racial program, introduced under the New Economic Policy in 1971 after clashes between ethnic Chinese and Malays, also known as Bumiputras, aimed to increase the wealth of the nation’s poorest grouping through benefits ranging from cheaper housing to greater access to initial public offerings.
Concern about the policy’s validity grew last year after a report by the Asian Strategy and Leadership Institute in Kuala Lumpur showed the original targets to address the wealth imbalance had been surpassed.
The February report by the Centre for Public Policy Studies, controlled by ASLI, said ethnic Malays may own as much as 45 percent of Malaysia’s corporate equity. That was higher than the government’s estimate of 19 percent in 2004 and surpassed the New Economic Policy’s goal of 30 percent.
ALSI on Oct. 10 last year said there were “shortcomings” in its report. Lim Teck Ghee, director of the Centre for Public Policy Studies, quit a day later to protest the retraction.
Policy Revision
A five-member council including Musa and Malaysian billionaire Robert Kuok that’s advising the Johor project agrees the ethnic program should be dropped, Musa said.
“I am confident that this Bumiputra thing, if I may put it this way, need not be the negative factor, and I am stressing this in this particular exercise,” Musa said. “There needs to be a revision, updating, of the way we approach it.”
Incentives to take part in the Southern Johor Economic Region are being finalized, Musa said. Middle Eastern and Japanese investors are among those that have agreed to plow funds into Johor, he said.
The 2,216-square-kilometer development will include roads, offices, homes, theme parks, hotels, factories and hospitals and is Malaysia’s biggest real-estate project. Development of the region will require 382 billion ringgit of investment from 2006 to 2025, according to Khazanah Nasional Bhd., Malaysia’s state investment unit, which is leading the project.
The site will generate more than 800,000 jobs in 20 years, Prime Minister Abdullah said in November. It may boost growth in Johor to an average of 7 percent from 2005 to 2025, compared with 5.5 percent without the revamp, Khazanah said.
UMNO BERDEMONTRASI UNTUK MINTA ABDULLAH LEPASKAN JAWATAN
Pilau Pinang 15hb- Demontrasi UMNo yang dijalankan dihadapan bangunan KOMTAR didalangi oleh Nor Yaacob.Ini dilakukan dengan menyediakan bas di kawasan parlimen Tasek Gelugor, Kepala Batas, Bandar PERDA dan juga di beberapa kawasan disekitar Sungai Dua
Selain demontrasi untuk kononnya Barisan Rakyat akan menghapuskan DEB , antara yang ditonjolkan ialah mendesak Abdullah Ahmad supaya melepaskan jawatan sebagai Perdana Menteri.Maklumat yang diterima oleh sumber WRLR menyatakan satu perhimpunan besar-besaran akan dijalankan di Kuala Lumpur dan dalam masa yang sama mendesak Pak Lah melepaskan jawatannya.
Sebenarnya itu motif utama demonrasi UMNO dan bukannya soal DEB.DEB hanya diputarbelitkan oleh media BN.
Sementara itu, Guan Eng memberi jaminan kerajaan gabungan DAP-Parti Keadilan Rakyat (PKR) tidak akan meminggirkan orang Melayu dan penganut agama Islam.
“Kedudukan Islam tidak perlu dipertikaikan lagi dan semua khabar angin mengenai azan tidak boleh dilaungkan adalah tidak benar sama sekali. Ini kali pertama saya dengar cerita seperti ini.
“Kita mahu dengar suara rakyat. Oleh itu, jika suara rakyat perlu didengar maka suara azan juga harus didengar,” jelasnya.
Sehubungan itu, Penasihat Jamaah Islah Malaysia (JIM) Pulau Pinang, Dr. Danial Zainal Abidin yang mengetuai 21 NGO Islam dalam pertemuan dengan Guan Eng berpuas hati dengan penjelasan yang diberikan berhubung kedudukan orang Melayu dan penganut agama Islam di negeri itu.
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