Najib defends Bumi policy

MALAYSIAN Prime Minister Najib Razak on Thursday defended the need to maintain a decades-old affirmative action programme for ethnic Malays, who make up about 60 per cent of Malaysia’s 28 million people.

He said the government will maintain its target to help Malays own 30 per cent of corporate wealth. Malay corporate ownership has risen from about 2 per cent when the programme started in 1971 to about 19 per cent now.

‘The issue is not of assistance but of managing and administrating the aid. The fact is that Malays in general are still left behind and need help,’ he said at the annual meeting of the United Malays National Organisation (UMNO), the lead party in the country’s ruling coalition.

Mr Najib has been chipping away at the New Economic Policy (NEP), which was launched after 1969 racial riots in an effort to narrow the wealth gap between Malays and ethnic Chinese, who dominate the business sector.

Critics say the policy has failed and that its biggest beneficiaries have been Malay entrepreneurs who cash in on an array of perks including discounts on property purchases and specially allocated government projects.

Mr Najib, who wants Malaysia to return to six per cent annual economic growth, said: ‘The economic challenges that await us are more difficult and demanding. The global economic landscape has changed. Our previous formulas may not work. If over the past four decades we failed to achieve our (NEP) goals using the same strategy, isn’t it time for us to think of a new way of achieving our dreams?’ — AP, REUTERS