Walla’s commentaries on UMNO’s unfinished Revolution
SAKMONGKOL AK47
I simply must share this rapier sharp analysis from my intrepid commentator, Walla. I accept it as a singular honour that he finds time frequently to visit my blog. He does too on a few other blogs. When he drops in for a visit, he leaves behind valuable gems of thought.
A: ‘I miss you, Sir.’
B: ‘(eyes pop, jaw drops, kretek embers land on sarung, burning hole size of ten sen coin)..You do? Well then, goodbye pink mop, and hello Sofea!’
A: ‘(looks at smoke spiraling up) Oh dear, is it hurting?’
B: ‘(grins bravely) Not yet.’
A: ‘Emm, Shall we not focus on your sartorial simplicity for the moment but ponder what our blogger has written? I think he has written another intelligent piece.’
B: ‘(flicking ash off) that’s hardly surprising, Sofea. With only a few exceptions, the others in the Umno leadership also display intellect too. Unfortunately all bovine. Kekeke.’
A: ‘I see you have not lost your bite.’
B: ‘But the other wire has also broken off….oh, never mind. What is it that weighs on your lovely brows, Sofea?’
A: ‘(eyes roll). I think Umno’s revolution will never be finished because the brobdingnagian challenges it has been facing will soon consume it completely.’
B: ‘(jaw drops again, twenty sen coin). You mean its legacy problems of economics and politics? Give me a minute to respond. (Turns away, opens kamus)…
I think it’s like this, Sofea. Every organism in life goes through its own phases of growth and decline. Under normal circumstances, they trace a sigmoid curve. First, slow palpable growth, then rapid accelerating growth, and finally slowdown to a plateau before decline to end somewhere.
The key to maintaining growth, or in this case political relevance, is to continuously find new S-curves before expiry of the old one.
What has been happening to Umno, Barisan for that matter, is that it has not been able to locate new relevance for itself anymore that can not only equal the original kickass spirit at the time of the formation of this country but also provide a real counterbalance to the emergence of new forces of change demanded by the rakyat.’
A: ‘But, Sir, Umno’s government has been delivering the goods to the rakyat, don’t you think so?’
B: ‘(eyes glint). You really think so, Sofea? Let me ask you two questions.
Firstly, which government can govern for long if it doesn’t deliver goods to the rakyat? In other words, any government run by any political party worth its salt will have to deliver goods to the rakyat. That’s what governments are for, isn’t it? So don’t arrogate to Umno some transcendental right that only it knows best or can do best. It hasn’t and it doesn’t and, by the denouement of recent events, it won’t. Remove the fulcrum of its spin and you will see its politics has devastated this nation. Let me put it bluntly – even if Umno wins the next general elections, the country loses, and frankly, i think it’ll be the end.
Which comes to the second point. By itself, politics is just a tool. It is just a tool to levitate and moderate the economics of nation-building. And the fortunes of Umno and Barisan have risen and fallen with the economic fortunes of this land. We must understand why.
When Malaya started, much of the country was relatively under-developed so that the potential for growth and development was assured. With expansion of the population, demand for goods and services increased until we reached the high-flying days of the 70’s when hot money flowed in followed by massive FDI that had helped build an industrial base beyond our plantations. Public finances were also shored up by oil and gas revenues.
Today, all that has changed. Hot money is only here to take occasional pot shots at punters in a market where share prices have had to be quoted in sen so as not to reflect how minute are the valuations. And that is because the fundamentals of good management to build real enterprises have been sacrificed for window-dressed performance not shored by real capabilities.
Next, FDI where it really matters is only going into industrial bases in Opposition-run states like Penang and Selangor. The others? Buildings again, as if another complex can produce things for export to earn currency to discharge deficits. Come to think of it, what has happened to Zamry’s Perak state projects? He’s quiet as a tikus, no? And other investment projects? The announcements are reruns of the same projects, like Rais’ tv movies.
And let’s not belabor how our oil and gas resources have depleted, even for their half-hearted verisimilitude of new finds. Aren’t we now importing gas as well?
Sofea, the economic legacy of Umno’s politics of the 70’s is the problem today. That period was growth but few saw that it was growth borne by subsidy. Instead of realizing it hard enough then to build real capability for the future, they just sat back and milked the cash register.
So that now when reality has finally bitten, the entire Umno leadership is amok, and right after the Sarawak elections, if you would care to note.
Because they have suddenly found the twin threat to their personal survival from the convergence of economic non-sustainability and political irrelevance.
All those wild spending in the 70’s went into crony projects and piratisation schemes but with financing charges for the treasury’s attention.
Just imagine, one of many such financing charges is no less than USD1 Billion. The rakyat are indirectly asked to pay for generations to come for a project that was not tendered out properly but benefited cronies who declared huge dividends to themselves while protecting their turf by cabling into Umno to bear the risk on some flimsy rakyat-centric excusatory spin.
Now, how did this happen? It happened because someone whose son has just been paid RM90 million for the land where resides Pudu wet market thought he was clever by buying early ahead of future inflation but clean well forgot how financing charges can balloon the final cost, what more on depreciated items.
And who will ultimately be paying for these mega-projects from future benefits foregone? Our momentarily happy, jomhebohing, rakyat.’
