WEF: KL policies behind brain drain

ARCHIVES 2013

By admin-s On Oct 12, 2013

(Business Times) – It appears little could change going forward. A hotly contested general election divided the country along racial lines, and an influential, right-wing element has evolved within Umno. To appease those elements, Mr Najib has had to resort to more affirmative action-type policies.

THE World Economic Forum (WEF) has revealed something most Malaysians already know – that affirmative action policies in favour of the bumiputera and a reliance on cheap foreign labour have driven the country’s brightest talents to seek opportunities elsewhere, mostly in Singapore.

The Geneva-based body’s Human Capital Index, a measure of a country’s ability to develop a skilled workforce, ranked Malaysia 22nd in a field of 122 countries.

In an index that evaluated quality of healthcare, infrastructure and education, Switzerland took the top spot, followed by Finland, Singapore, the Netherlands and Sweden. South-east Asian countries on the list include Thailand in 44th place, Indonesia (53rd) and the Philippines (66th).

The report said that Malaysia’s affirmative action policies and its dependence on cheap migrant labour have kept it from developing a skilled workforce that can compete with that in smaller, richer Singapore.

It is noteworthy that Prime Minister Najib Razak had homed in on the country’s brain drain in his New Economic Model introduced in 2010, and had promised to tackle it through, among other things, a gradual rollback of these policies.

Mr Najib even set up a Talent Corporation, tasked with wooing back skilled Malaysians from overseas.

Even so, affirmative action policies are still in place, although Mr Najib has withdrawn some in the services sector. The policies, already in place for 42 years, tend to make non-Malays feel discriminated against and like second-class citizens in their own country.

Economists have also criticised the policies for stifling Malaysia’s potential growth.