Saturday, July 11, 2009

Najib's 100-Days Promises, What's New?

In brief, here are Najib's promises when he launched is 100-days in power celebrations:
  • The prevention of crime;
  • The fight against corruption;
  • Access to quality education;
  • The improvement of the living standards for the lower income group;
  • Improvement of rural infrastructure;;
  • Improvement of public transportation.
So what's new? We have heard all of the above before from Mahathir's era to Pak Lah to now Najib. Will things actually change?

We had such high hopes when Pak Lah made the above promises, but we all fell flat on our faces. Anyone remember the "18 big fish"? Or the "All out war against crime"? Or the twice announced public transportation fund in 2006 and 2008 (with absolutely nothing to show)?

He has rightly placed the prevention of crime on top of the list. But he has shown that he is absolutely unwilling to reform the police force, for he is obligated to them to clamp down on all civil and political dissent. Najib was so engrossed in grabbing power in Perak, maximised the use of the police to suppress dissent, which resulted in crime rising massively in the state over the past 6 months.

We are faced with the greatest financial scandal in living memory with the RM12.5 billion Port Klang Free Zone scandal. But til today, all we see is Najib washing his hands completely over the issue. Such a big scandal afflicting Malaysia, and yet, not a word from the Prime Minister. All he has mentioned about the subject so far is that the MCA president will deal with it. In other words, "Let Ong Tee Keat sink all by himself, I'm not going to get my hands dirty on this." How does that sit with his promise to "fight corruption"?

And public transportation? He must be joking. The most important move today is to consolidate all departments involved with transportation under 1 ministry/minister. And yet, when the Entrepreneurs & Cooperatives Ministry was dissolved under his cabinet reshuffle, the Commercial Vehicles and Licensing Board is transferred to the Prime Minister's office instead of the Transport Ministry. So we have the Prime Minister directly taking care of taxis and public buses, the Finance Ministry taking care of RapidKL buses, the transport ministry taking care of KTM and LRT, and the Works Ministry taking care of the road transport network. A complete recipe for disaster.

And as for quality of education? We've not seen any moves yet from the Najib's administration on this except to reverse the teaching of Maths and Science back from English to Malay. My views are expressed here.

I think Malaysians in general will do well not to have their expectations set too high, if they were to have any expectations at all. I'm certainly once bitten twice shy, and I never trust somebody who will use ruthless measures to suppress peaceful protests, clampdown media freedom and stifle dissent. At least for Pak Lah, he appeared to be more "liberal" with his management of opposing voices, whether intentional or otherwise.

19 comments:

Khun Pana aka johanssm said...

"prevention of crime"
After 2 hour reading that article i witness 40-45 malay youth went on a rampage at the Ain Arabia garden Bukit Bintang and they beat up a foreigner. And it is only 6pm on a Saturday.

Yes, we heard all of those before.
It is all speeches and it is nothing more than that.
Where is the IPCMC , local elections,race relation act?

purple said...

Mr Pua, for the maths & science in Secondary school matter, pls bring it up to the parliment for debate. We are truely disappointed and sad on such decision. I am really heartache when I think of the future of our younger generation.

democrazyman said...

•The prevention of crime;
•The fight against corruption;

Does that mean there will be a new state election for Perak?

Anonymous said...

Garbage in garbage out and typical rubbish.
Just vote UMNO/BN out in the next GE and since the rakyat never voted him to be PM, so just ignore this nincompoop. Not worth listening to this guy who betrayed his former boss/PM and he is a man who lacks integrity, incompetent as far as many Malaysians and the world around would like to believe.
If he thinks he has gained the popularity now, please call for a snap election!!!

Odette said...

I think that the public will give recognition if it is due. Somehow though, I cannot help but agree with you ... the whole concept that is currently being pushed forward sounds really nice like a rather expensive advertorial but fear that the actual product does not match the description. The whole concept is good but the manner in which Perak was handled and peaceful dissent clamped sends out opposing messages. PKFZ -what's the latest dig on this? - UMNO seems to bulldoze through many other policy matters without considering the views of the component parties but does not offer any assistance to OTK? Our "favourite" Umno politician, KT of Selangor getting away with all his excesses also leaves the public feeling short changed and angry at his blatant disregard for public opinion and accountability. The MACC and police force is more a convenient and selective tool used by the government to serve its needs rather than an institution that the public can believe acts with integrity and independence.

The whole point is that when the actions do not match the rhetoric, Malaysians will end up with a product which doesn't deliver but costed alot to advertise. I would rather they focused more on action and less on the packaging. Just got my first dose of propaganda on TV ..... looks nice but......

Still, I would rather not continue to rant but will give the benefit of the doubt (yet again), watch and wait.

Can someone explain more about Equinas to me?

Anonymous said...

how to implement ipcmc when the police has the evidence linking najis/fat-bitch to altantuya?

4RAKYAT

Anonymous said...

All this spin about Najib is to con us into believing that he is a nice man and doing his best to bring reforms. The baggage he carries stinks and nothing is going to change that because we have been fooled too often in the past to forget leave alone forgive.
Even if he decides to come clean his credibility can never be restored simply because he should have done so at the first instance. The abuse of national resources to protect his image is simply unforgivable and unforgettable.
This is the level of cynism he has acquired.
It is good that blogs like yours keep this at the front of the public.

Anonymous said...

same jack fruit as that offered by his predeccesor.

aint he the DPM then.

what happened?

we get no jack fruits, did we? all we get is a coup and loads of silly decisions from judges to save the coup plotter.

he got the sunday sermon preacher to sell his story but the proof of the pudding is in the eating, aint it.

until then while I await for the jack fruits, humpty dumpty humpty dumpty.

jshin said...

good piece, good move

Anonymous said...

Lets step back and ask ourselves if its reasonable to expect more than 'goodies' changes and more important, whether he is capable of more than 'goodies' changes.

When he came into office, firstly, he did not get there by himself, he got there through positioning and a series of others misfortune and fortune.

When he got there, he did not paint some bold vision but rather looked around for things he could do culminating with 1Malaysia which even then is something vague.

In other words, this guy did not really promise he was going to make great changes. But he did promise change.

What does this mean? When Najib became PM, it was NOT with our agreement, not with our mandate. 100 days later, he still don't have a mandate, donb't have an agreement. All these 'goodies' changes is part of a larger negotiation for a mandate with the people. Its going to be an ongoing process leading to next GE.

People have to remember, everything presented to them is part of an ongoing offer for their vote in the next GE. They each have to evaluate whether that negotiation is to their satisfaction OR not. Najib is doing a sales job and Malaysian have to figure out if they are easy suckers for sales pitches or tough buyers. Its as much a measure of Malaysian as it is a measure of Najib.

Satish said...

Najib is full of talk & minimal action. BN is in big trouble. He's just covering a big mess with glitter.

Anonymous said...

Only stupid persons still believe in BN!

amoker said...

Ah, talk is easy and cheap.

Wonder how he gets 65% of support. kah kah. nothing concrete so far in 100 days.

Anonymous said...

The point is Najib is making a significant comeback from his personal lows. He is selling the idea that he is rich already, has got the top job now and want to do good.

Najib don't have to do much more AND he holds on to power unless there is scandals..

So that is basically what the opposition need to hit him hard. They need sensational news and it got to be gusher...

Ooi Beng Hooi said...

When petrol price increased from RM 1.62 to RM 1.92 on 26/02/08, the government said they will utilitise the saving from fuel subsidy to improve public transport infrastructure.

Similar statement made when petrol price increased from RM 1.92 to RM 2.70 on 05/06/08.

We have seen Pak Lah and Najib personally experienced LRT and communter rides.

Any significant improvement seen?

I did not come across Singapore newspapers reporting their PM taking MRT ride. But look at their pubilc transport infrastructure development.

They are far-sighted and already implementing new lines and expansion plans for MRT in anticipation of ridership in year 2020!

Not only the government of Singapore is able to deliver their plans/ promises, they can even bring forward the completion of Downtown Line Stage 3 and Marina extension.

Malaysians want to see actions and results, not barely empty promises

Manature said...

Dear MP of my constituency,

I hope you read comments as I hope to draw your attention to RPK's expose on the hanky-panky over at MAS like for example Untold MAS story Part 2 and more. Please bring this up in the Parliament and pressure for the culprits to be brought to justice.

Emily Pratt said...

YB Tony,

You are our voice.

I hope you can help me voice this message to PM:

"Don't just talk cock. Show us the money (result first) then we talk. We, the voter is you your boss, you are our servant... remember that"

Emily Pratt

Anonymous said...

this pm of ours was born with silver fork & spoon. what does he know. all that mentioned is like great grandfather & ah-ma story. we have heard it since Tun DM time. but each time GE come, "...remember 1969..." & all that shit.

nobody can touch the IGP. not even pak lah or tun DM. why? imagine the PDRM throw their support to opposition. that's why.

crime rates are at all time high. will the IGP score full marks in the so called KPI?

the fight against corruption? how can the corrupt fight the corrupt?

access to quality education? where & how? since when we have quality education unless you put kids in private school (& that's just a feeling of being better than government). if teachers are better paid, there would not be any need for private school. who is behind all these? why are chinese school kids being made to go round kopitiams asking for donations at 7-8pm???

enough is said.

Anonymous said...

Useless promises, bare said NO action done. Shame to be the leader for Malaysia. Sigh.