2008/03/14
OPINION: Election poses no hurdles to governance
http://www.nst.com.my/Current_News/NST/Friday/Columns/2185875/Article/index_html
SHAD FARUQI
Despite losing its two-thirds majority in parliament, the government should not face serious problems in running its daily affairs, says SHAD FARUQI
AFTER the stunning results of the 12th general election, many people are wondering what is in store for the Constitution, for parliament, for federal-state relations and for the special privileges of the Malays.
The Barisan Nasional has secured 140 of 222 seats, or 63 per cent support, in the Dewan Rakyat. By Malaysian standards, this is the lowest ever. But the loss of a two-thirds majority is not unprecedented. There was a similar position after the 1969 electoral battle. The Alliance won only 49 per cent of the popular vote and 66 per cent of the seats in the Dewan Rakyat.
This time around it has more than 50 per cent of the popular vote and 63 per cent of the seats. It has 28 extra MPs above the 112 majority and is only eight short of a two-thirds majority.
By world standards, this is a very comfortable margin of victory. Successive prime ministers in the United Kingdom, India and Japan have survived and thrived on much less.
What about the fear that the loss of a two-thirds majority in the Dewan Rakyat will lead to deadlocks and gridlocks? There is apprehension that bills may not be enacted and that the budget may not be passed.
These fears have no legal basis. We are psychologically so conditioned to abnormally high majorities and resistance-free passages of legislation that when something "normal and healthy" like a 63 per cent majority comes about, we see dangers where none exists.
Under Article 62(3) of the Federal Constitution, all ordinary bills require a simple majority of those present and voting. Finance bills require a simple majority. Laws to combat subversion under Article 149 and to combat emergency under Article 150 likewise require a simple majority.
Emergency Ordinances by the Yang di-Pertuan Agong do not require prior or subsequent parliamentary approval and the government can lean on this extraordinary power in exceptional situations.
The massive amount of subsidiary legislation that is enacted by the executive requires no prior parliamentary approval.
If constituency lines are to be redrawn under Section 10 of the 13th Schedule, that requires a vote of "not less than one-half of the total number of members of the Dewan Rakyat". Barisan Nasional has much more
than one-half of the total number of MPs in the Dewan Rakyat.
However, hurdles do exist in three areas:
- Constitutional amendments under Articles 159(3), 159(5) and 161E require a two-thirds majority, and this majority the BN does not have. It must be remembered, however, that the Alliance, too, did not have this two-thirds majority between 1971 and 1974.
- Under Article 2(b), if the boundaries of a state (e.g. Selangor and Sabah in the past) are to be altered, that amendment will require the consent of the state legislature.
- If in the interest of promoting uniformity of laws under Article 76, the federal government wishes to legislate on a topic in the State List, then subject to some exceptions, such a law must be adopted by the legislature of the state.
Obviously, Selangor, Kedah, Perak, Penang and Kelantan's support for such measures cannot be taken for granted.
Other than these three areas, we can expect that lively second-reading debates will take place and government proposals will be subject to greater scrutiny. The opposition will have its say. But at the end of
the day, the government will have its way.
Constitutionally speaking, any member of the Dewan Rakyat who commands the confidence of a simple majority of the total number of members of the Dewan Rakyat is entitled under Article 43(2) to be entrusted with the office of the prime minister.
There is no requirement that this person must belong to the largest party or to any party at all. For example, at one time in India, Prime Minister Indira Gandhi was expelled from her Congress Party. In the late 1980s, Prime Minister Datuk Seri (now Tun) Dr Mahathir Mohamad was left without a party when Umno was declared illegal. Both premiers retained their posts due to their support in parliament.
However, if this support evaporates, that changes the political and legal complexion and the Yang di-Pertuan Agong will have the discretion to choose anyone else who commands the requisite confidence.
Some tensions between the federal government and the five opposition states can be expected. But this is entirely normal in a federal set-up. What is worthy of note is that the Federal Constitution provides adequate machinery (in the form of the National Financial Council, the National Land Council and the National Council for Local Government) to reconcile these conflicts.
Under the Federal Constitution, some sources of revenue are guaranteed to the states and the federal government has no discretion to hold back these funds. These sources are Capitation Grants under Article
109, State Road Grants under the 10th Schedule, and 14 sources of revenue mentioned in Article 110 and the Ninth Schedule.
In addition, there is a State Reserve Fund under Article 109(6), Conditional Grants to the States under Article 109(3), and loans. The federal government has wide discretion in these three areas.
In respect of Malay privileges, Article 153 of the Constitution is one of the best protected and entrenched provisions of our basic charter. Besides a two-thirds majority, its amendment or repeal will require the consent of the Conference of Rulers.
There is not an iota of a chance of this article being trifled with. In the areas allocated to the federal government by the Constitution, the Yang di-Pertuan Agong is the protector and defender of Malay privileges. Whatever changes the election results may have brought, Malay privileges are not legally affected.
At the state level, all constitutions of the Malay states contain provisions similar to the Federal Constitution. The Malacca and Penang constitutions do not have Article 153-type provisions. But in all areas where the federal power exerts sway, affirmative action policies are going to continue.
I do not believe that Malays have much to fear in this matter.
Dr Shad Faruqi is professor of law at UiTM.
--------------------
Anwar Demands `Major' Changes in Malaysia Race Rules
http://www.bloomberg.com/apps/news?pid=20601109&sid=aMokX6s3gktw&refer=home
(Update2)
By Stephanie Phang and Angus Whitley
Enlarge Image/Details
March 13 (Bloomberg) -- Malaysia's opposition parties, fresh from their biggest electoral gains ever, have vowed to dismantle the country's legalized system of preferences for ethnic Malays. Doing so won't be easy.
Opposition leader Anwar Ibrahim said after the March 8 elections that ``major adjustments need to be made'' to the race rules. The parties will be able to accomplish some incremental progress toward that goal
in the five states they won. They also will pressure the ruling National Front coalition to move quicker in easing the requirements.
For now, that's about all they will be able to achieve, because most of the system is controlled at the federal level by a set of 37-year-old directives known as the New Economic Policy, instituted to help the majority Malays catch up with Chinese business owners. States have little say over the NEP, and some regions controlled by the opposition are dominated by Malays who don't want their advantages undone.
``A lot of the laws are central and federal,'' said Ooi Kee Beng, an analyst at Singapore's Institute of Southeast Asian Studies. The opposition parties ``are in a daze and trying to feel their way around.''
Anwar's People's Justice Party, the Democratic Action Party and the Pan-Malaysian Islamic Party, known as PAS, won enough seats to deny the ruling coalition the two-thirds majority it had enjoyed in parliament for 34 years.
Intel, Sony
They will stop setting aside projects for Malay businesses in their states, parting ways with National Front policies. These opposition-controlled areas include Penang, a base for Intel Corp., and Selangor, host to Sony Corp. Penang also plans to do away with racial quotas when licensing street vendors.
PAS, which has controlled northeastern Kelantan state since 1990, has said it doesn't discriminate based on race, and won't in Kedah, the state it has just won.
``That would resolve a major part of the problem, but only at the state level, where we are in charge,'' Anwar, 60, told reporters on March 11. ``Hopefully, things will change, but not in the very near future.''
Opposition attempts to change the NEP may be further hamstrung by internal disagreements. Anwar's party today threatened to pull out of governing Perak, a mainly Malay state the opposition won last week, over cabinet allocations.
`Creative Destruction'
Criticism of the NEP was taboo after they were introduced in response to race riots in 1969. They were aimed at alleviating poverty and rebalancing national wealth concentrated in Chinese and British hands,
a vestige of Malaysia's status as a U.K. colony until 1957.
Anwar's opposition to the NEP emerged over time. Early in his career, he was a champion of Malay preferences. Then, in 1998, he was ousted from the government and the ruling coalition's dominant party, the United Malays National Organisation, after calling for ``creative destruction'' of Malaysia's economic system. He later began criticizing the NEP for being used to justify institutionalized corruption.
Now he wants to dismantle it. ``The New Economic Policy benefits the few family members of the ruling establishment and their cronies,'' he said.
`Very Subjective'
The ruling coalition has eased the rules as it tried to lure global investment capital from China and Vietnam and explored free trade accords with the U.S. and European Union.
Malaysia's reluctance to increase access to government contracts by changing pro-Malay policies is among issues that have delayed a deal, U.S. Assistant Trade Representative Barbara Weisel has said.
``The NEP is very subjective,'' said Gan Kim Khoon, head of equity capital markets at OSK Investment Bank Bhd. ``A lot of it is left to interpretation.''
The rules give Malays preferences over Chinese and Indians in education, jobs and investments. The country's 19 public universities admit Malays with lower grades than Chinese and Indians. Companies must sell 30 percent of their shares to Malays and declare how many Malays they employ to be listed on the local stock exchange.
``The country's economic development has been possible despite this expanding web of rules because the government has applied pragmatic exemptions,'' said Song Seng-Wun, an economist at CIMB-GK Research in Singapore. Malaysia's economy has grown an average 6.8 percent a year since 1970.
Internal Pressure
Selected foreign investors have been allowed 100 percent ownership of their local businesses since then under special provisions. In 1995, the government announced the first of a series of regions where the NEP wouldn't apply. Prime Minister Abdullah Ahmad Badawi, 68, launched a second such area in the southern state of Johor in 2006.
Suhaimi Ilias, an economist at Aseambankers Malaysia Bhd., a unit of the country's largest banking group, predicted Chinese and Indian parties in the UMNO-led coalition would call for the rules to be eased further.
``Whatever it is, something will happen,'' Suhaimi said. ``The whole point is about reinventing. And that's what this country needed going forward.''
While the opposition likely won't push for low-cost housing and other federal benefits to be dropped, the parties want them to be based on need, not race.
``Affirmative action will continue,'' Anwar said. Helping marginalized Malays ``will not be purely on the basis of race.''
Whitley in Kuala Lumpur
Stephanie Phang in Kuala Lumpur at
Last Updated: March 13, 2008 03:22 EDT
------------------
Parts of Malaysia Begin to Roll Back Race-Based Policy
http://online.wsj.com/article/SB120526100093527787.html?mod=googlenews_wsj
ASSOCIATED PRESS
March 12, 2008
KUALA LUMPUR -- Malaysia's opposition pledged to roll back an affirmative-action program in five states where it won elections, setting in motion a major reversal of the ruling coalition's longstanding but controversial policy.
The governments in the five opposition-ruled states will "reduce race-based affirmative-action policies and begin to implement a more competitive merit-based system," opposition leader Anwar Ibrahim told reporters yesterday. He said the five states will try to ensure that the poor among all races receive benefits such as low-cost homes and education.
Dismantling the affirmative-action program -- meant to benefit the majority Malays -- was one of the main promises of the three-party opposition alliance that made massive gains in Saturday's elections.
The opposition, guided by Mr. Anwar, won an unprecedented four state governments in addition to one that it already ruled. It also increased its haul in the 222-member Parliament from 19 to 82 seats. Until now, the ruling National Front coalition had never gone below a two-thirds majority since 1969, and had never lost control of more than two of Malaysia's 13 states.
The result reflected widespread disaffection among the country's ethnic Chinese and Indian minorities over social and racial inequalities, mainly stemming from the affirmative-action program known as the New Economic Policy. It was started in 1971 to help the Malays, following violent race riots in 1969 that were blamed on the wealth gap between poor Malays and wealthy Chinese. The NEP gives a host of privileges to Malays including preference in government contracts.
The Malaysian state of Penang, which was won by the opposition Democratic Action Party, fired the first salvo against the NEP, long considered an untouchable policy.
Lim Guan Eng, who was sworn in yesterday as the chief minister of the Chinese-dominated Penang, announced that state contracts will no longer be awarded based on NEP. Many state contracts are known to go to businesses with links to the ruling party.
Copyright (c) 2008 Associated Press
------------------------
March 13, 2008 22:34 PM
NEP Not An Issue In Selangor - Khalid
http://www.bernama.com/bernama/v3/news_lite.php?id=320505
SHAH ALAM, March 13 (Bernama) -- Newly sworn-in Menteri Besar Tan Sri Abdul Khalid Ibrahim said today the New Economic Policy (NEP) would not be an issue in Selangor as the government was more concerned with bringing development to the people, irrespective of race.
He said the three-party coalition comprising Parti Keadilan Rakyat (PKR), DAP and Pas, which formed the new state government following the recent general election, was not race-biased.
Instead, the whole Selangor population should enjoy the fruits of development, he told reporters after taking his oath of office as the 14th Selangor Menteri Besar before the Sultan of Selangor, Sultan Sharafuddin Idris Shah at Istana Bukit Kayangan today.
"I don't see the NEP as an issue, so I don't want to discuss about it. What I want to discuss is whether we have done enough to help the needy among the Malays, Chinese, Indians and others," he said in response to reporters' questions whether Selangor would follow the move by the DAP-controlled Penang government which proposed to abolish the NEP in the state.
Nevertheless, he said, "We must respect the rights given to the Malays as enshrined in the Federal Constitution, but not to the extent of jeopardising the cohesiveness of the society."
Abdul Khalid also said that the royal institution or the Sultanate in Selangor must also be respected because the Sultan is the head of Islam, who is responsible in safeguarding the interests and the welfare of the Muslims and the Malays.
The coalition, he said, would work towards enhancing the state's development, establish an efficient economy and ensure Selangor would continue to register growth.
He also assured the people of a smooth transition period from the previous leadership to the new one headed by him.
Abdul Khalid said: "I must commend the effort of the previous Menteri Besar (Datuk Seri Dr Mohamad Khir Toyo) whose works has ensured that the state has adequate resources and reserves to sustain the development."
It would be a challenge for the new team, he said, to enhance the state's development and at the same time facing global challenges like higher oil and commodity prices, as well as the slowing down of certain major economies including the United States.
He also said he would recommend to the State Secretary not to carry out any office refurbishment "or anything like that" or acquire a new car for the Menteri Besar to ensure there was no increase in operational cost.
Abdul Khalid said: "We want to set up a team whom the people of Selangor had voted for. They want to see us managing Selangor in the most effective and transparent manner."
He also said it was important for the new line-up to set higher priorities, more so when the Sultan of Selangor himself would monitor their performance.
"We must ensure that we have the confidence of investors and entrepreneurs... that we are here to create a better environment for business and growth," he said.
On allegations that important documents had either been shredded or taken out of the state government office, Abdul Khalid said he would look into the matter.
On his position as the new Football Association of Selangor (FAS) president, he said: "Okay (I'll be the president), but my priority is the development of the state."
Abdul Khalid is holding the FAS presidency by default following his appointment as Menteri Besar.
-- BERNAMA
OPINION: Election poses no hurdles to governance
http://www.nst.com.my/Current_News/NST/Friday/Columns/2185875/Article/index_html
SHAD FARUQI
Despite losing its two-thirds majority in parliament, the government should not face serious problems in running its daily affairs, says SHAD FARUQI
AFTER the stunning results of the 12th general election, many people are wondering what is in store for the Constitution, for parliament, for federal-state relations and for the special privileges of the Malays.
The Barisan Nasional has secured 140 of 222 seats, or 63 per cent support, in the Dewan Rakyat. By Malaysian standards, this is the lowest ever. But the loss of a two-thirds majority is not unprecedented. There was a similar position after the 1969 electoral battle. The Alliance won only 49 per cent of the popular vote and 66 per cent of the seats in the Dewan Rakyat.
This time around it has more than 50 per cent of the popular vote and 63 per cent of the seats. It has 28 extra MPs above the 112 majority and is only eight short of a two-thirds majority.
By world standards, this is a very comfortable margin of victory. Successive prime ministers in the United Kingdom, India and Japan have survived and thrived on much less.
What about the fear that the loss of a two-thirds majority in the Dewan Rakyat will lead to deadlocks and gridlocks? There is apprehension that bills may not be enacted and that the budget may not be passed.
These fears have no legal basis. We are psychologically so conditioned to abnormally high majorities and resistance-free passages of legislation that when something "normal and healthy" like a 63 per cent majority comes about, we see dangers where none exists.
Under Article 62(3) of the Federal Constitution, all ordinary bills require a simple majority of those present and voting. Finance bills require a simple majority. Laws to combat subversion under Article 149 and to combat emergency under Article 150 likewise require a simple majority.
Emergency Ordinances by the Yang di-Pertuan Agong do not require prior or subsequent parliamentary approval and the government can lean on this extraordinary power in exceptional situations.
The massive amount of subsidiary legislation that is enacted by the executive requires no prior parliamentary approval.
If constituency lines are to be redrawn under Section 10 of the 13th Schedule, that requires a vote of "not less than one-half of the total number of members of the Dewan Rakyat". Barisan Nasional has much more
than one-half of the total number of MPs in the Dewan Rakyat.
However, hurdles do exist in three areas:
- Constitutional amendments under Articles 159(3), 159(5) and 161E require a two-thirds majority, and this majority the BN does not have. It must be remembered, however, that the Alliance, too, did not have this two-thirds majority between 1971 and 1974.
- Under Article 2(b), if the boundaries of a state (e.g. Selangor and Sabah in the past) are to be altered, that amendment will require the consent of the state legislature.
- If in the interest of promoting uniformity of laws under Article 76, the federal government wishes to legislate on a topic in the State List, then subject to some exceptions, such a law must be adopted by the legislature of the state.
Obviously, Selangor, Kedah, Perak, Penang and Kelantan's support for such measures cannot be taken for granted.
Other than these three areas, we can expect that lively second-reading debates will take place and government proposals will be subject to greater scrutiny. The opposition will have its say. But at the end of
the day, the government will have its way.
Constitutionally speaking, any member of the Dewan Rakyat who commands the confidence of a simple majority of the total number of members of the Dewan Rakyat is entitled under Article 43(2) to be entrusted with the office of the prime minister.
There is no requirement that this person must belong to the largest party or to any party at all. For example, at one time in India, Prime Minister Indira Gandhi was expelled from her Congress Party. In the late 1980s, Prime Minister Datuk Seri (now Tun) Dr Mahathir Mohamad was left without a party when Umno was declared illegal. Both premiers retained their posts due to their support in parliament.
However, if this support evaporates, that changes the political and legal complexion and the Yang di-Pertuan Agong will have the discretion to choose anyone else who commands the requisite confidence.
Some tensions between the federal government and the five opposition states can be expected. But this is entirely normal in a federal set-up. What is worthy of note is that the Federal Constitution provides adequate machinery (in the form of the National Financial Council, the National Land Council and the National Council for Local Government) to reconcile these conflicts.
Under the Federal Constitution, some sources of revenue are guaranteed to the states and the federal government has no discretion to hold back these funds. These sources are Capitation Grants under Article
109, State Road Grants under the 10th Schedule, and 14 sources of revenue mentioned in Article 110 and the Ninth Schedule.
In addition, there is a State Reserve Fund under Article 109(6), Conditional Grants to the States under Article 109(3), and loans. The federal government has wide discretion in these three areas.
In respect of Malay privileges, Article 153 of the Constitution is one of the best protected and entrenched provisions of our basic charter. Besides a two-thirds majority, its amendment or repeal will require the consent of the Conference of Rulers.
There is not an iota of a chance of this article being trifled with. In the areas allocated to the federal government by the Constitution, the Yang di-Pertuan Agong is the protector and defender of Malay privileges. Whatever changes the election results may have brought, Malay privileges are not legally affected.
At the state level, all constitutions of the Malay states contain provisions similar to the Federal Constitution. The Malacca and Penang constitutions do not have Article 153-type provisions. But in all areas where the federal power exerts sway, affirmative action policies are going to continue.
I do not believe that Malays have much to fear in this matter.
Dr Shad Faruqi is professor of law at UiTM.
--------------------
Anwar Demands `Major' Changes in Malaysia Race Rules
http://www.bloomberg.com/apps/news?pid=20601109&sid=aMokX6s3gktw&refer=home
(Update2)
By Stephanie Phang and Angus Whitley
Enlarge Image/Details
March 13 (Bloomberg) -- Malaysia's opposition parties, fresh from their biggest electoral gains ever, have vowed to dismantle the country's legalized system of preferences for ethnic Malays. Doing so won't be easy.
Opposition leader Anwar Ibrahim said after the March 8 elections that ``major adjustments need to be made'' to the race rules. The parties will be able to accomplish some incremental progress toward that goal
in the five states they won. They also will pressure the ruling National Front coalition to move quicker in easing the requirements.
For now, that's about all they will be able to achieve, because most of the system is controlled at the federal level by a set of 37-year-old directives known as the New Economic Policy, instituted to help the majority Malays catch up with Chinese business owners. States have little say over the NEP, and some regions controlled by the opposition are dominated by Malays who don't want their advantages undone.
``A lot of the laws are central and federal,'' said Ooi Kee Beng, an analyst at Singapore's Institute of Southeast Asian Studies. The opposition parties ``are in a daze and trying to feel their way around.''
Anwar's People's Justice Party, the Democratic Action Party and the Pan-Malaysian Islamic Party, known as PAS, won enough seats to deny the ruling coalition the two-thirds majority it had enjoyed in parliament for 34 years.
Intel, Sony
They will stop setting aside projects for Malay businesses in their states, parting ways with National Front policies. These opposition-controlled areas include Penang, a base for Intel Corp., and Selangor, host to Sony Corp. Penang also plans to do away with racial quotas when licensing street vendors.
PAS, which has controlled northeastern Kelantan state since 1990, has said it doesn't discriminate based on race, and won't in Kedah, the state it has just won.
``That would resolve a major part of the problem, but only at the state level, where we are in charge,'' Anwar, 60, told reporters on March 11. ``Hopefully, things will change, but not in the very near future.''
Opposition attempts to change the NEP may be further hamstrung by internal disagreements. Anwar's party today threatened to pull out of governing Perak, a mainly Malay state the opposition won last week, over cabinet allocations.
`Creative Destruction'
Criticism of the NEP was taboo after they were introduced in response to race riots in 1969. They were aimed at alleviating poverty and rebalancing national wealth concentrated in Chinese and British hands,
a vestige of Malaysia's status as a U.K. colony until 1957.
Anwar's opposition to the NEP emerged over time. Early in his career, he was a champion of Malay preferences. Then, in 1998, he was ousted from the government and the ruling coalition's dominant party, the United Malays National Organisation, after calling for ``creative destruction'' of Malaysia's economic system. He later began criticizing the NEP for being used to justify institutionalized corruption.
Now he wants to dismantle it. ``The New Economic Policy benefits the few family members of the ruling establishment and their cronies,'' he said.
`Very Subjective'
The ruling coalition has eased the rules as it tried to lure global investment capital from China and Vietnam and explored free trade accords with the U.S. and European Union.
Malaysia's reluctance to increase access to government contracts by changing pro-Malay policies is among issues that have delayed a deal, U.S. Assistant Trade Representative Barbara Weisel has said.
``The NEP is very subjective,'' said Gan Kim Khoon, head of equity capital markets at OSK Investment Bank Bhd. ``A lot of it is left to interpretation.''
The rules give Malays preferences over Chinese and Indians in education, jobs and investments. The country's 19 public universities admit Malays with lower grades than Chinese and Indians. Companies must sell 30 percent of their shares to Malays and declare how many Malays they employ to be listed on the local stock exchange.
``The country's economic development has been possible despite this expanding web of rules because the government has applied pragmatic exemptions,'' said Song Seng-Wun, an economist at CIMB-GK Research in Singapore. Malaysia's economy has grown an average 6.8 percent a year since 1970.
Internal Pressure
Selected foreign investors have been allowed 100 percent ownership of their local businesses since then under special provisions. In 1995, the government announced the first of a series of regions where the NEP wouldn't apply. Prime Minister Abdullah Ahmad Badawi, 68, launched a second such area in the southern state of Johor in 2006.
Suhaimi Ilias, an economist at Aseambankers Malaysia Bhd., a unit of the country's largest banking group, predicted Chinese and Indian parties in the UMNO-led coalition would call for the rules to be eased further.
``Whatever it is, something will happen,'' Suhaimi said. ``The whole point is about reinventing. And that's what this country needed going forward.''
While the opposition likely won't push for low-cost housing and other federal benefits to be dropped, the parties want them to be based on need, not race.
``Affirmative action will continue,'' Anwar said. Helping marginalized Malays ``will not be purely on the basis of race.''
Whitley in Kuala Lumpur
Stephanie Phang in Kuala Lumpur at
Last Updated: March 13, 2008 03:22 EDT
------------------
Parts of Malaysia Begin to Roll Back Race-Based Policy
http://online.wsj.com/article/SB120526100093527787.html?mod=googlenews_wsj
ASSOCIATED PRESS
March 12, 2008
KUALA LUMPUR -- Malaysia's opposition pledged to roll back an affirmative-action program in five states where it won elections, setting in motion a major reversal of the ruling coalition's longstanding but controversial policy.
The governments in the five opposition-ruled states will "reduce race-based affirmative-action policies and begin to implement a more competitive merit-based system," opposition leader Anwar Ibrahim told reporters yesterday. He said the five states will try to ensure that the poor among all races receive benefits such as low-cost homes and education.
Dismantling the affirmative-action program -- meant to benefit the majority Malays -- was one of the main promises of the three-party opposition alliance that made massive gains in Saturday's elections.
The opposition, guided by Mr. Anwar, won an unprecedented four state governments in addition to one that it already ruled. It also increased its haul in the 222-member Parliament from 19 to 82 seats. Until now, the ruling National Front coalition had never gone below a two-thirds majority since 1969, and had never lost control of more than two of Malaysia's 13 states.
The result reflected widespread disaffection among the country's ethnic Chinese and Indian minorities over social and racial inequalities, mainly stemming from the affirmative-action program known as the New Economic Policy. It was started in 1971 to help the Malays, following violent race riots in 1969 that were blamed on the wealth gap between poor Malays and wealthy Chinese. The NEP gives a host of privileges to Malays including preference in government contracts.
The Malaysian state of Penang, which was won by the opposition Democratic Action Party, fired the first salvo against the NEP, long considered an untouchable policy.
Lim Guan Eng, who was sworn in yesterday as the chief minister of the Chinese-dominated Penang, announced that state contracts will no longer be awarded based on NEP. Many state contracts are known to go to businesses with links to the ruling party.
Copyright (c) 2008 Associated Press
------------------------
March 13, 2008 22:34 PM
NEP Not An Issue In Selangor - Khalid
http://www.bernama.com/bernama/v3/news_lite.php?id=320505
SHAH ALAM, March 13 (Bernama) -- Newly sworn-in Menteri Besar Tan Sri Abdul Khalid Ibrahim said today the New Economic Policy (NEP) would not be an issue in Selangor as the government was more concerned with bringing development to the people, irrespective of race.
He said the three-party coalition comprising Parti Keadilan Rakyat (PKR), DAP and Pas, which formed the new state government following the recent general election, was not race-biased.
Instead, the whole Selangor population should enjoy the fruits of development, he told reporters after taking his oath of office as the 14th Selangor Menteri Besar before the Sultan of Selangor, Sultan Sharafuddin Idris Shah at Istana Bukit Kayangan today.
"I don't see the NEP as an issue, so I don't want to discuss about it. What I want to discuss is whether we have done enough to help the needy among the Malays, Chinese, Indians and others," he said in response to reporters' questions whether Selangor would follow the move by the DAP-controlled Penang government which proposed to abolish the NEP in the state.
Nevertheless, he said, "We must respect the rights given to the Malays as enshrined in the Federal Constitution, but not to the extent of jeopardising the cohesiveness of the society."
Abdul Khalid also said that the royal institution or the Sultanate in Selangor must also be respected because the Sultan is the head of Islam, who is responsible in safeguarding the interests and the welfare of the Muslims and the Malays.
The coalition, he said, would work towards enhancing the state's development, establish an efficient economy and ensure Selangor would continue to register growth.
He also assured the people of a smooth transition period from the previous leadership to the new one headed by him.
Abdul Khalid said: "I must commend the effort of the previous Menteri Besar (Datuk Seri Dr Mohamad Khir Toyo) whose works has ensured that the state has adequate resources and reserves to sustain the development."
It would be a challenge for the new team, he said, to enhance the state's development and at the same time facing global challenges like higher oil and commodity prices, as well as the slowing down of certain major economies including the United States.
He also said he would recommend to the State Secretary not to carry out any office refurbishment "or anything like that" or acquire a new car for the Menteri Besar to ensure there was no increase in operational cost.
Abdul Khalid said: "We want to set up a team whom the people of Selangor had voted for. They want to see us managing Selangor in the most effective and transparent manner."
He also said it was important for the new line-up to set higher priorities, more so when the Sultan of Selangor himself would monitor their performance.
"We must ensure that we have the confidence of investors and entrepreneurs... that we are here to create a better environment for business and growth," he said.
On allegations that important documents had either been shredded or taken out of the state government office, Abdul Khalid said he would look into the matter.
On his position as the new Football Association of Selangor (FAS) president, he said: "Okay (I'll be the president), but my priority is the development of the state."
Abdul Khalid is holding the FAS presidency by default following his appointment as Menteri Besar.
-- BERNAMA
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