- Berikut senarai 10 kesilapan Utama yang telah dilakukan oleh mantan Perdana Menteri Tun Mahathir sebagaimana yang ditulis oleh Nawawi Mohamad dan Wong Chun Mei dalam Malaysia Chronicle
- Dasar Ekonomi Baru (DEB) - Menurut bekas Menteri Kewangan Malaysia dan rakan karib Tun M, Tun Razaleigh Hamzah, DEB dirangka untuk meningkatkan penyertaan kaum bumiputera dalam aktiviti ekonomi tetapi telah diterbalikkan oleh Tun M untuk melahirkan segolongan kapitalis Melayu yang menjadi usahawan istimewa dengan disumbat berbagai peluang mewah dari kerajaan sehingga pecah perut.
- Mengutamakan kroni sedangkan rakyat terbesar tak dapat apa-apa - Tun Mahathir telah mengumpulkan semua kekayaan negara ke dalam tangan segelintir orang yang amat bernasib baik seperti Vincent tan, Robert Kwok dan Ananda Krishnan. Mereka selain itu hanya menikmati kuah saja sedangkan habis isi telah dibelasah oleh kumpulan pilihan. Akibatnya orang Melayu menjadi sebahagian daripada 96% mereka yang miskin dan 40% daripada mereka berada dalam golongan yang amat rendah pendapatan.
- Menaruh kepercayaan pada orang yang salah - Mereka seperti Tajudin Ramli, Halim Saad, Rashid Hussein, Mohd Noor Mutalib dan Abdul Rahman Maidin menggambarkan keadaan ini.
- Menjadikan negara kaki hutang - Hutang negara membuncit sehingga melebihi RM450 billion. Selama 22 tahun memerintah satu senpun tidak disimpan oleh negara untuk hari hujan.
- Lemah pengetahuan mengenai ekonomi - Mahathir hanyalah seorang doktor perubatan dan beliau bukanlah seorang pakar ekonomi yang baik. kelemahan tersebut membuatkan segala tindakannya tidak mempunyai asas yang betul dan kukuh.
- Menghidapi sindrom Diktator - Salah satu contohnya adalah beliau mengubah perlembagaan untuk mengurangkan kuasa Agong dan para Sultan. Beliau juga menjadikan sistem kehakiman menurut segala kehendaknya sepertimana tindakannya memecat Tun Salleh Abbas. Akibatnya rakyat sampai sekarang masih syak wasangkan dengan keletusan sistem kehakiman.
- Polisi perkauman - Beliau meyakinkan rakyat Melayu bahawa apa yang dilakukannya adalah demi kepentingan orang Melayu. Badan seperti BTN seumpamanya digunakan untuk menyebarkan dakyah agar menaruh curiga pada bukan Melayu
- Rasuah - Beliau bukannya melawan rasuah sebaliknya menyuburkannya lagi sehingga negara menjadi sepertimana yang ada sekarang ini.
- Campurtangan dalam pengurusan negara - Selepas 55 tahun memerintah Melayu masih lagi ketinggalan dan susah hasil daripada jagaan khas pemerintahan Umno/BN dan ini membuatkan orang Melayu mula kecewa dan mula beralih pada pembangkang. Melihat itu beliau lalu menyerahkan kuasa pada Pak lah dengan harapan boleh menguruskan negara secara kawalan jauh. Malangnya beliau tak dapat kawal Pak lah lalu melancarkan gerakan menjatuhkannya bagi menggantikan Najib. Kini Najib juga mengalami perkara yang sama. Mahathir sampai sekarang masih nak kacau pengurusan serta pemerintahan negara.
- Mengkacau bilaukan Umno dan menolak naik Mukhriz - Beliau dengan terang sentiasa menyokong anaknya untuk naik ke atas tanpa memperdulikan apa nak jadi dengan Umno. Lagipun bukankah dia juga yang membiarkan Umno diharamkan lalu menubuhkan Umno yang baru. Apa dia peduli...
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Former premier Mahathir Mohamad has criticized every prime minister of
Malaysia from the late Tunku Abdul Rahman to the current leader Najib
Razak, sparing no one except of course, himself. Mahathir has also
criticized other world leaders including UK's Tony Blair and of course
George W Bush, the 43rd president of the United States.
So far none of his local peers have swung back at him, which is not
surprising considering that several are already dead and only Najib and
5th prime minister Abdullah Badawi are alive. As for the international
leaders, they have largely ignored Mahathir's existence, which only adds
to his frustration, but there is nothing he can do to them. However, he
can make life miserable for his successors here, and this he is already
doing.
When Mahathir retired in 2003, after 22 years as PM, there was talk about his 'great' legacy and he was even called Bapa Pemodenan or
Father of Modernization. Some 9 years after his retirement, the
excesses and sheer ill-judgement of his economic, social and political
decisions have come back to wallop the nation with a backlash stronger
than the ferocious tsunami of 2006 that devastated much of South Asia.
At 86, Mahathir is now reviled by most Malaysians, blamed for the
massive corruption that may soon bankrupt the country if no remedial
economic action is taken, and for the apartheid-scale racial fissures
amongst the various ethnic groups in the country.
NEP
Just pick the New Economic Policy, which was the brainchild of the
policymakers of the 1960s but which he abused to the maximum. This abuse
alone is enough to ensure that he will stay in the Malaysian Hall of
Villains rather than in the Hall of Fame which he still thinks he
belongs in.
His peers with better memories including former Finance minister Tengku
Razaleigh Hamzah said last week that the NEP was never meant to create
or to be used to incubate a class of Malay capitalists, but to address
poverty and to raise the level of Malay participation in the economy. It
was never meant to be abused by the government of the day to handpick a
select group of Malay entrepreneurs, load them with sharply-discounted
government deals and then expect them to prosper and create enough
economic ripples to help lift the rest of the community.
This was Mahathir's first and major mistake. But was it really a
mistake? Doubters and critics point to the enormous wealth he
accumulated for his cronies and proxies through the money-making schemes
hatched under the guise of the NEP, and by privatizing government
assets to favored Malay entrepreneurs, one of whom is the disgraced
former MAS chairman Tajudin Ramli. Not able to deal with the 'instant
success' or the stress of big time business, many succumbed to debt
during the 1998 Asian financial crisis. Tajudin and friends like Halim
Saad fell from hero to zero, losing enormous amounts of money and
requiring massive government bailouts.
Cronies but the masses get nothing
The second mistake Mahathir, in his foolishness, made was to pool the
major part of the nation's wealth in the hands of a few. This time he
included non-Malays millionaires such as Vincent Tan, Robert Kuok and
Ananda Krishnan. Tan has just announced his retirement, Kuok unhappy
with the worsening racial system in the country has chosen to stay Hong
Kong, while Ananda is wanted by the Indian authorities for allegedly
having corruptly wangled a telecoms licence to buy into Aircel.
This pooling of wealth in the hands of a few inevitably left the
ordinary Malays and Malaysians with just a few crumbs to share amongst
themselves, a slow-boil situation that has blown up to today's red-hot
disputes about social and economic fairness. Not only is there not
enough money for scholarships, education, healthcare, employment and
welfare for everyone, even the Malays who have been repeatedly told by
Mahathir's Umno party that they will get priority, have left in the
lurch.
Malays now form 96% of the poorest 40% lowest income earners in the
country. As for the non-Malays, of course, they have felt the pinch
more. Many have been forced to go overseas to work and to study. That's
right, educational and employment opportunities are scarce for the
non-Malays in the country. Again, the only group that benefited were the
elite in the Umno party, their families and cronies. So Mahathir -
despite his self-praise - was in fact rather shortsighted. Money was far
more important to him than he cared to admit.
Trusting the wrong people
The third mistake that Mahathir made was choosing the wrong people for
the wrong jobs. He also trusted the wrong people. All of the Malays
tycoons that he picked had no real business savvy but were merely the
trusted aides of former Finance minister Daim Zainuddin. That is why
guys like Tajuddin, Halim, Rashid Husein of RHB Bank, Mohd Noor Mutalib
and Abdul Rahman Maidin of MRCB fared poorly in the end. Some have even
been hauled to court to settle debts.
Only Daim Zainudin remains 'filthy' rich. His nominees ended up owning
all the various banks and business enterprises meant to be transferred
into Umno Baru. Somehow, as the Umno legend goes, Daim managed to secure
these for himself. This was obviously a huge letdown for Mahathir.
Instead of 'tricking' people over to his point of view, for once, he had
been had!
Set Malaysia off on the borrowing habit
Mahathir did not foresee that the National Debt could be as high as it
is today, having ballooned to over RM450 billion. Despite several
'begging' trips to Singapore and Brunei, he was politely rebuffed. In
the end, he borrowed from overseas by issuing bonds and 'stealing' every
spare sen from Petronas and the other Government-Linked-Companies to
fund his mega projects. Throughout his 22-year rule, Mahathir never
saved a sen for Malaysia for a rainy day. And this was his fourth
mistake.
Weak grasp of economic principles
Mahathir is just an ordinary doctor; a general practitioner and not a
specialist. His understanding of economics is as rudimentary as the
average Malaysian. His idea of increasing the equity of the Malays is so
simplistic - use the GLCs. Mahathir’s vision of doing business is by
profiteering through controlling shares in as many companies as possible
without considering the possibility of losing money. Sad to say, real
life businesses involves losses, not just profits.
Mahathir’s economic policy was not based on any solid foundation and had
never been tested in any country before. It was based on his opinions
and viewpoints. If these had been any good or worked, many countries
would have already implemented similar ideas centuries ago. Even
established capitalist and communist economic systems have come under
fire and economic collapse is a norm these days, part of a man-made boom
and bust cycle. Several economists have even urged nations to revert
back to gold-based currencies, an ancient and established type of
monetary system, so what are Mahathir’s child-like economic concepts by
comparison? His fifth mistake is therefore his skewed understanding of
the economy. It led to the controversial de-pegging of the ringgit from
the US dollar and the overnight closure of the CLOB share market trading
in 1998 - two events that investors have still not forgiven Malaysia
and Mahathir for.
Dictator syndrome
Mahathir's ego and unconscious desire to be a dictator is his sixth
mistake. He amended the constitution to weaken the Agong and the Sultans
and then made sure that the law and enforcement bodies obeyed him. He
sacked the Chief Justice Tun Salleh Abbas and closed both eyes when
judges were openly bought by those who had money. It would be tough for
Malaysians and their investors to fully trust the judiciary system
again. This is why the Umno-BN has lost its integrity and the people
their faith in the coalition. Malaysians will always distrust whatever
Umno-BN does even if it may be well-intentioned.
Racist policies
To prevent the disintegration of his policies and his misdeeds from
being exposed, Mahathir had to resort to his favorite racial politics.
He had to convince the Malays that what he had done was necessary and in
their interests. He kept for himself the great jewels and gave out the
small chips so as to convince the Malays that the war against the other
races was real. The non-Malays had to be kept back. Thus the budget
allocations for places like BTN or the National Civics Bureau where
Malay graduates and civil servants were openly taught to be suspicious
of the other races.
But not all the Malays bought it. Such teachings were against Islam and
also against universal values. The Malays were left confused, while the
non-Malays totally sidelined. So being racist is Mahathir's seventh
mistake.
Corruption
If Mahathir and Umno have been successful in making sure Malaysia
achieves developed nation status by 2020, why does the record show so
many serious faults to date. There are only eight years to go but the
economy is still in a shambles with the national debt soaring, racial
and religious harmony in disarray, and the political situation worsening
with Umno-BN now openly resorting to physical violence to stop the
opposition from holding their rallies.
The education system is also leading nowhere, healthcare is getting
worse and more expensive, the much-touted and corrupt 1Care already
rejected before it can even come on-stream, law and order is still
questionable, mismanagement and graft more entrenched than before in the
Umno-BN government. Instant of all cylinders kicking in, and
culminating into the realization of Vision 2020, Malaysia may go
bankrupt instead. Not fighting corruption, but perpetuating it is
Mahathir's eighth mistake.
Meddling with the running of the country
The majority of the Malays are poor and still need government help
despite 55 years of Umno “successes“ (read failures). The non-Malays
have been patient enough and have given Umno enough chances. They have
waited until the third generation after the nation's independence in
1957 and they are now fed-up with Umno-BN. The same too is happening
with the Malays. Those not in the direct line of the Umno gravy train,
and this would be the great majority, are getting fed-up too. More have
voted for the opposition and will continue to do so.
When Mahathir realized that things were turning sour, he handed over the
baton to Abdullah Badawi, thinking that he could still control the
running of the government by 'remote control'. But when things were not
carried out as he had wished, Mahathir forced an ouster and replaced
Badawi with Najib. Granted, the disorganized Badawi was in no capacity
to lead Malaysia but Najib is just as incapable too. All through,
instead of giving a helping hand, Mahathir continued to meddle with the
running of the country. Interfering with the running of the country and
disallowing the current leaders to put in solutions that suit the era is
Mahathir’s ninth mistake.
Causing trouble in Umno and pushing Mukhriz up the ladder
Yet Mahathir stubbornly refuses to accept or to admit to his mistakes.
This is one man who refuses to face up to reality. He is not really
interested in the welfare of Malaysians at all, not even the Malays or
Umno. He only wants to save his face and to make sure that his son
Mukhriz will become prime minister no matter what deals he has to
execute with the current batch of Umno warlords to effect this.
Ruthless and completely selfish, Mahathir would think nothing of
creating chaos just to fulfill that ambition. After all, he could
de-register Umno just to stay in power. Imagine what he won't dare to do
to get Mukhriz in as Umno president. But it is this incessant
interfering and trouble-making in Umno that will be his tenth and last
mistake.
Mahathir will doom Umno, and in imploding, Umno will very likely take Mahathir down for the count.
