LETTER | Politicians should now close ranks

LETTER | With the unity government in place, newly minted prime minister Anwar Ibrahim must have been spending long hours planning and strategising various initiatives on how he could deftly steer the country back into economic health.

While doing all these, he must also look at the composition of his cabinet and these are both sensitive and difficult.

He has to accommodate the requests of the component parties of his government as well as select clean and capable ministers. This balancing act is intricately difficult and delicate.

The supporting parties should also not exert undue pressure on the PM and leave it to his wise discretion.

Their biggest boost in lending support to Anwar’s unity government as advised by our Yang di-Pertuan Agong is the ability to implement their own initiatives, parallel to the PM’s own efforts.

We are all aware that the country’s coffers are seriously scraped, with the EPF and Petronas milked to the extreme.

The PM has openly declared that he is foregoing his salary as he can live off his MP’s allowance. All the appointed cabinet ministers can follow his example.

In fact, another good initiative would be to do away with the many unnecessary allowances that MPs enjoy, such as allowances for parking, entertainment, hand-phones, and a host of others. All these are superfluous and a waste of public funds. Extraordinary situations demand extraordinary measures.

If political parties are true to their mettle, stop campaigning publicly about whom you wish to have as the deputy prime minister. Instead, these unity government parties should harness their energy to have initiatives complementing the PM’s, such as proposing a 20 percent cut in the MPs’ allowances towards a fund to help the government.

Already, the PM is seriously looking at how the B40 or even B60 could be assisted. After all, all these parties had publicly campaigned during GE15 that they can do this and that for the poor rakyat. Now is the time to show your true mettle, and show it by concrete actions rather than empty promises.

On the part of the government, its hands are full, having a humongous debt to service as well as a high operating budget.

All these monetary sacrifices and contributions can be channelled into a fund to alleviate the woes of the struggling B40. Food prices have risen tremendously, children need to be fed and schooled, wages have remained stagnant and many are more concerned with having their stomachs full rather than having nutritious meals.

It is time for MPs and the rich to show their kindness and action. We have seen pictures of politicians buying votes by openly going around handing out cash. You should do that now if you are really kind and benevolent.

The government also needs to be really serious on the issue of the ugly two Rs – racial and religious extremism. And sad to say, our education system has not been spared of these two Rs.

The basic thrust of education is reading, writing, and arithmetic, but in the last decade or so, we see the additional two Rs being incorporated into it. Small wonder why parents are shying away from the public school system and prefer to pay heftily for private education. They simply cannot cope with the two additional Rs.

We look forward to a capable team of cabinet ministers and prudent fiscal policies. A clean, administration, backed by capable leadership and supported by action is what the country needs to realign itself with economic health. We can be great again.

The views expressed here are those of the author/contributor and do not necessarily represent the views of Malaysiakini.