Mat Hasan fears M'sia heading towards post-Arab Spring destitution

Umno acting president Mohamad Hasan fears that Malaysia is slowly heading in the direction of Arab Spring countries, which became destitute post-revolution.

He said the Pakatan Harapan government has failed to keep its promises, leaving the economy, national debt, and people's livelihoods in shambles.

"The economy is getting worse, debt is increasing, and people lives are becoming harder not easier.

"So Malaysia seems to be heading in that direction (of the Arab Spring countries).

"We don't want Malaysia to be that bad, but slowly but surely, if nothing is being done, our country is slowly moving towards that," Mohamad told reports in Rantau today.

Mohamad cited, Iraq, Egypt, and Libya as examples of countries worst off after a revolution.

Iraq was not part of the Arab Spring, as the Saddam Hussein regime had been deposed by the US.

This, however, led to political instability in the country - including the rise of terrorist group ISIS - which hurt the economy. The World Bank estimated the Iraq's gross domestic product only grew 0.6 percent in 2018.

Likewise, Libya and Egypt's economy suffered due to political instability following the Arab Spring in 2011.

However, Egypt's economy has since improved under the leadership of a new autocratic regime, which adopted a broad-reform programme by the International Monetary Fund in 2016,

Standard Chartered reported that Egypt is set to become the world's 7th largest economy by 2030.

On the domestic front, the Pakatan Harapan government claimed it had been left to bear over RM1 trillion in debt and liabilities by the previous BN government.

However, Prime Minister Dr Mahathir Mohamad said today that the country is in a healthier financial state with the national debt reducing as a result of GDP growth.