Stability essential for a country’s development

MAR 24 -

I think most Nepalis know that Malaysia is a multi-racial and multi-tribal country. Normally, multi-racial countries are difficult to govern because there are always going to be conflicts among the different races and the tribes. But the founding fathers of Malaysia decided that we need stability in order to develop our country. And in order to have stability, we need to ensure that there is no racial conflict. They devised a way of sharing the country. The country is to be shared among different races in a fair manner—economic resources as well as political powers. This was a wonderful formula because it has given Malaysia more than half a century of peace and stability.

There was about 50 percent poverty in our country at the time of our independence. In order to eliminate poverty, we decided that we should open up land for the landless which we did. But we very soon were left with little land to distribute. Therefore, we decided we should industrialise. Industrialising Malaysia was very difficult because we had no knowledge, we had no capital, no management skills and we knew very little about the market. Hence, we decided that we should invite foreigners to come to our country to set up industries which should be labour-intensive. Our intention was to create jobs for our people, not revenue for the government. We thought that if we created jobs for our people and they become prosperous, the country would become prosperous and eventually the government would generate some revenue from the prosperity. This strategy worked very well, allowing Malaysia to create so many jobs.

After having practically overcome the problem of joblessness and income, we thought we need to increase the earnings of our people for which we need skills. We needed to enable them to take up more responsible and more technology intensive jobs. To do this, we had to educate our people. Fortunately by that time, the country was prosperous and the government had money and we focused on education for our people through free primary education, scholarships for secondary schools and building universities.

All over the world, you will find Malaysian students. And, when they came back as engineers, lawyers, technicians, architects etc, we were already prepared for upgrading our industries for greater value

addition. Until today, Malaysia is not yet a developed country, but we hope to become a developed country by 2020.

During all these times, we had to manage politics, and the economic wealth of the country. In terms of politics, the idea of sharing power in the country worked very well. All the parties participated in the government. They retained their identities, but they joined together in a coalition, a coalition before election. That is a difference here because a coalition after election is a coalition of convenience. A collation before election means we help each other. It doesn’t matter which party the candidate is from, all the other parties in coalition support that candidate. Hence, in most cases, we had two thirds majority in parliament. This majority is very important because we can make decisions. Although the oppositions would criticise it but listening to the opposition and making some modifications, we were able to include them in our plans and carry them out. We have five-year plans 10-year plans and even 30-year plans. We developed Malaysia as per a well laid-out plan.

By the time I became the prime minister, things were all in place. Previous prime ministers had done a good job and it was for me to only enhance and improve on the plans they had laid down. And it was not too difficult, although we had to face a lot of adversities.

To us, to be a fully developed country is not just about per capita income, but also the sophistication in running the country. We need people who are capable, who are inventors. It was not a tough job to develop simply because the founding fathers found a formula to keep the country stable. Because when you share with each other, you need to agree to sacrifice something for the sake of others. If you are not prepared to sacrifice, then, obviously, there won’t be any sharing. Also, we decided that we would adopt a democratic system of government.

Some people accused us of not being democratic enough. But we are democratic in the sense at least that we are having elections in introducing the government and since the government had delivered on its promises, the same government has been elected almost every election. And the coalition at times is of 14 different parties. One can see it is a big coalition and the opposition too has come up with a coalition because they have realised that fighting alone means they will lose. Hence, Malaysia today has almost two party systems. If there are two party systems, at least one will have two-thirds majority. If you have a lot of parties, all of them will be small ones and you can never get 51 percent and they can never really set up a government that is strong enough to handle the problems of development. It is a system that requires sound skills and understanding. Many people who are new in democracy fail to understand that in democracy you must accept defeat. We find that in many Arab countries, for example, they like democracy only when they win. As we can see that when they lose they take to the streets and try to bring down the government. This destabilises the country and an unstable country can never develop.

We have to remember that political parties are there to serve the people, not to serve themselves. I had to remind myself, when I was the prime minister, that I was there to serve the people, not myself. Nevertheless, I was called a dictator. As far as I know, dictators normally do not resign. But I resigned.

(An edited version of the speech delivered by former Malaysian Prime Minister Mahathir Mohamad at the Nepal Business Conclave 2014)

Source: The Kathmandu Post