Amanah strategy director Dzulkefly Ahmad said this was because for three consecutive years, Najib had failed to achieve his targeted growth, and it was on a downward trend.
“Looking at the current condition, in order to achieve US$15,000 (RM64,500) by 2020, considering the gross national income (GNI) per capita is US$9,096 or RM37,738 in 2016, we need to at least have 12% (13.5% to be exact) yearly GNI growth consistently every year until 2020. That’s mission impossible,” he said.
Dzulkefly said Najib set a comprehensive economic transformation plan to propel Malaysia’s economy into a high income economy in 2010.
The plan aimed to lift Malaysia’s GNI to US$523 billion by 2020, and raise per capita income from US$6,700 to at least US$15,000, meeting the World Bank’s threshold for high income nation.
It was projected that Malaysia would be able to achieve the targets set if GNI grew by 6% per annum.
Dzulkefly said the Bank Negara Malaysia 2016 Report recorded per capita income of US$9,238 (RM36,078) for 2015 at an exhange rate of US$1 to RM4.01. For 2016 it registered per capita income of US$9,096 (RM 37,738) at an exchange rate of RM4.45.
For 2017 until March, per capita income had increased to RM39,656 but because of the exchange rate with US$1 at RM4.45, it was quoted at US$8,906 or US$ 9,889 (if the exchange rate was taken at US$1 to RM4.01 )
“More importantly, for three consecutive years, Najib failed to achieve his targeted growth and it is on a downward trend. Bank Negara registered a downward growth rate of 6% GDP in 2014, 5% in 2011 and 4.2 % for the year 2016. BNM has projected growth rate of 4.8% for 2017.”
Therefore, he said, achieving a high income economy in 2020 was “mission impossible”.
He said Minister in the Prime Minister’s Department Abdul Rahman Dahlan’s contention that the biggest challenge to Malaysia becoming a high income nation by 2020 was the weakness in the ringgit was “at best only half-truth or at worst misdirected or flawed”.
“Even if the ringgit strengthens, the growth rate does not allow for such US$15,000 GNI per capita to be achieved come 2020.
“Be that as it may, Najib is reported to have said recently that Malaysia is ‘firmly on the path’ to becoming a high-income nation. For now, it is undoubtedly not a small feat, Mr PM!”
Dzulkefly said it would be better for Najib to remain focused on achieving socially equitable development where disparity of both income and wealth continued to be reduced, while corruption and leakages were effectively stamped out.
“Focusing on achieving higher productivity and higher value-added enterprises would surely be more significant.”
Dzulkefly ended by asking if the government had a strong political commitment to achieve this.