Professor Dr Jomo Kwame Sundaram said: “My view is that given the situation in the West today, it is probably Chinese finance which will be able stimulate the world economy to have a strong recovery. However, this does not mean we have a blank cheque and should accept anything that comes from China.”
He was speaking at the Asia Business First Forum on Tuesday.
The Edge Financial Daily quoted Jomo as saying: “We have to take a positive view of its potential but we must make sure that we protect the interests of the nation, the public, the consumers and the taxpayers.”
He said he would have criticised the East Coast Railway Link (ECRL) project even if it were to have been financed by firms from other foreign countries, not just China.
“I have very strong objections to [the] ECRL, partly because the projections which are made to justify the project I believe to be false and there is no way that the whole project can be justified on its own terms.
“I would criticise the project because of what we have been told, and I’m not the only one,” he was quoted as saying.
Jomo noted that Institute for Democracy and Economic Affairs chief executive Wan Saiful Wan Jan had also criticised the project despite his previous support for China’s US$100 billion Forest City development in Johor.
Jomo said he was not against all investments from China, pointing to the successful collaboration with Chinese investors that has led to the export of Malaysian solar panels.
“I think we have to be much more nuanced. It’s not a black and white world we live in, and it’s important for us to see the tremendous potential of Chinese financing for world economic recovery.
“But we must also take caution to not end up like Sri Lanka, where they built a port using public money but at the end of the day end up in a situation where they basically turned over the port to a Chinese company to run for the next 99 years,” Jomo cautioned.