From Murray Hunter
Newly created Parti Bangsa Malaysia (PBM)’s policy platform launch on Dec 21 didn’t get too much publicity due to the flood crisis and the platform escaped any deep analysis.
The policy platform, titled “The Great Reset 2030” and launched by Nor Hizwan Ahmad, a former political secretary to plantation industries and commodities minister Zuraida Kamaruddin, is strikingly similar to the “The Great Reset” initiatives espoused last year at the World Economic Forum (WEF), held in Davos, Switzerland.
Nor Hizwan espoused that “The Great Reset 2030” should be embraced by ordinary Malaysians. He used the emotive arguments that Malaysia is now far behind its neighbour Singapore because of “systemic” socio-political, economic, technological, and education issues.
In addition, Nor Hizwan condemned racial and religious based politics that has divided the nation.
These arguments, many will agree, specifically target the Millennial and Zoomer generation, who will be able to vote for the first time during the next general election.
PBM’s solutions to Malaysia’s problems closely follow some of the WEF Great Reset ideology. Nor Hizwan identified five technological disruptions that are putting Malaysia behind the rest of the world. These include artificial intelligence (AI), robotics, genome sequencing, blockchain, and clean energy.
Nor Hizwan’s solution is for Malaysia to embrace Industry 4.0.
This is unsuitable for the majority of Malaysia’s 1.15 million cash-strapped micro, small and medium enterprises (MSMEs).
Industry 4.0 is the latest buzzword to which the current government has already allocated RM45 billion over the next five years.
Most of the funds so far have gone to large corporations to undertake Readiness Assessment Programmes on the premise of increasing current worker productivity by 30%. The beneficiaries of this scheme have been a small group of connected elite consulting companies.
Industry 4.0 requires extremely high capital investment, long learning curves, and long payback periods. Very few of Malaysia’s current MSMEs can afford to do this.
Many Industry 4.0 systems are not agile as claimed. The vast majority of Malaysian MSMEs still rely on manual labour, utilise rudimentary production methods, and operate on shoestring finance, with spasmodic customer bases.
Consequently, there are going to be few multiplier effects from the large elite companies that take up the Industry 4.0 Readiness Assessment Programmes, which are subsidised by taxpayers.
PBM might be better off focussing on the 5.6% of the population in poverty, which effects one in 20 Malaysians, or 1.7 million people. There is a greater need for the transformation of rural industries and SMEs in the Malay heartlands, and urban areas that aspire to increase their revenues and incomes.
It appears that the new paradigm that PBM advocates is best suited to the elite, rather than the masses. PBM needs to offer a policy that will benefit all of the people across the demographic spectrum of Malaysian society.
PBM’s policy is just the same as that of the current Ismail Sabri government.
In addition to PBM’s plagiarising of the WEF’s “Great Reset” narrative, there are a number of other issues that need to be further investigated. These may bring the party’s six pillars comprising young people’s aspirations, being multiracial, representing women, education, economy, and technology into question.
There are deep suspicions that PBM is a vehicle being readied for the Azmin Ali and Zuraida group, along with the other PKR defectors.
The 53,000 members from Penggerak Kommuniti Negara (PKN), who were reported to have pledged allegiance to PBM, were from an organisation formed by Zuraida under the auspices of the housing and local government ministry when she was its minister.
PKN is now led by Nor Hizwan. Even though PKN is an NGO, there have been questions over the its close links to the Ismail government.
This is consistent with PBM’s own pledge of support to the current government, hardly an independent position supporting the narrative of the Dec 21 launch.
Murray Hunter is an independent researcher and former professor with the Prince of Songkhla University and Universiti Malaysia Perlis.
The views expressed are those of the writer and do not necessarily reflect those of FMT.