Part 2 - Visionary Cronies

What will you do if you were involved in an accident along the ever-hectic LDP highway?

To be precise, the accident took place on the wee hours of the morning rush or the time when the blue collars were getting home after a stressful day. Of course, you will be making a scene which passer-by will slow down and gaze at you like you’re a gazelle in a zoo. Also, you’re not hitting any dumb concrete wall but another person car, and worst both cars had to be towed away.

I bet you will call your friends which were staying near-by which is proven to be useful to help you deal with the situation too.

Maybe this is naïve perception, but wouldn't this type of actions done by politicians too. What I’am implying here is that when politician were in the need to execute a development task or required some sort of detailed suggestion, they will call forth their cronies in order to get the job done. This is because; they are the ones familiar with these type of particular tasks. An instrument. PM knew their effectiveness and as well their ability to execute something. Without doubt, in modern world where people seek to gain easy money by cheating, back-stabbing or blackmailing; it is important to seek help from the people we trust. Just as if we were involved in an accident along LDP.

Back in the days when Dr. Mahathir was in the helm of government, people were making noises about his cronies’ policy. People thought that he is giving away easy money to these corporate people in return of sure win for the election run. Big names such as Robert Kwok, Syed Al-Bukhary and Tun Daim Zainuddin were the ones which are deemed as Mahathir’s tightest cronies. Well, IMHO, Tun himself cannot single handedly run a country and achieve what has credited to him today. The title of Bapa Pembangunan wouldn’t be there not because a set of cronies that Dr. Mahathir had.

Not to over-exaggerate the person that I admired, but Tun has utilized his cronies like a magician with its sparkling magic wand. With a neat black coat, clean white shirt underneath and red bow clinging near the neck, he cast a magic which spurned KLCC, Formula 1 tracks, KLIA and MSC which alluded our view from seeing the dark and ugly side of politics. Of course, Mahathir had to intervene lots of things which can be morally questionable. But we were filled with joy and pride. Marvel at these stuff. The love of our nation and the ‘Malaysia Boleh!’ slogan lauded here and there without stopping for bereavement. We were given a slice of paradise of what it could be amongst the best and well respected nation in the region perhaps the world.

But, not all of Mahathir cronies are good in executing his Wawasan 2020 notion. Eric Chua nearly crippled Perwaja steel. Our main steel processing company. We could just sell iron-ore to the mat-sallehs and get easy money, but what Perwaja did is turning these iron-ore into a value added products which sells at higher price. ( Just like we heard Singapore buying our kayu balak and made it into furniture and selling it back to us ). Venturing into steel industry needed real lots of money. We had to borrow from the Japanese (with interest, of course) to purchase those ore smelting machinery which costs bajillion of dollars. Perwaja , although, not reaching the magnitude of success brought by Petronas or Proton, still managed to create jobs and spurned a lot of Datuk Sris and orang kayas which daughter or son can have their own sports car and may be speeding off the LDP in their overgrown Gucci/DKNY/Guess/Ray-ban shades.

Bakun is one of the flopped Megaprojects which has turned into miniproject. Used to be one of possible largest dam in the world which may empower the whole Malaysia, including each pengkikir kelapa in Perlis till the disco lights bulbs of Johor ( possibly selling some AC/DC to Indonesia ). It has downgraded to supply hydroelectric to Borneo and later only to Sarawak needs. Who could guess which cropped area shall only benefit by Bakun next? Pity whoever Mahathirs’ crony handling this project. It was economic recession by then when this project began to stall and stun. Cough, cough and fell coma.

Today, no doubt, anyone who becomes the prime minister has a set-of-cronies in order to execute some significant task which requires lots of multi-spectral co-operation to be done smoothly and in controversially. Like the Kedahan famous utterance of: “ Buat bagi jadi, cukup “ ( Make it done, shall be enough ). A prime minister may get green-light from the cabinet. Total nod from the public but without cronies that are capable, thoughtful and daring, efforts can proved to be futile. All politicians with their agendas shall have cronies, if not; all their vowed promises during ceramahs and manifestos could be nothing but hot air.

Now, Malaysia has been experiencing what I called the lackluster in physical and economic development. Of course, when asked, Pak Lah cleverly answered that he is focusing on human development and capital. He ascertained that they should not be first class magnanimous futuristic city like Putrajaya and Cyberjaya filled with its citizen still chomping bubble gum and spitting it on the bus-stop waiting chair. As the saying goes: Third-class mentality, first class facility. He lauded to eradicate this third class mentality.

Still, after years, we could see the third class mentality is still very much alive. While our eyes were focused and hungry towards change, a good disease which Mahathir bought ( remember when we waited patiently for the Twin-Tower to finish to claim the highest tower and countdown to Commonwealth? ), now our eyes are definitely accustomed to see what changes brought by Pak Lah as PM. Have you seen anything yet? Perhaps we should give Pak Lah another 18 years, by then, it all will be visible.

Perhaps, the Pak Lahs’ sets-of-cronies really lacked in vision. They never envisioned anything great or fantastic as Mahathir cronies had. Yet, easy money were still given out to them ( thus, may bankrupt the nation as well ). Malays which were considered as privileged and given some perks had to fight amongst Malay to decide whoever deserved the perks. That’s ugly and sounded childish. Sometimes, it made me think that are Pak Lah cronies are those people that lepak at the kedai kopi and bragged about how Pak Lah should deservedly nominated as Bapa Pembangunan Modal Insan ?. Later, heed off with his BMW X5/Harrier/Muranos/Q7 to brag about the same matter to different kampungs.

Its not that difficult to imagine what type of Pak Lah cronies are. Clearly, we see KJ lauding the Mat Rempits as Mat Cemerlang. In his exhaustive effort to rebrand them by endorsing their polar jump,then Pak Lah seeks his advice. I guess by now, you’ll know what type of Pak Lah cronies are. If there is a Harvard educated Malay put side-by-side with a selekeh Malay with 4Mbps broadband connection with ‘people of higher-places’, the latter may be richer than the first. Plus, how often heavy crime occurred lately?

Oh well, if Malaysian were addicted to new and visible development, I guess Tun Dr. Mahathir shall be fully blamed for bringing this ‘bad’ habit to Malaysian citizen. But again, Tun was blamed for the wrong thing: He was blamed to strain the Malaysian budget with his Mejaprojects which costs Bajillion ringgits which restricted physical development today. A legacy problem.

The prospect BN will win a majority in coming election is somewhat there. But, granted, if Pak Lah wins another mandate as PM. Please, get some visionary cronies.

Finally, I would like to apologize if my definition of cronies are too shallow or sounded naïve. And apologies to those overgrown shades owners and BMW X5/Murano/Q7 owners. I wasn’t implying you to those mentioned above people, just a dramatized exemplary.