Budget 2014: Najib’s transition to hand-to-mouth economy and abandonment of ‘the future’.

BN managed to steal another term at the seat of government despite commanding less than majority support of the electorate in the GE13. Any right thinking organisation who suffers a near defeat like thus would be taking a hard look of reassessment in the mirror, and right the wrongs that got them there in the first place.

The 2014 budget would be the ideal opportunity and crucial platform for Najib to convert the promise he made on the campaign trail pre-PRU13 of 'transformation' and reform into reality. With the budget for the forthcoming year tabled afore our eyes, not only do we see that it was all a lie, it is also clear that there was no intention to transform in the first place.

Since the 5^th of May, the BN government is not only refusing to right the wrongs and have seen very little ‘transformation’ if not none at all, but definitely a great deal more of the same old ugly traits of the devil we have known for too well and too long.

The government’s own figures shows that 60% of the nation are eligible for BR1M  thereby 60% of Malaysians earn less than RM3000 per month thereby being below the tax paying threshold. With the introduction of GST, they will now be paying tax. We can see through the tabling of the GST, that BN is adversely affecting, in effect robbing the general masses including the poor and struggling lower middle class, to further enrich the super rich, as seen from 1% reduction of corporate tax.

What is also damningly worrying is the general direction of the BN government’s economic rationale. In simple terms, the ratio between operational expenditure (OpEx) and development expenditure (DevEx) is akin to the relationship to a business’s ration between money allocated to overhead and paying the bills (OpEx) and money allocated to buying assets and equipment to improve or expand and develop.

The general rule of thumb when looking at administrative budgets is that a year-on-year increase in the OpEx budget, means the more the organisation is having to focus on the present, vis a vis a reduced focus on the future. Naturally, the higher the percentage of DevEx signals a stronger focus on improving the organisations capacity to grow or develop, thereby less of a focus on the future.

What we can see on the graph (Fig.1) above is a systematically orchestrated decrease in DevEx since 2010. More astounding, not only is this trend apparent in terms of DevOp percentage of total budget, but in absolute currency term, the BN Government is cutting DevOp by 3.2 billion, a whopping 6 % year on year. This is counter-characteristic to a developing nation claiming to gun for developed status within the next 6 years, and clearly shows that Najib is abandoning investments in future growth.

Corresponding to that, year on year increase in OpEx sounds another spine-shivering alarm bell. The systematic increase in of OpEx from 73.6% when Najib first tabled a budget as Finance minister cum Prime Minister, to its current crippling 82% signals an unsustainably ballooning government bubble, heading for inevitable explosion.

Some conspiracy theorists have touted this as Najib’s strategy of ‘investing’ in a larger ‘brainwashing training camp’, in the guise of a growing civil service which BN views as a fixed deposit constituency, to ensure continued support for BN. In political-economic term, this is simply too much government, with no governance, at the expense of the nation’s future.

The general outlook if I had to give one on this particularly budget based on these figures, which is but the tip of the enormously huge RM264.3 Billion iceberg, is thus; Najib has only the interest of maintaining power, apparent in his astoundingly bold increase in resources he intends to deploy in growing the ill-fit-for-purpose government machinery; and near-blind-shortsighted-ness in fatally cutting DevEx, indicative of an abandonment of any investment in the future beyond this election cycle.

Najib is nursing his desperation and maintaining the 56 year old lie that is BN at the expense of not just the Malaysians today, but our generations to come. GST, rising fuel costs and abolishment of sugar subsidies are frightening but is but a small part of the darkness in the coming four years ahead.

Those walking the corridors of power are laughing at us whilst we face dark prospects ahead. We the people have but limited options in voicing our fears and choosing an alternative path, one of which is through the process of democratic elections. That Failed.

What other options do we have?

By

Enflaming

Really

Strong

Insurrecting

Hearts

4 a better Malaysia to do the needful? Maybe….

Decision is yours.