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The Royal Commission of Inquiry report into Tabung Haji’s on its financial issues is finally public, some four years after it was completed. The RCI findings point to serious weaknesses in governance, financial management, and investment decisions. And the government is now considering stronger oversight, including regulation of Tabung Haji’s investments by the Securities Commission. But is stronger oversight enough to prevent history from repeating itself? On this episode of #ConsiderThis Melisa Idris speaks with political economist Professor Emeritus Edmund Terence Gomez, Emeritus Professor of Political Economy at Universiti Malaya and has long researched the linkages between politics, policies, and enterprise.

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00:10Hello and good evening. I'm Melissa Idris. Welcome to Consider This.
00:14This is the show where we want you to consider and then reconsider what you know of the news of
00:18the day.
00:19The Royal Commission of Inquiry report on Tabung Haji has been made public four years after it was first completed.
00:27Now the RCI findings point to serious weaknesses in governance, in financial management and in investment decisions.
00:36And the government is now considering stronger oversights including regulation of Tabung Haji's investments by the Securities Commission.
00:44But should we be asking different questions? Should we be looking deeper into the problem beyond looking at corporate governance?
00:51Because is stronger oversights enough to stop from history repeating itself?
00:56So joining me on the show now is political economist, Professor Emeritus Edmund Terence Gomez,
01:02who is an Emeritus Professor of Political Economy at University of Malaya.
01:06And he has long researched the linkages between politics, policies and enterprise.
01:11So Terence, it's good of you to join me on the show to talk about this. This is quite important.
01:15Now a lot of people have been focused. So the report was sat on essentially for four years.
01:21Now it's been made public. And I think a lot of people don't know how to digest this information.
01:26There's so much that's come out. And we're looking at it from a financial management, corporate governance perspective.
01:32Can you talk to me about your research and looking back at history and what has led us to this
01:40point?
01:40What is the most important thing that you think Malaysians should take away from the RCI findings?
01:46I'm glad you raised that because the point here, Melissa, that I would like to put on the table is
01:50this.
01:50Let's stop looking at it from a corporate governance point of view.
01:54Let's look at it from a public governance point of view.
01:57Now so far we haven't heard anyone talking about it from that perspective.
02:00When we look at it from the point of view of public governance, then we look at the state, the
02:07government, the structure of the state.
02:10And Tabung Haji constitutes one major government-linked investment company, one of seven, which is controlled ultimately by the Minister
02:18of Finance.
02:19Now that becomes very interesting.
02:21Now the focus here is no longer the corporate sector.
02:23It's the Minister of Finance with the Religious Minister, Minister of Religious Affairs, who appear to have a lot of
02:30control over Tabung Haji.
02:32Now let's look at the report.
02:34And when you look at the report, the first thing that hits you is, I've seen all this before.
02:40History is, as you just said, is repeating itself.
02:43So let me take you back in history into how did we get to this point and how is it
02:48repeating itself.
02:49A defining moment was the 1997 Asian financial crisis.
02:54Then, as you know, there was a feud between then Prime Minister Mahathay and then Finance Minister Anwar Ibrahim.
03:00And Anwar was removed as Finance Minister.
03:05Now, subsequently, Mahathay appointed an economic advisor named Noam Mohamad Yaakob.
03:12And when he came on board, he looked at what was happening at all the assets that the government had.
03:20Because remember, when the 1997 global financial crisis occurred, what did the government do?
03:26They went and re-nationalized a lot of companies that had been privatized.
03:30All these companies now were back in the government's hands.
03:34Now, this brings us to another important point.
03:37What had led to this point where the government had to intervene and re-nationalize privatized assets?
03:42Now, this, we go back to the history of Tabung Haji.
03:45Tabung Haji, like PNB and EPF, were government institutions to draw funds from the people,
03:54which were then supposed to be invested, to serve their interest.
03:58Now, at that time, in 1969, what happened was, after the crisis, we had the new economic policy,
04:03and then they created a lot of public enterprises.
04:05When they created a lot of these public enterprises, they intervened in the economy.
04:08Remember that point?
04:09They were intervening significantly.
04:11And here's another important point.
04:13At that point, because they created so many public enterprises,
04:17they created a ministry of public enterprises.
04:21Because we had so many, and this is a very important point we must remember,
04:25in 1995, they removed the Ministry of Public Enterprises.
04:29And they said, we're going to create a Ministry of Entrepreneurial Development.
04:33Now, this is significant because they were saying,
04:36okay, in the 1970s, we built up a lot of assets.
04:39In fact, we had to have a Ministry of Public Enterprises for it.
04:42But then what happened subsequently?
04:44We are shifting the economic model from state intervention to privatization.
04:50We want to create private enterprises.
04:52And so a lot of these assets were channeled into private hands.
04:56But this model proved to be problematic because these assets went into the hands of people who are well-connected.
05:03The problem of cronism came up.
05:05Remember at that point, even nepotism came up.
05:08And subsequently, everything fell apart in 1997.
05:11And then we had to bail out.
05:13So now you know the history.
05:14Now that point I made from public enterprises to entrepreneurial development
05:17is a significant shift from institutions to promoting the rise of individual Bumiputra capitalists.
05:26That was the point.
05:27Now in 1998, 1999, after the crisis, they re-nationalized everything.
05:31So they had to shift back from individuals to institutions.
05:36Wow, it's a cycle.
05:37It keeps going, yes.
05:38This is the point I'm trying to make.
05:40You see the way things are moving.
05:43There's no order to the way they are thinking through their public policies.
05:48Now, okay, let's go back to this point.
05:50They have decided to go back and now have on their hands re-nationalized everything.
05:55They have what is now known as the GLC complex.
05:59When they had the GLC complex, when Noor Mohamed Yaqub came in, he looked at these institutions
06:07and they also had to be bailed out, sorted out.
06:12They set up institutions like Danahata Special Purpose Vehicles to deal with that.
06:16And Noor Mohamed Yaqub told Mahathir, there's a big problem with Tabung Haji.
06:22That means way back in the year 2000 already, the economic advisor to the Prime Minister had said to him,
06:29there's something fundamentally wrong with Tabung Haji.
06:32And this is all documented?
06:33All documented.
06:34I've even written about it.
06:35If you read my book, Minister Finance Incorporated, I state it there very clearly.
06:38But if you want to hear it from the horse's mouth, read Noor Mohamed Yaqub's autobiography.
06:44He himself said it in his book.
06:48And now he is, when you look at that, you realize what were they doing with Tabung Haji in the
06:531990s
06:54that led to this crisis that needed to be reconstituted.
06:57Now let's move forward a bit.
07:01Mahathir leaves and Abdullah takes over as Prime Minister.
07:05And one of the things Abdullah did was to introduce the GLC Transformation Plan.
07:08You remember that?
07:09Yes.
07:09A 10-year plan.
07:10Yes.
07:10This is our history.
07:12And when you look at the GLC Transformation Plan, he was looking primarily at the GLICs,
07:16the Government-Linked Investment Companies, and the publicly listed companies.
07:19And one of them was Tabung Haji.
07:22Now here's where things get very interesting.
07:24When they looked at Tabung Haji as well as the other GLICs, but let's focus on Tabung Haji,
07:29they said we need to have major institutional reforms here.
07:33And if you look at the current RCI report, and you look at the recommendations that were
07:38made at that time, exactly the same.
07:41Please go and read those documents.
07:44We've been here before.
07:44We've done this before.
07:46Exactly the same.
07:48So whatever you're seeing in the RCI report was said 20 years ago.
07:53So if they said that they had a GLC Transformation Plan and they said no politicians should be
07:59as directors, corporate governance is very important.
08:03We must look at how they operate.
08:05And Tabung Haji, this is very important.
08:07How Tabung Haji operates is very different from EPF.
08:10Let me explain that.
08:12We keep lumping them all up together, don't we?
08:16That is the problem, Melissa.
08:17They are fundamentally different types of institutions.
08:20EPF is where we, in the private sector, a portion of our salaries put in the EPF for us
08:26when we retire.
08:29So it's a sort of savings institution which every month there's a lot of money going in.
08:34Then we have PNB.
08:35PNB was created to allow people to, Bumi Putra's, to invest in PNB so that they can
08:39invest in economy so that they can redistribute wealth.
08:41Completely different from Tabung Haji.
08:43Tabung Haji was created because you want to allow the Muslim folk to go and do the hajj.
08:49And when it was created in the 1960s, it was precisely to help the poor folk to allow them
08:55to do the hajj.
08:56That was a social mandate.
08:57Completely different thing.
08:59So you can see the purpose behind the GLCs were completely different.
09:03LTAT was the pension fund for the armed forces.
09:06So when you look at these different GLCs, the first thing that comes to your mind is,
09:11okay, now that they got all this money, how do they function?
09:14The issue of functionality.
09:16Now, EPF and PNB function like typical investment funds.
09:21They just invest in companies.
09:23And then the dividends are then accumulated and then paid back into the funds of EPF holders
09:28or PNB holders.
09:30But Tabung Haji, like LTAT, was very different.
09:36Tabung Haji, for some reason, they decided it's going to function like a corporate group.
09:40So if you look at the Tabung Haji structure and you compare it with EPF and PNB, they are
09:45fundamentally different.
09:46PNB and EPF have a huge volume of companies.
09:50They just have function as investors there.
09:53They don't play any role in terms of management.
09:55But if you look at Tabung Haji, they have Tabung Haji at the top.
09:59They control a holding company which has many subsidiaries, which are involved in many sectors.
10:05So they are directly involved, as you saw in this report, in plantations, in infrastructure,
10:10you name it, they are involved in it.
10:12So they have gone into many different industries.
10:15So they function like a typical company.
10:19That is not how the others function.
10:21The same thing with LTAT.
10:23And I bring up LTAT because Tabung Haji and LTAT are two enterprises which have been mired in scandals.
10:30LTAT owns the Boston Group, which was mired in the combat shipping scandal, as you know.
10:37So there is a history there too, which is very similar to Tabung Haji.
10:41So these two organisations are most similar to each other in terms of design and structure.
10:48That is right.
10:48And they are fundamentally different from the other GLIC funds, which are pension funds or investment funds, basically.
10:54Now that difference is important because we go back to the story of the GLC Transformation Plan.
11:00They looked at them separately.
11:02And for each of them, they had an agenda of how they should function.
11:05And they allowed Tabung Haji to function as a corporate empire.
11:08But that meant they had to keep close supervision on them.
11:11That is where the corporate governance issue becomes more important for Tabung Haji.
11:15Because they have ownership and control of a large number of enterprises.
11:19And they better manage those companies well.
11:23But the problem here is this.
11:25Because they have such a huge corporate empire.
11:28And they have got so many subsidiaries and associate companies and joint ventures.
11:31The number of people who are being appointed as directors at all these different companies, which is so huge.
11:38We haven't looked at that.
11:39Even the RCI didn't look at that.
11:41Now how many politicians are functioning or were functioning as directors at companies at the lower levels, which is beyond
11:48the public eye?
11:49So there's a lot more going on here.
11:51And this is, as I said, is a public governance issue.
11:53Because ultimately, who controls Tabung Haji?
11:56It goes back to the Minister of Finance.
12:00And members of the Executive Arm of Government, including the Minister of Religious Affairs.
12:03They have enormous powers.
12:05So this is how the thing works.
12:07I am Prime Minister, come to finance Minister.
12:11I will appoint a Minister in the Prime Minister's Department in charge of Religious Affairs.
12:14And that person is in charge of Tabung Haji.
12:17That's the system.
12:20The Minister in charge of Religious Affairs will then appoint the Chairman of Tabung Haji.
12:25And as you know, as we speak today,
12:28charged in court is none other than the Minister who was in charge of Religious Affairs,
12:32who had control of Tabung Haji's, and the Chairman of Tabung Haji.
12:38Both of them have been charged in court today.
12:40So you see, the Minister and the Chairman,
12:43these are the two most important people in this structure.
12:46Between the two of them, the Minister appoints the Chairman,
12:50and I am no member.
12:51The Chairman will appoint a Board of Directors,
12:53and can also appoint the Managerial Team.
12:57Now the Managerial Team, for all intents and purposes,
12:59can run a company like a proper professional,
13:03and run it well, and do its own thing.
13:05But the Chairman, or the Minister, or someone even higher up than them,
13:09may say, I want you to do this.
13:11Political influence.
13:12Yes.
13:13Because ultimately it's controlled by the Executive Arm of Government,
13:16in fact by the Prime Minister, or the Finance Minister.
13:19Who can then inform the Religious Affairs Minister,
13:21who will then inform the Chairman,
13:22who will then inform the Managerial Team what to do.
13:25And that one instruction can completely change the way in which the whole company...
13:32It can torpedo all the best governance corporate clients
13:36if you have a directive from the very top.
13:39Yes.
13:39And undermine.
13:40And undermine the whole group.
13:42So this is what you were saying about why this is a story of public governance.
13:46This is a public governance issue.
13:48So this report was completed,
13:50this current RCI report was completed May 2022.
13:53It was only made public four years later.
13:55And if we look at timing, let's go back in history,
13:57there's been a political question around the timing of the release of this report,
14:04given UMNO's changing dynamics within the unity government
14:07and the current alignment with certain other parties.
14:10So when we think about that,
14:12about the political influence in corporate groups,
14:19corporate empires in organisations that behave like corporate empires,
14:24how do we prevent the political cycle from repeating itself?
14:29Then when one government makes decisions involving public funds,
14:33and then a later government investigates those decisions,
14:37and then those findings become politically weaponised.
14:40I see this as a cycle repeating itself.
14:42How do you see it?
14:43In fact, that's a very good analysis given of the political system
14:47because look, I talked about ownership and control.
14:50Let's put aside ownership,
14:52looking here at the corporate side of it.
14:54Let's go to control.
14:56Control is more important than ownership.
14:58Because control means this question is this,
15:02the question is this,
15:03where does power lie?
15:04Control isn't always apparent, is it?
15:07It's not clear.
15:08It's not clear.
15:09That's why I asked the question,
15:09where does power lie?
15:10And I hear when I talk about the concept of power,
15:12I use the issue of decision-making powers.
15:16Where does ultimate decision-making powers lie?
15:20Now, you talked about the political aspects.
15:23And now Abdullah comes along and has this GLC transformation plan,
15:26and we assume things will now run well.
15:28And yet, in 2017, Tabung Haji was again in crisis.
15:33What happened during that period
15:35when the reforms were supposed to have been implemented
15:39that led again to this crisis?
15:42Here, what that means is,
15:44from a corporate governance point of view,
15:45they did what they had to do.
15:47But they didn't do one important thing.
15:49From the control aspects, decision-making control,
15:53we're talking about institutions here,
15:54who has control over the institutions?
15:56Where does the control lie?
15:57There was no devolution of power.
15:59There were no checks and balances introduced here.
16:02And so, for all the corporate governance reforms
16:04that they introduced,
16:05including saying no politicians on the board
16:07and all of which didn't pan out anyway,
16:09the fact of the matter is,
16:11the ultimate point,
16:14check on the executive arm of government
16:16because they control a huge segment of the corporate sector
16:18through the GLC complex,
16:20they didn't touch that.
16:21That meant that for all the reforms that Abdullah introduced,
16:25one thing he didn't want to do,
16:26he didn't want to release ownership
16:28or control over the corporate sector.
16:32And when Najib came in,
16:34unfortunately for us,
16:35we can see we went back to the old ways
16:37where Tabung Haji then eventually in 2017
16:40landed up in the mess that it was in.
16:42Now we come to the defining moment.
16:452018.
16:45You remember 2018?
16:47We talked about what MDB,
16:48but in 2018,
16:49when the new government came in,
16:51they looked at, again,
16:53a repeat of what we saw in 1999.
16:56When Mahathir now,
16:57again as Prime Minister,
16:59he is told,
17:00there's something fundamentally wrong with Tabung Haji,
17:03just as it was in 1999.
17:05Look at how history repeats itself.
17:07And he has no choice
17:08but to introduce a mechanism
17:11to save Tabung Haji.
17:13And so you have UJSB,
17:15a special purpose vehicle
17:17which was created
17:18to take over the ailing companies
17:20within the Tabung Haji group
17:21and try and revamp these groups.
17:22Remember that part.
17:24They put that in place.
17:25Now that happened in 2018, 2019.
17:28But in 2020,
17:30while all this was going on,
17:31the government fell.
17:33Now it becomes interesting.
17:35When the government fell,
17:37Mohitin becomes Prime Minister.
17:39And remember by this time,
17:40there was a lot of lobbying
17:42and, you know,
17:44shifting among politicians,
17:46manoeuvring who was going to be the Prime Minister.
17:48And suddenly...
17:48It was the season of SDs.
17:51I'm glad you brought it up.
17:53You know that.
17:53But the point here is,
17:54a new government was formed in 2020.
17:57That government wasn't very stable.
18:00That government was under Mohitin.
18:02And in 2021,
18:05although UMNO was in the cabinet
18:06and there were about nine cabinet members
18:08who were from UMNO,
18:09one man was not in that cabinet.
18:12The UMNO president himself,
18:14Ahmad Zahid Hamidi.
18:16And by 2021,
18:17Mohitin was having problems with Zahid.
18:19And Zahid had instructed
18:21his ministers to quit
18:23the Mohitin cabinet.
18:25This is around mid-2021.
18:30Now, this is my reading.
18:31I may be wrong.
18:33But I will stand by what I'm going to say.
18:35So, one response here
18:37by Mohitin was
18:38he introduced an RCI
18:41or Tabunghaji.
18:44Now, we talk about
18:46how institutions
18:47can become
18:48weaponized
18:49for political purposes.
18:52Now, soon after he did that,
18:55his government fell.
18:56He did that in July 2021.
18:57A month later,
18:59his government fell.
19:00And Ismail Sabri took over.
19:03Ismail Sabri and Hisham Wudin
19:04were seen to be
19:05one faction
19:05against the others.
19:07There was this political
19:08one of the rings also there.
19:09But now we have
19:10an UMNO president there.
19:11But this UMNO president
19:12is not,
19:13UMNO prime minister
19:14is not the president
19:15of the party.
19:16So, there's still problems here.
19:17The ASEA report
19:19is done.
19:20And in 2022,
19:23the report is ready
19:25for tabling.
19:26In fact,
19:27it was given
19:28to the cabinet.
19:29Ismail Sabri was prime minister.
19:30That report was given
19:31to Ismail Sabri
19:32and his cabinet.
19:33And let me remind you
19:34who else was in that cabinet.
19:36PAS,
19:37Bersatu,
19:38UMNO.
19:39All of them were there.
19:41They were all part
19:42of the cabinet.
19:42How quickly we forget
19:44that PAS, Bersatu,
19:46UMNO were all there
19:47and they all saw
19:48that report.
19:49They all saw that report.
19:50In 2022.
19:51I'm putting that
19:52on the table here
19:53because let's remember
19:53what happened in parliament.
19:54When they walked out.
19:55And how PAS walked out.
19:56Yes.
19:57But my question is,
19:58PAS, how can you walk out?
20:00You were part
20:00of the government.
20:01You saw that report.
20:01You knew exactly
20:02what was happening.
20:03You saw that report
20:04yourself in 2022.
20:07But let's give
20:09the benefit of the doubt
20:10to the responsibility government
20:11because the government
20:11decided to call
20:13for elections.
20:15So, in 2022,
20:16there's a change
20:17of government
20:18and we have
20:20a new government
20:20and now again
20:21it's a hung parliament.
20:24Coalition is forged
20:25and UMNO is back
20:26in power.
20:27But Ahmad Zahid
20:28is now Deputy
20:31Prime Minister.
20:33So, UMNO is not only
20:34back in part
20:35of the ruling coalition.
20:36They also hold
20:37the position
20:38of Deputy Prime Minister.
20:39Now, let's go back
20:40to the question.
20:41Meanwhile,
20:42what happened
20:43to the RCI report?
20:45Surely, the new government
20:46led by Anwar Ibrahim
20:49and Zahid
20:50have the report
20:51on the table too.
20:53And what was done
20:54with that report?
20:55Nothing.
20:58Nothing was done
20:59with that report.
21:01And nothing happened
21:02until we saw
21:04last month
21:04when we saw
21:05the Negeri Simulan
21:06state election
21:07and suddenly
21:07there appears
21:07to be a feud
21:08between UMNO
21:09and PKR
21:10and suddenly
21:11the report
21:12is now tabled
21:14in the public domain.
21:16Declassified.
21:17And the people
21:17who are all
21:19alleged to have
21:20committed a lot
21:21of crimes here
21:22within Tabung Haji
21:23are none other than
21:24UMNO leaders
21:25themselves.
21:27Now, what does
21:28this story tell us?
21:31we are dealing
21:32with funds
21:33from poor people
21:34in this case
21:35Tabung Haji.
21:36Poor people
21:36giving their funds
21:37their savings
21:38putting money
21:38in their savings
21:39so that they can
21:40go and do the hajj.
21:41There's an element
21:42of trust
21:42by these people
21:43in the government
21:44that they will
21:44look after their savings
21:45and invest it properly
21:46for their well-being
21:47so that they can
21:48perform the hajj.
21:49Right?
21:50And instead
21:50what does Tabung Haji do?
21:52They go and get involved
21:53in all kinds
21:54of business deals
21:55which was exposed
21:56in the RCI.
21:57So many dubious deals
21:58were exposed.
21:59And this is something
22:00a trend we have seen
22:01in the past
22:02before
22:03in the 1990s
22:04the same thing
22:06is happening again
22:07and when you see
22:08all this
22:09the question then arises
22:10who takes responsibility
22:12for all this nonsense?
22:14It goes back
22:14to the executive
22:15arm of government
22:17and this is where
22:18the problem
22:18becomes really serious.
22:20Is this government
22:21really serious
22:22about cleaning up
22:23corruption
22:24in this country?
22:25Is the government
22:27really serious
22:27of ensuring
22:29that the institutions
22:30in which they
22:31accumulate a lot
22:32of funds
22:32and situated
22:33within a GLC complex
22:35which they control
22:36there are proper
22:36checks and balances
22:37and transparency
22:38and accountability
22:39in the system.
22:40All this is missing
22:41and this is the thing
22:43that is exposed
22:44in the RCI report.
22:45Well you've laid it out
22:46for us Terrence
22:46the fact that history
22:48keeps repeating itself
22:49and goes all the way
22:50back to
22:531970s
22:53even
22:54when it was all
22:55first conceptualized.
22:57So do you think
22:58that this will happen again?
22:59How do we stop
23:00history from repeating itself?
23:01This comes back
23:02to how the government
23:03will act today.
23:06It's not just a matter
23:08of having an RCI report
23:09and the corporate
23:10governance issues
23:10being cleaned up
23:11and making sure
23:12this mess is now
23:13and dealt with.
23:13So it's not just
23:14about the RCI report?
23:16It's about institutional
23:16reforms in terms
23:17of ownership
23:17and control
23:18of the companies
23:19under the GLC ecosystem.
23:22Has there been
23:22any discussion
23:23on this?
23:24Nothing whatsoever.
23:26Now we come back
23:26to a second point
23:27I said earlier.
23:29Tabung Haji functions
23:30in a manner
23:31which is very different
23:32from the others.
23:34I feel
23:35Tabung Haji should function
23:36like an investment fund.
23:38It is not Tabung Haji's
23:40role to become
23:40a corporate empire
23:41and to be involved
23:42in all kinds of
23:43business deals.
23:44That is not what
23:44it was set up for.
23:45When it was set up
23:47in the 1960s
23:48by Unku Aziz
23:49when he suggested it
23:50and it became
23:50Tabung Haji,
23:51it was just
23:52collect the funds,
23:53invest it properly,
23:54get the dividends
23:55and make sure
23:56that that money
23:56is then used
23:57to allow these people
23:58to go and do the hajj.
23:59That was all
24:00they were supposed to do.
24:01Who gave them
24:02the mandate
24:02to suddenly become
24:03a corporate empire
24:04and this was sanctioned
24:05also approved
24:05by none other
24:06than Abdullah's government
24:08when they did
24:09the GLC transformation plan.
24:10Why should they
24:11be asked
24:13to become
24:13a corporate empire
24:14where the risk factors
24:15are very, very great?
24:17Is it possible,
24:17is it feasible
24:18to unwind
24:19and untangle
24:20those decisions
24:21to rethink
24:23Tabung Haji's
24:24structural design?
24:26In fact,
24:26I would argue
24:27that that was
24:28one of the things
24:29in the defining moment
24:31really,
24:32Melissa,
24:33was 2018.
24:34We had the chance
24:35to revamp everything.
24:39Remember,
24:39in 2018,
24:40the reason why
24:41the Najib government
24:43fell
24:43was because of
24:441MDB.
24:461MDB is a GLC
24:49and this is a point
24:51I want to repeat
24:51to whenever I speak
24:53about this issue,
24:54I want to remind people,
24:541MDB was a GLC.
24:58In 2018,
24:59the run-up to the election,
25:00Mahathir repeatedly
25:02made this point
25:02and he called
25:03the GLC ecosystem
25:04a monster.
25:06Remember,
25:06he called it a monster
25:07and he said
25:08we must revamp
25:09this monster.
25:11Well,
25:11he could have
25:12but he didn't.
25:13That is the point.
25:15Remember,
25:15they had
25:16an institutional
25:17reform committee,
25:18they had a committee
25:18of eminent people
25:20which was created
25:21to look into all this.
25:22Remember,
25:23there was supposed
25:23to be a report
25:25after 100 days.
25:26Now,
25:27I'm putting all this
25:27on the table
25:28because I want to say this
25:29and I want to be
25:30very clear about this.
25:32Politicians repeatedly,
25:33when in opposition,
25:34complain about the GLC system,
25:35they complain about
25:36all the abuse
25:37of all these
25:38important institutions
25:39including Tabunghaji
25:40and LTAT
25:40and yet when they come
25:42to power,
25:43what do they do
25:43to bring about
25:44real change?
25:46Politicians don't want
25:47to release
25:49the enormous power,
25:50economic power
25:51they have
25:51through their control
25:52of the GLC ecosystem
25:53because it helps them
25:54further entrench
25:55their political power.
25:57The politicians
25:58have failed this miserably
26:00and when they
26:01have the chance
26:02to do it,
26:02they repeatedly
26:03refuse to act.
26:04Terence,
26:04if you see the word
26:05GLC reform
26:06in the next
26:08election manifesto,
26:09will you believe it?
26:12I don't think
26:13they're going to say it
26:13in any...
26:14You don't think
26:15it will make an appearance
26:16in any political manifesto?
26:18Because it will be
26:19the laughingstock.
26:20The party will be
26:21mocked if they do it
26:22because let me say
26:23this to you.
26:24To be clear
26:25so the audience
26:26knows this.
26:27First,
26:28the GLC ecosystem
26:29that we talked about
26:30has always so far
26:32been at the federal level.
26:33But if you look
26:34at the state level...
26:35We haven't even
26:36touched that.
26:37We haven't gone there yet
26:38and if this is happening
26:40at the federal level,
26:41please,
26:42let's be clear.
26:43I'm sure this is also
26:44happening at the state level
26:45and every state
26:46has got a GLC ecosystem.
26:48Now, let's look
26:49at the parties
26:49that control the GLCs
26:51in these different states.
26:52Past controls
26:53a couple of state governments.
26:57I'm not controls
26:57a couple of state governments.
26:59DAP controls Penang.
27:01PKR controls
27:03Selangor.
27:03PBB controls
27:05Sarawak.
27:06And we are talking here
27:07about all the major parties.
27:10So,
27:11all the major parties
27:12in this country,
27:13the ones who are
27:14most likely to win
27:15the next general election,
27:16all of them
27:17also control GLCs
27:18at the state level
27:18and all of them,
27:19to my mind,
27:20if we do a proper investigation
27:21and I'm willing
27:22to bet on this,
27:24we will find
27:24a lot of wrongdoings
27:26or public misgovernance
27:29occurring at that level too.
27:31Now,
27:32do these politicians
27:33at the state level
27:34or at the federal level
27:34want to give up
27:35that economic control
27:36that they have?
27:37No.
27:38Why?
27:39Because,
27:39let's be clear,
27:40let's put it all
27:41out there.
27:43Through their control
27:44of this economic wealth,
27:45it's a source
27:46of funding
27:46for the party.
27:48Eventually,
27:49it becomes a source
27:49of political financing
27:51for the party
27:52which is from
27:53the public office
27:53which nobody knows about
27:55and now all parties
27:56seem to be doing it.
27:58So,
27:59we have a serious problem
28:00in this country.
28:01There's no political will
28:02on the part of any party
28:03to bring about the reforms.
28:05So,
28:05to answer your question,
28:07which party
28:08is going to be brave enough
28:08to come and say
28:09this will probably be
28:10the breakaway parties
28:11like Basama?
28:12We might have to push
28:13and I think it's on us
28:14to push for a political
28:15financing act.
28:17Terrence,
28:17before we open
28:18another Karen of Worms
28:20on the show,
28:21we've run out of time.
28:21I regret to say it
28:22and I want to thank you
28:23so much for sharing
28:23your research
28:25and your knowledge
28:25with us today.
28:27That's all the time
28:27we have for you
28:28on this episode
28:28of Consider This.
28:30I'm Melissa Idris
28:31signing off for the evening.
28:32Thank you so much
28:32for watching
28:33and good night.

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