Restore Local Elections, Not Racial Fear

Agora Society Statement on 12 December 2018

Agora Society is disappointed at the statement made by the current Prime Minister Tun Dr Mahathir Mohamad at a local government event for insisting there would be no reinstatement of local elections under the Pakatan Harapan (PH) government. Local elections formed an integral component of Malaysia’s democracy until it was unceremoniously suspended in the 1965 and formally abolished with the passing of Local Government Act in 1976. By abolishing local elections, Malaysians are essentially being denied the right to vote for its local councillors which contradicts the principle of democracy. Therefore, Agora Society is of the view that local elections should be restored as soon as possible.

The Prime Minister reasoned that local elections may produce the wrong result which will create a division between urban and rural local councils. Firstly, Agora Society wishes to emphasize that a political mandate coming from a free and fair local elections would only lead to a democratic result which is certainly not wrong in any manner. In fact, local councillors that are elected through local elections would have more political legitimacy and accountability towards its voters unlike the appointed councillors Malaysia currently has now.

Also, the suggestion of an impending racial conflict due to local elections is baseless and could be easily refuted. Since 2008, Malaysians have had witnessed a change of state governments numerous times without descending to racial violence and the change of federal government from the most recent General Election further exemplifies Malaysian’s propensity towards accepting any election results without resorting to physical violence.

The newly appointed Deputy Minister of International Trade and MP of Bangi YB Ong Kian Ming has also correctly pointed out that the ethnic composition of urban city councils have changed significantly through an article dated 2015. For example, the 2010 census data shows that the Malay population (45.9%) within Kuala Lumpur City Hall is more than the Chinese population (43.2%). The Deputy Minister even proclaimed that out of the 3 city halls, 9 city councils and 37 municipal councils in Malaysia, only 6 have populations where the Chinese outnumber the Malays. This gives further credence to the argument that local elections might not produce an outcome where Chinese would occupy most of the local council seats in urban areas.

Agora Society was also aware that at the same event, the Prime Minister has also warned the local authorities not to simply abuse its power and even uttering the famous phrase 'power tends to corrupt, absolute power corrupts absolutely'. However, the local authorities in Malaysia would always be more susceptible to instances of corruption and abuse of power so long as local councillors are appointed by state government. The appointment system falls short of checking the decisions made by the local government as the only entity

that the local councillors are only accountable to are the governing parties of the state government. Therefore, if the Prime Minister is sincere in preventing corruption and abuse of power, he should immediately restore Malaysian’s long abandoned ‘third vote’.

Furthermore, Agora Society is also dismayed by the fact that strong advocates of local elections prior to the last General Election has seemingly turned a deaf ear or feeling indifferent towards the Prime Minister latest announcement. For instance, the aforementioned article written by YB Ong Kian Ming was actually a rebuttal towards Hadi Awang who has expressed similar racial concerns towards having local elections in Malaysia in 2015.

Other than that, the current Minister of Finance also had a history of trying to restore local elections through judiciary means when he was still the Chief Minister of Penang. In fact, the former Chief Minister of Penang used to explain that the state government is powerless to unilaterally push for local elections as long as the Local Government Act 1976 is not amended. Thus, with the change of federal government, PH has ran out of pretexts and advocates of local elections acting lukewarm towards this issue now is wholly unacceptable.

Equally, the Housing and Local Government Minister has also said that local elections will be implemented in 3 years. To sum up, there is no shortage of people in the PH’s cabinet that are supportive of the idea of reinstating local elections. Agora Society is concerned that the current Cabinet would bear no difference to the previous BN’s cabinet if the Prime Minister’s views are deemed to be final and not properly challenged within the cabinet or by the government backbenchers in the Parliament.

Finally, Agora Society also opposed to the idea that restoration of local elections to be deferred indefinitely because it was not stated as one of the promises from PH’s Manifesto. Agora Society ought to remind the PH government again such excuses are at best naive and at worst disingenuous. PH’s Manifesto has explicitly stated that Pakatan Harapan is committed to strengthen local democracy and the PBT’s accountability to the local community will be improved, and only by reinstating local elections where the local governments in Malaysia would have any semblance of local democracy and a certain degree of accountability. Therefore, until there is a proper local election in place, Malaysia will continue to have a local government that is not by the people or of the people.

Agora Society Malaysia

12.12.2018

*Agora Society Malaysia is a loose network of individuals who believe in the principles of democracy and good governance. More information please visit http://agoramalaysia.blogspot.com/ or http://www.facebook.com/agora.msia

Eliminate employment discrimination in all sectors, including discrimination in public services

Joint Press Statement by 5 Civil Society Organisations, March 13, 2019

5 civil society organisations urge the government to comprehensively eliminate employment discrimination in all economic sectors, rather than selectively eliminating discrimination in specific areas. This should include discriminatory practice in public services.

We support the statement of Minister in the Prime Minister’s Department, Waytha moorty, who vowed to eliminate employment discrimination in the private sector, that "Malaysia should not have any form of discrimination.... I hope that employers will focus on uniting all ethnic groups through employment, because this will maximize our workforce."

But we would like to remind Waytha Moorthy that the government is the largest Malaysian employer which hires 1.7 million employees, which is 10% of the current 16 million labor force in the country. Eliminating employment discrimination by excluding the public service sector will raise doubts about selective justice. The current composition of public services and top civil servants completely fail to reflect the demographic of Malaysia.

Why the FundMyHome ‘property crowdfunding’ scheme is bad news

Press Statement by Agora Society on 11 November 2018 in Kuala Lumpur

The Agora Society has been closely following the Pakatan Harapan government’s commitment to provide affordable housing options to all, and is deeply concerned about the recently announced, government-backed P2P financing scheme ‘FundMyHome’ (described in the Budget 2019 speech as a ‘property crowdfunding’ platform). We feel that this scheme was rolled out too hastily and falls remarkably short of its purported priority of providing secure and stable long-term homeownership to aspiring first-time homeowners. While the prospect of moving into a, say, RM250,000 house – for five years – instantly with only a downpayment of RM50,000 (or 20%) might seem alluring at first glance, we are fearful that first time homeowners may be obscured from the scheme’s long-term implications.

For a start, buyers do not have full ownership of the property, and their rights as owner are only fully realized once they have fully paid for the property after the initial five-year period. According to our calculations, first-time homeowners intending to stay in the property for more than five years will be financially worse-off by the end of Year 5 (Figure 1). Row (f) of Table 1 and Figure 1 show that if the annual home value appreciation rate is 5% per annum, buyers would end up with an additional debt of RM37,911 relative to a scenario where they utilised a standard mortgage[1]. This additional debt figure rises to a staggering RM104,757, relative to a standard mortgage, if the annual home value appreciation rate is 10% per annum. This shows unequivocally that the price of refinancing – necessary to keep the house beyond the initial five-year period – is much higher than that of a standard mortgaged property. Buyers will need their household income to increase by at least 5.81%, or 1.19% in compound annual growth rate (CAGR), during the 5 years just to keep pace with the burgeoning home value. If a first time homeowner is not able to afford a standard mortgage for said property at the beginning, it is highly unlikely he or she will be able to afford a significantly higher refinancing cost five years later (see Rows (f) and (g) of Table 1).

Mahathir Mohamad must recuse himself from the MA63 Committee

//Press Statement by Agora Society Malaysia on 12 October 2018//

The Agora Society is shocked at the announcement by Liew Vui Keong, Law Minister in the Prime Minister’s Department, that the committee set up to review the 1963 Malaysia Agreement will be headed by Prime Minister Mahathir Mohamad.

We are of the view that, for over 20 years as prime minister, Mahathir undermined the democratic and electoral processes in Sabah, and connived at the plunder of Sarawak’s wealth and natural resources by corrupt politicians, all at the expense of the Sarawak people. It would therefore not be too far-fetched to say that Mahathir is the root cause of the various problems and the inequality gap between East and West Malaysia today.

Given Mahathir’s lack of moral credentials to assume such an important role, the pledge by the PKR, DAP and Amanah leaderships to promote democracy, integrity and clean politics will ring hollow should the Pakatan Harapan (PH) government give its approval.

Racialisation of Pakatan Harapan

Press Statement by Agora Society on 17 March 2018

Agora Society congratulates Pakatan Harapan for releasing the GE14 manifesto Book of Hope that embodies significant reforms such as the decentralisation of federal power, abolition of draconian laws, electoral reforms, introduction of EPF for housewives and anti-sexual harassment bill.

However, we regret to note that the Book of Hope also shows complex characteristics of populist, welfarist, reformist and racialist that compartmentalise Malaysians along racial lines. The 203 pages of manifesto has mentioned in total 25 times the term Bumiputera, 35 times Malays, 5 times Chinese, 48 times Indian and 24 times Orang Asal. Many preferential social and economic policies for Bumiputera were openly stated.

On the contrary, the PR’s Orange book back in 2013 vowed to shift the focus of the government policies from ones that are based on Bumiputera equity to ones that aim at the increment of household income of all Malaysians. It also stressed that affirmative actions should be need-based rather than race-based. While the Orange Book also upheld the constitutional protection of Islam, Malay language, special position of Malays and the Monarchy, most of its policies were based on universal rights for all citizens and classes.