British Prime Minister Liz Truss became the country’s shortest serving Prime Minister in history by resigning after only 45 days following policy failures, U-turns and improprieties. Truss’ failed policies have caused economic despair to individuals and businesses as evidenced by the steep drop in the value of the pound, hike in interest rates and inflation as well as loss of investor confidence.
Truss’ economic policy failures and U-turns is eerily familiar in Malaysia with the same and worse, faced by the rakyat and businesses under caretaker Prime Minister Sabri. Ismail Sabri recently made three U-turns in a single week on his rationale for dissolving Parliament to call for snap elections. First Ismail blamed 12 PN ministers for writing to the King opposing dissolution of Parliament on 11 October for his decision to dissolve Parliament despite recommendations by government agencies that it should be held until after the monsoon season was over.
Then on 13 October he made a U-turn by saying he did not blame the 12 PN Ministers for sending the letter to the King because they were only following orders from their party leaders. On 17 October Ismail made the second U-turn by saying he should have sacked the 12 PN Ministers for writing the letter to the King opposing his suggestion to dissolve Parliament. Then on October 19, Ismail made a third U-turn by saying that he was only joking about sacking the 12 PN Ministers.
Ismail Sabri is worse than Liz Truss in making 3 U-turns in less than one week. More concerning is his deadly silence at the steep depreciation in the value of our currency and rampant corruption. The ringgit dropped to a historic low of RM4.74 today against the US dollar, after also having dropped to a historic low of RM 3.33 against the Singapore dollar and losing more than 4% of its value this year against the Indonesian rupiah. Malaysians are questioning Ismail inaction, when they have to pay higher for imports and heightened interest costs as well as debt repayments for our government’s US-denominated loans.
Like in the UK, Malaysians also suffer from a hike in interest rates and escalating inflation and cost of living as well as the threat of an economic recession. Malaysia is worse off than the UK with rampant corruption that does not stop with the infamous RM 52 billion 1MDB scandal but also the RM 9 billion contract to purchase 6 Littoral Combat Ship(LCS), with 5 LCS to be delivered by August 2022 but not a single LCS has been delivered despite having paid out RM 6 billion. To-date not a single person has been charged for the LCS scandal.
Unlike Liz Truss who resigned, Ismail Sabri is unrepentant about his failures and has chosen instead to brazenly ask for Malaysians to return UMNO and him to power. Liz Truss’ resignation is a timely reminder of the importance of political accountability for mismanaging the economy and that Malaysians must punish UMNO and Ismail for policy failures and U-turns.