The inflationary pressures in the economy have made life difficult for the low income and the middle class Malaysians, who are finding it difficult to make ends meet. Base on quarterly rates provided by the department of statistics in Malaysia the consumer price index has gone up from 1.8% in April to 3,3% in the month of July. The rate in month of June was 2.5%. Consumers have to pay more for food & non alcoholic beverages where the rate has increased to 3.8% percent in July from 3.4% in June.
Based on the statistics it obvious that the price of basic items such as food has gone up and this nullifies the Government assurance that there would not be a drastic increase of price food items after the imposition of GST. Furthermore the continued decline of the ringgit has already exacerbated the inflationary crisis.
With the impending interest rate hike in the United States there would be a further decline of the ringgit.
Malaysia is going through Cost push inflation that is due to high cost of materials, which is the factor of production. Most business imports their raw materials from overseas that are quoted in US dollars. It is obvious that business establishments have passed the cost to the rakyat. The introduction of the GST, reduction in Fuel subsidies, profiteering suppliers who have capitalized from the imposition of GST, middle man transactions, and the unresolved MDB crisis are issues that are directly and indirectly related to inflation.
The Government has recently come up measures to restore the confidence in the equity market by injecting RM 20 billion to Value cap for investment. This will not resolve the fundamental issues that affect the rakyat in terms of cost of living. It is puzzling that the ethno centric red shirt rally that took place on September 16 seems to be more of parody of ethnic pride, rather than highlighting real issues such as inflation.
The introduction of the Goods and Services Tax( GST) was a wrong move and worse still at a wrong time. The Government should cancel immediately the GST collection to ease inflationary pressure. Also to reduce the extra costs of burden to the public.
Therefore I called the government to take effective remedial measures to addressed inflationary pressures affecting the rakyat. From the facts above, it obvious the Prime Minister Najib has failed to address issues related to cost living that resonates with ordinary people.
A Responsibility Government places the well being of common people has its main priority. I therefore urge the government to urgently convene a special parliamentary session to address the critical issues related to inflation.