POLICIES on poverty eradication should be focused and reflect realities on the ground, said former United Nations Special Rapporteur on extreme poverty and human rights Philip Alston.

Alston, who wrote a report for the UN about Malaysia’s poverty from an 11-day visit here last year, said he observed that Putrajaya’s policies were general, rather than targeted.

“When I was in Malaysia, I (asked about) the key policy challenges in relation to housing, food, state of women, and so on.

“The answer was (there is) no poverty and so we don’t really have to address these particular issues,” he told The Malaysian Insight in a Skype interview in conjunction with the release of his UN report yesterday.

“(With) general policies, the problem is that the poor never benefit from such policies.

“General policies are aimed at the middle class and the wealthy and unless you have a specific focus, you (shouldn’t) come up with those policies.”

Citing affordable housing for the low-income group as an example, Alston said problems related to public housing include poor living conditions and a long wait for assistance.

There will be little progress in ensuring better housing for poor people unless the government shapes its policies around “real world statistics”, said Alston, who has disagreed with Putrajaya on the national poverty rate of 0.4%.

Although poverty is often associated with rural areas, Alston said the presence of soup kitchens in and around Kuala Lumpur also reflects the state of urban poverty in the country.

“Even in Kuala Lumpur there are soup kitchens every night – a wonderful indicator of real poverty because no one goes to a soup kitchen unless they don’t have an alternative.

“If you line up at a soup kitchen every night you are in serious difficulty and to leave that to voluntary agencies and pretend the (poverty) figures are not really as high as they suggest, is just to deny reality,” he told The Malaysian Insight.

“Politicians need to get out at night in the capital, go to these areas, look at the people lining up, speak to them and understand the situation they are in,” he added.

Alston said Malaysia, at one point under the Pakatan Harapan administration, had appeared to be exploring a range of policy options to address poverty.

However, he described the current government’s move of defending the absolute poverty rate of 0.4% as a “depressing development”.

He said no country in the world had such a low poverty rate, and that Malaysia ought to revise its poverty rate to show a more inclusive picture of marginalised groups.

“It is not that Malaysia is doing much worse than other countries, but it is completely ignoring the one-fifth of the population who are really experiencing poverty.”

The UN also released Putrajaya’s response to Alston’s report.

Putrajaya, in response to Alston’s findings from his research visit last year, said the 0.4% poverty rate is derived from internationally accepted standards.

“Malaysia stands by its absolute poverty rate, which was recorded at 0.4% of total households, or 24,700 households, in 2016.

“This poverty rate is derived from internationally accepted standards based on the Canberra Group Handbook on Household Income Statistics, Second Edition (2011), which is published by the UN.

“As such, the assertion made by Professor Alston that there is ‘a statistical sleight of hand that has nefarious consequences’ is wholly unacceptable and irresponsible.” – July 7, 2020.