THE government’s initiatives so far may seem populist but are quite necessary to ensure stability.

An irate rakyat is the last thing Prime Minister Anwar Ibrahim needs right now, that could scuttle his efforts to calm muddled waters, dissuade Malay-Muslim sentiment and bring everyone back into a moderate, progressive fold. 

Yet, social programmes are expensive, especially when you consider Malaysia’s large proportion of people needing assistance and civil service.

Any initiative covering the B40 would involve nearly 2.92 million households, at Malaysia’s 3.8 per household, bringing the number over 11 million people.

Even a minuscule allocation of RM100 for groceries, would set the government back 1.1 billion ringgit per month, or 13.2 billion a year.  

To make matters worse, economic factors aren’t in our favour, and the only saving grace seems to be that population growth has slowed down after Covid-19.

Subsidies, along with civil service wages are the two parts of our budget with high compound growth. As unpopular as it is, these need to be tackled. 

Privatisation and private-public partnerships are nothing new, and there are government units under the Prime Minister’s Office that constantly explores this avenue.

The problem has been, in the past, that targeted units with high growth potential were hindered by government involvement, or profitable units that can be spun off internationally, or into adjacent business areas, providing more revenue for the government.

We saw TNB, Telekom Malaysia and LHDN born this way. We saw infrastructure like ports and train services go private, and the higher growth and job opportunities are testament to the success of these corporatisation exercises.  

Perhaps it is time to look at the less profitable parts of the government machinery. Real estate, for example. 

Housing is part of government benefits for its employees and are scattered around the country.

The police and military have barracks and quarters attached to stations and bases, and more senior ministries like Customs have entire blocks of housing built, concentrated around their areas of activity.

In some areas, like Putrajaya, these are sometimes combined into “joint” civil service quarters. Over the years, these have grown and could be tapped for financial potential.

The government can look at repurposing additional units or blocks into rentable housing units.  

Similarly, disused offices, instead of being left abandoned and in disrepair, could be rented out for small and medium businesses, drop ship businesses, or even refurbished as shared workspaces for up-and-coming startups, or government mentored entrepreneurs.

These can all be further monetised via real estate investment trusts (REITs) or similar funds, to generate more revenue for the government. 

Instead of direct subsidies for the needy, a portion of those subsidies could instead be used for education and refurbishment programmes, to improve social mobility and help those on assistance improve their income levels and not need help.

We should be looking at eradicating and not be transfixed on B40, a permanent feature of any population, with realistic goals to move more people into a taxable bracket, or better still, a sustainable consumption-based system to stabilise and improve our national income source. 

Private companies can be invited to participate in bodies promoting sports, agriculture, environmental, social, and corporate governance, technology as partners in ownership, with KPIs to lower government spending, improve productivity and achieve goals.

To continually “promote” something without realising deliverables is aimless and involving profit-driven parties in them could be the incentive they need to realise our national goals. 

As we have successfully corporatised national profits before, it is time for us to use a similar strategy to improve our national losses. – April 19, 2023.

* Emmanuel Joseph firmly believes that Klang is the best place on Earth, and that motivated people can do far more good than any leader with motive.

* This is the opinion of the writer or publication and does not necessarily represent the views of The Malaysian Insight. Article may be edited for brevity and clarity.