IT’S fair to say Lim Guan Eng’s style has not gone down well with everyone. 
     
Over the past 36 hours, political comrades and friends have been giving him advice, much of it unsolicited. They would like the new finance minister to be more ministerial and ‎less like the fierce opposition warrior he was for three decades.

They suggest Lim hires professional media help so that his press releases don’t sound as if Armageddon is around the corner for Malaysia.

They would like him to take a step back, think through the issues at hand and be aware that sometimes, he may not have the complete picture. Exercise prudence before sending a spray of gunfire in the direction of any imagined enemy of the state.

In short, Lim’s critics and well-meaning friends want him to remember that his every word and action carries far more power and pull now than ever before. 

He is the Finance Minister of Malaysia. His words can move the stock market and influence whether investors view Dr Mahathir Mohamad’s Malaysia as a worthwhile play or a feel-good tale minus the storybook ending.

Lim is a fast learner. He will get the concern over his comments on the 1Malaysia Development Bhd (1MDB) scandal and the trillion ringgit debt that the Pakatan Harapan (PH) government inherited from Najib Razak and friends.

A Bloomberg writer had said Lim could do with more tact on these issues, but this is from the same news agency that called Najib Razak a survivor who would be able to scrape through the May 9 polls.

So there will be occasions when his DAP DNA will comes to the fore but by and large, expect the former chief minister of Penang to be more ministerial in the months to come. 

He may choose his words more carefully and even surround himself with old media hands.

But let’s be clear: Lim Guan Eng is going to keep on calling a spade a spade. He doesn’t know any other way. His good friends get the same treatment from him. 

He is an extremely loyal friend but if he is unhappy about something you did or said, you will know about it. He is blunt and doesn’t mince wordst.

And that shouldn’t change. Malaysians voted in what they thought would be a good change from Barisan Nasional. Politicians who are forthright and honest about the issues of the day. 

Let’s not get these people with sharp tongues in ill-matched suits to be the weak-minded mute politicians in sharp suits. All they need is just a wider vocabulary to tell truth to power, and to Malaysians and the world at large. – May 25, 2018.