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©New Sunday Times (Used by permission)
by Santha Oorjitham

Did voters send a signal to civil servants preparing the Mid-Term Review of the Ninth Malaysia Plan? Politicians and academics tell SANTHA OORJITHAM that the poor are feeling the pinch and feel disconnected from the government

THE Mid-Term Review of the Ninth Malaysia Plan (9MP) is "the most important socio-economic development plan post-March 8", says Datuk Dr Denison Jayasooria, executive director of MIC's Social Strategic Foundation.

"The election results showed the discontent of various sectors, including low-income and urban voters, about the delivery system and even the way statistics and charts were used to show that poverty was a rural problem.

"Parts of the Bumiputera and non-Bumiputera communities felt that socio-economic development plans were not reaching them and that distribution was not fair."

He calls for a "radical rethink to address the concerns of the lower-income group, who feel disconnected from the federal government".
Datuk Seri Mohd Effendi Norwawi, the former minister in the Prime Minister's Department responsible for the Economic Planning Unit, says: "The review cannot be just another routine exercise of updating economic modelling based on past templates; neither should it be another bidding exercise by ministries and agencies for more funds."

Issues such as the global food shortage, increasing price of goods and fuel, and poverty "were exploited by the opposition in the recent general elections".

But, he says: "The government now has the opportunity in the review to turn things around in their favour by coming out with solutions to these issues."

Former Sabah deputy chief minister Datuk Tham Nyip Shen (who gave a presentation at a recent forum on the review organised by the Asian Strategy and Leadership Institute's Centre for Public Policy Studies [CPPS]) says: "The election results show that Sabahans have high hopes of the Barisan Nasional government, which has spent so much more money on developing (Peninsular) Malay-sia than on Sabah."

Perhaps the message for Parliament, where the review is due to be tabled on June 26, is that the remaining two and a half years of the 9MP should focus more on the third of its five initial thrusts: addressing persistent socio-economic disparities constructively and productively.

The plan, launched at the end of March 2006, did note rising inequality in income, including within each ethnic community.

It aimed to increase the income share of the bottom 40 per cent of all households and to address "inter- and intra-ethnic disparities, particularly by raising income through enhancement of skills and capabilities".

There have been improvements within the first half of the plan.

The rural-urban average income ratio narrowed between 2004 and last year (from 1:2.11 to 1:1.91), Dr Ragayah Mat Zin, the principal research fellow at Universiti Kebangsaan Ma-laysia's Institute of Malaysian and International Studies (Ikmas), said at the CPPS forum on the review.

Ragayah says the incidence of poverty had dropped from 5.7 per cent in 2004 to 3.6 per cent last year, while hard-core poverty had dropped from 1.2 per cent to 0.7 per cent during that period.

But, she says: "The poverty line income (RM687 per urban household of five and RM698 per rural household) is just enough to survive.

"We want people not only to be free of absolute poverty, but to have a better quality of life."

She adds: "There are pockets of poverty which have been missed in Sabah, Sarawak, among the Orang Asli and single mothers, especially in urban areas."

Sarojini's family in Kuala Lumpur, for example, barely makes ends meet.

The homemaker has been unable to collect her husband's RM300 pension since he died in March.

Monthly expenses (rental, water and electricity bills, food, transport and school expenses) for the widow and her six children come to about RM850.

They live in a low-cost flat (paying RM124 per month) and receive RM300 per month from the Social Welfare Department, which also provides RM200 annually towards school fees.

When any of them fall ill, they walk to the nearby government hospital where treatment is free and medication costs RM1.

First-born Indran, 17, earns RM200 per month as an electrical apprentice. A nephew has supplied groceries to the family since Sarojini's husband died.

They have the "basic necessities" but there is nothing to spare.

Darshini, 15, for example, has never been to a cinema. "I've never been anywhere. When I don't have school, I stay home."

Tham, who heads the Sabah Progressive Party's think-tank, paints a similarly bleak picture of Sabah, which has the highest incidence of poverty in the country: 23 per cent below the poverty line in 2004 (although it has dropped from 30 per cent in 1990).

"Many people in rural areas lack basic amenities, especially electricity and water.

And most goods are more expensive in Sabah, even for controlled items such as salt, sugar and rice."

The state also has the lowest literacy rate in the country, "not because the government has not provided education for Malaysian citizens in Sabah, but because there are a lot of children of illegal immigrants in Sabah", he says

Almost 25 per cent of the state's population (in 2005) are non-citizens, he says.

"Illegal immigrants are the mother of all problems here, including health and security problems. Job opportunities are also not good."

According to the 9MP, "poverty continued to be predominantly a rural phenomenon with 70.6 per cent of the poor residing in the rural areas".

But Ragayah says the urban share of poor households has risen, although there are more poor people in the rural areas. (In 2004, the incidence of rural poverty was 11.9 per cent and the incidence of urban poverty was 2.9 per cent.

Last year, the incidence of rural poverty had dropped to 7.1 per cent while urban poverty dropped to two per cent.)

Tony Pua, the DAP Petaling Jaya Utara member of parliament and economic adviser to party secretary-general Lim Guan Eng, said: "The bias has been towards rural areas, which have been cushioned from rising commodity prices, while those in urban areas have to deal with the rising cost of living. That's a double whammy for the urban poor."

Rising prices have forced Sarojini's family to cut back. Although they eat three meals a day, they eat less. They buy cheaper brands of rice and cooking oil and less meat.

Effendi says: "We have to focus on the low-income group," and the issue is "very resolvable" as long as there is co-ordination.

"There is much duplication and overlapping among ministries and agencies. The mid term review has to be ruthless in dealing with the 'turf' issue to ensure all the agencies involved are pulling in the same direction and complementing each other."

Pua, who also spoke at the review forum, calls for more data, broken down by ethnic group and region (including urban and rural), so that policies can target specific groups.

Ragayah says: "The poor must be empowered with good education."

She wants policies such as giving scholarships to students with nine As and free textbooks to be based on their families' ability to pay.

"More weight should be given to the socio-economic background of students. Those who can afford it should pay."

Education, or lack of access to appropriate education, has set the course for Sarojini's family. Indran left school after Standard Six and had no further education.

His younger brothers Naidu, 14, and Nathan, 9, both slow learners, dropped out of primary school because their teacher could not cater to their special needs.

But their youngest sister, Thulasi, was able to take advantage of a neighbourhood Tamil kindergarten and is doing well in Standard Two.

Darshini, who scored five As in the Ujian Pencapian Sekolah Rendah examination, hopes to train as a nurse when she finishes school, if she can get a scholarship.

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