KUALA LUMPUR, Jan 16 — Datuk Seri Najib Razak has posted a sarcastic admission that it could be his fault as the former prime minister that the current government did not appear to have a clear blueprint for building up Malaysia’s economy.
In a condescending response to unnamed detractors who criticised him for attacking the government in the middle of the Covid-19 pandemic, Najib insisted he could not sit idly by.
Citing reports of high-profile investments in Indonesia by tech giants such as Google, Amazon and Tesla, the former PM questioned why it was that Malaysia could not attract similar interest.
“Here we are only able to boast of an announced investment from Volkswagen, which it turns out was was brought in when I was the prime minister,” he said on Facebook.
He accused the government of not taking any steps to match Indonesia, of lacking any plans for the local economy, and of taking no effort to help small and medium enterprises make the jump up the value chain.
Najib also claimed that there was no direction or plan for the digital economy or e-commerce in the country.
“All we have is sitting around and waiting. That’s right. Sitting and waiting.
“Oh, there’s also a handy excuse. ‘Blame Najib’,” he added.
Najib’s Umno is superficially allied with Prime Minister Tan Sri Muhyiddin Yassin’s Bersatu in the Perikatan Nasional ruling coalition but the two strange bedfellows have behaved like fierce rivals in recent months.
At least three federal lawmakers from Umno have publicly withdrawn support for Muhyiddin, which appeared to have robbed him of the majority support in Parliament needed to remain as the prime minister.
However, Muhyiddin was able to convince the Yang di-Pertuan Agong to proclaim an Emergency on Monday, thereby allowing him to suspend both Parliament and elections in Malaysia so long as the proclamation remains in effect.
