Shadow Policy Committee

Oleh Lim Guan Eng, Setiausaha Agung merangkap Ahli Parlimen Bagan Dengan penuh ikhlas dan rasa rendah diri, saya mengucapkan Salam Aidilfitri buat semua umat Islam di Malaysia. Semoga 1 Syawal 1432 Hijrah demgan harapan baru untuk menjalankan tugas kerja masing-masing dengan penuh bertanggungjawab dan melawan sebarang kemungkaran. Kerajaan negeri Pakatan Rakyat Pulau Pinang berusaha menunaikan kewajipan kami kepada rakyat dengan urustadbir CAT - Cekap, Akauntabel dan Telus yang berlandaskan "amar maaruf nahi mungkar". Urustadbir baik dan cekap ini bukan sahaja mendapat pengiktirafan di peringkat tempatan dan negara seperti oleh Lapuran Ketua Audit Negara dan perunding dana kewangan Tan Siok Choo. Malah Pulau Pinang baru ini dipuji oleh majalah ekonomi antarabangsa "The Economist" dan Transparency International atas usaha melawan rasuah dan mengamalkan sistem tender terbuka. Pihak tertentu yang tidak bertanggungjawab cuba mainkan sentimen perkauman dengan m...

By Dr. Hiew King Cheu The many obvious incidents and events have shown that in Malaysia we are in urgent need and it is compulsory that a "total overhaul" is to be implemented in our election system. The Prime Minister Dato' Seri Najib Tun Abdul Razak has also said that a Parliamentary Select Committee is to be set up to look into the various matters arising from the election system and the problems within, because the Malaysian people have called for a clean and fair election in Malaysia. This is a immediate need to clean up the mil-practices involved in the election process, and there are many unfair ways whereby the true representatives of the people during any elections have been deprived of their chance to be elected to represent the people. There are loop holes and installed means to ensure that the election result is one sided. This is why we must have an election system reform. The voice of the people must be heard and they are asking for a clean and ...

By Aaron Ngui A total of 1,375 secondary school leavers from Penang who will be continuing their studies at public higher learning institutions will receive RM1,000 from the state government this year. The money is intended help them defray costs for their travel and student affairs expenses. Chief Minister and DAP Secretary-General Lim Guan Eng (pix) expressed hope that those who received the money will return to Penang to contribute to the state's development. He said this was because the state had many career opportunities, as evident in it being able to attract some RM12 billion in investments last year, the highest in Malaysia. “Penang is also cleaner, greener and safer now,” he said, citing reduction in crime by 72 percent last year. He said this when presenting 30 students with their aid money during a ceremony at the Dewan JKR in Bukit Mertajam here today. Lim also handed out RM1,000 each to 71 beneficiaries under the state’s Senior Citizens Appreciatio...

After a slump, an early engine of globalisation is thriving again IF YOU are going to have a heart attack, have it in Penang. So one might think, to the see the hospitals in George Town, the capital of this north-western Malaysian state. Patients are flocking in. Ted Mohr, the head of the venerable Penang Adventist Hospital says that he will admit 70,000 medical tourists this year. The hospital specialises in heart procedures and it will perform roughly 23,000 of them this year, including 550 open-heart operations. Such is the demand that the hospital is doubling its number of beds. Mr Mohr gives two main reasons for Penang’s success with the coronary crowd. First, it is relatively cheap. Open-heart surgery that would set you back $100,000 in America costs only about $10,000 in Penang. Second, Penang’s hospitals are as well-equipped as many in the West. The combination of low cost and high technology is the main reason why industries across the state of Penang, made up of the...

By Shannon Teoh With race and religious politics intensifying since the 2008 general election, Malaysians believe that inter-racial relations have degenerated over the past five years due to distrust among the different races. A survey of 1,013 Malaysians conducted from May 24 to June 8 by the Merdeka Center for Opinion Research found that only 66 per cent of respondents said ethnic relations were “good” — a 15 per cent decline from the 78 per cent who said so in February 2006. It also found that just over a third believed that there was “sincere and friendly ethnic unity,” down from 54 per cent five years ago, and those that thought unity was superficial rose from 29 per cent to 44 per cent. Respondents also said they trusted other races less, with trust towards Indians declining from 37 to 31 per cent, Chinese decreasing from 47 to 42 per cent and belief towards Malays dropping marginally from 66 to 65 per cent. “A significant factor noted in this particular query was ...

By Debra Chong Chief Minister and DAP Secretary-General Lim Guan Eng’s open tender policies are helping Penang regain its lustre as a ‘global city’ by lifting the state’s economy to beyond that of a sweat shop industry, The Economist reported this week. In its latest issue dated August 13, the international weekly dubbed Penang “the first custom-made city of globalisation” and credited Lim for boosting the port city’s revival by axing a racial special treatment economic policy in the state to create a more level-playing field that appeals to foreign investors. “He has become the first governor in Malaysia to open up all state tenders to competition. This has entailed dismantling the special preferences for ethnic Malays that have underpinned the BN’s rule since the early 1970s,” the influential magazine on business and international affairs said of the Penang chief minister and his economic reforms. “Adapted to the national stage, such policies could transform the way that...