FOR WHATEVER ITS WORTH (26)

Recently the issue of Bumiputera equity whether its 45% as claimed by Dr Lim Teck Ghee former ASLI head, or is it 18.9% as per the governments estimate for the 9MP, has seen fiery and provocative debates from politicians and non politicians alike.

To me whether its 30% or 45% or below 20%, in reality only a small fraction of Malays or Bumiputera are actually well off. The lucky ones, they drive cars that could buy dozens of low cost houses, a cup of coffee for them is worth RM25 compared to ours which is between RM1 to RM1.20 depending on which Mamak stall you frequent. Their shoes is worth a clerks basic monthly salary and their underwear could buy us kilos of ikan kembung.

But say what you like these group are small, mostly instant millionaires (spoon fed by Umno or their kind), heavily associated and dependent on their political masters. The larger fraction are the commoners like us, who froth from the mouth when there is 30sen hike in the price of petrol, who bargain like hell in pasar malam and the wet market.

I could not understand how our non Bumi brothers could be so engrossed in the ASLI debate (like Kit Siang and the rest) as though we are trying to rob the daylight out of them. For your information us commoners are not at all concerned whether its 30 or 40 or 100% as whatever figure it is. To us the government has failed in improving the livelihood of us all. They may have succeeded in enriching a small fraction of cronies, but the rest of us are not. In fact to most Malays and Bumi our non Bumi brothers are more successful and leads a better prosperous life.

Did you read todays papers?

It was reported that someone has bided RM200,000 for a single number plate with the letters TAN. And the second highest bid was RM50,000! The only Malay that has a name close to TAN that I know of is ATAN. But I dont think my friend Atan Kelonsot has got even 1% of RM200,000 in his bank account.

And as far as I can remember no one bothered to bid such amount when the number plates ABD (short form for Abdul), ABU or WAK came into being, not that they dont bother but surely they would not cough out such amount for number plates!

Well some are surely lucky but most are not.