KUALA LUMPUR: Malaysia needs a finance minister who can be the chief executive officer (CEO) for Malaysia's economy as hard times are looming, said an economist.
Carmelo Ferlito of the Center for Market Education, in an FMT report, said this when urging Prime Minister Datuk Seri Anwar Ibrahim to select a new finance minister who can get the economy to work and whose knowledge goes beyond accounting or finance.
He also suggested that the other ministers are to be the newly-appointed finance minister's managers.
"This person must be someone who would acknowledge that the engine for the economy is entrepreneurship rather than populist decisions.
"So, this CEO must set up the proper and functional institutional framework that will allow entrepreneurship and competitiveness to thrive," he told the news portal.
Ferlito also said the upcoming finance minister must also be able to grasp the dynamism of the economy and ensure that ministries such as the International Trade and Industry Ministry and the Human Resources Ministry are not obstructive.
The reason given was Malaysia's economy and investment climate had suffered from disjointed policies such as strict labour regulations and price controls.
"Ministries need to understand how their actions can nurture entrepreneurship instead of suffocating it like what we saw in recent years," he added.
The same report also quoted another economist Shankaran Nambiar of the Malaysian Institute of Economic Research who said the next finance minister must understand how policies work and how they affect markets and different sections of the population.
Nambiar said it is not a good idea for Anwar to take up the finance portfolio.
"For reasons of good governance and also because of the challenges that may arise next year, it may not be appropriate for the prime minister to be finance minister although I don't doubt Anwar's competence," he was quoted in the report.
Anwar, who was the finance minister between 1991 and 1998, had an audience with the Yang di-Pertuan Agong this morning, believed to be in relation to his cabinet line-up.
He was reported as saying that the cabinet line-up will be unveiled soon.