THE Bumiputera Economic Congress has ended with a bang. But that is rubber before it hits the road. When it comes to implementation, the bang resembles a whimper.
We think there are two reasons for this. Firstly, there is much lost in translation. Secondly, key factors for Bumiputera success, defined nearly six decades ago, may need a re-evaluation.
Start with reason number one. There is no doubt about the resolve of resolutions of such congresses. Their zeal appears to suggest a constancy — an obduracy, some will say — that will not go away even when the proverbial tyre hits the road. But it does.
The erosion of their staying power is a 60-year-old narrative, though to be fair, the "lost in translation" first happened when the New Economic Policy (NEP) was formulated in 1969.
If our reading of the congress proceedings is right, the Bumiputera Economic Transformation — not to be confused with the congress — is the NEP with a new emphasis. New emphasis or new look, it pays to look at indicators used by the Economy Ministry: equity ownership, income distribution and participation in skilled labour.
According to Economy Ministry secretary-general Datuk Nor Azmie Diron, who updated the congress on the socioeconomic status of Bumiputeras, it is a "left-behind" story. Half of Bumiputera households are in the low-income group, earning less than RM6,000 compared with Chinese and Indians. So it's no surprise that Bumiputeras top the poverty table.
Malay reserve land, too, is crying for optimal utilisation. Is it because the resolve got lapped by the time it hit ground zero? Or, as our second point suggests, is it because the key factors for Bumiputera success needs a rethink? Economy Minister Rafizi Ramli thinks so.
Speaking to the media after a panel session at the congress, he said it was time to shift focus beyond 30 per cent Bumiputera equity, a target first set under the NEP to uplift the community. To him, the world of business has changed and our business practices must change with it.
Our focus should be on investment practices, economic participation and management control. Rafizi may be onto something here.
Taking government-linked companies (GLCs) as an example to drive home his point of management control, if not economic participation, he said such entities are really Bumiputera businesses. "From the top, the chief executive officer to the president and down to everyone else, is Bumiputera."
An exaggeration no doubt, but we take his point. Move over equity, here comes value creation and ownership.
A shift of focus of another kind was suggested in a Facebook post by former law minister Datuk Zaid Ibrahim, with his own brand of exaggeration. "No group in the world", he wrote, "were as fortunate as the Bumiputeras".
Zaid's post appears to be a response to Bursa chairman Tan Sri Abdul Wahid Omar's disclosure at the congress that only one out of 97 listed companies in the last three years was Bumiputera-owned. To be fair to Wahid, he was marshalling Bumiputeras to the private sector — his universe — where the bulk of the nation's wealth is made. Here is a call to action to Bumiputeras: own, operate and manage.