The new buzzword in business nowadays is ESG — the environmental, social and governance theme. Corporate performance has now been tied to an ESG Index for supposedly responsible investing and even financial sector lending decisions. But make no mistake, it is ideology masquerading as social respo...

my Say: Malaysia must walk its own path in ESG

After 26 years, United Engineers (M) Bhd’s purchase of a 32.6% block in Renong Bhd continues to intrigue, with startling new disclosures surfacing recently.

In the latest twist related to the November 1997 transaction, former Renong major shareholder and supremo, Tan Sri Halim Saad, has...

Alternative Views: UEM-Renong deal: The ball is in MoF’s court

When assessing human progress, granularity matters. What we see the closer we get to ground truth is often quite different from the picture painted at a national or subcontinental level. In most countries, including Malaysia, paying attention to progress closer than just at the national level bec...

My Say: How a microregional perspective can inform strategy

Policymakers, economists and experts have recently been talking about our government debt level.

As at the end of 2022, the federal government debt-to-gross domestic product (GDP) ratio stood at 60.4%. Including the off-budget or contingent liabilities, our total public debt had reached...

My Say: Good and bad news about the government’s debt level

Business leaders across the globe are regularly asking themselves some form of the following four questions:

1.     How do I navigate today’s environment of extraordinary uncertainty?

2.     How likely are...

My Say: Leaders navigating an uncertain world

Champions or cheats?” That is the question. And it is being asked as the significance of Manchester City’s evisceration of Real Madrid in the Champions League, and fifth English Premier League (EPL) crown in six years, begins to sink in. As brightly as the players have shone on the field, they co...

Business Of Sports: Conundrums of war: Manchester City in power battle for football supremacy

The sovereign debt crisis was high on the agenda at this year’s spring meetings of the World Bank and the International Monetary Fund (IMF), with all eyes on China, the biggest creditor to the developing world, and the International Development Association (IDA), the World Bank’s fund for the poo...

The New Global Economy: Growing out of the developing-country debt crisis

One of the defining developments of our time is the increasingly fractious relationship between the US and China. No one should underestimate the dangers posed by two nuclear-armed big powers pushing and shoving against each other. That is all the more the case for Southeast Asia, which will be o...

My Say: Is geopolitical turbulence really so bad for our region?

Seven years ago, in April 2016, Malaysia officially signed on to the Paris Agreement to pledge its commitment to achieve carbon neutrality by 2050. But since then, there has been no sight of a definitive road map to achieve this national goal, leading to questions on whether this remains only an ...

My Say: Carbon pricing for our future

The term “middle-income trap”, as it applies to Malaysia, was given prominence in 2010 during the tabling of the New Economic Model and the rollout of the Economic Transformation Programme (ETP) under the Najib administration. The purpose of the ETP, according to its 2010 report, was to “lift Mal...

My Say: Escaping the middle-income mindset

New nations, by virtue of being “new”, suffer immediate ontological challenges. Not only does this concern its very existence as an integrated geographical entity, a national economy and a united polity, but also its acceptance by neighbouring countries and big global powers.

And so, on...

Picking On The Present: Why Malaysia always feels more likely to fail than succeed

At the upcoming parliamentary sitting in June, Prime Minister Datuk Seri Anwar Ibrahim is scheduled to table the Health White Paper (HWP), which will set out the guiding principles and strategies to reform and strengthen the country’s healthcare system. As co-chairs and members of the 13-person H...

State Of Health: Now is the time for health reforms

Any visit by a Malaysian prime minister to China is a test of gumption, enterprise and judgment. When the leader of a country that is as strategically pivotal as Malaysia deals with a major power, every word and gesture is watched by audiences — both foreign and domestic — with abundant detail an...

My Say: Anwar’s China visit combines economic diplomacy with geopolitical hedging

Is American politics so dysfunctional that the US government can’t even pay its bills on time? That is the central question behind the latest debt ceiling drama playing out in Washington, DC. So far, efforts to increase the country’s borrowing limit suggest that the answer could very well be yes....

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