Malay Agenda - Modern Usage

Modern Usage

The Malay Agenda has been particularly prominent in UMNO General Assemblies. It is often associated by politicians with Malay political primacy, as embodied by ketuanan Melayu, and the Malaysian New Economic Policy (NEP), which grants Malays substantial preferences and quotas in the private sector.

In the 2006 UMNO General Assembly, several politicians brought up the issue of leaders from other members of the governing coalition, the Barisan Nasional, who criticised or questioned the government's ethnic policies. One analyst said: "This AGM is quite interesting in other ways, apart from the feuding that does exist, which seems to purport that there are different groups in opposition to each other within the ruling party; it's clearly a question of what we might call simply as a Malay agenda, and the Malay agenda is the primacy of Malays in politics in this country."

At the Assembly, Education Minister and UMNO Youth Chief Hishamuddin Hussein, who had made headlines when he brandished the Malay dagger (kris) at the previous year's Assembly, stated that "The Malay Agenda in the National Mission should not be regarded as a zero-sum game, by saying only the Malays are benefiting and that the non-Malays are losing out. The non-bumiputras should be brave enough to admit that during the implementation of the New Economic Policy, they also derived benefits, either directly or indirectly, through projects in the various sectors." Other delegates spoke out against the perceived economic inequities, citing the Malays' official share of equity that stood at 18%, although Malays comprised almost half the Malaysian population.

The share of equity itself had been heatedly disputed not long before when a local think tank calculated the Malay share of equity to stand at 45% in 2006, based on the 1,000 publicly listed companies. This significantly exceeded the government target of 30%, which had been set by the NEP. However, the figures were disputed by the government, which used par value instead of market value to calculate equity, did not consider any portion of government-linked companies to be Malay-owned, and looked at all 600,000 registered companies instead of just the publicly listed ones. Critics argued, however, that the usage of par value was antiquated and did not reflect the true value of the equity owned.

At the Assembly, some responded by calling for the Malay equity target to be increased to 70%, in line with the Malay Agenda. At the same time, Deputy Prime Minister Najib Tun Razak said that there would be no time limit set for the achievement of the Malay Agenda, arguing that four centuries of colonialist oppression of the Malays could not be undone in a few decades.