10th PM and Collective Responsibility
By Adam Sumardi, Media Analyst
It was great to read news on YAB 10th Prime Minister setting the example on working together as a team in ensuring the nation progress. For too long since 2018, we were plagued by innecessant politicking, sowing distrust between politicians and civil servants. It wasn’t unheard of that supporting letters , which often innocent and subject to internal government rules on procurement and processing is being leaked to media for political opponents to score cheap political points. Admittedly, when the 10th Prime Minister was sitting on Opposition bench, his team led by Communications Director Fahmi Fadzil took lead on this.
But times are changing now. Anwar Ibrahim has changed. His instructions on not airing the government’s dirty laundry to the public will reverberates across the whole corridors of power.
After all, its only last 4th of January, Fahmi Fadzil the K-KOM minister was reprimanding Digital Nasional Berhad ( An MoF company responsible for our national 5G execution ) on claims about good 5G progress. Mind you this was an international collaboration with the premier 5G equipment provider in the world; not plagued by allegations of intellectual property theft nor accusations of spying and data breach transmitted to a certain military server belongs to a superpower currently accused of violations of our maritime borders.
It would seem that Prime Minister Anwar Ibrahim had enough and ordered these nonsense to stop. Unfortunately, his Cabinet member probably missed this directive when he openly laid the blame of FINAS for not censoring the controversial movie Pulau, reportedly attracting complaints over its trailers potraying girls in skimpy bikinis. Again, The Communication Minister got himself in a hot soup again.
His comments on DNB reportedly would be captured by the market, as DNB attempted to reduce dependencies on public funds and raised capital through banking facilities which obviously listening to market stories before deciding to assist our national 5G projects- reportedly would attract hundreds of billions in economic growth thanks to Internet of things. Media statements or tweets from a Minister is deemed so powerful that it could change our nation’s future.
Similarly his comments on passing the bucks to LPF/Finas sent a signal to our censorship board that they are on their own. Excessive censorship would mean our film industry which apparently now no longer enjoy A minister’s protection on freedom of creativity to make profit would suffer immensely.
I wonder how long will the 10th Prime Minister realize that his Communication Minister is not up to par.
