This article first appeared in Forum, The Edge Malaysia Weekly on December 25, 2017 - December 31, 2017

Several developments in the year past stand out because of their significance for Malaysia’s future.

The biggest of these, in terms of its economic, political and social impacts, is probably the massive growth in China’s influence on Malaysia’s development and its consequences for the country.

In 2017, that role became highly visible in the run-up to the groundbreaking ceremony for the RM55 billion East Coast Rail Link in August. As questions were raised about the high price and economic viability of the project, attention fell on the flood of Chinese investments into Malaysia’s infrastructure, energy and real estate sectors.

Over the next two decades, this pipeline is expected to bring some RM400 billion into the economy, a Citi Research note said.

While government leaders and major beneficiaries are sanguine about the ample multiplier effects of these projects and their transformative potential for the development regions, other voices are markedly cautionary.

The concerns range from overcapacity in its ports to fears of a loss of sovereignty and the possibility that part of the funding would be used to paper over financial fiascos like that of the 1Malaysia Development Bhd investment fund.

In the short term, however, the Chinese funding is being seen as very useful to keep the economy humming as the country heads for the 14th general election, which must be held by the middle of next year.

While on the topic of the general election, it is apt to note the role of the demographically dominant Malay-Muslim electorate in the formation of the federal government.

In this context, the tabling of the a Private Member’s Bill to amend the Syariah Courts (Criminal Jurisdiction) Act 1965 in April holds a special place.

Two points emerge on this score. The first is that the bill introduced by PAS president Datuk Seri Abdul Hadi Awang could not have been mooted without the support of the government, which took the unprecedented step of clearing the parliamentary order paper of its business to make way for Hadi’s motion.

The cooperation between Umno on the government side and PAS, its erstwhile sworn rival for Malay-Muslim voters, signifies an appeal to racial and religious loyalties that is likely to increasingly shape the direction, tone and content of their political strategies.

The second point is that the effect of the proposed amendments, which seek to enhance the Syariah Court’s powers to impose penalties, is to accentuate the duality in the country’s legal system — separating the ground covered by its secular code that is rooted in the Federal Constitution from the territory of the Syariah code that draws its authority from Islamic jurisprudence.

This division will continue to test the wisdom, judgment and understanding of our leaders, legal experts and communities as we navigate between the two systems on our common journey.

A third development concerns the appointment of judges beyond the constitutionally stipulated retirement age.

In July, the Prime Minister’s Office announced that Chief Justice Tan Sri Md Rauf Sharif and Court of Appeal president Tan Sri Zulkefli Ahmad Makinudin had been appointed “additional judges” to the Federal Court, allowing them to retain their top posts beyond the mandatory retirement age of 66 years and six months.

The appointments were strongly criticised by the Malaysian Bar, which resolved at an extraordinary general meeting in August that the appointments were “null, void and unconstitutional”.

The Bar has filed a legal action against the appointments, asking the Federal Court to decide, among other things, whether an additional judge can be appointed on the advice of the chief justice after the latter had retired.

Another question was whether the appointments of judges by the King under the Constitution were justiciable. Case management has been set in January.

A fourth development that marks the year gone by is the arrests of a number of high-profile persons in corruption probes.

The most notable of these would be the arrest of Parti Warisan Sabah president Datuk Seri Mohd Shafie Apdal in October, among 10 officials of his party, in connection with the investigation into the alleged skimming of RM1.5 billion in development funds from the Rural and Regional Development Ministry between 2009 and 2015, during his tenure as its minister.

In March, Johor exco member Datuk Abdul Latif Bandi was detained in a probe into the reduction of land premiums for housing and industrial projects and land status conversions.

In both these cases, reports of fleets of luxury vehicles, branded accessories and valuables being seized from suspects, along with millions of ringgit in cash and in multiple accounts being frozen, have made the news.

Interestingly, in May, Malaysian Anti-Corruption Commission (MACC) chief Tan Sri Dzulkifli Ahmad reportedly announced that the commission would not go after politicians before the 14th general election so that their cases would not be used as campaign fodder.

Another telling development was the seizure by the Inland Revenue Board of about RM126 million in fixed deposits belonging to businessman Tan Sri Lee Kim Yew. The action was taken in relation to RM22.5 million in taxes due from Country Heights Sdn Bhd.

The company is a unit of Country Heights Holdings Bhd, of which Lee is executive chairman and a major shareholder.

A longtime ally of former prime minister Tun Dr Mahathir Mohamad, who is now a vocal critic of the government, Lee had accused the authorities of bullying tactics by initiating criminal investigations against him.

In a letter to his friends, Lee said: “I would like all my friends to know that I don’t have any personal tax liability. In fact, I have a surplus tax credit with IRB.”

Another opposition-friendly business leader who has made the news is Supermax Corp Group managing director Datuk Seri Stanley Thai Kim Sim.

The Supermax Corp boss was jailed for five years and fined RM5 million for insider trading involving APL Industries, a rubber glove maker, in 2007.

Supermax Corp chairman Rafidah Aziz said Thai’s lawyers had filed an appeal on the conviction as well as the sentence, on the grounds that it was “manifestly excessive”.

That makes five developments in 2017 that will reverberate well into the future.

Rash Behari Bhattacharjee is associate editor at The Edge Malaysia

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