KUALA LUMPUR (Nov 26): Datuk Seri Anwar Ibrahim, the poster boy for the "Reformasi" movement in 1998, is sworn in as Malaysia’s 10th prime minister at a time overdue reforms in many key areas need to happen more than ever before.
Anwar’s job may well be the toughest yet: Not only does the Pakatan Harapan (PH) coalition he leads not have a simple majority on its own, the unity Government he leads inherits a Putrajaya that has had little choice but to take on more debt, on top of the sizeable pile it already had, to save lives and livelihoods during the Covid-19 pandemic.
Anwar has said that reviving the economy, easing the people’s high cost of living plus weeding out corruption are the top of his reform agenda.
He has also assured that “none should be marginalised under my administration”.
“Let us now focus on the economy, and do whatever it takes to revive it, so that the welfare of the rakyat, particularly the poor and the marginalised, will be protected,” he said at his first media conference as the PM on Thursday (Nov 24), broadcast live.
“Within a month or so [from the Dec 19 special Parliament sitting], we will table a new or revised Budget 2023,” he said at the Sg Long Golf Club in Kajang, Selangor, on Thursday.
Investors and market watchers may have to wait until at least mid-January to see how the Anwar administration will amend Budget 2023, but Anwar has delivered his first two election promises that were (almost) entirely within his control even before clocking in at his office in Putrajaya: Monday (Nov 28) is a public holiday in conjunction with PH’s win in the 15th general election, and he will not take the PM’s salary. He took care to say that he had discussed the public holiday with the chief secretary to the government before announcing it.
What else can he realistically deliver as the head of a unity Government?
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