Listen to Daim, Eng

Daim Zainuddin doesn't lose his cool but you can see from the headlines today that he's gotten really fed up with the current crop of leaders in the Malaysia Baharu-Pakatan Harapan government that he's part of.   

I will hazard a guess that the former two-times Minister of Finance and powerful chairman of the Prime Minister's special committee of Elders is growing peeved with current MoF Lim Guan Eng. 

From his untrue trillion ringit (sic) national debt to his kelakar tak masuk akal excuse for making low-income PPTPN-laden students pay back they study loans, contrary to earlier PH promises, Eng has been quite obsessed with the blame game. Anything he can't account for or explain or understand, he blames (former PM) Najib Razak or the previous (BN) government. 

Six months after PH had won the general election, little has been achieved, Even the Federal government's Budget 2019 failed to lift the gloom and feeling of doom.    Latest bad news: Moody's move to change Petronas outlook to negative. That decision was made in direct response to Eng's Budget, I must stress, not for weak governance or any fault of the national oil corporation. 

'In a statement today, the global ratio agency's senior vice-president Vikas Halan said the decision to change the outlook to negative reflects its view that the financial profile of Petronas may deteriorate if the government continues to ask the national oil company to keep dividend payments high, especially should prices decline. 

This follows the announcement by the government that Petronas will pay dividends of RM26 billion in 2018 and RM54 billion (inclusive of a one-off special dividend of RM30 billion) in 2019. "Such a situation would no longer support a ratings level for the company that is current two notches above that of the sovereign. In such as scenario, Petronas' ratings could be constrained to no more than a notch above that of the sovereign," Halan said.

As announced in Budget 2019 on Nov 2, Petronas will pay RM30 billion as a one-off special dividend to the government in 2019, in addition to the regular annual dividend, which in 2019 will total RM24 billion. The company will also pay RM26 billion in dividends in 2018, versus annual dividend payments of RM16 billion in 2016 and 2017.'

The new crop should listen to Daim. The rakyat is sick of the blame game. Eng, especially, better buck up instantly. Or he'll end up as the shortest-serving Minister of Finance ...