The budget does not address the fundamental weaknesses of the country's fiscal and financial illnesses. Little or no mention is made of the off-budget agencies and their profligate budgets for which the government is ultimately responsible. Parliament has no oversight of it, but in Malaysia it provides the government with a parallel budget almost as large as the national budget but over which the elected representatives have no control of. The government makes use of their funds to hide its own profligacy before Parliament. Putra Jaya is built out of Parliamentary reach because its construction is funded by Petronas, an off-budget agency. Plans are afoot to sell a large chunk of its petroleum exploration arm to a crony, and Parliament is not told about it. But the budget does not discuss its impact and reach and is presented to Parliament more to hide the cancer within than any attempt to cure it.

THE MERDEKA DAY 2003 PARADE IN Putra Jaya was not, as it turned out, to mark Malaya's 46th or Malaysia's 40th anniversay, but a 'proper and fitting" sendoff for Malaysia's long-serving Prime Minister. He retires, against his will, in October. There are misguided souls out there who believe that Dato' Seri Mahathir Mohamed at 78 is far better leader for Malaysia than Dato' Seri Abdullah Badawi at 64. And a move is afoot, if cocktail party talk is believed, for a Malaysia-wide appeal to the Conference of Rulers to ask him to stay on - and this is where one begins to disbelieve - for "a few more months, or at least until the general elections". There are still people, especially who benefited most under his 23-year-old rule and face bankruptcy and worse when he goes. And well-meaning people who cannot countenance life without him at the top. He has been such a great leader, a man who made Malaysians stand tall, that without him we would all be orphans, is their refrain.

The Merdeka Day parade at Putra Jaya on 31 August 2003 was his official sendoff, a grateful nation thanking him for his three decades of leadership, two as Prime Minister. But there was a forced grandeur about it. In the background were the ghosts of his failures - he has to his credit, when all is said and done, more failures and disasters than successes - to dampen what was to have been a happy sendoff. He must have sensed that soon enough. He waits for the Organisation of the Islamic Conference summit in Putra Jaya in October, but a pall hangs over it. The Middle East is in a boiling cauldron, after the US invasion of Iraq, and the Summit is where harsh and anti-US statements would have to be made. Many OIC members are unhappy at this prospect. So far less than a dozen have said they would attend. The prospect of a postponement should not be dismissed out of hand.

This year's celebration in Putra Jaya is narrowed down to an irrelevant focus: to give the Prime Minister, Dato' Seri Mahathir Mohamed, a fitting send-off after 22 years in office. Nothing more, nothing less. This is when it began to unravel. The 46th Merdeka Day celebrations in 2003 is important for two historical dates: the centenary year of the birth of Malaya, and Malaysia's, founding father, Tengku Abdul Rahman Putra Al-Haj, and the fourth decade of Sabah and Sarawak in Malaysia. Both are indubitably ignored. One can see why. The Merdeka celebration this year is contrived so the governing National Front (BN) coalition could present its best foot forward in a not-so-subtle campaigning for the general elections. It was to rouse the crowd in frenzy to back the BN. It did, and could, not. Something had gone awry. Instead, the BN government tried to generate interest with concerts and entertainment programmes that had nothing to do with celebrating a national history marker. The crowds would not gather otherwise. The organisers of the celebration were as tired as those watching or participating in it. You cannot flog a dead horse for too long.

He dominated it as no one ever did, the contrary view became less and less that today cabinet ministers would not stand up and be counted. He saw the cabinet, as parliament, as a rubber stamp which must affirm whatever he wanted or said, however outrageous or unworkable. He embarked on a massive privatisation of government assets, insisted it had no business in business, and, with the oil money flowing, went on a building spree, the most ambitious of which is the new administrative capital of Putra Jaya. But his policies began to fall apart as the men he chose as billionaires and the cronies of the Establishment who benefited had no independent existence and they survived only with continued government projects.

Malaysia has now released a series of advertisements putting her case public for Singapore to rebut when, if, talks resume. The National Economic Action Council (NEAC) placed the advertisements but behind it is the Prime Minister, Dato' Seri Mahathir Mohamed's deft hand. It is brilliant. It tells Singapore what she must resolve before an amicable settlement. It is also pointless. Malaysia need not have to make its case public. For Singapore is painted into a corner. It is all but impossible for the talks to resume until the two Prime Ministers, Dr Mahathir and Mr Goh Chok Tong, meet in Putra Jaya. Both Malaysia and Singapore know this. But Dr Mahathir is on his way out, and it would be Dato' Seri Abdullah Ahmad Badawi, who would in his place. Would Singapore allow it or send in the deputy prime minister instead? More than the water talks, Dr Mahathir has raised the spectre of, to use the current buzz-word, regime change in Singapore.

If all this does not make sense, it is not meant to. When a BN leader makes any suggestion, it must be accepted as a thunderbolt from Mount Olympus. Not to be questioned. If you do, then like Zeus, Dr Mahathir would throw a thunderbolt at you. How dare you suggest Dr Mahathir has amnesia or senility? Don't you know he only talks of what is achievable? He said Putra Jaya will be built. It is. The KL twin towers? It is. He abhors sodomy and corruption. He proved it by sending his own deputy prime minister to jail. So now he wants clean candidates. He will get it. If the candidates are not corrupt, they bathe daily, or at least I think they do. That should be clean enough. So, has BN ever fielded any one who is not clean? So why this talk now of such irrelevancies as demanding a list of assets and the like?

But he made one serious miscalculation. He sued two journalists, amongst others, for defamation, but they, unlike the others, would not drop dead at his command. In the first case, I lost all my appeals, then got a rehearing of the Federal Court appeal on several grounds including the close relations that existed between his lawyer and the then chief justice. A date was fixed for the hearing but is now postponed: Tan Sri Vincent Tan did not believe he could get a fair trial without a coram of five judges. When my advocate asked for five judges at the Federal Court, it was rejected; there were not enough judges to go around, you see. There are still not enough Federal Court judges to go around, but he got it. No doubt on the time honoured principle that what is allowed Zeus is disallowed the cow. The only difficulty for Tan Sri Vincent is Zeus, in his case, is about to be forced off his perch in Mount Putra Jaya before long.

So it is not surprising that few cared nor knew of what Raja Tun Mohar had wrought in a lifetime of dedicated public service, what his lineage was, or why we should be glad that we had a Razak Ahmad in our midst as a catalyst for social reform. That he worked with another great Johorean, Dr Syed Husin Ali, who did his pre-university studies at the English College in the 1950s when I was in the junior classes there, in standing up to authority and fighting for those whose rights were trampled for no reason than they were poor and dispossessed, shows that greatness does not come with titles and official positions. It is people like them who makes Malaysia a livable and worthwhile country to die for. Not the Petronas Twin Towers or Putra Jaya or the mad rush to be an industrialised country at any cost. Raja Tun Mohar and Mr Abdul Razak Ahmad represent the best of what Malaysia is. To one adieu, to the other thanks.

Somewhere in his term, he decided his was a Sisyphyan task, did not see it worthwhile to pursue it. He compromised his principles. How else could you explain his presence at a meeting in Putra Jaya in February this year at a political meeting to ensure that the jailed former deputy prime minister, Dato' Seri Anwar Ibrahim, is not released from jail under any circumstance. He was at two meetings in February, one headed by the law minister, Dato' Seri Rais Yatim, and the other by the deputy prime minister, Dato' Seri Abdullah Ahmad Badawi. His presence there was not widely known. So when he retired, it was with nose clean and in high respect.

Now it is the turn of Dato' Seri Anwar's release. The campaign for that has had several false starts, but it is done with more discretion and quiet force these days. The West Asian Islamic governments are not happy about his continued incarceration. The Saudi government had made official and unofficial representations for his releasewith what happened. Dato' Seri Anwar is still a popular figure in the Middle East. Deliberately or not, Dr Mahathir when addressing a Middle Eastern political forum last year was introduced "as the eminent Malaysian Prime Minister and an excellent friend of us all, Dato' Seri Anwar Ibrahim". He was not, to put it mildly, amused. With the OIC summit in Putra Jaya in Octoberr, in what is to be his crowning achievement in office, could he withstand the pressures of OIC leaders, as he could not the European leaders?

Every one from the Prime Minister down is less than honest. The newspapers, as usual, ignore it, reporting a garbled view of the government response, which raises more questions. Nothing short of a full statement would now suffice. But the BN would not do that. Look at how the financial stimulus package was announced. It was not to Parliament, as it should have, with days of debate on it. It was released, as an imperial edict from Putra Jaya, based on hope than reality. In most times, it works. When it does not, the BN is diffused, frightened, disorganised. And dissembles. It does not want to be second-guessed. It alone has the people's interests at heart. The Opposition does not. So it had better shut up.

Petronas has every reason to be less honest. It has squandered its tremendous reserves for a number of projects it had no business to be involved in. It owns Putra Jaya, the administrative capital that is a drain on the public purse. It owns Proton, the F-1 motor racing circuit in Sepang, and a slew of companies and products that is far removed from its main product: petroleum. The US$1billion sponsorship costs for the F-1 championship in Sepang and the Sauber Petronas F-1 racing team appears to matter more than the future of its 70 IT specialists. It owns the Petronas twin towers, forced on it by the government so the Kuala Lumput City Centre (KLCC) would show the world how developed a country Malaysia is. Its considerable funds are used to cover government shortfalls and other financial needs. I suspect the Petronas management sees red ink dominating its balance sheets after its unrestrained financial profligacy. And it does short term staunching by such measures as hiving off its IT department.

THE MALAYSIAN PRIME MINISTER, DATO' Seri Mahathir Mohamed, is due to retire in October after 22 years in office and hosting the OIC summit in Putra Jaya. That is clear as day to all and sundry. Except for a few diehards amongst his supporters who cannot imagine a life without him at the helm. When he spent half his political life as Prime Minister, the withdrawal of his perks can be incalculable. One member of his entourage, now retired, says of the exhilaration he felt when he found himself in Kota Kinabalu without flights and his presence in Kuala Lumpur required in 12 hours. He called a crony business man, who flew with his own plane from souther Philippines, without hesitation, and was on board to make sure he was well looked after. He did it a couple of time after that, and each time it worked. Can one then imagine what his former boss could, as Prime Minister?

But Dr Mahathir is, has always been, close to Tan Sri Vincent. He had planned Bukit Tinggi as Malaysia's administrative capital, long before Putra Jaya. And it was Tan Sri Vincent who was favoured. The cabinet met once in his resort, and initial work on the new capital had led to a flurry of real estate speculation. But it had resistance from within and without. And it died down. And he remained the super-crony.

There is reason to believe this. The director of Sungei Buloh prison went out of his way to issue Dato' Seri Anwar's release on 14 April 2003 two months earlier. This shook the government no end. On 17 February, two meetings were held in Putra Jaya: the first that justice minister, Dato' Seri Rais Yatim, called had the two high court judges in the Anwar trial, the retiring chief justice, Tun Dzaiddin Abdullah, two federal court judges, the Inspector-General of Police, and others, and met for two hours "until 4.32 pm". They adjourned immediately to the office of the acting prime minister, Dato' Seri Abdullah Ahmad Badawi. With him were the Attorney-General, Dato' Ghani Patail, and others. That meeting continued until dinner. The import of the two meetings was clear: make sure Dato' Seri Anwar is not let out, find ways to ensure he remains in jail, with his nine-year sentence starting immediately.

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