The Fuel Price Debate

Well the debate was alright, though far too short and somehow I felt that both parties did not explain themselves well enough. Shabery did himself an injustice by continuing to attack Anwar’s past – such as his demonstrations in the 1970s, his performance during the 1997 Economic Crisis. Though Anwar showed himself to be the bigger man by not criticising Shabery’s past and saying, ‘this is not an Anwar versus Shabery debate’, Shabery continued to repeat the same criticism.

Its a shame because what Shabery said made a lot of sense, but his criticising behaviour seemed to cater more towards anti-Anwar types rather than wooing fence-sitters. Why woo people already on your side? A waste of his time, better to criticise the ideas rather than the speaker.

Personally I agree with debate points given by both men, time willing I’ll write something about the pros and cons of maintaining the petrol price hike.

A translated summary of points I remember:

Why are we not in the same standing as neighbours like Singapore and South Korea, when we were at the same standing before? We have fallen so far due to mismanagement of the economy under the present government!

To those who criticise our promise that the petrol price will be lowered by 50 sen only should we take the Federal Government – 50 sen is only the first step. If the present price is maintained, our economy will continue to decline each month.

– Anwar Ibrahim

We are not even in the Top 20 of oil-producing nations, and by 2015 we will become a net oil importer! If ours is the only nation with increasing oil prices, then its fair to criticise but it is not – that is the global reality. Show me a nation that subsidises the price of petrol and has low interest rates – there is none.

– Shabery Chik