KUALA LUMPUR: Asia is the place to be in this time of
change and uncertainty, says CIMB Group group chief executive Datuk Seri Nazir
Razak.
“This is the Asian century.
Within Asia, I pick Asean. South-East Asia is well-positioned. Asia's future
will also rest on how Asians make the best of it,” he said at the Bar Council's
International Malaysia Law Conference plenary session “Asian Landscape: What
Next?” here yesterday.
He said the biggest political
question in Asia was China's upcoming 18th Party Congress and whether a smooth
transition would follow.
Lawyer Tommy Thomas said one
could no longer look to the West for guidelines on banking given its past
history and current crisis, adding that Malaysia's banking model was “pretty
good”.
“For the Asian thinking, the
policy and decision-making must be indigenous. This is the challenge for Asia
in the coming years,” he said.
Thomas said greater economic
input was needed from the layman, adding that common sense was valuable to
trade.
Universiti Malaya's dean for
Social and Behavioural Science, Research Cluster Prof Edmund Terence Gomez
stressed the importance of institutional and policy reform to help boost the
economy and instil greater confidence among investors.
Affirmative action, he said,
should not be practised in business as “selective patronage was not beneficial
to the economy”.
Giving a rundown on the
Government's Economic Transformation Programme at a later session, Minister in
the Prime Minister's Department Datuk Seri Idris Jala said Malaysians should
get out of the vortex where the discussion was “Who got government contracts?”
Instead, he said: “The question
you should be asking is: How can I make it out there?”
To a question, he suggested that
the Bar Council come up with proposals on how the Government could help the
legal profession get a foothold in overseas markets.
On whether Pemandu would take up
the suggestion over an Independent Police Complaints and Misconduct Commission,
Jala said they had pioneered a system in Selangor where anyone who lodges a
report could assess the police immediately onsite or later via SMS.
He added that a complainant could
also track the status of his police report as with a package that had been
couriered.
SHAILA KOSHY and FLORENCE A. SAMY
Business & Investment Opportunities
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