Warisan Merdeka Project : 100-Storeys Building

The recent budget announced by Prime Minister Datuk Seri Najib Razak has created a lot of controversies.

And there’s one that really caught my attention, the Warisan Merdeka project. This project is about to build a 100-storeys building that gonna cost RM5billions.

So without wasting my time bluffing around, here I state few questions that always been asked by the people and answer from me regarding to this mega project.

What is this project is all about? Some kind of joke?

This project called Warisan Merdeka. It is about spending RM5billions to build a new 100-storeys building. And yes, this is totally a joke! (sarcastic)

What makes u think u deserve to complain?

Because I’m a Malaysia citizen and I’m a taxpayer, so I deserve to know where the money goes. So do u and anybody else as long as they are Malaysian and pay tax, we all deserve to know how the money being spent.

Why can’t we have the new tall building?

Because we already have KLCC, and that is enough for now. Even KLCC are still got an empty space. And besides of KLCC, we still got a lot of surplus office building that still not occupied.

Why Dr. M can build KLCC but Najib can’t build this?

Well let me remind u that Dr.M did that when we in booming time, but now we in deep debt as what Idris Jala said, so we have to spend our money wisely. Let me remind u that RM5billions is not a small amount of money. Its equal to RM5000 MILLIONS! There’s a lot of zeroes.

Then how we want to achieve Vision 2020?

Tall building or short building got nothing to do with our plan to be Negara Maju Wawasan 2020. Many world class cities such as Tokyo, London (even Singapore!) do not have skyscrapers. This cannot be an excuse to not be Vision 2020.

Everyone say that this building will create more work opportunities, so this is a good thing right?

Yes this will create more work opportunities, but only to the foreign labor, such as Indon and Bangla, after that no more work opportunities coz the building won’t get occupied. So this is not a good thing.

The employment of foreigners workers is not their fault, its Malay fault coz most of us don’t want to work as labor. Don’t u think so? Typical Malay.

Yes. That’s right. That’s why we need to spend the money in human capital. We better use that money towards encouraging creativity, education so that we can change the typical Malay attitude to the first class minded attitude. In other words, use that money to develop human capital instead of physical infrastructure.

Don’t u think that we need a progressive building?

No, we need a progressive mind.

Doesn’t this project will make us a high income society?

Well let me ask u back. Who are u going to fool? How is building a 100-story building going to make us a high income society? U cannot spend ur way out! If u can Japan would have done that. Japan's economy was stagnant for over a decade and what save them is prudent spending and investment in technology and education. This deficit spending is going to bring the country to her knee and is not sustainable.

So I don’t think this project will helps us to move forward as a high-income economy. High-income economy is not talking about tall buildings, high-income economy is talking about people who have the energy, the expertise and the entrepreneurship to be able to earn high incomes.

They said that 93% will be held by non-government entities? So it’s a win-win situation right?

Don’t forget to look at the fact that this year FDI plunge almost to 81%! Even the investors lost the trust to invest on our country and this is a fact, u can check it by urself at World Investment Report 2010.

My apology. But out of topic a little while, coz I don't really understand. Got Toll hike - complain. No Toll hike - also complain?

Poor u kid, for ur convenience in understanding:
1.) toll hike = highway users pay more
2.) no toll hike = government pay more (compensate) = all taxpayers, including non-highway users, pay for the toll.
3.) In case u don't know, government's money come from tax paid by taxpayers.

What are the other problem with this RM5bil project?

New palace announced by Sammy Vellu was RM400million, now shoot up to RM900 million. So u can guess the final price of this 100 storey tower. Now say RM5 billion, later sure come out the bill cost RM7-8 billion. Plus, based on the KL landscape this tower will only create problems like traffic jam, floods, and congestion.

What is the meaning of development to u?

Development doesn't mean having the tallest building, doesn't mean having PutraJaya, doesn't mean having a national car which is not really a national car but a rebadged Mitsubishi. Development means the rakyat enjoys quality living in the form of safer environment where our children can roam the street freely to play, where the rakyat can enjoy the resources of the country and not having to slog day and night just to pay the increasing living expenses, where there are parks for the rakyat to enjoy, where the rakyat can enjoy affordable houses and cars.

But it is good to take risk rite?

Yes, I agree with that, but even we wanna take a risk, take a good one, don’t blindly take risk that will clearly gonna make us lose. Use your head to think, don’t use ur ass.

Then where should we spend the money?

First we can spend it to human capital like investing in education, revamping the syllabus, hire better qualified teachers and teach all Malaysians the spirit of competition and innovation. The RM5bil money also better be use to build more affordable homes for the lower income people so that they will have roofs over their heads, improve school and hospital buildings and facilities, turn PTPTN into scholarship, improve public transportation and basically anything but just not another useless tall building! 

Finally, let us all ask ourselves : 

Whats the point of having tall building while we don't have tall attitude???