The Nurul incident has taught us that it is imperative for the government to systematically groom the future leaders of this country.

Finally, Nurul Izzah tendered her resignation as the PM’s senior advisor on economics and finance under mounting pressure, but at the same time, she accepted the invitation of Hassan Marican, head of the finance ministry advisory panel, to co-head the secretariat together with Petronas’ Khairil Anuar Ramli.

Hassan Marican said on Sunday that the advisory panel would make proposals to the prime minister on boosting government revenue and cutting operating expenditure, including reviewing and restructuring the existing subsidization mechanism and providing more comprehensive social protection to vulnerable communities.

It is our wish that Nurul will continue to contribute towards the development of this country with her new undertaking.

The 43-year-old Nurul Izzah Anwar graduated with a Master’s degree in international relations from Johns Hopkins University, one of the world’s top ten universities. She was elected a Member of Parliament at a very young age of 28, and was re-elected twice until her unexpected defeat in GE15.

Given her academic qualifications and 15 years of experience as an elected rep, Nurul would have made an important political rising star the country should specifically invest in.

Unfortunately, because of her relationship to PM Anwar and the fact that she was given the job through the backdoor, Nurul had no other option but to leave.

The biggest difference between a cabinet system (as in the UK and Malaysia) and the presidential system (as in the United States) is that in the former, a politician will have to be elected to the House before he or she could become a member of the cabinet, while experience and competency are not really that important.

This means a politician must know how to get elected in order to get the power through the front door!

Unfortunately, Nurul was beaten by her PAS rival in the recent general election. This, coupled with the fact she is the PM’s daughter, should stop her from getting into government office even though she is more than qualified for the job.

As Nurul is a talented young politician that deserves a chance, Anwar decided to appoint her as his senior advisor on economics and finance on a pro bono basis.

But, as the appointment has contravened the principle of not appointing a direct family member to government post, Nurul has  since come under heavy censure from politicians on both sides of the divide, as well as NGOs and current affairs critics.

The biggest problem faced by Malaysian politics is that most of the 222 Members of Parliament are mere “politicians,” not elite members who know how to run this country efficiently.

Other than Nurul, former finance minister Tengku Zafrul Tengku Abdul Aziz, former health minister Khairy Jamaluddin and a few others were also defeated in the election.

If the political alliances that we have today have not adopted a systematic approach to groom the country’s future administrators but have instead allowed “politicians” to keep dominating the political landscape, while the voters have failed to elect the most capable persons to the august house, how is this country going to be delivered out of its destiny of having to be run by a bunch of incompetent political goons?

Renowned Taiwanese economist Chi-Ping Shih has once commended the three Scandinavian states (Finland, Sweden and Norway) and Singapore as models of democracy for their systematic grooming of administrative talents. The people living in these countries enjoy enviable per capita income, happiness index and corruption perception index, among others, just because their countries are run by professionals!

In Taiwan, the economy took off in the 1970s through the 80s, laying a solid foundation for its core industry today. The island now boasts some of the most comprehensive semiconductor industry because they started their wafer manufacturing industry way back in mid 1970s.

What about us? Back then we were only focusing on rubber, oil palm plantation and tin mining, and introducing the “New Economic Policy,” university admission quota, and then the automobile industry in the 80s. That explains why we are what we are today!

But this should not be reason for us to feel dejected, so long as we conscientiously groom our talents in all sectors irrespective of race and religion from this moment on.

This nevertheless requires time, probably ten or twenty years, not so much for ourselves but the future generations!

We understand that it is absolutely necessary for the prime minister to avoid appointing his own family members to key government positions, as this is essential to maximize the power of checks and balances in democratic politics. We cannot afford to let Anwar appoint his daughter just because we trust him.

The Nurul incident has taught us that it is imperative for the government to systematically groom the future leaders of this country.

In the meantime, it is our sincere hope that the advisory panel will do its job by offering timely and effective solutions to the PM on stimulating the national economy, reducing debt, checking the runaway inflation, mitigating the cost of living and addressing the many day-to-day problems faced by the rakyat.

When Tun Mahathir was helming the Pakatan government, he named a “council of elders” comprising former Bank Negara governor Zeti Akhtar Aziz, former finance minister Daim Zainuddin, Hassan Merican, Malaysia’s richest man Robert Kuok, and economist Jomo Kwame Sundaram. A proposal was submitted to Tun M, but until this day we still have not heard anything from the government.

Anwar must not go down the same old path. He must seriously take into consideration the constructive views offered by his advisory panel in identifying the right path for the country’s economy.