PETALING JAYA: For Malaysians, political and racial conflicts are the major challenges in the country’s economy over the next three years.

This was revealed in a survey where 42.8 per cent of Malaysian respondents believe these two conflicts are the major challenges for the economy of Malaysia over the next three years.

Another 24.2 per cent of Malaysians see the drastic inflation or slashing of interest rates as major challenge in the economy of Malaysia.

Malaysians are less worried about geopolitical issues, China-United States trade war, or the wars in Europe and the Middle East.

The survey, entitled 2024 Trend Survey : Public Sentiment in Turbulent Times, was jointly conducted by Taiwan-based Global View Research, Lianhe Zaobao of Singapore, Sin Chew Daily and the Department of Journalism at Hong Kong Baptist University.

Malaysians, Singaporeans, Taiwanese, Hong Kong residents and Chinese nationals were interviewed in the survey.

Associate Professor Teo Wing Leong from University of Nottingham Malaysia said the conflicts would result in investors – both foreign and local – adopting a wait-and-see approach, which leads to slower economic growth.

At the same time, it increases the outflow of talents from Malaysia to other countries, said Teo, who is the head of the school of economics, faculty of social sciences of the university.

“Unlike Singapore, Taiwan, Hong Kong and China, Malaysians see political and racial conflicts as the major challenges for the economy due to the unique racial composition in Malaysia and the political developments back home since 2018,” said Teo.

Malaysia is made up of multi-racial community and racial clash is most likely to occur, he said.

“We have five prime ministers in six years since 2018. The disparity in racial representation in the ruling coalition and the opposition has led to racial issues being exploited in last few years,” Teo said.

He is of the view that Malaysians, regardless of their ethnicity, should embrace diversity and help one another.

This will prove to the politicians that people from different ethnic groups are not easily influenced by racial politics.

Respondents from Singapore and Hong Kong see major challenges in the drastic inflation and interest rate cut,  while respondents from China regard the China-US trade war as a major challenge in the economy over the next three years.