R.Nadeswaran
MORE than seven years ago – in October 2006, to be precise, – I sent this stinker of a message to then domestic trade and consumer affairs minister, Datuk Mohd Shafie Apdal, in one of my columns:
"If you are invited for tea at the Domestic Trade and Consumer Affairs Ministry or by its officials, you'd be better off declining it. That's because the ministry and its officials are trying to tell us to use one tea bag for every 10 cups of tea! Not exactly though, but by words to that effect.
"The minister, in his festive season message via a full-page advertorial, suggests that consumers should 'minimise the use of ingredients such as sugar and flour by making cookies with less of such ingredients'.
How the heck do you make cookies without the right amount of ingredients? The advertorial is not the only media the ministry is spending on. Why are our civil servants making the minister look stupid with such unkind statements?
It is no intention of this writer to recycle old stories, but in view of the price increase and the hardship faced by the people, similar statements reflecting on ignorance, lack of knowledge and unawareness transcend into shades of stupidity and folly.
The message is simple – stop giving the people false hopes by "threatening" traders or retailers who raise prices because there are no laws which prevent them from raising prices.
Please do not give false hopes to consumers by making all kinds of statements and promises. If you don't deliver or are unable to keep them, you make the rakyat even angrier. Talk about sending hundreds of enforcement officers out to the field to "check on increases" is nothing but pure bunkum!
If your officers have not already briefed you, allow me to enlighten you. Let is be categorically stated that our system is one of free enterprise – willing buyer-willing seller at a price agreed upon. If the buyer cannot agree on the price, he chooses another source.
The government will not and does not fix prices of raw or cooked food, or that matter any commodity. The fixing of petrol and diesel prices is merely an administrative arrangement between the government and the oil companies.
The price of a cup of tea varies from location to location. It may cost RM1.20 in a stall; perhaps RM2 in a restaurant; RM12 in an up market shopping mall and even RM20 in a five-star hotel.
So, if the stall operator increases his price to RM1.50, does it amount to profiteering? No, but he has committed an offence if he does not have a board listing the prices of the food that is on sale at his stall. Well, that's another law altogether – not related to profiteering. This law gives the consumer a choice to look and compare prices before making a purchase or placing an order.
There is no law against profiteering. Period.
If there is any, then the ministry should first ask the hoteliers to justify why some of them charge RM40 for mamak mee – 10 times more than the average restaurant. Of course, patrons are paying for the ambience, décor and the service.
So, stop giving consumers false hopes. We have to accept that the price increases are going to hurt all of us who earn an honest living without backhanders, coffee money and other forms of inducement above and below the table.
People must face reality but in our case, not very long ago in the many speeches, announcements, assurances, proclamations and chest-thumping promises, the various parties gave undertakings of a different kind. They guaranteed that they would bring down prices if they were voted into power.
Having achieved that, it is their onerous duty and ultimate responsibility to honour their words and deeds. They cannot run away from the fact that they can do nothing to arrest the series of price increases triggered by the withdrawal of subsidies.
They now cannot fall back and make more empty promises such as "we will go after profiteers" which they will never be able to do. This is the price we are paying for the monopolistic trades and systems of business that have been created in the past for the benefit of a few.
At every turn, important commodities and staple food are in the hands of a few. It is not too late to open the markets for healthy competition.
The government and its officials must stop making statements which underestimate the intelligence of the people. Land Public Transport Commission (SPAD) chairman Tan Sri Syed Hamid Albar's quick "cure" for the demand by school bus operators to raise prices is allowing parent-teacher associations (PTAs) to operate school buses.
Is he in Malaysia or another planet? You don't go and buy buses off the rack. You order the chassis and engine and subsequently the coach is built according to specifications.
But that aside, how could he have imagined that PTAs have that kind of money to invest in a bus or several buses? It is agreed that time-tabling and collection of monthly fees can be done, but what about maintenance of buses, keeping spares, etc? A bus is not a car which you send to the neighbourhood garage for oil and filter change and carry on driving.
We need a concerted effort to keep in check the effects of spiralling prices. We can do without pledges that cannot be kept. These are not election promises, some of which can be written on running water and no one cares.
The issue of price increases hits everyone where it hurts and a permanent solution must be found instead of political rhetoric.
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