Today we had dinner at the home of former Deputy Prime Minister Musa Hitam. When the guard let us into the gate of a medium-sized estate (not incredibly large or overly-fancy), I immediately noticed his modest car collection: A Lexus LX (SUV), Audi A8, a 5-series BMW, a Jaguar, and large car with a BMW cover over it (probably a 7-series)—something light, you know? To the left of the front door was an infinity pond with large koi swimming around. To the right was a shoe rack. We all removed our shoes before entering the house that sat on a hill in a neighborhood with much larger and fancier estates.
Not only was this dinner and conversation in such an intimate setting a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity because Musa Hitam was a former Deputy Prime Minister (Al Gore’s older Malaysian counterpart), he’s also the current chairman of the board of directors at Sime Darby. If you forgot or have not read my prior blog entries, one of my responsibilities was to conduct a SRI (Socially Responsible Investment) rating for Sime Darby. On the ground in Malaysia, the company’s name is associated with poor labor rights in the distant past; and corruption in the recent past and present. At work, when Sean found out that I was rating them, he warned me to take my time because there were several allegations of corruption (which reduced the score of their rating). Here I was sitting on this man’s couch starting at his family photos—one flawless Asian woman on horseback sporting neat equestrian apparel (seriously, this photo belonged in a magazine!).
When he entered the room, we stood,individually introduced ourselves, and he began chatting about how he only paid RM850,000 (US$283,333) for this home after a divorce. He lucked out 20 years ago during a tough economic time when many people were selling mansions for almost nothing.
Getting down to business, he discussed the political history of Malaysia from Independence (1957) to the current administration. He included commentary on the direction that Malaysia was headed when he served under Prime Minister Mahathir bin Muhammad. Hitam won the seat in an open election after holding the following government positions in the years leading up: Chair of the Federal Land Development Authority, Deputy Minister of Trade & Industry, Minister of Primary Industries, and Minister of Education. Blaming Mahathir’s intolerant regime, he resigned and parted ways with Malaysian national politics. He also offered commentary on the sitting Prime Minister, Najib, who he speaks with quite often, but tries to avoid the subject of politics with. Basically, Hitam says that PM Najib is a good guy and the most tolerant PM Malaysia’s seen, but surrounded himself with all of the wrong people. Najib will call an election in less than a year, to prove his legitimacy, since he was appointed to the position. Hitam thinks that he will lose. He also touched on racial politics of Malays vs. …well, everyone else. He is pro-meritocracy and believed that fellow Malays should feel insulted that many of their leaders are trying to scare them into believing that they need the positive discrimination to be successful. That’s the second Malay I’ve heard make that argument.
Changing subjects, Hitam bragged about the World Islamic Economic Forum’s (WIEF) bottom-up approach juxtaposed to the World Economic Forum in Davos. As the chairman of this organization, he made it a point to tell us that he rejects all political and religious rhetoric, focusing on economics. He also pointed out the irony that this body sought the political goal of externally promoting positive association between the Islamic religion and their emerging economic practices and financial products. Many aspects of Islamic finance are catching on in Muslim and some non-Muslim groups in the West. Hitam said that the US is not invited to the WIFE just yet, because they either get overly-excited or get too afraid to talk about anything other than terrorism.
I knew it would come up eventually. The chairman of Sime Darby, a multibillion-dollar company looked me right in the eyes and asked me what I thought of his company. I was more nervous that I did not have hard facts and numbers memorized about my ratings. I first complemented him on how detailed the 2010 Annual Report was. A lot of information about their CSR efforts was available. What caused their ratings to suffer was the many corruption allegations. Hitam explained that when he began his chairmanship in 2007, he set up an internal task force to expose all of the company’s dubious dealings; “whatever allegation you’ve found came from us. We investigated, fired those responsible, and publicized it ourselves.” Professor Heng asked about Sime Darby’s human rights and labor violations. He abruptly asked, “What violations? Where did you find them? If it is going on, I want to know where as soon as possible. Actually, Sime Darbvy is the industry leader with the highest minimum wage.”
He moved the Sime Darby discussion to their palm plantations in Liberia. When he took the reins four years ago, he had his staff survey all of the property that they owned. Several hectares surfaced in Liberia. Even though the civil war there had been over for years, he was told that the land was worthless and should be discarded. He did not take that advice, and set up palm plantations there. Sime Darby also built schools for the children of the workers and housing for their families. He was particularly proud of the upgrade in these facilities—no more long row houses with one room for each family to squeeze into. “The Liberian people are so happy that we are there.” It was hard not to feel a slight cynicism when anyone makes statements like that, but I could sense integrity in this man. The question is could his family survive in one of these houses for a week when they visit Liberia?
The rest of the evening played out like anyone would imagine—a dinner with an elder statesman and foreign graduate students. Questions and conversations about corruption, immigration, women’s rights, religion, and ASEAN’s emergence danced around the table. He methodically handled every question with the same format. First he would spend a lot of time telling what you didn’t want to hear. It was an opportunity to remind us of how great Malaysia is, how far it has come, and that the US has ALL of the same problems in different manifestations. Then he would crack a joke before briefly mentioning where Malaysia could do a little better.
Before we left, he showed a couple of is his fruit trees in the backyard, the view of the Masjid downhill, and the giant deck (more than half the size of my parents’ house) that his friend’s daughter designed. I admired his infinity pool as I headed back inside. We met his 17-year old son (I assume he’s from the second marriage) who was headed to MIT for engineering. We stepped out of the door, put on our shoes and thanked him for the conversation and hospitality.
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