00:0050 years after Tun Abdul Razak Hussein's death,
00:03his son says one idea still matters.
00:07Nazir Razak says it could help a divided Malaysia.
00:11He points to a method his father,
00:13Malaysia's second Prime Minister, used after 1969.
00:17Not a quick fix, but a national consultation
00:20that rewired policy and institutions.
00:24He was extremely consultative, yet bold.
00:30He went through extensive consultation,
00:34you know, very formal consultation process.
00:36The Razak report all the way down to parents and teachers.
00:43The Rukunegara NEP, he had a national consultative council
00:48of 67 leading lights, who for months on end,
00:54spent weekends arguing and debating why May 13th
00:58and what we need to do going forward.
01:02Nazir's point is simple.
01:04Those were choices made after hard conversations.
01:07They were deliberate, they were wide.
01:10They were meant as a 20-year plan,
01:12but remains in place five decades later.
01:16Today, Nazir asks,
01:18are those instruments still fit for purpose?
01:21He notes the national economic policy was meant to be time limited.
01:26He asks whether we have outlived its logic,
01:29or whether it needs refinement.
01:32He warns that parliament alone won't do it.
01:35He says party politics often narrows what leaders can say.
01:40So he argues for something broader,
01:43a consultative process that reaches across society.
01:47Nazir also invokes stewardship.
01:50He tells stories about fiscal restraint,
01:53about leaders who treated public money as public trust.
01:57That culture, he argues, is essential if institutions are to endure.
02:03If Malaysia wants that conversation now,
02:06Nazir's question is practical.
02:09Who convenes it?
02:11How do we protect the conversation from short-term politics?
02:15And how do we ensure outcomes are enforceable?
02:20Nazir says the goal is not to reproduce the past.
02:23It's to borrow a technique.
02:26Inclusive, thoughtful national dialogue focused on the long term.
02:31Read the full article on FMT.
02:33Tun Razad's legacy may hold answers for divided Malaysia's future.
02:38For a deeper look at Nazir Razad's argument
02:40for a new national consultative process.
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