Malaysians should savour this rare moment of government transparency. Chances are it won't last long.

This would not have happened without former prime minister Dr Mahathir Mohamad prying open the gates to the list of Approved Permit (AP) holders. Only he had the power to get the government to do his bidding - not once but twice.

Days after the government vowed it would not release the tightly guarded list, Prime Minister Abdullah Ahmad Badawi took the unprecedented step of making it public, albeit only the one for this year.

And when his ex-boss complained that the list was incomplete, Abdullah had to call on International Trade and Industry Minister Rafidah Aziz to follow up with further disclosures.

Will there be more transparency to come?

Mahathir has promised that the matter will not end here. Indeed, all the power to him. Malaysians should cheer him on for like Mahathir, we want to see the full list of AP holders since the practice began in the 1970s.

However, when all is said and done, the AP list is just the tip of the information iceberg. Now that our appetite has been whetted by this little tidbit, it is time for the government to come clean on the host of other secrets it has kept from us.

But don't hold your breath. Given the track record of this government and its opaque administration, this could be as good as it gets.

Gov't running on empty

For Rafidah Aziz, the writing is already on the wall. Her days are numbered.

And Abdullah's silence on the on-going AP war is not unexpected. It would be difficult for anyone to step in when two elephants are furiously stomping on each other. Nevertheless, it is not often that the prime minister - the country's most powerful man - is reduced to a mere bystander in a spat between two hard-headed politicians.

But Abdullah is likely to end up the biggest winner. He can now get rid of a tainted minister and check Mahathir's influence over national carmaker Proton, all in one swift stroke.

However, this is not the only issue on Abdullah's plate. More important is the country's economic outlook for the next few years. And that picture doesn't look very pretty.

The government is currently burdened with a runaway budget deficit, loss in global competitiveness and an ill-trained workforce. Worse still, an economic downturn is expected around the corner.

In the Mahathir days, the solution would have been simple - spend our way out of economic trouble. But Mahathirnomics only works when we are flushed with money. Those good old days of pump-priming are gone.

Over the decades, Mahathir had often boasted that the country was rich enough - thanks to generous contributions from national oil company Petronas - to pay for his profligate spending on mega-projects.

Even so, many economists have warned that the bailouts and the construction of white elephants only delay the inevitable. Malaysians will eventually have to pay for Mahathir's excesses.

The chickens, or rather the turkeys, have now come home to roost. But the old man has left Abdullah to sweep up the droppings.

It is no wonder that the billion-ringgit oil subsidies have to be slashed. The government wants the savings from the subsidies to build more schools and hospitals.

No doubt, as oil prices go up, Petronas will earn more from exports. But Minister in the Prime Minister's Department Mustapha Mohamed has cautioned that the additional income must be spent responsibly. It would be unwise, he argued, to spend Petronas' windfall profits on fuel subsidies.

This is as good as saying that the Mahathir cabinet, of which many of its members are still in government, had been irresponsible in spending our money in the past.

Not only a Rafidah problem

Back to the AP war.

It is clear that Mahathir has skillfully, through his influence in the government-controlled media and with his die-hard supporters within the party, turned the AP issue into a Rafidah problem.

Let's not be distracted by the salvos lobbed by the warring parties. Both the feuding leaders - and this government - are responsible for the AP imbroglio.

In the heat of his battle with Rafidah, the ex-PM has reportedly said that he protected her three times.

We know of the one time he defended Rafidah. On this score, Mahathir should practice what he preaches. In the interest of transparency, he should reveal the other occasions he had willingly abused his power to shield his once-favourite minister.

Leaders must be held accountable for their actions. In other countries, Rafidah would have been immediately sacked for lying about the AP list. And both she and her mentor would be put in the dock for their past indiscretions.

But, of course, things are done differently in Malaysia. The one bright spark in this bizarre AP saga is that the government, unlike the previous Mahathir regime, is grudgingly responsive to criticism.

So it does pay to put the government on its toes. Even Citizen Mahathir knows it.