Even if the New Economic Policy (NEP) is discontinued, corruption among politicians would still be rampant,  political analyst Lim Teck Ghee said.

"I must confess that I got it wrong about the NEP, because I thought if we discontinued it, a new policy would come that would bring about the desired change in our country.

"This is wrong because even if the NEP ended today, the hijacking and pillage of the public treasury will continue under whichever new policy.

"So long as there is government procurement, we will get high- and low-level politicians putting their hands or their relatives' hands (into the nation's coffers), helping themselves and bending the rules to their favour," he said.

Lim said this during the launch of the book Anatomy of an Electoral Tsunami, which he co-authored with Terence Netto and S Thayaparan. 

He termed corruption in Malaysia a "multi-headed hydra" with two heads growing when one is chopped off.

In order to deal with this, he added, public disclosure and transparency are absolutely essential.

As such, Lim suggested that the government set up a website where information on government contracts, concessions and committees can be openly accessed by members of the public.

The asset declarations of public officials and their families should also be listed on this website, he added.

"(This way), we can prevent this massive corruption and hijacking found in 'Malaysia lama' and which are likely to continue in 'Malaysia baru'," he said.

A watchful eye

Former navy commander Thayaparan warned Pakatan Harapan that even their own supporters would be keeping a watchful eye on them to ensure the coalition does not go down the same path as BN.

"We are all Harapan supporters, but let me assure you, Harapan, we will be watching you because we will not make the same mistake we made (with BN).

"We voted them in, we trusted them and then we got lazy because we thought they would be okay.

"But not this time around, friends, not this time around," he said.

BN, which had been the government in Malaysia for almost 61 years, suffered a shocking defeat in the 14th general election last May after its leaders were plagued by corruption scandals.

The new Harapan government had run its election campaign based on a platform of institutional reform and reducing the rakyat's burden in terms of living costs.

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