Malaysia prime minister Anwar Ibrahim said his efforts to woo foreign investors had already borne some fruit with companies such as Tesla, SpaceX, Geely, and Dell.

He was speaking at the Milken Institute's Asia Summit during a lunchtime dialogue on Sep. 13, hosted by Bloomberg Southeast Asia Correspondent Haslinda Amin, and covered a wide variety of topics, including the importance and impact of foreign investment in Asia, as well as the ongoing fallout of 1MDB.

Investment and taxes

The 76-year-old was attending the Asia Summit as part of his continuing outreach to bring more foreign investment to Malaysia, and was questioned by Amin on the subject.

In addition to the dialogue, he also attended a session with global investors interested in Malaysia, where he made his comments about having attracted foreign investors.

The Malaysian leader also brought up semiconductor firm Infineon pledging a 5 billion euro (S$7.3 billion) investment in Malaysia, which Anwar described as an "immense help to boost confidence".

But a significant part of Malaysia's financial woes came from a lack of income, and Anwar was quizzed about how he would bridge the shortfall, whether it might be through new taxes or the reintroduction of GST.

Anwar laughed at being asked to speak about new taxes in front of potential investors, but said his main goal was subsidy rationalisation, saying that it had to take priority over measures to broaden the tax base, such as GST.

When asked about GST, he reiterated his previous comments, saying that GST is both transparent and efficient as a tax system, but it cannot be implemented while many Malaysians are still living in abject poverty.

Fuel subsidy

Anwar explained that the current system of fuel subsidies did not always have the intended effect, and said he would like to reduce the amount of fuel subsidies enjoyed by the rich.

He then joked that he also included "the rich Singaporeans going to Johor to buy petrol" as part of that group of well-off spenders, before demurring and stating, "I'm not complaining, I'm just stating a fact."

Amin then clarified that Singaporean drivers are not allowed to buy subsidised fuel.

Despite this, Singaporeans have regularly been found trying to exploit subsidies.

Turning serious, Anwar said smuggling through the borders in the north was also "huge", with smugglers resorting to using Malaysian cars to get around restrictions on foreign vehicles.

In this way, Anwar described subsidies as currently practised as "irrational and uneconomic", and if misuse could be reduced, Malaysia could save billions.

Goldman Sachs and 1MDB

Malaysian media, such as the Malay Mail and the New Straits Times, were most taken by Anwar's comments regarding global investment bank Goldman Sachs and Anwar's determination to recover money lost via the 1MDB scandal.

As reported by Reuters, Anwar's government said in April 2023 that it intended to review the US$3.9 billion (S$5.31 billion) settlement that had been reached with the investment bank by Anwar's predecessor Muhyiddin Yassin in 2020.

Anwar reiterated during the dialogue that he believed the issue has yet to be settled, and said Goldman Sachs will not be allowed to "shy away".

"You can't consider (Malaysia) some banana republic that you can squander and then leave us alone," he said.

"No. We will not stop at that, because it is not my money, and I owe it to my people."

When asked how far he is willing to go if Goldman Sachs does not cooperate, he simply said, "We'll go very far."

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Top image via Milken Institute