August, will be the month....

It is confirmed. By August, we will be paying the same price S'poreans pay for their petrol.

And yes, I am scared shit. My monthly petrol expenses comes to about RM250. In two months time, I will be paying at least RM500. Well, an extra of RM250 can be absorbed, albeit painfully. But think of the chain reaction with the rise of petrol price. Everything, absolutely everything in this country will increase in tandem. Food, property, the opportunistic toll operators, the opportunistic hawkers... I wonder if our monthly church offering should be increase too, considering the church expenses will be similarly affected ...

The government has agreed to float the price of cement (floating the price of some 'item' always means the price will go up, up and away....). This means properties, whether new or old will have another excuse to 'appreciate' in price. The government has also agreed to float the price of raw chicken to reflect the market rate. This means the chicken that we consume here and in S'pore will be sold at similar price.

I am wondering aloud, why stop there Badawi? If you want to open up and let everything reflect the world prices, why not open up all? Why didn't you remove all the AP for cars, plastic materials and other raw materials that are so important to the manufacturing sector? Why don't you liberalise all banking sector, insurance and telecommunications?

Half baked measures like this will more likely makes us less competitive while at the same time choking us unnecessarily. The cost of manufacturing is still high in Malaysia. There are too many taxes, resulting in our products being less competitive as compared to S'pore. My opinion is, if you want to take steps in opening up the country, do so with prior planning and not in knee jerk fashion. Set a timetable and allow the rakyat to plan for their future. We Malaysians, are not afraid of competitions. But let the competitions be fair. We are not frightened by realities of life and we know all these while we are blessed with the artificial low price of certain raw materials (and artificially high prices for certain item). The only thing that we hope from the government is in not being a stumbling block in our effort to compete with the rest of the world.

So what should we do? My first worry is the price of house. I don't have much money, but I know if I fail to secure any house now, the price will doubled by year end. Inflation level will increase significantly. And by that time, I will not be able to afford any house. Other than that, I guess I will take it in stride the increase in price of common commodity. I will travel less to my hometown, I will drive less aggressively.

In the mean time, my advise to all of you readers (as if there are many...:P) -

• Travel as much as you can. Travel to those places which you wanted to (but not able to due to financial constrains)
• Eat anything, everything and as much as you want
• Drive to far away places locally
• Buy the things which you have been eying for months now....
• Eat, Play and Be Happy....

The bottom line is -

You may hesitate in doing many things now due to monetary consideration.

But my advise is, DO IT NOW!

Simply because, many things will be out of your reach soon!!!