KUALA LUMPUR, Aug. 23 -- In the past few years, every time the Department of Statistics Malaysia (DOSM) publishes the figures for Foreign Direct Investment (FDI), certain quarters tend to compare the FDI figure against the Foreign Investment (FI) data captured by the Malaysian Investment Development Authority (Mida).

Allegations tend to follow on how they believe the Mida numbers are fudged to achieve a feel-good factor. Never mind that since becoming the Minister of Investment, Trade and Industry (Miti), I have produced at least two explainer videos (and a few more on related topics) clarifying the difference between these technical calculations of investments. Or that Miti has consistently been issuing its quarterly Report Card since 1...