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| His Majesty, Sultan Hj Hassanul Bolkiah with Rajah Isteri |
Brunei is a peaceful, stable country but all authority bows to His Majesty as the supreme leader of the country and it is against the law to criticize any of the Royals or any of the decision making processes here.
In fact HM takes great care of his people- if you are Bruneian, you are provided with a virtually free health service,free schooling, interest free loans for houses, a free piece of land which can be applied for once you turn18, government subsidised rice ,sugar and petrol/diesel.
In fact, the retail price of rice, sugar and petroleum products has not altered one cent in over 20 years!
I read last year that the subsidisation of oil alone costs His Majesty's government over 500 million a year. Premium unleaded petrol costs $0.53c /litre and diesel about $0.38c/litre- wow!
Costs me about $33 to fill my tank from empty. It always seems pretty painful to go to NZ on holiday and pay NZ$130+ for one full tank!
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| Crown Prince Muda Billah with HRH Pg Sarah |
The 'rakyat' (people) are very grateful to their benevolent King for providing all these services and are very patriotic and respectful.
But the feeling among many locals I work with is that there still needs to be some regular form of inflationary wage adjustments.Many here have large families and it does cost quite a bit to feed that many mouths, even on a simple diet of cheap rice, inexpensive local fish and vegetables.
One area of small discontent within the population are the number of 'stateless' people living in Brunei.These people are generally part of the local Chinese community and hold a red identity card ( as opposed to a Yellow I/C which designates a Bruneian citizen). Most of these people were born here , yet cannot apply for a yellow I/C. It does make a difference in the health sector where they get charged for some services whereas citizens would be free.
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