The Ethics Code Reached the Floor. The Questions Arrived With It.

KopiTalk LegCo Tracker · Second Meeting, Day Three — In-Depth from the Hansard · 6 August 2026 

By Malai Hassan Othman

Brunei's first code of ethics for Legislative Council members opened with broad support for its purpose. Then came the harder question: adopt a workable first code and improve it later, or settle its safeguards before asking the Chamber to bind itself?

Yang Berhormat Awang Haji Salleh Bostaman bin Haji Zainal Abidin began with a warning about process. A document important enough to govern the conduct of Legislative Council members, he said, had reached them dalam tempoh yang agak singkat — within a relatively short period — before they were asked to consider adopting it.

He supported the direction. He did not support the draft in its present form.

By the time he sat down, Brunei's first Code of Ethics and Conduct for Legislative Council Members had acquired something every credible integrity instrument should survive: scrutiny from the people it was designed to bind.

The code was not rejected. Nor did Council try and fail to pass it. Usul Bilangan 5/2026 remained under debate when the Speaker adjourned the sitting, with other members still to be heard when Council reconvenes on Saturday, 8 August.

That distinction matters. What happened on Thursday was not institutional failure. It was the beginning of an argument over how an institution should restrain itself — and how carefully it must draw the line between accountability and the freedom to perform a representative duty.

The morning had opened with a cleaner ending to another story. Usul Bilangan 4/2026, supporting His Majesty's decision to establish three Coordinating Minister posts, was put to a show of hands after a multi-day debate. Every hand went up. The motion passed unanimously, and the gavel came down.

Usul Bilangan 5/2026 was different from the moment it reached the floor.

Yang Berhormat Pehin Datu Lailaraja Mejar Jeneral (B) Dato Paduka Seri Haji Awang Halbi bin Haji Mohd. Yussof introduced it by returning to His Majesty's call in February 2025 for a code that would help members discharge their duties dengan lebih berkesan dan berintegriti tinggi — with greater effectiveness and higher integrity.

He also cited His Majesty's March 2026 warning that the Government tidak akan bertolak ansur — would not tolerate — corruption, because unchecked corruption could threaten national security.

The draft was led by Yang Berhormat Pengiran Haji Isa bin Pengiran Haji Aliuddin, whose account of two decades navigating cross-agency grey areas anchored this column's Day Two report. It also drew input from the Attorney General's Chambers, the Anti-Corruption Bureau and Legislative Council members, alongside practices used by overseas legislatures.

Five principles run through it: loyalty, integrity, professionalism, transparency and mutual respect.

Its reach is wider than ceremonial behaviour. It covers conduct during sittings and official engagements, compliance with the law, conflicts of interest, declarations of assets, gifts, confidential information, prudent use of public resources and obligations continuing after a member leaves office.

The draft also contains enforcement machinery: complaint procedures, preliminary review and investigation, an investigative board and a declaration register. That is important because the mover placed the code in the space below the criminal threshold.

Corruption and criminal breach of trust are already offences. Public confidence, however, can also be damaged by an undeclared gift, an unmanaged conflict, misuse of office, favouritism or nepotism — conduct that may be unethical even when it does not result in a criminal prosecution.

The question was never whether integrity mattered. It was whether the draft had drawn its obligations precisely enough.

Yang Berhormat Pehin Orang Kaya Johan Pahlawan Dato Seri Setia Awang Haji Adanan bin Begawan Pehin Siraja Khatib Dato Seri Setia Haji Md. Yusof spoke first. He supported the code as a historic step, but asked that post-service obligations be confined mainly to confidentiality rather than following a former member indefinitely.

YB Pehin Dato Adanan also urged comparison with international parliamentary standards, including work associated with the Inter-Parliamentary Union and Commonwealth Parliamentary Association. His preferred route was to introduce the code, then review and update it periodically. He also asked how far work had progressed on updating the Council's Standing Orders — a related question that should not disappear beneath the ethics debate.

Yang Berhormat Dayang Chong Chin Yee followed. Her intervention was supportive but technically careful.

If confidential material was to be protected, she asked, who would identify it as confidential? Would the definition extend beyond material formally classified under security rules? Would members receive the ICT policies they were expected to obey, a practical compliance guide, a briefing and a named officer from whom to seek advice?

She also asked how one code would apply across two different roles. Ministers exercise executive authority and are already subject to administrative, financial, procurement and public-service rules. Appointed members may face conflicts arising from private employment, business, professional practice or organisational involvement.

YB Chong did not argue for weaker standards. She asked for clarity about which obligations apply to everyone, which relate specifically to parliamentary work and how the code interacts with rules already governing ministerial office.

Then YB Salleh Bostaman changed the temperature of the room.

He accepted that the code was a step in the right direction. But as is, he said, it still contained issues requiring explanation and adjustment — made more troubling by the short time members had been given to consider it.

Conflict-of-interest declarations, he argued, should not be voluntary. They should be mandatory, filed periodically, updated when circumstances change and extended to relevant interests involving spouses and dependent children.

He wanted members with a relevant conflict to declare it, seek approval where appropriate, withdraw from the affected consideration and have that action recorded. Gifts should carry a defined financial threshold rather than a standard open to argument after the event.

His concern also reached beyond domestic transactions. Approaches involving foreign governments, agencies or outside organisations — including sponsorship, hospitality, donations, services and lobbying — should be declined, declared and reported where they could advance a private interest or create the appearance of conflict.

The most delicate point concerned information.

YB Salleh Bostaman fully accepted that properly classified secrets must remain protected. But not every piece of official information is necessarily secret. If the definition becomes too broad, he warned, members could become 'overzealously cautious' — afraid to ask legitimate questions or give constituents a straight explanation for fear that any answer might be treated as a breach.

He applied the same reasoning to collective responsibility. It should preserve confidence in government, he said, without closing the space for alternative views, difficult discussions and legitimate scrutiny. If appointed members merely repeated one position, the checks-and-balances function of the institution would weaken.

He also wanted the proposed investigative board and its membership more clearly defined, together with rules covering social media, sexual harassment and protection for members themselves.

His conclusion was unambiguous. The code was masih belum bersedia untuk diterima dalam bentuknya yang sedia ada — not yet ready to be accepted in its current form. He recommended further examination and coordination before it returned for the Chamber's support.

The Speaker then entered the discussion with a careful qualification. He said he was not trying to give weight to either side — 'which I shouldn't be and I have no business to do it' — but acknowledged that he shared the same institutional interest as the other members.

No code, he observed, would ever satisfy everyone or become a perfect document. 'We will have to start somewhere.'

That supplied the debate's real dividing line.

One approach says an institution should begin with a workable code, learn from experience and refine it over time. The other says that confidentiality, conflicts, gifts, investigations and members' freedom to scrutinise government are too consequential to leave imprecise at the point of adoption.

Both positions can claim integrity as their purpose. One fears delay. The other fears ambiguity.

With other business still on the agenda, the Speaker adjourned the sitting without calling a vote. He indicated that other members would be given room to continue the debate. The motion was neither passed nor rejected, and it was not formally referred back. It remains before the Chamber.

There is something healthy in that unfinished ending. A code intended to protect public confidence should not acquire legitimacy merely because everyone agrees that ethics are important. Its legitimacy will also depend on whether its rules are clear, even-handed, enforceable and safe for honest scrutiny.

Saturday will show whether Council chooses to start somewhere or first decide exactly where that somewhere should be.

Day Three of LegCo, in a Nutshell

The coordinating-minister motion passes — Usul Bilangan 4/2026 was approved unanimously by a show of hands after the mover's summation. The Hansard records all members present raising their hands before the gavel confirmed the result.

The ethics-code debate remains open — Usul Bilangan 5/2026 was introduced and seconded, followed by three speeches from YB Pehin Dato Adanan, YB Chong and YB Salleh Bostaman. No vote was called before adjournment. Debate is expected to continue when Council reconvenes on Saturday, 8 August.

Beneficial ownership: the figure that should trouble regulators — As of 25 July 2026, only 13.5 per cent of companies registered with ROCBN — 1,301 of 9,633 — had filed beneficial-owner declarations. That was up from 8.2 per cent in April, but still means more than 86 per cent apparently had not filed, 15 months after filing became mandatory on 25 April 2025. The requirement supports FATF Recommendation 24 on money laundering, terrorism financing and proliferation financing.

Fiscal consolidation produces savings — but keep the estimate honest — Phase One ran 86 initiatives, of which 22 were reported completed. Nine completed initiatives were estimated to have generated BND34.7 million in savings, including BND11.6 million from replacing Ministry of Defence meal rations with catering contracts. Phase Two carries 58 initiatives through 2029/2030.

GLC employment comes with localisation numbers — Darussalam Assets group companies employ more than 9,000 people, about 86 per cent of them local. BFI and BMC reported local workforce rates of 80 and 95 per cent. Hengyi had offered engineering scholarship programmes to 935 students and exceeded its agreed 50 per cent localisation level by the end of 2025.

The 30MW solar project has a local-content ledger — The flagship public-private-partnership solar plant is under construction and expected to begin operating by the end of 2026. It is projected to power about 2,000 homes and avoid around 26,000 metric tonnes of carbon dioxide emissions annually. The project created 22 local construction jobs, expects eight local operations and maintenance positions, and awarded about BND5 million — 30 per cent of project value — to local subcontractors.

Tourism spending rises while stays get shorter — Nearly 400,000 visitor arrivals were recorded in the first half of 2026, up 7.8 per cent, with sea arrivals rising 70 per cent. Estimated visitor spending increased from BND140 million to BND150 million and hotel sales rose 17 per cent, from about BND17 million to BND20 million. Yet the average hotel stay fell from approximately three days to two — the figure policy-makers should watch beside the celebratory ones.

Saudi investment will face the normal tests — with Hajj and Umrah in view — The Ministry of Finance said Saudi opportunities would be assessed through cost-benefit, value-for-money, long-term-return and risk analysis. Brunei's Hajj and Umrah requirements — pilgrims' welfare, accommodation costs and continuity of services — would remain an important strategic consideration, not an exemption from investment discipline.

Even 'night-time economy' needed a rethink — A question on tourism after dark prompted the Speaker to suggest that ekonomi waktu malam might need a better label — 'barangkali galak sedikit bunyinya' — drawing laughter across the Chamber. Sometimes policy begins with finding language the public will actually want to repeat.

 

Day Two of LegCo: The Prescriptions Are on Record. The Delivery Contract Is Not.

KopiTalk LegCo Tracker · Second Meeting, Day Two — In-Depth from the Hansard · 5 August 2026

By Malai Hassan Othman

A poultry farmer’s two decades inside Brunei’s bureaucratic grey areas became the day’s argument in miniature. After two days and 22 members, Council had produced several remedies. What remains missing is the public contract that says who owns each outcome, how success will be measured and when delivery is due.

Yang Berhormat Pengiran Haji Isa bin Pengiran Haji Aliuddin has spent nearly two decades in the livestock industry. On Wednesday, he described what that has meant in practice: securing land, building poultry infrastructure and navigating licences involving halal certification, vehicle permits, foreign workers and imported raw materials — each handled under different ministries, departments and rules.

His complaint was not that Brunei has no agencies. It was that a problem crossing several agencies can fall into what he called grey areas: overlapping functions, conflicting procedures and uncertainty over who is responsible. Decisions slow down. Business activity and investor confidence pay the price.

But Pengiran Isa did more than diagnose the problem. He proposed a dedicated coordinating platform with a clear mandate to track cross-agency cases, accelerate decisions and secure a resolution within a reasonable period. For businesses, it would become a single point of reference instead of requiring them to pursue the same issue separately through several offices. He also argued that stronger coordination could help curb corruption — a serious claim that deserves attention in its own right.

That intervention captured much of what Council had spent two full days discussing. Usul Bilangan 4/2026 supported His Majesty’s decision to establish three Coordinating Minister posts for national security, economic policies, and social policies and human resources. When the debate concluded, the Speaker said 22 members had taken part and that the motion had received the full support of the Chamber.

The unanimity was significant. So was the distinction between supporting a new structure and defining how its performance will be judged.

Day One had supplied the economic warning. Yang Berhormat Dato Seri Setia Dr. Haji Abdul Manaf bin Haji Metussin said Brunei’s economy had expanded by an annual average of only 0.7 per cent in the decade to 2025 — belum mencukupi dan memadai, not yet sufficient or adequate. Yang Berhormat Awang Haji Salleh Bostaman bin Haji Zainal Abidin had put the delivery problem more plainly: the country does not lack plans, strategies or KPIs. The challenge is execution.

Day Two turned that complaint into several prescriptions.

Yang Berhormat Dr Awang Haji Mahali bin Haji Momin proposed aligning existing ministerial KPIs with shared national outcomes such as economic growth, poverty reduction and food security. He went further than simply calling for another dashboard: he proposed an Integrated National Performance Monitoring System, supported by a single source of truth across ministries, continuous performance assessment, risk analysis and rapid corrective action.

His test was the right one. A poverty programme should not be judged only by how much assistance it distributes, but by whether recipients move out of poverty and become self-reliant. Food security should not be measured merely by the amount held in reserve, but by whether the system can withstand disruption and continue feeding the country.

Yang Berhormat Dayang Hajah Safiah binti Sheikh Haji Abd. Salam gave public visibility to the same accountability principle. She proposed a national Wawasan dashboard setting out the main KPIs, targets, current achievement, lead agencies and corrective measures, updated regularly and accessible to the public. That is more than data presentation. It is an invitation for citizens to see whether national promises are moving.

Two other members carried the argument towards jobs and the grassroots. Yang Berhormat Awang Abdul Aziz bin Haji Hamdan proposed cross-ministry KPIs covering local employment, economic development, investment and household income, alongside village and mukim economic strengths. He also warned that digital growth must be matched by coordinated protection against scams, identity theft and data breaches.

Yang Berhormat Haji Awang Sulaiman bin Haji Nasir proposed developing Satu Kampung Satu Produk into Satu Kampung Satu Ekonomi — One Village One Economy. His model would take communities from an idea to a product, from a product to the domestic market and then to exports, supported by an integrated village socioeconomic plan, economic profiles, clear targets and coordination across the relevant ministries and agencies.

These were not four identical proposals. They were complementary parts of a possible delivery architecture: aligned outcomes, integrated data, public reporting, named leadership, corrective action and an economic chain extending to the village level. Pengiran Isa’s single coordinating platform supplied the practical front door for people and businesses caught between agencies.

The central question is what happens to those proposals now. The motion supported the coordinating structure already established on 4 June. The Hansard records the prescriptions offered from the floor, but not their conversion into a mandatory public framework with agreed owners, baselines, reporting dates and consequences for delay. Full support created political consensus. It did not, by itself, create that delivery contract.

The employment debate showed why such a contract matters. Yang Berhormat Pehin Orang Kaya Indera Pahlawan Dato Seri Setia Awang Haji Suyoi bin Haji Osman returned to unemployment, citing His Majesty’s 15 June Cabinet Meeting call for urgency. He pressed for easier business conditions, stronger foreign direct investment, a larger hiring role for government-linked companies and temporary cross-department placements to move registered jobseekers into work.

Yang Berhormat Awang Mohammad bin Abdullah @ Lim Swee Ann added the connection between training and an actual job. He cited Singapore’s SkillsFuture and Work-Study arrangements and Malaysia’s PERKESO employment-insurance system as models for combining skills development, career guidance, work experience, job matching and employment support. His underlying point was that training numbers alone cannot be the final measure. The destination must be employment.

Question time and ministerial statements also showed that parts of government already work with targets and deadlines. The Visit Brunei Year 2027 strategy set out seven approaches — not six — and said success would be measured through visitor numbers, length of stay, tourist spending, returns to local businesses and wider community benefits. The food-security response included minimum reserves of three months for fertiliser and six months for poultry feed, 100 per cent self-sufficiency in eggs and contingency work arising from conflict in the Middle East.

The health figures were similarly concrete. From January to June 2026, nearly 8,000 BruHealth risk assessments were completed. More than 6,500 people were identified as requiring further screening, and nearly 1,600 screening appointments were booked. BN on the Move recorded 17.55 billion steps, involving between 29,000 and 33,000 active users a month.

The afternoon added a ministerial statement on artificial intelligence in education and detailed infrastructure commitments. Five major dams provide a combined raw-water storage capacity of 180 million cubic metres. Five water-treatment projects were listed, several with 2028 or 2029 completion dates. The non-revenue-water programme carries a target of 25 per cent by 2035, while 51,458 smart meters had been installed and another 77,493 were targeted for completion by December 2027.

Housing came with its own measurable gap: a national home-ownership target of 85 per cent by 2035 against a current rate of 68.1 per cent, with at least 1,606 new units planned under the Twelfth National Development Plan. These commitments matter. They show that government is not operating without figures, targets or dates.

What is still missing is the bridge between sectoral commitments and the national result that opened this debate: an economy averaging 0.7 per cent annual growth over a decade. Which initiatives are expected to move that number? By how much? Who brings ministries together when progress stalls? What corrective action follows, and when does the public get to see it?

That returns the argument to Pengiran Isa and his poultry business. His two decades in the grey areas are what a shortage of coordination looks like outside the Chamber: one permit, one agency boundary and one delayed decision at a time. Yet his speech also showed that Council did not end the debate empty-handed. The prescriptions are now on the parliamentary record.

The next test is whether the new Coordinating Ministers turn those prescriptions into an operating system: one that assigns ownership, publishes the baseline, sets the deadline, tracks the file and intervenes when delivery slips. The structure is in place. The delivery contract now needs to be written.

KopiTalk LegCo Tracker · Second Meeting, Day Two — In a Nutshell · 5 August 2026

Day Two of LegCo, In a Nutshell

Day Two at a Glance The motion carries — After two full sitting days and twenty-two speeches, Usul Bilangan 4/2026 — endorsing the three Coordinating Minister posts — closed with what the Speaker called sokongan penuh: full support, no dissent recorded. Everyone named the same missing piece — and it wasn't in the motion — Four members proposed the fix from two angles. YB Dr Mahali and YB Dayang Safiah called for a single public dashboard — a papan muka wawasan negara — tracking every national outcome with a named lead agency and corrective action when it slips. YB Abdul Aziz and YB Haji Sulaiman carried the same idea down to village and mukim level. The motion approved only the three ministerial appointments. The dashboard was never adopted. The coordination gap, in one business owner's words — YB Pengiran Haji Isa described running a livestock and poultry operation for nearly twenty years inside "grey areas" between agencies — halal certification, vehicle permits, foreign worker permits, raw material imports — each on its own timeline, none able to say where his file stood. This is the story the full essay opens and closes on. Unemployment, again — YB Pehin Dato Suyoi pressed for easier business conditions, more FDI, a bigger GLC role in hiring, and temporary cross-department placements for jobseekers, invoking His Majesty's 15 June Cabinet Meeting titah. YB Mohammad @ Lim Swee Ann pointed to Singapore's SkillsFuture and Malaysia's PERKESO as models for linking training to placement. The scale of what's already under construction — The Minister of Development listed 17,239 hectares already allocated for industry and agriculture, five water-treatment plants moving toward 2029, five dams holding 180 million cubic metres, and 1,606 new housing units in the pipeline against an 85 per cent home-ownership target (current rate: 68.1 per cent). The Energy Minister added 347 megawatts of new generation capacity and offshore projects targeting first oil in 2029. None of it was tied back to the 0.7 per cent growth figure from Day One. AI, everywhere — The Minister of Education delivered a formal ministerial statement on a "Sovereign AI" approach to education — 4,892 teachers trained, 4,281 AI-literacy certified. Three other ministers returned to AI and digital transformation in their own speeches the same afternoon. The morning's numbers — A seven-approach Visit Brunei Year 2027 tourism strategy anchored by a Borneo Eco Resort project, a new Middle East–conflict response community structure, a Singapore trade MoU, and health-system digitisation — 8,000 BruHealth risk assessments, 1,600 booked screenings, 17.55 billion steps logged on BN on The Move, 75 successful smoking-cessation quitters since 2023.

Day One of LegCo: The Number Was 0.7%. Nobody Blinked.

KopiTalk LegCo Tracker · Second Meeting, Day One — In-Depth (From the Hansard) · 3 August 2026

A decade of growth averaging 0.7 per cent a year. A minister said so himself, on the floor, while making the case for a new coordinating post. Hansard records no follow-up. What came next across the rest of Day One either answers that silence or deepens it.

By Malai Hassan Othman

The Hansard records no request for the figure to be repeated, no question asking what had held it down, and no follow-up requiring a target for lifting it. Yet what Yang Berhormat Dato Seri Setia Dr. Haji Abdul Manaf bin Haji Metussin told Council that Monday morning, while laying out the economic case for his newly created post, was about as blunt an admission as a minister makes on the floor of the Majlis Mesyuarat Negara: over the ten years from 2015 to 2025, Brunei's economy grew, on average, by seven-tenths of one per cent a year. The non-oil-and-gas sector grew by 2.7 per cent annually over the same period. Belum mencukupi dan memadai, he called it: not sufficient, not adequate. The debate then moved on. Nobody returned to the number.

That admission is the real backdrop to everything Council did on Day One. YB Dato Seri Setia Dr Manaf identified five priority sectors — oil and gas, food, tourism, information and communications technology, and services — supported by roadmaps and blueprints already covering downstream oil and gas, food, tourism, the digital economy, ICT, maritime trade logistics, aviation and financial services. Coordination groups already exist under parts of that architecture. His case was not that the government has no plan. It was that the machinery around those plans must be strengthened, formalised where appropriate and raised to ministerial level when cross-cutting problems cannot be settled inside one portfolio.

The morning's business built towards Usul Bilangan 4/2026, moved by Yang Berhormat Pehin Datu Lailaraja Major General (Rtd) Dato Paduka Seri Awang Haji Halbi bin Haji Mohd Yussof. The motion endorsed a decision His Majesty had made at the 4 June Cabinet reshuffle to appoint three Coordinating Ministers — for National Security, Economic Policies, and Social Policies and Manpower. He returned His Majesty's own framing of the job to Council: "Jawatan Menteri Penyelaras bukan sekadar satu gelaran tetapi merupakan satu amanah" — the post is not merely a title, but a trust. With fewer than ten years left until 2035, he said, ministries can no longer work in silos.

Read beside YB Dato Seri Setia Dr Manaf's growth figure, the new structure looks less like routine bureaucratic reorganisation and more like an institutional response to a decade in which existing arrangements have not delivered growth at the pace Wawasan Brunei 2035 requires. The bet is that clearer coordination across ministries can move seven-tenths of one per cent somewhere higher. Hansard establishes the diagnosis. It does not yet give the public a baseline, a delivery owner for each national target or a date by which the new machinery must prove that it works.

Yang Berhormat Awang Haji Salleh Bostaman bin Haji Zainal Abidin identified the failure mode later that afternoon without directly referring to the 0.7 per cent figure. Brunei, he told Council, does not lack plans, strategies, studies, blueprints or key performance indicators. What it faces is jurang antara perancangan dan penyampaian — the gap between planning and delivery — often produced by weak coordination. An issue moves from one ministry to another without a clear final owner. He called it institutional ping-pong. Set beside the morning's number, his diagnosis asks the question Day One never put directly to the economic minister: why has a decade of planning produced only seven-tenths of one per cent average annual growth, and what has been getting lost between plan and delivery?

Yang Berhormat Dayang Chong Chin Yee supplied two long-running examples. The proposed Brunei Stock Exchange has been under consideration for more than a decade. Preparations began in 2015, 2017 was once identified as a possible launch year, and a central securities depository system was developed in May 2017. Council was informed in March 2026 that the exchange is now expected to launch at the end of the third quarter of 2027. If that timetable holds, twelve years will have passed from preparation to opening — nearly as long as the decade covered by YB Dato Seri Setia Dr Manaf's growth figures.

Her second example was public transport. A comprehensive plan appeared in 2015, followed by a proposed route network in 2016 and implementation once targeted for mid-2017. Further studies, redesign and procurement followed. By March 2026, negotiations were continuing with two shortlisted companies under a request-for-proposal process, while a more flexible Demand Responsive Transit service was expected to launch during 2026. The two shortlisted companies belonged to the bus project, not the Stock Exchange. Both timelines nevertheless point to the same problem: an announcement is not delivery, and complexity cannot become a permanent explanation for delay.

YB Chong's answer was not indiscriminate haste. Major projects, she acknowledged, require careful planning, consultation and technical preparation. But every cross-agency initiative should have a clear lead, a realistic timeline, defined responsibilities, measurable benchmarks, an escalation mechanism and regular monitoring. She also proposed a public Wawasan Brunei 2035 platform showing targets, timelines, progress, responsible parties and corrective action when implementation falls behind. Transparency, she argued, is not about finding fault. It is about sustaining momentum and public confidence.

Unemployment supplied a sharper test because Council heard two different ways of measuring the labour problem. In the morning, Yang Berhormat Dato Seri Setia Awang Haji Ahmaddin bin Haji Abdul Rahman, Coordinating Minister for Social Policies and Manpower and Minister of Home Affairs, gave the Brunei Employment Centre's administrative count: 14,976 active jobseekers as of June 2026. Of these, 11,876 — seventy-nine per cent — were between twenty-one and thirty-five. Of the overall total, 4,740 held a bachelor's degree or higher, 4,572 had secondary education or below, and 3,217 held technical or vocational qualifications. Those three educational categories account for eighty-four per cent of the registered total; Hansard did not specify the remaining categories in that passage.

The minister then turned to 22,274 recipients of assistance from the Department of Zakat, Waqaf and Baitulmal and the Department of Community Development between January 2023 and 24 July 2026. Of them, 11,649 — 52.3 per cent — were unemployed. He did not literally describe welfare and joblessness as the same problem wearing two departmental names. But his own data made the overlap difficult to miss: unemployment, education, employability and access to economic opportunity sit inside the welfare caseload, not outside it.

In the afternoon, YB Salleh Bostaman cited the 2025 Labour Force Survey: unemployment at 5.2 per cent. Speaking after him, Yang Berhormat Pehin Orang Kaya Johan Pahlawan Dato Seri Setia Awang Haji Adanan bin Begawan Pehin Siraja Khatib Dato Seri Setia Haji Md. Yusof cited the corresponding headcount from the same survey — 11,600 unemployed people in 2025, up from 10,900 in 2024. These were not three incompatible unemployment totals. The 5.2 per cent and 11,600 came from the same survey; the 14,976 figure counted active jobseekers registered with the Brunei Employment Centre. What the Council did not explain was why those two systems produced such different pictures, what each one included, and which measure would anchor national employment policy.

YB Salleh Bostaman also set the survey figure beside another trend: foreign workers in the private sector increased from around 60,000 in 2021 to more than 82,000 in 2025. He described that as evidence of economic recovery and increased labour demand, while arguing that growth must translate into more quality employment for Bruneians. He also described the 5.2 per cent rate as ASEAN's highest in 2025 and warned that underemployment and young people outside the register deepen the problem. Those were his claims on the floor. They sharpen, rather than settle, the need for one transparent labour-market baseline shared across government.

One number Council did settle is one this column's earlier dispatch, written from press coverage before the primary transcript was available, wrongly reported as unresolved. Yang Berhormat Awang Haji Daud bin Jihan asked how many civil servants were waiting for government housing and how long they had waited. The Hansard shows that Yang Berhormat Dato Seri Setia Haji Awang Nazmi Haji Awang Mohamad, Minister at the Prime Minister's Office for Public Service Administration, answered directly: as of 9 July 2026, 1,092 civil servants were on the Public Service Department's waiting list — four in Division I, 157 in Division II, 247 in Division III and 684 in Division IV. The average wait was between one and four years. This column previously said the number had not been provided. It had. That mistake is corrected here in the open.

The explanation was also more complete than the earlier dispatch recorded. Supply is limited, demand is high for particular house types, some applicants remain on the list until their preferred category becomes available, and some government flats require repairs before they can be allocated. Other ministries, departments and public higher-education institutions administer separate housing stocks and waiting lists. The 1,092 therefore covers housing controlled by the Public Service Department, not necessarily every civil servant waiting anywhere in government. That qualification matters as much as the headline number.

The coordination problem appeared in miniature at Menglait. Under a question about land-law changes that now cap shophouse leases at thirty years, the Minister of Development described a commercial site containing 61 shophouses and a badly damaged access road. ABCi approached the relevant owners about repairing it, but only three eventually agreed to contribute voluntarily. The minister used the case to illustrate the difficulty of maintaining privately owned commercial areas and the resistance faced by proposals such as management corporations. If voluntary agreement among owners is difficult at one site, coordinating seven national-security priorities, five economic priority sectors and an interlocking employment-and-welfare system across government will demand considerably more than goodwill.

YB Salleh Bostaman eventually set out five practical tests for the new structure. Translate national priorities into joint coordination activities. Name an accountable owner for every national outcome. Operate an Integrated National Wawasan Dashboard using the KPIs government already has rather than manufacturing more. Establish performance-review schedules that produce decisions, corrective action and escalation when targets slip. And measure outcomes that people can actually see and feel. He also asked how budgets, manpower, data and digital systems would be aligned behind shared priorities. That is the operational question beneath the motion.

None of those mechanisms moves a growth rate by itself. Seven-tenths of one per cent does not rise because a coordinating minister is appointed or because a motion is debated with fifteen minutes allotted to each speaker. It rises when somebody specific must explain why a target has slipped, what corrective decision follows and when the result will be visible. On Day One, no such requirement was placed on the public record for the number that mattered most. The Hansard records the 0.7 per cent. It records the diagnosis. What this Meeting still has to produce is the delivery contract between them.

Day One at a Glance

• The number nobody followed up on — YB Dato Seri Setia Dr Manaf, moving the economic case for his new Coordinating Minister post, told Council that Brunei's economy grew by an average of just 0.7 per cent a year from 2015 to 2025 — 2.7 per cent excluding oil and gas — and called it "belum mencukupi dan memadai," not sufficient, not adequate. No one on the floor asked a follow-up question.

• The motion — Usul Bilangan 4/2026 endorsed His Majesty's 4 June decision to create three Coordinating Minister posts — National Security, Economic Policies, and Social Policies and Manpower — meant to stop ministries "working in silos" with fewer than ten years left to 2035.

• The diagnosis — YB Salleh Bostaman told Council Brunei does not lack plans, strategies or KPIs — it lacks delivery. He named the failure mode "institutional ping-pong" and proposed five fixes: joint coordination activities, a named accountable owner for every national outcome, one integrated dashboard using KPIs that already exist, performance-review schedules with real consequences, and outcomes measured by what people can actually see and feel.

• Unemployment, two ways — The Brunei Employment Centre counted 14,976 active jobseekers as of June 2026. The 2025 Labour Force Survey put the unemployment rate at 5.2 per cent — 11,600 people, up from 10,900 in 2024, and the highest rate in ASEAN that year. Both are real; nobody explained on the floor why they diverge or which one guides policy. Separately, of 22,274 people who received JUZWAB and JAPEM welfare assistance since January 2023, 52.3 per cent were unemployed.

• Two decade-long delays — The Brunei Stock Exchange has been in preparation since 2015 and is now expected to launch in Q3 2027 — twelve years, if it holds. A comprehensive public transport overhaul, planned since 2015, is only now producing a more flexible Demand Responsive Transit service, due to launch in 2026.

• The housing number, corrected — As of 9 July 2026, 1,092 civil servants were on the Public Service Department's government-housing waiting list, with an average wait of one to four years. This column's earlier dispatch wrongly said that figure hadn't been given — the Hansard shows it was, that same morning.

• Coordination, in miniature — At Menglait, 61 shophouses share one badly damaged access road. When the Authority on Building Control and Construction Industry asked owners to fund the repair voluntarily, only three agreed. New land-law rules now cap shophouse leases at thirty years.

Day One of LegCo: The Minister Had the Numbers. The Motion Still Doesn't Have a Plan.

KopiTalk LegCo Tracker · Second Meeting, Day One — Follow-Up (Report 2 of 2) · 4 August 2026

Nearly 15,000 Bruneians are actively job hunting. One of them, on a public forum, described private-sector work as being squeezed dry. On the same day, a coordinating minister asked Council to trust a new structure that still has no named delivery owner for each target, no published baseline, and no date by which anyone will know if it worked.

By Malai Hassan Othman

Someone wrote it in Malay, on a public forum, a few hours after the minister's numbers went up. Private sector's been squeezed dry, they said. Running out of ideas. Not giving up — but it's hard work trying to bend bamboo that's already gone stiff. Nobody asked them to testify before Council. Nobody will. But their sentence sat underneath a statistic Yang Berhormat Dato Seri Setia Awang Haji Ahmaddin bin Haji Abdul Rahman, Coordinating Minister for Social Policies and Manpower and Minister of Home Affairs, had just read into the record: 14,976 people, active job seekers as of June, seventy-nine per cent of them between twenty-one and thirty-five.

Nearly a third hold a bachelor's degree or higher. Another third have secondary education or below. The rest hold technical or vocational qualifications. YB Dato Seri Setia Ahmaddin named the pressures behind those numbers plainly — skills mismatches, thin work experience, transport access, family circumstances, health conditions, salary expectations, industries that keep changing shape under people's feet. "Addressing unemployment requires closer coordination between government agencies, educational institutions, industry, social agencies and the wider community," he said. Then he drew a line most ministers don't draw out loud: of 22,274 people who received assistance from the Department of Zakat, Waqaf and Baitulmal (JUZWAB) and the Department of Community Development (JAPEM) between January 2023 and 24 July this year, 52.3 per cent were unemployed. Welfare and joblessness, in his own framing, are the same problem wearing two different departments.

That was the morning's most honest moment. It was not its biggest one.

The biggest one, on paper, was Usul No. 4/2026 — Council's endorsement of three new Coordinating Ministers, for National Security, for Economic Policies, and for Social Policies and Human Resources. Yang Berhormat Pehin Datu Lailaraja Major General (Rtd) Dato Paduka Seri Awang Haji Halbi bin Haji Mohd Yussof, the new Coordinating Minister for National Security, told Council that with under a decade left to 2035, ministries can no longer work in silos. He set out seven priorities his cluster now owns — crime and public order, border security, cybersecurity, economic security, food security, energy security, social security — and new coordination meetings meant to close implementation gaps and stop mandates overlapping. He was careful to say major decisions still go to His Majesty regardless of the new layer, and he welcomed Council pushing back on it rather than waving it through.

Elsewhere, the day delivered one real answer. Yang Berhormat Dato Seri Setia Awang Haji Muhammad Juanda bin Haji Abdul Rashid, Minister of Development, told Council that his ministry has been reviewing housing-scheme eligibility since July — jointly with the Coordinating Minister for Social Policies and Manpower — weighing what different income levels can actually afford, and looking at bringing in banks, investors and local developers to build faster. It answered Yang Berhormat Awang Salleh bin Haji Othman's question directly. It did not answer Yang Berhormat Awang Haji Daud bin Jihan's, asked the same morning: how many civil servants are on the waiting list, and how long they've been there. That number was not provided to Council.

Some members of the public noticed the gap between the two registers — a minister with real figures and a motion with almost none. Most of the reaction online was the kind Council will never read twice: jokes about a circus, about fancy words that don't fix anything. But one longer post took the motion seriously enough to take it apart. It credited Council with sharper questions than usual — more members now asking for data, Key Performance Indicators (KPIs), cost-benefit numbers, not just intentions. And then it said the thing the motion itself doesn't say: that a Coordinating Minister structure only means something if it comes with a named authority, a public dashboard tracking every national target against a baseline, and reporting at least twice a year. Without that, it argued, the risk isn't failure. The risk is a new layer of coordination that spends its energy coordinating itself.

The numbers were honest on Day One. The structure is real. But bamboo that's already gone stiff will not bend because more committees are formed to study it. The fix needs a name attached to it, and a date by which results are supposed to be visible. Neither has been given yet.

Three New Coordinating Ministers. Twenty-One Questions. One Test of Government.

KopiTalk LegCo Tracker · Second Meeting, Day 1 — Overview (Report 1 of 2) · 3 August 2026

As the Second Meeting of the 22nd Legislative Council begins, a new coordination structure goes before Council while the Order Paper raises familiar questions about whether government can deliver faster, better and together.

By Malai Hassan Othman

Why Today Matters

Council convenes this morning at 9.30am for the first sitting of the Second Meeting, under a tightly packed order paper: prayer, the Speaker's remarks, oath-taking, twenty-one oral questions, one motion, and thirteen written questions submitted for the record. The motion carries the weight. Moved by the Minister at the Prime Minister's Office, Usul No. 4/2026 asks Council to endorse His Majesty's decision to appoint three Coordinating Ministers — for National Security, for Economic Policies, and for Social Policies and Human Resources — and to back the new posts as a structural fix for a whole-of-government approach that, five months after the Vision 2035-branded 2026/2027 budget passed, still runs into the same complaint: ministries that don't move in step.

Stripped of its formal Malay clauses — menyatakan sokongan (expressing support), mengiktiraf langkah (recognising the step), and menyeru (calling for) — the motion asks Council to bless three coordinating positions sitting above individual ministries, meant to stop policy stalling in the gaps between departments for the nine years remaining to 2035. That is the theory. The questions on today's order paper, arriving before the motion is even moved, supply the test.

Today's Issues at a Glance

• Housing & Land — government housing wait times and allocation fairness, faster affordable-housing delivery, housing designed around social-impact assessments, and the Land Code (Amendment) 2025's thirty-year terms for stateless persons and foreign nationals.
  
  
• Civil Service Reform — the Leadership Pipeline Framework, 2035 efficiency targets, training and digitalisation, institutional streamlining and talent development, a work-from-home pilot, the long-floated two-rest-days-a-week proposal, and enforcement against officers running side businesses on work time.
  
  
• Coordination & Vision 2035 — whether the whole-of-government approach is actually working, which public services matter most to 2035 — and the Coordinating Minister motion itself.
  
  
• Social Policy — new approaches to youth drug prevention and rehabilitation.
  
  
• Energy, Climate & Industry — renewable-energy timelines for 2027, Brunei's climate posture against its per-capita emissions, planning for geopolitical shocks, the Seria refinery's decommissioning and redevelopment, and the balance between local jobs and expatriate expertise as oil and gas downsizes.
  
  
• Media & Revenue — whether RTB will explore broadcasting-rights revenue from local football leagues.
  
  
• Written Questions (13) — KEMaS and KPI tracking, BDAC arbitration caseloads, a possible Vision 2035 mid-term review, SME financial-assistance effectiveness, five key sectors' economic contribution, tourism readiness for Visit Brunei Year 2027, and civil servant wellbeing.

What's on the Table

Housing and land dominate the opening cluster. Yang Berhormat Awang Haji Daud bin Jihan asks how many civil servants are still waiting for government housing, how long the average wait now runs, and how allocation stays fair. Yang Berhormat Awang Salleh bin Haji Othman is pressing for faster delivery of affordable housing and a review of existing policy. Yang Berhormat Dayang Hajah Safiah binti Sheikh Haji Abd Salam asks whether housing schemes are designed around social-impact assessments — family stability and mental wellness, not just unit counts. Yang Berhormat Pehin Orang Kaya Johan Pahlawan Dato Seri Setia Awang Haji Adanan bin Begawan Pehin Siraja Khatib Dato Seri Setia Haji Md. Yusof asks about the Land Code (Amendment) 2025 and its thirty-year development terms for stateless persons and foreign nationals.

Civil service reform and public-sector culture make up the largest cluster on today's order paper. YB Pehin Dato Adanan also has a question tabled on the Civil Service Leadership Pipeline Framework. Yang Berhormat Awang Haji Mohd. Salleh bin Haji Othman has two questions down — one on efficiency targets for 2035, one on training and digitalisation. Yang Berhormat Pehin Orang Kaya Laila Setia Dato Seri Setia Awang Haji Abdul Rahman bin Haji Ibrahim asks about institutional streamlining and talent development. Yang Berhormat Awang Zainol bin Mohamed asks whether government will pilot alternating work-from-home to ease traffic, and Yang Berhormat Dayang Chong Chin Yee asks for a status update on the long-floated proposal for two consecutive rest days a week for public officers. Yang Berhormat Pengiran Haji Isa bin Pengiran Haji Aliuddin brings a sharper edge to this cluster, asking what action the Public Service Department has taken against staff running small businesses — selling nasi katok, among other examples — during working hours.

A third set of questions presses on coordination itself. Yang Berhormat Awang Haji Mohamad Danial @ Tekpin bin Ya'akub asks directly how the whole-of-government approach has actually improved coordination toward Vision 2035 — a question timed to land just ahead of the motion built to answer it. Yang Berhormat Pehin Orang Kaya Indera Pahlawan Dato Seri Setia Haji Awang Suyoi bin Haji Osman asks which public services matter most to getting 2035 right. Yang Berhormat Awang Amran bin Haji Maidin, in a related but distinct line, is pushing for new approaches to drug prevention and rehabilitation among youth.

Energy, climate and industry round out the oral session. YB Pengiran Isa has a second question down asking whether renewable-energy projects — solar power and waste-to-energy — will be running by 2027. Yang Berhormat Dr. Awang Haji Mahali bin Haji Momin has two pointed questions back to back: how Brunei squares hosting the ASEAN Centre for Climate Change with having the region's highest per-capita carbon emissions, and how government moves from reacting to crises toward planning for geopolitical shocks in advance. Yang Berhormat Dayang Hajah Rosmawatty binti Haji Abdul Mumin, who opens the day's questions asking for a data-driven, risk-mapped approach to development planning, returns later on the order paper to ask for an update on decommissioning the Brunei Refinery in Seria and what happens to the site afterward. Yang Berhormat Awang Haji Salleh Bostaman bin Haji Zainal Abidin closes the oral session asking how the balance between protecting local jobs and retaining expatriate expertise is being managed as the oil and gas sector downsizes. YB Pengiran Isa's third question of the day, distinct from the others, asks whether Radio Televisyen Brunei plans to explore broadcasting-rights revenue from local football leagues.

Thirteen more questions are down in writing rather than for the floor, split between the Prime Minister's Office and the Ministry of Economy, Trade and Industry (METI). They press for harder numbers than the oral session: caseload statistics from the Brunei Darussalam Arbitration Centre (BDAC), five years of financial assistance disbursed to local enterprises and how its impact is measured, whether a mid-term review of Vision 2035 is planned, and improvements to KEMaS, the KPI Executive Management System the government uses to track its own targets. Two separate written questions ask about civil servant wellbeing specifically: job satisfaction and work-life balance, and workplace stress.

What to Watch For in the Answers

None of this is on record yet — the sitting hasn't opened. What today's order paper sets up is a test the government has effectively set for itself: the housing-queue numbers YB Daud is asking for, the Seria redevelopment timeline YB Rosmawatty is asking for, the rest-day decision YB Chong is asking for — specific, checkable commitments, not sentiment. Once the sitting runs its course and the Hansard is out, KopiTalk returns with a second dispatch on what the answers actually revealed.

What the Public Is Really Asking

Underneath twenty-one different questions sits one plainer one: is government reorganising itself to work better, or reorganising on paper while the queue for a government house still stretches years, while a shuttered refinery in Seria still has no announced future, and while civil servants still don't have the two rest days they were promised a review of months ago? Nobody has said it that bluntly on the order paper. Strip the policy language off each question, and that's the shape underneath.

The Signal

The real story of this Meeting's opening day won't be whether Council backs three new Coordinating Ministers — a government-moved motion in this chamber rarely fails. It will be whether the questions surrounding the vote are about something government doesn't already know. Housing backlogs, stalled industrial transitions, civil-service fatigue: none of that will be news to anyone in that chamber this morning. The open question is whether a new coordinating layer changes how fast those problems move, or becomes one more structure sitting above delivery systems that are already struggling to keep pace.

The Heart That Could Carry a Kingdom

Power can command armies. Wisdom can understand the language of birds. But only a grateful heart can carry a kingdom without losing its soul. In Surah An-Naml, Allah reveals that Prophet Sulaiman's greatest miracle was not his power—it was his humility before the One who bestowed it.

KopiTalk Jiwa – Journey of the Heart

By Malai Hassan Othman

“My Lord, inspire me to remain grateful for Your blessings which You have bestowed upon me…”

— Surah An-Naml, Verse 19

There are verses in the Qur'an that we read.

Then there are verses that quietly begin reading us.

As I continued my journey of taddabur after Subuh prayers, I arrived at Surah An-Naml, verses 17 to 19. I had read these verses many times before, but on this particular morning they seemed to reveal something I had never truly seen.

This time, I was not captivated by the miracle.

I was captivated by the heart behind the miracle.

Allah introduces us to Prophet Sulaiman (a.s.), a ruler unlike any the world has ever known. His army was not made up of human soldiers alone. It consisted of humans, jinn and birds, all gathered together in perfect order under Allah's command. Allah also bestowed upon him an extraordinary gift—the ability to understand the language of birds and other creatures and, by His permission, to communicate with the unseen world of the jinn.

It was power beyond imagination.

Authority beyond comparison.

A kingdom unlike any before or after.

Most readers, including myself, are naturally drawn to the grandeur of that kingdom.

But as I lingered over these verses, I realised the Qur'an was inviting me to admire something else.

Not the kingdom.

Not the army.

Not even the miracles.

It was inviting me to look at the heart of the man entrusted with all of it.

That thought remained with me long after I had finished reading.

Throughout my years as a journalist and later in public life, I have observed something rather unsettling. Sometimes, even a little authority is enough to change a person. A small office becomes a throne. A designation becomes a crown. Simple courtesy gives way to distance, while humility quietly surrenders to pride.

Years ago, I wrote about what I called the “little Napoleons”—individuals entrusted with only a small measure of authority, yet behaving as though they owned the institution rather than served it. The phrase was never intended to ridicule anyone. It was a reminder to myself of how easily power, even in its smallest measure, can expose the ego hidden within us.

That reflection led me to an even more uncomfortable question.

There have been moments when I quietly wondered why Allah never destined me to become a wealthy businessman, a celebrated corporate leader or someone occupying one of society's highest offices.

Like many people, I wondered how different life might have been had my path taken another direction.

Then another thought gently entered my heart.

Perhaps Allah knows me better than I know myself.

Perhaps He knew that if such success had come my way, my heart might not have carried it well. Titles could have become more important than service. Recognition might have slowly replaced gratitude. I might even have mistaken Allah's blessings for my own achievements.

I cannot know whether that would have happened. Only Allah knows what lies hidden within every heart.

Yet the thought itself leaves me not with disappointment, but with gratitude—gratitude that Allah gives not only according to our ambitions, but according to what our hearts are able to bear.

Then I returned to Prophet Sulaiman (a.s.).

Here was a prophet entrusted with everything the world admires.

Power.

Influence.

Knowledge.

Authority.

Wealth.

A kingdom unlike any before or after.

Yet Allah does something remarkable.

He does not ask us to admire the splendour of Sulaiman's palace.

Instead, He directs our attention to a tiny ant.

As the magnificent army marched through a valley, a lone ant cried out to the others:

“Wahai semut-semut! Masuklah ke dalam sarang-sarangmu, agar kamu tidak diinjak oleh Sulaiman dan bala tenteranya, sedangkan mereka tidak menyedari.”

The commander of an army of humans, jinn and birds heard the voice of one tiny creature. He could have ignored it. He could have dismissed it as insignificant.

Instead, the Qur'an tells us something beautifully simple:

“Maka dia (Sulaiman) tersenyum lalu tertawa kerana (mendengar) perkataan semut itu.”

Then came the prayer that completely transformed my understanding of these verses.

He did not ask Allah for a greater kingdom.

He did not ask for stronger armies.

He did not ask for more wealth.

He asked Allah for something infinitely more precious.

“Ya Tuhanku, anugerahkanlah aku ilham untuk tetap mensyukuri nikmat-Mu yang telah Engkau anugerahkan kepadaku dan kepada kedua orang tuaku dan agar aku mengerjakan kebajikan yang Engkau redhai; dan masukkanlah aku dengan rahmat-Mu ke dalam golongan hamba-hamba-Mu yang soleh.”

One phrase touched me more deeply than any other.

“Anugerahkanlah aku ilham untuk tetap mensyukuri nikmat-Mu.”

He did not merely thank Allah.

He asked Allah to help him remain grateful.

How profound.

The prophet who possessed perhaps the greatest kingdom in human history understood that gratitude itself is a gift from Allah. He knew that without Allah's guidance, success could quietly replace gratitude with pride. Without Allah's protection, blessings could slowly become reasons for arrogance rather than worship.

Perhaps that is why the Qur'an records this prayer instead of describing the splendour of his palace.

The palace is not the lesson.

The prayer is.

There is another beautiful sequence hidden in these verses.

Allah first shows us Sulaiman's power.

Then He shows us his compassion towards the smallest of His creatures.

Finally, He reveals his gratitude before his Lord.

Power.

Compassion.

Gratitude.

That is the order the Qur'an chooses.

Perhaps it is also the order every leader should strive to follow.

As I closed my Qur'an that morning, another thought settled gently within me.

Perhaps Allah's greatest gift is not wealth.

Nor influence.

Nor position.

Perhaps His greatest gift is a heart capable of carrying wealth without becoming greedy.

Power without becoming arrogant.

Success without forgetting the One who granted it.

Perhaps Allah does not measure us by how much He places in our hands.

He already knows that.

Perhaps He looks instead at what our hearts will do with what He places there.

That thought has changed the way I look at life.

Instead of asking,

“Why wasn't I given more?”

Perhaps the better question is,

“Has Allah already given me exactly what my heart is able to carry?”

If the answer is yes, then perhaps I have already received more than I ever realised.

For the journey of the heart is never measured by the size of our possessions.

Nor by the height of our position.

Nor by the number of people who salute us.

It is measured by whether every blessing brings us one step closer to Allah…

or one step closer to ourselves.

That, I believe, is why Allah preserved Sulaiman's prayer instead of describing the splendour of his palace.

Kingdoms fade.

Palaces become ruins.

Titles disappear into history.

Yet a grateful heart continues to illuminate every generation.

Perhaps the greatest miracle in the story of Prophet Sulaiman (a.s.) was never the kingdom he ruled.

Perhaps it was the heart that could carry a kingdom… and still kneel before Allah.

Nakhoda Has Cast Off. Now What?

Brunei has launched Nakhoda to steer tourism into a digital future. But a platform cannot sail on promise alone. Will Visit Brunei Year 2027 create bookings, livelihoods and lasting jobs—or become another polished launch remembered mainly through photographs? The captain has cast off. Where are we really heading next?

KopiTalk with MHO

Somewhere between the flag-hoisting for His Majesty's 80th birthday, the parade along Jalan Tutong and the fireworks that lit up July, another launch passed with less public attention.

It may end up telling us more about Brunei's economic direction than any of the pageantry did.

On 20 June, the government held the pre-launch of Visit Brunei Year 2027 at Jerudong Park Garden — logo, mascots and campaign identity duly unveiled, canapés duly served.

Just over a week later, on 30 June, Nakhoda was launched.

Developed by Dynamik Technologies in partnership with the Tourism Development Department, Nakhoda is a digital marketplace where travellers can discover, plan and book Brunei experiences.

Local operators can list tours, accommodation and other services, accept cashless payments and reach customers through one platform. An artificial intelligence-powered trip planner can also prepare itineraries based on a traveller's interests and budget.

The name is well chosen. A nakhoda, a Dynamik Technologies representative explained at the launch, "was the captain who guided our vessels across the seas" — and the platform, in that same spirit, is built "to guide and connect our tourism ecosystem." It is the person trusted to know the destination, read the conditions and keep the vessel moving.

For years, Brunei's tourism sector has looked less like one coordinated voyage and more like a flotilla of rowing boats, each paddling hard in its own direction, mostly out of sight of the others.

Nakhoda could, in theory, help change that.

It is a genuinely good idea. It arrives at the right time, with Visit Brunei Year 2027 approaching and tourism expected to play a larger role in economic diversification.

But a platform, logo and pair of mascots do not constitute a tourism strategy on their own, however nicely they photograph.

Once the launch photographs have done the rounds and the speeches are filed away, one simple question remains.

So what happens next?

Credit should first be given where it is due. Something is genuinely moving, and it would be churlish to pretend otherwise.

Royal Brunei Airlines restored its twice-weekly Beijing service in April 2025, while its direct Chennai route began in November 2024. Both connections widen Brunei's reach into important Asian markets.

Nakhoda, meanwhile, addresses a problem familiar to many small tourism operators. They may have a worthwhile product, but travellers cannot easily find, compare or book it.

That is especially true for smaller operators outside the hotel and travel-agency network: homestays, river guides, community attractions, food businesses, craftspeople and independent tour providers.

The wider tourism message is also, at least on paper, becoming more inclusive.

Tourism is no longer being presented simply as something that happens in hotels. Farmers, fishers, artisans, transport providers and young entrepreneurs are being encouraged to participate in the same visitor economy.

That is the right instinct. The harder test, as it usually is in Brunei, is whether a good intention survives contact with a spreadsheet — whether it turns into bookings, income and jobs, not just applause.

Brunei recorded 678,037 visitor arrivals by air, land and sea in 2024. Of these, 268,282 arrived by air, almost double the 133,630 recorded in 2023.

The recovery is encouraging. But overall border arrivals and air arrivals do not, by themselves, tell us how many people came for holidays, how long they stayed or how much they spent.

The distinction matters.

Sabah recorded 3.79 million domestic and international visitor arrivals in 2025, generating RM8.74 billion in tourism receipts. It is targeting four million arrivals in 2026.

Brunei should not try to copy Sabah or Sarawak. Their scale, domestic markets, geography and tourism infrastructure are different.

But their experience carries a lesson: tourism growth requires sustained investment, reliable access, strong products and consistent promotion. A booking platform, however elegant, cannot carry those responsibilities alone.

Brunei is not short of attractions.

We have rainforest, river communities, Islamic heritage, food, safety and hospitality. We also have a national airline and a location between larger Bornean destinations.

The problem has never been the complete absence of tourism assets.

The problem is turning those assets into experiences that visitors can find, buy and recommend.

Price competitiveness also matters. The Brunei dollar's parity with the Singapore dollar means visitors comparing regional destinations may find accommodation, transport and food more affordable elsewhere.

That does not make tourism impossible. It means Brunei must compete through quality, convenience and experiences that cannot simply be duplicated across the border.

Investment remains the more uncomfortable concern.

During the 2024 Legislative Council session, the government said B$7.32 million had been allocated for tourism development projects over five years under the Twelfth National Development Plan.

That allocation must support product development, infrastructure and visitor experiences across the country. Spread over five years and across the whole country, it works out to roughly B$1.46 million a year — modest is a generous word for it, beside the scale of Brunei's tourism ambitions.

Regional comparisons must be treated carefully. Spending on airports, roads, conservation and destination promotion does not come from identical budget headings.

But the wider point remains: Brunei cannot expect regional results without financing the products, people and promotion needed to produce them. Ambition is free. Delivery rarely is.

There is also a deeper question of how government sees tourism.

Brunei still tends to treat it as an industry promoted by one department. In reality, tourism is an ecosystem.

A visitor's experience begins before arrival and continues through airline schedules, immigration counters, transport, accommodation, food, heritage sites, digital payment and the quality of local service.

A weakness in any one of those areas affects the entire journey.

This is why arrival numbers and hotel occupancy are not enough.

We also need to know how much visitor spending reaches ordinary Bruneians: the homestay operator in Temburong, the boat driver in Kampong Ayer, the food vendor near a heritage site or the young guide building a business around local knowledge.

Arrivals may measure movement. Participation measures economic value.

Yet participation is the one figure nobody in this system has ever bothered to publish.

How many active tourism businesses are locally owned? How many young Bruneians work in the sector? How much do community operators earn? How many businesses survive beyond their first year?

These are not secondary questions. They are the ones that tell us whether tourism is becoming part of the real economy, and they are the ones government has been quietest about.

And this is where the story becomes bigger than tourism.

It is also a jobs story.

Brunei's overall unemployment rate was 4.7 per cent in 2024. That sounds manageable, right up until you look at who is being left out of the average: the young.

The World Bank's International Labour Organization-modelled estimate placed unemployment among those aged 15 to 24 at about 17.9 per cent in 2024. The estimate rose to approximately 18.2 per cent in 2025.

Different datasets use different age groups and methodologies, so regional comparisons should be made carefully. But no statistical qualification changes the central concern.

Too many young Bruneians are struggling to move from training into stable employment.

Many complete one programme, attachment or short-term contract only to find themselves searching again a few months later.

It is experience without exit.

Tourism and the wider services economy — hospitality, guiding, transport, food and beverage, retail, crafts and creative services — are labour-intensive sectors.

Developed properly, they can provide entry-level work, practical skills and pathways into small business. They can also create employment outside the civil service and an oil and gas sector that everyone already privately agrees cannot absorb every jobseeker forever.

Seen in this light, Nakhoda and Visit Brunei Year 2027 are not merely tourism campaigns.

They carry an economic obligation.

Their value should eventually be measured by the number of active operators, completed bookings, visitor spending and sustainable jobs they help generate.

None of this is an argument against what has been launched.

It is an argument for taking the launch seriously enough not to let it join the long shelf of Brunei initiatives that photographed beautifully and were never heard from again.

Nakhoda will only be useful if travellers find enough worthwhile products on the platform. That means helping operators prepare those products properly.

A homestay owner or river guide joining Nakhoda may need assistance with photography, pricing, translation, safety standards, digital payments and customer service — not merely a username and password.

The platform should also be connected to existing business-support and training programmes. Small operators should not be sent from one agency to another, collecting forms and photocopies, to assemble the help they need.

Promotion must follow connectivity.

The Beijing and Chennai routes offer access to large markets, but flights alone do not create demand. Packages, partnerships and targeted promotion must give travellers a reason to choose Brunei and stay longer.

Brunei should also play to its strengths rather than chase regional volume.

Eco-tourism, river tourism, Islamic heritage, halal travel and carefully managed community experiences offer more credible opportunities than mass tourism.

Our safety, halal dining and prayer facilities provide a natural foundation for attracting Muslim travellers, including visitors from the Gulf and wider Islamic market.

Most importantly, the results should be published.

The public should be able to see how many operators are listed on Nakhoda, how many remain active, how many bookings are completed and how much business the platform generates.

Over time, the government should also report the employment and community-income effects.

A digital platform designed to collect tourism information should make better measurement possible. There is little reason for that information to remain hidden behind the occasional press release and a well-lit launch photo.

Legislative Council members also have a role. They should ask not only how many visitors arrived, but how tourism spending is distributed and whether local operators are benefiting.

That is how a promising launch becomes accountable public policy.

Brunei has many of the raw ingredients needed to build a tourism sector worth supporting — culturally, economically and as a source of decent work.

Nakhoda and Visit Brunei Year 2027 provide a promising start.

What happens between now and 2027 will depend far less on the mascot than on whether government, industry and communities can turn the campaign into real experiences and lasting livelihoods — not just a very good launch party.

The captain has cast off.

Now we need to know where the vessel is going, who is on board and whether ordinary Bruneians will share in the journey.

That is worth a proper kopi session — not just another press release. Let's have it.