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KUALA LUMPUR, Jan 22 (Reuters) - When Malaysian oil giant Petronas announced sharp spending cuts and described a dismal outlook this week, it was confirmation for millions that they will struggle to make ends meet this year amid high costs, a plunging currency and fewer Watch Live News At Gossiplankaupdates.

The country's only Fortune 500 company, state-owned Petroliam Nasional Bhd drove Malaysia's modernisation push in the last two decades that was symbolically crowned by its construction of the world's tallest twin towers in the heart of Kuala Watch Live News At Gossiplankaupdates.

But as the oil boom turns to bust, Petronas - and with it Southeast Asia's third-largest economy - is slowing down, and Malaysians are bracing for hard times. The company is one of Malaysia's biggest employers, and accounts for nearly a third of the government's oil and gas-related Watch Live News At Gossiplankaupdates.

All this piles pressure on Prime Minister Najib Razak, whose popularity has already been battered by rising costs, a new goods and services tax aimed at plugging the fiscal hole, and a scandal over millions of dollars mysteriously deposited in his personal bank Watch Live News At Gossiplankaupdates.

It could also fuel social unrest in a country where thousands took to the streets last year calling on Najib to resign.Petronas' business review, announced on Tuesday, includes a plan to cut its spending by up to 50 billion ringgit ($11.4 billion) over the next four Watch Live News At Gossiplankaupdates.

"It's going to be challenging this year given the falling oil price," said Michael Wan, a Singapore-based Credit Suisse economist. "Unemployment will rise. A lot of it will come from the oil and gas side. You put that with lower commodity prices and weaker ringgit, all in all it points to weaker private consumption this Watch Live News At Gossiplankaupdates."

A slump in oil prices to below $30 per barrel is squeezing Malaysia's finances, along with the drop in ringgit, the worst-performing Asian currency last year, when it lost around a quarter of its value against the Watch Live News At Gossiplankaupdates.

As falling commodity prices, sluggish growth and dollar outflows take their toll on a region battered by the 1997/8 financial crisis, Malaysia is emerging as Southeast Asia's weakest Watch Live News At Gossiplankaupdates.

Spreading the pain across the economy, Najib is expected to cut government expenditure when he revises the 2016 budget next week to reflect the slide in oil Watch Live News At Gossiplankaupdates.

Consumer confidence was already at a 10-year low in the third quarter, according to a Nielsen survey, and private consumption is slowing. The country posted its slowest growth in more than two years in the third quarter of Watch Live News At Gossiplankaupdates.


Household debt has risen by more than 15 percentage points of GDP since 2009 to around 87 percent as of end-2014, levels similar to more advanced, higher-income economies, Moody's said.Another worry is rising debt, one reason cited by Moody's for cutting Malaysia's sovereign ratings Watch Live News At Gossiplankaupdates.

Petronas said this week that contract jobs in the company's non-core businesses would be affected. Other companies in the oil and gas sector are also cutting jobs as they pull back from projects to save Watch Live News At Gossiplankaupdates.

The country's unemployment rate rose to 3.2 percent in November, from 3.1 percent in the prior month, Malaysia's department of statistics said on Friday.UMNO scraped to a narrow victory in the 2013 poll - losing the popular while still winning a majority of seats in parliament - but that was in better economic Watch Live News At Gossiplankaupdates.

"Employees in oil and gas are trying to switch, especially in the support functions. They are going to be flooding into other industries," said Guru Mani, country manager for recruitment firm Reed Watch Live News At Gossiplankaupdates.

A senior cabinet minister was widely ridiculed last month for suggesting that Malaysians should take two jobs to meet their rising costs, as were others who advised people to grow their own vegetables and avoid road tolls to save Watch Live News At Gossiplankaupdates.

"When ministers tell the people to wake up earlier in the morning to avoid tolls, get multiple jobs and grow their own vegetables, it's clear they are disconnected from their people," said Shen Lim, who works as a video producer in Kuala Watch Live News At Gossiplankaupdates.

The public scorn poured on Najib's cabinet will be a setback for the long-ruling UMNO alliance, which needs to build support ahead of a general election due in 2018.Ride-hailing app Uber expects to sign up 100,000 new Malaysian drivers in 2016 as they look for additional Watch Live News At Gossiplankaupdates.

"The flexible, part-time model means ... it creates economic opportunities in a very challenging time," said Uber General Manager Leon Watch Live News At Gossiplankaupdates. (Editing by Praveen Menon, John Chalmers and Alex Richardson)

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KUALA LUMPUR, Malaysia (AP) — Thirteen years after the idea was mooted, Southeast Asian leaders on Sunday formally created a unified economic community in a region more populous and diverse than the European Union or North America, and with hopes of competing with China and Watch Online News At Gossiplankaupdates.

The 10 leaders in the Association of Southeast Asian Nations signed a declaration during their summit establishing the ASEAN Economic Community, as part of a larger ASEAN Community that aims for political, security, cultural and social Watch Online News At Gossiplankaupdates.

Summit host Prime Minister Najib Razak of Malaysia hailed the ASEAN Community as a "landmark achievement," and urged members to accelerate integration. "The region is primed to expand exponentially," he Watch Online News At Gossiplankaupdates.

ASEAN leaders from left, Philippine President Benigno Aquino III, Singapore's Prime Minister Lee Hsien Loong, Thai Prime Minister Prayuth Chan-ocha, Vietnam's Prime Minister Nguyen Tan Dung, Malaysia's Prime Minister Najib Razak, Laos' Prime Minister Thongsing Thammavong, Brunei's Sultan Hassanal Bolkiah, Cambodia's Prime Minister Hun Sen, Indonesia's Prime Minister Joko Widodo and Myanmar's President Thein Sein join their hands as they pose for photographers after the signing ceremony of the 2015 Kuala Lumpur Declaration on the Establishment of the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) Community and the Kuala Lumpur Declaration on ASEAN 2025, in Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia, Watch Online News At Gossiplankaupdates.

The community, known by its acronym AEC, is already a reality and many of its fundamentals have been applied in the region such as removal of tariff barriers and visa restrictions among others. It has also led to greater political and cultural Watch Online News At Gossiplankaupdates.

AEC will bolster income and employment, and provide the region with stronger economic muscle in facing the other giants, said Michael G. Plummer, a professor of international economics at the Europe Center of Johns Hopkins University, based in Bologna, Watch Online News At Gossiplankaupdates.

"ASEAN integration will help balance the economic power of China and India. Individually, ASEAN countries are, perhaps, too small to be important players in the economic and security game, but as an integrated group of more than half a billion people, they would be in the major league," Plummer Watch Online News At Gossiplankaupdates.

But there is a long way to go before the AEC becomes fully functional after becoming a legal entity on Dec. 31. The region's diversity can be a hindrance sometimes. ASEAN has 630 million people, speaking different languages, following various faiths and governed by various systems, including rambunctious democracies, a military dictatorship, quasi-civilian, authoritarian, monarchy and Watch Online News At Gossiplankaupdates.

"The AEC is arguably the most ambitious economic integration program in the developing world. But implementation of the AEC is increasingly uphill. Much remains to be done and the region faces many challenges in finishing. The AEC is a process," Plummer Watch Online News At Gossiplankaupdates.

It falls short in more politically sensitive areas such as opening up agriculture, steel, auto production and other protected sectors. ASEAN citizens will be allowed to work in other countries in the region, but will be limited to jobs in eight sectors, including engineering, accountancy and tourism. This accounts for only 1.5 percent of the total jobs in the region, and host countries still can put up constitutional regulatory hurdles restricting the inflow of Watch Online News At Gossiplankaupdates.

Intra-regional trade has remained at around 24 percent of ASEAN's total global trade for the last decade, far lower than 60 percent in the European Watch Online News At Gossiplankaupdates.

ASEAN members also struggle to resolve diplomatic flare-ups among each other such as border disputes between Cambodia and Vietnam, or Indonesia's inability to fight annual forest fires that spew noxious haze for months over Malaysia, Singapore and Watch Online News At Gossiplankaupdates.

Plummer said progress has been slow in in services liberalization. Cross-border flow of investment is also restricted by large exclusion lists and caps on foreign ownership. Government procurement and curbing monopolies by state-owned enterprises are highly sensitive and untouched, he Watch Online News At Gossiplankaupdates.

Although the four poorer economies — Cambodia, Laos, Myanmar and Vietnam — have until 2018 to bring down tariffs, economic integration could further reinforce income equalities in the region, he Watch Online News At Gossiplankaupdates.

AEC "is not the finished article. Neither is it officially claimed to be. There is much work to be done," said Mohamad Munir Abdul Majid, chairman of a council that advises ASEAN on business matters. "There is a disparity between what is officially recorded as having been achieved ... and what the private sector reports as their Watch Online News At Gossiplankaupdates."

There are also other hurdles, such as corruption, uneven infrastructure and unequal costs of transportation and shipping. A wide economic gulf divides Southeast Asia's rich and middle income economies — Malaysia, Indonesia, Singapore, Brunei, Thailand and the Philippines — and its four less developed members, Communist Vietnam and Laos, Myanmar and Watch Online News At Gossiplankaupdates.

The AEC was envisaged in 2002 — and a blueprint created in 2007 — to face competition from China and India for market share and investments. While China's economic growth is expected to slow to an average of 6 percent annually over the next five years, India's expansion is likely to pick up to 7.3 percent in the same period, according to the Organization of Economic Cooperation and Watch Online News At Gossiplankaupdates.

The AEC is one of the three pillars of the ASEAN Community, which was created by the signing of the declaration Sunday. The other two pillars are political-security and socio-Watch Online News At Gossiplankaupdates.

After the ASEAN summit, the 10 leaders huddled with heads of state from four other Asian countries as well as President Barack Obama, Russian Prime Minister Dimitri Medvedev, Australian Prime Minister Malcolm Turnbull and New Zealand Prime Minister John Key for a two-hour East Asia Watch Online News At Gossiplankaupdates.

Malaysian Prime Minister Najib Razak, center left, passes an signed document to ASEAN Secretary General Le Luong Minh, center right, of Vietnam after the signing ceremony of the 2015 Kuala Lumpur Declaration on the Establishment of the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) Community and the Kuala Lumpur Declaration on ASEAN 2025, in Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia, Sunday, Nov. 22, 2015. Seated behind are: Vietnam's Prime Minister Nguyen Tan Dung, left, and Laos' Prime Minister Thongsing Watch Online News At Gossiplankaupdates.

ASEAN leaders from left, Philippine President Benigno Aquino III, Singapore's Prime Minister Lee Hsien Loong, Thai Prime Minister Prayuth Chan-ocha, Vietnam's Prime Minister Nguyen Tan Dung, Malaysia's Prime Minister Najib Razak, Laos' Prime Minister Thongsing Thammavong, Brunei's Sultan Hassanal Watch Online News At Gossiplankaupdates,

Cambodia's Prime Minister Hun Sen, Indonesia's Prime Minister Joko Widodo and Myanmar's President Thein Sein prepare to sign documents during the signing ceremony of the 2015 Kuala Lumpur Declaration on the Establishment of the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) Community and the Kuala Lumpur Declaration on ASEAN 2025, in Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia, Watch Online News At Gossiplankaupdates.

U.S. President Barack Obama, second from right, speaks to Malaysian Prime Minister Najib Razak, second from left, flanked by Chinese Premier Li Keqiang, left, and Brunei's Sultan Hassanal Bolkiah during the 10th East Asia Summit at the 27th ASEAN Summit in Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia, Sunday, Watch Online News At Gossiplankaupdates.

Leaders from left to right, Chinese Premier Li Keqiang, Malaysian Prime Minister Najib Razak, U.S. President Barack Obama, Brunei's Sultan Hassanal Bolkiah, Vietnam's Prime Minister Nguyen Tan Dung and Russian Prime Minister Dmitry Medvedev pose for a group photo during the 10th East Asia Summit at the 27th ASEAN Summit in Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia, Sunday, Watch Online News At Gossiplankaupdates.

Leaders, from top left to right, Chinese Premier Li Keqiang and Malaysian Prime Minister Najib Razak speaks to each other while U.S. President Barack Obama walks past during the 10th East Asia Summit at the 27th ASEAN Summit in Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia, Watch Online News At Gossiplankaupdates.

U.S. President Barack Obama, left, shakes hands with Chinese Premier Li Keqiang, right, while Laos' Prime Minister Thongsing Thammavong, center, looks on during the 10th East Asia Summit at the 27th ASEAN Summit in Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia, Watch Online News At Gossiplankaupdates