Can a besieged Malaysian PM fix the faltering economy?

MALAYSIAN Prime Minister Najib Razak, embattled and besieged as he is due to a financial scandal, will announce tweaks to the country's budget announced last October on Thursday.

This is not just any other budget revision for Mr Najib, although it would mark the second straight year the financial plan is being recalibrated, no thanks to slumping oil prices that has hit the heavily crude-reliant economy.

It follows two days after the country's attorney general cleared Mr Najib of US$681 million graft allegations and shut down a seven-month probe on the matter without fairly substantiating his decision, further fanning public cynicism.