Ali Baba is a term describing business practices in Malaysia and Indonesia involving indigenous and non-indigenous cooperation to take advantage of affirmative action provisions favouring indigenous Malays or Native Indonesians.
Ali Baba is a business practice in Malaysia, where a Malay company obtains a contract from the government-sponsored affirmative action system for the Bumiputera (the Malaysian New Economic Policy under Ketuanan Melayu) and subcontracts it to an ethnically Chinese-owned company.
[3][circular reference] This program was enacted to advance pribumi – who were also called Bumiputera before Soeharto's New Order which means ethnically native businessman (but now also includes women) – to engage pribumi businessmen in order to advance national economics, to transition the economic system from a colonial system to a national system, and to encourage cooperation between pribumi and non-pribumi businessmen.
When this program was in effect, pribumi businessman was ordered to give training and responsibility to Indonesian workforce in order to hold staff position as government gave loan and licence to national private business.
However, the core of this program, which in favor of native people, is resurfaced as new concept of putra daerah (which may be literally translated as "son of the land"), as autonomy system instated.