Malaysia Today - Your Source of Independent News
Malaysia Today - Your Source of Independent News |
- GDP growth? What raw figures do not say
- Koh Tsu Khoon: He's hot and he's cold
- It's Muhyiddin and not Noh Omar who should answer
- Unscrupulous actions, unethical behaviour
| GDP growth? What raw figures do not say Posted: 18 Nov 2011 10:36 PM PST Come election season, it is natural for us to expect more positive news to come out from official (a.k.a. controlled) channels. What this mean is that official GDP increased impressively because of government spending during Q3 was almost 4 times more than Q2! Interesting to note that the federal government is the biggest employer and anything they spend, with a deficit budget, will increase national debts (to be paid back by tax payers) Some artiles about the national debt "Angka yang mengerunkan..." "Kerajaan Persekutuan hutang RM438 bilion atau 53% daripada KDNK!"  Now what did BN government spend in those past 3 months? Some of the answer is here If the 5.8% was meant to make BN look good, it merely highlighted yet again the uncontrolled spending of BN administration. 5% is also the magic figure in 2012 budget where so many quarter questioned the over optimistic estimation (MIER included) hence going by Q3 2011 logic, Najib/we tax payers have to pay not so special bonus every quarter to reach his magic 5% for 2012 then. "higher expenditure of emouluments, supplies and services..."? The some of the supplies and services that contribute some of this 5.8% will appear in next year's Auditor General's report. More binocular purchases? Maybe there will be more Feedlotgate too; condo buying from food security fund (hey KJ, that public fund IS for food security, not investment purpose...by the way, who did Feedlot buy from and who will Feedlot sell to in the future and at what price?) When you read the jabatan statistic report below, more tell tale signs will emerged. |
| Koh Tsu Khoon: He's hot and he's cold Posted: 18 Nov 2011 10:29 PM PST Brains but no brawn Party chairman Koh Tsu Khoon, with all his brains and his doctorate should have seen this coming from miles away. After helming Penang for 18 years, he fell with a mighty thump onto a massive pile of discontent, along with the rest of the Gerakan leaders who have helmed Penang along with him. Serving under the legendary Lim Chong Eu as political secretary and then his chief aide, one would have thought that Koh was groomed for greatness when he took the reins as Chief Minister. However, Penang never again reached the spectacular heights that his predecessor achieved. Though progress did come to Penang, it came slowly. Koh Tsu Khoon can tout that the building of the PISA indoor arena and the registration of Penang as an UNESCO World Heritage site as achievements during his tenure. However, his government was very much in the Barisan Nasional fold, practising closed tenders, cronyism, widespread corruption and graft. The Thinker Katy Perry sums up Koh quite nicely. As a man known as "The Thinker", his indecisiveness and notoriety for changing his mind like a girl changes clothes has become folklore, both amongst Penangnites and his own party. Despite being fully tri-lingual in Bahasa Malaysia, English and Mandarin, talk is all he appeared to be capable of doing. A member of Penang's economic research unit told me once that the former Chief Minister used to get only 3 hours of sleep a night as he was always deep in thought. "Unfortunately, that's all he seemed able to do," she quipped to me with a smile. After becoming Gerakan President in 2008, the image of the party has sharply declined, mostly thanks to him. Gerakan was seen increasingly as Umno's lapdog, just like the MCA and MIC. Koh appears physically frail, and that has translated to Gerakan's fall from grace as they had no voice or intention to affect real change. Senator Koh After losing his parliamentary bid, the new Najib administration took pity on him and appointed him as a Senator and a Minister in the Prime Minister's department. This obviously was met with clear indignation with from the people. This man had lost the trust of the electorate which led him to be rejected in the polls, and yet the Prime Minister had the temerity not just make him a senator, but a Minister?! To add salt to wound, the role given to a man famous for being unable to make decisions was to take charge of the National Key Result Areas. It was so ironic. If he had done such a good job as Chief Minister of Penang, why did Gerakan lose so badly? Obviously he was not very good at his new job, and soon he was replaced by the more capable Idris Jala. He has just been floating about, making occasional appearances for his token existence in what is an already over-bloated cabinet. Internal dissent Calls for him to step down and dissenters within Gerakan started to rear their heads. He was undoubtedly considered a liability and represents everything is wrong with the party. In order to stop the rot, they had to cut of their head so to speak. Wanita Gerakan Chief Tan Lian Hoe made clear her gripes against his leadership at their national delegates conference only last month, calling on him to be brave and "make decisions or step aside". Koh stepped up to say that he would make the tough decisions and lead the party through the next election. How things can change so quickly. Stepping aside best for Gerakan With Koh announcing that he will not contest in the next general elections for either the state or parliamentary seats, I anticipate that many opposition politicians would be disappointed that he is no longer a target, nor a candidate which they could have an easy win over. I would venture to speculate that the Prime Minister obviously feels that Koh is not a 'winnable' candidate, and made this clear to him during the meeting in Putrajaya with the BN heads on Tuesday. Koh himself, should have seen this coming. By stepping aside, this has also led to his successor, Chief Minister Lim Guan Eng to enter the debate by saying that Umno wanted to sideline Koh. Although speculation was rife that Koh's 'sacrifice' would be to contest in the next GE against the incredibly popular Lim Guan Eng, but it appears that what he meant was 'self-sacrifice'. Read more at: http://dougtan.blogspot.com/2011/11/koh-tsu-khoon-hes-hot-and-hes-cold.html |
| It's Muhyiddin and not Noh Omar who should answer Posted: 18 Nov 2011 05:07 PM PST He said: "I can confirm that NFC is under the High-Impact Projects Committee and at the time of the loan approval to NFC, that was not under the Cabinet, not (mentioned) in the meetings." It's the Deputy Prime Minister Tan Sri Muhyiddin Yassin, who was the Agriculture Minister in 2006 and who was responsible for the approval of the NFC project, who should answer whether the decision to award the NFC project was discussed during Cabinet meetings as Noh Omar only became Minister after the March 2008 general elections – and whether it gave rise to "conflict-of-interest" situations involving the Minister for Women, Family and Community Development Datuk Seri Shahrizat Abdul Jalil and her family responsible for the NFC project. Muhyiddin should also explain whether he and his Ministry were aware of the involvement of Shahrizat's family when his Ministry made the NFC award. As pointed out by the Auditor-General's Report 2010, approval of the NFC, which the National Feedlot Corporation's (NFCorp) website described as "a High-Impact Project under the Ninth Malaysia Plan….instrumental in attaining the 40% self-sufficiency for beef production by 2010", was approved way back in 2006. The NFC has lived up to its reputation as a "high impact project" although in a very perverse manner, not in terms of fulfilling its objective to attain 40% self-sufficiency for beef production by 2010 but in raising the hosts of issues about government efficiency, effectiveness, accountability, transparency and integrity in the past month since the Auditor-General's 2010 Report focussed spotlight on its operations. The controversial RM250 million "soft loan" to NFCorp, leading to the highly questionable purchase of two luxury condominiums completely at variance with the objective of NFC, is not the only public expenditure on the NFC project. From 2007 to 2010, the government had spent RM48.71 million to develop the project. The government has also given a RM13 million launching grant to NFCorp. This means that the total public outlay in the controversial NFC project exceeded RM300 million. Two days ago, the NFCorp executive chairman Datuk Seri Dr. Mohamad Salleh Ismail finally broke the 23-day silence of NFCorp but instead of being the last word to end the raging RM300 million NFC scandal, Salleh has opened up a Pandora's Box raising even more questions waiting to be answered. For instance, although Salleh claimed that NFCorp started in 2009, in actual fact it was offered to be the NFC Integrator on 27th October 2006 and as stated by the website of Real Food Company (one of the subsidiaries of NFCorp) on the launching of Gemas Gold Meats as Malaysia's "premium brand of quality meats".
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| Unscrupulous actions, unethical behaviour Posted: 18 Nov 2011 03:09 PM PST Christian bashing has become a way of life for some unscrupulous people that their conduct seriously threatens to undermine our harmony. It would appear that these people are intent on causing chaos to promote their evil political agenda on behalf of the Barisan Nasional and Umno. All kinds of absurd rumours have been spread to suggest that there is a conspiracy to turn Malaysia into a Christian state. Accusations have been levelled that rampant attempts are underway to convert Muslims to Christianity. On 5 November 2006, the mufti of Perak, Harussani Zakaria, spread a malicious and vicious rumour that a church in Ipoh was conducting a baptism ceremony for Muslims. As a result, about 300 Muslims gathered at the Ipoh church in Jalan Silibin to protest against the 'conversion', forcing the police to be called in. This incident could have led to an ugly religious clash. According to Sisters in Islam (SIS) programme manager Norhayati Kaprawi, "this is not the first time the mufti has made careless statements and allegations." She cited a number of previous statements made by the mufti, including in February where Harussani claimed that between 100000 and 250000 Muslims had renounced Islam. To date he has not been able to furnish any proof for his outlandish claim, which had the potential to outrage Muslim sensibilities. He did not even do the decent thing that is expected of a person who had genuinely committed an error. There was no remorse; there was no apology. The latest claims by the Selangor Islamic Affairs Department (Jais) – that it had found that eight ways by which Christian missionaries are spreading the Gospel, one of which is by means of a high-tech device called a 'Solar-Powered Handheld Talking Bible' – is ridiculous and appalling. Selangor state exco member in charge of Islamic affairs Hassan Ali revealed that the other ways in which the 'Good Word' is being spread to convert Muslims include setting up welfare groups to extend financial and other forms of assistance to single mothers, the poor, the elderly and others. He further stated that, in addition to cash, inducements by Christians to the target groups also come in the form of the provision of daily necessities, capital for business purposes and other aid. If Hassan has so much irrefutable evidence, then he should make a police report. It is a moral responsibility that he should exercise immediately. Very likely, the police will spring into action. In matters of this nature, we can expect the police to be super efficient. If indeed there was evidence, then the culprits attempting to convert the Muslims should be prosecuted. Aliran very strongly supports such prosecution for any violations of the law. The very fact that no one has been charged so far would mean that Hassan and the others of his ilk should stop talking nonsense and behave in a reverential manner befitting their religious personage. They bring shame to their office and lose their dignity and they can never be looked upon as respected religious leaders. This unverified wild claim of conversions to Christianity raises a very pertinent question. Is the faith of the Muslims so weak and superficial that Muslims can be so easily swayed, induced and bribed to renounce their faith in spite of the fact "the al-Quran is disseminated through loud speakers, television, radio and at government functions," as pointed out by former Perlis mufti Mohd Asri Zainul Abidin?
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