| Our Malaysia of the 70s Posted: 25 Jan 2013 11:24 AM PST 
There was a certain kind of magic, innocence, and sincerity to foster a Malaysian identity, back then. It didn't matter what race you were one could love to one's heart's content folks like these: P Ramlee, AR Tompel, Aziz Sattar, Saloma, Siput Sarawak, Ayappan, Lim Goh Poh, Andre Goh, Kartina Dahari, Orchid Abdullah, soccer players like V Arumugam the 'Spider Man', Soh Chin Aun 'The Towkay', Shaharuddin Abdullah the cool guy, Mokhtar Dahari 'Super Mokh', Santokh Singh, and many other great names that helped make Malaysian Malaysia proud. A REPUBLIC OF VIRTUE Dr Azly Rahman With the state of racial and religious things entire in our beloved Malaysia today - rumours of a festival of Bible-burning, continuing humiliation of the Malaysian Indians especially, the death of critical sensibility in our public universities, the devastating revelations of the 'Sabah IC-gate' plot, the issue of 'stateless Indians' and the criminalisation of children not able to be schooled because they were born 'stateless' and a host of other issues Malaysian-ly unbecoming. I have decided to travel down the path of nostalgia. I am quite sure many of you reading this column would agree that the late sixties and early seventies presented a good frame of reference of what it means to be Malaysian and what 'national identity' could be about. Names upon names came back to me as I conjure fond memories. There was a certain kind of magic, innocence, and sincerity to foster a Malaysian identity, back then. It didn't matter what race you were one could love to one's heart's content folks like these: P Ramlee, AR Tompel, Aziz Sattar, Saloma, Siput Sarawak, Ayappan, Lim Goh Poh, Andre Goh, Kartina Dahari, Orchid Abdullah, soccer players like V Arumugam the 'Spider Man', Soh Chin Aun 'The Towkay', Shaharuddin Abdullah the cool guy, Mokhtar Dahari 'Super Mokh', Santokh Singh, and many other great names that helped make Malaysian Malaysia proud. One could laugh at the comedian-ventriloquist Jamali Shadat's jokes, remember names such a V Sambanthan, Khir Johari, the great statesman Dr Ismail Abdul Rahman, Tan Siew Sin, Temenggung Jugah (the man with a really cool haircut I so wanted one... ), Aishah Ghani, and of course the reluctant but down-to-earth and benevolent multiculturalist-statesman Tunku Abdul Rahman with his famous uncontrollable blurting of Malay curse words and his philosophy of "oil and water can never mix". A simple, yet profound life was back then... 
Those were the days before today... when hell is breaking loose. What happened to the ethos of that genre, I wonder. Growing up in the early 70s, different words to describe reality, practices, and possibilities were dancing happily around me. Perhaps those street names tune us to calmness... Jalan/Lorong Aman, Sentosa, Bahagia, Rahmat, Syukur, Ne'mat, and Merdeka... All these shaped the child's mind, such as that of mine growing up with a fascination of names, as if living is about being taught names and being able to "read the self and the word" in order to be liberated. There were also words related to spirituality; words such as 'sembah-Hyang', marhaban, berzanji, kenduri, berkhatan, and bersugi gigi... There were also cool words related to Malay magic such as jampi serapah, tangkal, kemenyan, dukun, pawang, and of course the "mambang laut-mambang darat-mambang udara" trinity/trio"...
Smooth-sailing seventies
Back in the day of the smooth-sailing seventies people were happy wearing what ought to be simple fashion and accessories... kebaya, baju kurong (not a straitjacket mind you), baju Melayu Telok Blangah, terompah, selipar chapal, selipar Jepun... manik koran, and all kinds of Malay, Chinese, and Indian 'bling bling' to adorn oneself with cultural niceties. Growing up in the kampong, I was not attuned to hearing totally foreign words, imported from elsewhere to denote and connote the self, spirituality, and salvation, and "saving the soul of others"; words such as solat, dakwah, ushrah, tarbiyyah jihad, muzakarah, jubah, serban, hijab, purdah, burqah, niqab, Arqam, tabligh, Ayatollah, muktamaar, buah tamar, or even Daulah Islamiyah... Not that I knew or had even heard of... until the beginning of the eighties when these words like Karl Marx would say, became technologies of the "body, mind, and spirit" that changed the social relations of production and the ideological landscape of the country and the consciousness of a segment of Malay people... And I never heard anyone wanting to burn the Bible nor shout "Allahu Akbar" (God is great) when scoring goals in a friendly kampong football match. And the beauty of living back in the day was how the self was constructed out of the early introduction to pluralism/multiculturalism such that in me, every time the Chinese spirit of Bruce Lee possesses me, I could just go out and beat up my best friend Fook Shiang for example. We could then walk to town and overdose on the Indian food tosei and capati. Along the way we would stop by breezy Lido beach to grab a bite of the Javanesse soul food tauhu (tofu) sumbat. Next, we could stop by at our teacher's house and listen to his stories of Malay spiritual powers and magic called 'Ilmu Budi Suci' where the energy within possibly called the 'chi' can be harnessed so that one could kick like Bruce Lee without even touching your enemy! Then, back in the day, we could go home after that to watch Joe Bugner got punched out into outer space by the 'Black Superman' named Muhammad Ali. I could still remember the words of the announcer ... "Annnddd in thissss corneerrr... weighing 220 pounds... from Louisville Kentucky... the undisputed world champion... Moooo hammaaaad... Aaaa Liiii... Aaaa Liiiii... Aaaa Liiii..." to the sounds of the audience gone berserk. I could go on and one with this nostalgic; a trip down memory lane of the seventies especially, just by recalling words and words that were synonymous with a world that was about to enter globalisation but was dealing with a strange brew of modernisation and uneven development - a Malaysia before Mahathirism. That was true multiculturalism without any strand of today's idiocy. That was our Malaysia with a lot of sense and sensibility. DR AZLY RAHMAN, who was born in Singapore and grew up in Johor Bahru, holds a Columbia University (New York) doctorate in International Education Development and Master's degrees in the fields of Education, International Affairs, Peace Studies and Communication. He has taught more than 40 courses in six different departments and has written more than 300 analyses on Malaysia. His teaching experience spans Malaysia and the United States, over a wide range of subjects from elementary to graduate education. He currently resides in the United States. ********************************** OUR USUAL REMINDER, FOLKS:
While the opinion in the article/writing is mine,
the comments are strictly, respectfully, and responsibly yours;
present them rationally, clearly, politely, and ethically. https://www.facebook.com/#!/azly.rahman http://azlyrahman-illuminations.blogspot.com/ |
| Scriptures, neighbours, Terry Jones and Ibrahim Ali Posted: 25 Jan 2013 11:18 AM PST 
On the second shelf were all the scriptures we owned: including the Bible and the Quran. And copies of various Hindu works. These were given pride of place and handled with great care. write2rest Some years ago I read Max Rodenbeck's Cairo: The City Victorious. Cairo gave me good insights about how people cope politically, socially and economically in a crowded city.
I think it was also Cairo which gave me a precious insight about the reverence with which Muslims treat their Holy Book.
It seems Egyptian Muslims do not print calendars with Quranic verses since the pages – and thus the revered verses – will end up in the garbage. [Did you know that Jews bury their worn out scriptures?]
In Malaysia, many stick Quranic verses onto the windscreens and dashboards of their cars. The verses are in Arabic, Malay or English. I do not know what they do with these verses when they are worn out. I do not think such use of the Quranic verses in any way diminishes the esteem in which the verses are held. Rather, I think such uses honour the verses.
There are many ways in which we honour scriptures.
I exercised great care when handling my father's copy of the Quran (actually Marmaduke Pickethall's translation). We showed our respect for our neighbours by the respect we showed the book they revered: even to the extent of where we kept our copy of the book.
We had one book case. It was built to accommodate the Encyclopaedia Americana (1964), which was on the first shelf. The second shelf was for reference books – mainly dictionaries.
Also on the second shelf were all the scriptures we owned: including the Bible and the Quran. And copies of various Hindu works. These were given pride of place and handled with great care.
Before we had study desks we sat on the floor to read. I never placed either the Bible or the Quran on the floor – I knew that doing so would displease my father. (I do not remember any of my siblings showing an interest in religious books.)
I am therefore dismayed when I hear of people who want to burn the scriptures. In my view, people like Terry Jones who incite people to burn Qurans are uncouth, bad neighbours and as much a disgrace to Christians as Osama bin Laden is to Muslims. Read more at: http://write2rest.blogspot.com/2013/01/scriptures-neighbours-terry-jones-and.html |
| Even the Devil (You Know And Not The Angel That You Don’t?) Should Be Given the Benefit of ... Posted: 25 Jan 2013 11:11 AM PST 
Back in the Henry VIII days, the punishment for high treason was "hanged, drawn and quartered". Convicts were fastened to a wooden panel, and drawn by horse to the place of execution, where they were hanged (almost to the point of death), disembowelled and quartered (chopped into four pieces). Nicole Tan Lee Koon The following article by Kim Quek is basically a "Project M or Project IC for dummies" : http://www.themalaysianinsider.com/sideviews/article/sabah-rci-what-next-kim-quek/. I would like to add my two sens' worth of thought on it. You see, it is a well-known secret that Dr M started this clandestine project in the 1990's to capture Sabah for UMNO. After much pressure from the Opposition, a Parliamentary Select Committee (PSC) on Integrity headed by Bernard Dompok was set up in February 2007. Three months later, Dompok quit as chairman of the committee over disagreements on the function and scope of the committee, in particular, over the refusal of the National Registration Department to appear before the committee. The findings of the PSC were never made public. In May 2008, Lim Kit Siang tabled a motion to set up a Royal Commission to investigate the problems relating to illegal immigrants in Sabah. The motion however was rejected by the Deputy Speaker of the Dewan Rakyat, Ronald Kiandee. Subsequently, Pak Lah announced the setting up of a high powered cabinet committee chaired by the then Deputy PM Najib Tun Razak. However, it was pointed out by a senior Sabahan politician Chong Eng Leong similar committees were set up in 2000 and 2006 without any results. Merely lip service to pacify Sabahans. There were several government crackdown operations to deport illegal immigrants since the 1990s. The last crackdown was in August 2008. These operations served to deport immigrants without proper documentations but it does not serve to address the issue of Project IC. Najib not only did not produce any results from the so-called high powered cabinet committee, he became an expert in giving out citizenships to illegal immigrants himself as it was stated whilst Dr M had given citizenships to foreigners in Sabah to stay in power, Najib is now doing the same in the whole country! (http://www.freemalaysiatoday.com/category/nation/2013/01/24/you-help-me-i-give-you-ic/) The whole exercise, according to Raja Petra, was like a Hollywood movie script. It seems that UMNO used funds from Libya to cut a deal with Abu Sayyaf to overthrow PBS in Sabah. Dr M finally admitted that he gave out citizenships during his tenure and claimed that it was legal. Dr M conveniently disregarded the Reid Commission by saying that what he did was as legal as what Tunku Abdul Rahman did by giving out citizenships to Chinese and Indians! Remember the unsuccessful coup d'etat by the Al Ma'unah? Mohamed Amin and his group were charged for "waging war against the King" or treason, and became the first people convicted of such an offence in Malaysia. I opine that what Dr M, Megat Junid, Aziz Shamsuddin and Najib did (if found to be true) was even more serious than Al Ma'unah and if found to be true, they should be charged with high treason! Interestingly, Al Ma'unah was charged for treason which is a British legacy under the Malaysian common law. Back in the Henry VIII days, the punishment for high treason was "hanged, drawn and quartered". Convicts were fastened to a wooden panel, and drawn by horse to the place of execution, where they were hanged (almost to the point of death), disembowelled and quartered (chopped into four pieces). Their body parts were then displayed in prominent places across the country, such as London Bridge. I know one anti-Dr M guy who used to jokingly say that he wants to see Dr M hanged between the Petronas twin towers in his inebriated state. It may be proper during the Middle Ages but not at this time and age. As I subscribe to Sir Thomas More's contention that even the devil (that we know and not the angel that we don't?) must be given the benefit of the law. In conclusion, I hope that perpetrators of such blatant and treasonous acts of giving out citizenships to illegal immigrants in order to continue their hegemony be brought to justice with the due process of law. |
| Atrocities of the illegal car park operators and the negligence of Selayang Municipal Council Posted: 25 Jan 2013 11:02 AM PST It is to be noted here with due emphasis that Selayang Municipal has been notified about this exasperating behavior via multiple phone calls and reports but it seems they are shutting one eye to the obvious as to this matter. During the lodge of report every year, Selayang Municipal comes with the same excuse that they will deal with this matter every single year but till this day, nothing appears to have changed. Justina Illegal car parking is widely reported on the Net and in newspapers. Adding to this queue, the Batu Caves Temple during Thaipusam is a perfect example demonstrating the atrocities and aggressive behaviors of illegal car park operators. Its obvious to all who park their cars outside Batu Caves Temple during Thaipusam that the car park rate is at rocket prices. The illegal car attendants charge rates ranging from RM5 to RM10 for a car to be parked the whole day. This is made even worse when they charge for cars parked just nearby the road and claim that they will be taking good care of the car but the hidden truth is the moment the car park space is full, they abscond with the money. Upon confrontation with them, they appear to demonstrate their aggressive behaviors towards car owners and insult them with humiliating vulgar words. Some even have the courage of telling the car owners that if they wish to park here, they can park at their free will and nobody is forcing them to do so. It is to be noted here with due emphasis that Selayang Municipal has been notified about this exasperating behavior via multiple phone calls and reports but it seems they are shutting one eye to the obvious as to this matter. During the lodge of report every year, Selayang Municipal comes with the same excuse that they will deal with this matter every single year but till this day, nothing appears to have changed. Hope this year will be different as the Thaipusam festival is one of the main attractions of Malaysia and matters such as this tends to disturb the occasion and contaminate the reputation of Malaysia for tourists. |
| MTUC Calls for Royal Commission Inquiry on Foreign Workers Posted: 25 Jan 2013 10:56 AM PST 
Quite frankly, if they cannot afford to pay a minimum wage that is just at the poverty line they have no business to be in business. Andrew Lo, Secretary MTUC Sarawak Division CHUA SOI LECK & Small Businesses - Don't cut your noses to spite your faces. The latest woeful attempts by certain business groups to squeeze more out of their workers, especially foreign workers just show the true colours of Malaysian employers. To resort to threat of demonstration show how low they can stoop to. The Minimum Wage policy was finally introduced precisely because of the exploitation of workers especially by these small businesses who contrary to popular thinking, actually make much more than you and me. There are 600 thousand businesses in Malaysia. If it is not lucrative, why are there so many wanting to be in business? I am shocked that the President of MCA has openly threatened to support demonstrations to get their way. His statement only goes to show that he is only serving the interest of MCA leaders who own such businesses. This is what he is reported to have said; "If it fails to do so by then and if many small and medium sized enterprises, including those run by MCA leaders, want to have a demonstration against the ministry, we will support them." MCA, said Dr Chua, had proposed to the ministry almost a month ago that foreign workers pay for their own levy, transport and housing costs following the implementation of minimum wage. Transport and accommodation allowances for foreign workers, he said, could be deducted from their minimum wage. MCA should do so after the employment agents who charge exorbitant fees and make billions out of the whole foreign workers racket, instead of asking the poor foreign workers, who bear subsistence expenses to pay for the levy transportation and housing cost. It beggars believe that these employers, who are the most vocal opponents of the minimum wage can proudly claim that they are still paying RM500 wages to even local employees. The Minimum Wage Order gave them the chance to apply for deferment but they refuse to produce audited accounts to back up their claims that they will go bankrupt saying that it is a trade secret. Quite frankly, if they cannot afford to pay a minimum wage that is just at the poverty line they have no business to be in business. Please understand that one of the main objectives of the MW is to reduce our reliance-addiction on foreign workers. By demanding that they bear food and levy will only serve to encourage these unscrupulous employers to continue to employ more foreign workers at huge social, security and cost to the country. We believe that it's at least 2 to 3 millions of them. It will open up to the possibility that soon unscrupulous party may issue I/C to them. MTUC has been calling for a Royal Commission Inquiry on the whole racket of recruiting and employing foreign workers. Please also think carefully as all these attempts to squeeze them will come back and bite the employers as one day foreign workers may not even want to come to this country. So don't cut your nose to spite your faces. |
| Bendera PKR dan PAS diconteng dengan lambang Salib di negeri Johor Posted: 25 Jan 2013 10:51 AM PST 
(Harakah) - Tidak cukup dengan berbagai-bagai jenis keganasan dan vandalisma yang dilakukan oleh samseng-samseng yang diupah RM30 oleh UMNO terhadap apa saja yang menjadi milik PKR/Pakatan Rakyat.. kini bendera pula menjadi mangsa. Kejadian dilaporkan telah berlaku di sebuah negeri yang dikatakan sebagai Kubu kuat terakhir bagi UMNO di Selatan Semenanjung.
Meskipun negeri tersebut merupakan kubu kuat bagi UMNO sebuah parti yang membela nsaib orang Melayu kononnya, perlu kita ketahui bahawa orang Melayu di Johor adalah orang Melayu paling miskin di Malaysia.
Ini menurut Presiden Dewan Perniagaan Melayu Malaysia (DPMM), Datuk Syed Ali Alattas baru-baru ini dalam satu kenyataan yang boleh di baca di ( SINI )
Mungkin kerana terdesak kerana kemiskinan maka samseng upahan UMNO di Johor terpaksa mengambil upah menconteng bendera PKR dan PAS dengan lambang salib pula..
Laporan dari MSO mengatakan..
Satu perbuatan jahat yang sungguh mencelakan dilaporkan berlaku di Johor malam tadi apabila bendera PAS dan PKR dicalitkan (print) dengan lambang salib. Kejadian itu berlaku di Batu Pahat Johor.
Selain bendera itu dicop dengan lambang salib ianya juga ditulis dengan perkataan-perkataan buruk menghina kedua-dua parti itu, ini menggambarkan si pelakunya seorang yang belum tamadun ataupun "gedebe tahi kucing."
Cara berpolitik tidak bermoral ini juga menunjukkan pihak yang melakukan perbuatan itu dalam keadaan terdesak dan nazak.
Tidak dipastikan apakah perletakan lambang salib itu pada bendera kedua-dua parti itu yang telah dipasang, atau ia disiapkan awal-awal kemudian dipasang malam tadi.
Beberapa helai bendera yang dicop lambang salib itu telah diturunkan. Satu laporan polis berhubung kejadian itu dikatakan telah dibuat pagi ini - laporan sepenuhnya sila baca di ( SINI )
Budaya apa agaknya yang pemimpin-pemimpin UMNO cuba terapkan di sini selain dari budaya kurang ajar dan tidak bertamaddun?
Saksikan juga bagaimana di negeri ini anak-anak Melayu yang masih bersekolah diajar untuk menjadi kurang ajar dengan menunjukkan isyarat lucah kepada beberapa pemimpin dari Pakatan Rakyat di ( SINI ) |
| Who will win GE13? Posted: 24 Jan 2013 07:51 PM PST 
P Gunasegaram, Malaysiakini Numbers, they say, never lie although statistics can be made to. Where they are most useful, however, is when they can be analysed to give a scale of the magnitude of the task ahead for someone who wants to achieve something. The opposition Pakatan Rakyat coalition, comprising of Parti Keadilan Rakyat (PKR), PAS, DAP and allies in Sabah and Sarawak, has made plain its target of taking over the government in the next 13th general election, and is publicly confident of doing so.
Can it? The figures clearly show that it is a much easier task for Barisan Nasional to keep its power than it is for Pakatan to wrest it away. Before I get pilloried as a doomsayer for opposition chances, do hear me out. As I said, numbers don't lie.
Let's focus on Parliamentary elections which decide federal power. The March 2008 elections, GE12, saw a huge swing of votes to the opposition. Popular vote for BN dropped to a mere 50.3 percent from its previous 64 percent. The BN lost 58 seats to the opposition, effectively Pakatan. The opposition gained 61 seats to take 82 seats. The difference between seats gained and lost is because of the three additional seats in 2008.
In peninsular Malaysia where all of the swing occurred, the opposition had 51 percent of the popular vote. But because their strength was in the urban areas which had much higher population densities, it translated into a smaller proportionate number of 80 seats for the opposition, and 84 seats for BN in the peninsula.
What saved the day for BN was the very solid showing in Sabah and Sarawak where it lost just one seat in each of the two states to garner 25 seats in Sabah, and 31 seats in Sarawak. That gave them 56 seats from East Malaysia and thus, the right to rule.
Without the strong showing in Sabah and Sarawak, BN would have been really on the ropes, and much closer to losing the elections. In the event, BN garnered 140 seats in Parliament, comfortably exceeding Pakatan's 82 seats, with only eight seats short of a two-thirds majority.
But it is a testament to the strong showing by BN in all the previous elections (barring the ill-fated 1969 elections) that this comfortable victory was still the worst showing by BN in any polls to date, forcing the resignation of BN head Abdullah Ahmad Badawi, and the subsequent ascent of Najib Abdul Razak to his position as BN chief and prime minister.
What would it take for Pakatan to win GE13 at the federal level? BN has 58 more parliament seats. It would need at the least a swing of 30 votes for a narrow two-seat majority in the house. For that, you need to see another swing as big as the one we saw in 2008 towards the opposition.
The question is, where is Pakatan going to get the 30 seats? Most of the seats which are of a Chinese majority or which have significant Chinese populations, are already in the bag. Chinese votes can't swing much more than it already has, and so is not likely to be decisive in terms of getting more seats, although it will help in the retention of many.
Key 'Malay, Sabah and Sarawak' votes
The key this time is whether there will be a continuous swing in Malay votes to PAS and PKR the way it was in 2008, and whether major swings will be seen in Sabah and Sarawak of the scale that was seen in 2008 in the peninsula.
Realistically, one should expect that the swing to Pakatan, in terms of seats won, will moderate overall in peninsular Malaysia, and that there will be some reversals even if the popular vote overall increases in favour of the opposition.
That would mean that without a significant shift in Sabah and Sarawak, and a gain of at least 15 seats there to 17 overall from East Malaysian states, there is likely to be little chance of upsetting the BN hold in terms of Parliamentary seats. Even with such a swing there, Pakatan still needs to get an additional 15 seats in the peninsular, which is not an easy task.
Yes, Pakatan will make more inroads. But will they win? Tough, but not impossible. After all, no one predicted the swing to Pakatan in 2008. What's there to say that it could not happen again? A lot could depend on the events leading up to the elections.
Opposition pundits point to investigations by the Royal Commission of Inquiry into the illegal immigration and registration of voters there which may find traction among Sabahans in favour of the opposition.
Those who think BN will win say Najib has tried hard to regain both the middle ground and Malay votes, and may succeed at least partially.
One thing's for sure, its going to be closer than ever before. If you want to make your vote count - and your vote will count more than at anytime, since voting had begun in this country in 1955 - make sure you go out there and vote on polling day, even if you have to return from Singapore or Kalimantan.
That way, whatever the result and whichever party you supported, you would have done your part towards free and fair elections in this country, the results of which would reflect majority aspirations.
P GUNASEGARAM is publisher and editor of business news portal KiniBiz which is to be set up next month in a joint venture with Malaysiakini. He has worked as a journalist and analyst in Malaysia for over 30 years. |
| Race in politics, politics in race Posted: 24 Jan 2013 07:47 PM PST KTemoc Konsiders I have just read P Gunasegaram's article Who will win GE13? in Malaysiakini. He has very methodically, and I believe quite logically, laid down his points which argue that it will be a tough struggle for Pakatan to secure a majority of federal seats in Peninsula to claim rule after the election. But he said it's tough though not impossible, using the March 2008 results as indicative of Pakatan achieving the 'impossible'. But he cautioned that it will likely be a very close call, where in such a situation, every single vote will count, more than ever before in Malaya/Malaysia's 55 years' history as an independent nation. Malaysian politics is the story of politics of race or, if you like, race in politics. Unfortunately we can't escape racial discussions in politics because in truth we haven't yet possess adequate thrust (or trust) and thus the required escape velocity to overcome its powerful gravitational pull, which compels us into more mundane Earthly understanding of its issues. One insight Gunasegaram shared with us in his article has been that the Chinese vote bank is more or less already owned by Pakatan, and thus any further increase in Chinese support will likely not be as dramatically significant as it had been in 2008. Whatever moderate gains Pakatan will further obtain from the Chinese in GE-13 will probably be in some MCA-held seats in Johor. Also, rumours have it that Hishamuddin Hussein will be changing his seat for another as 40% of the registered voters in his current constituency of Sembrong are Chinese, so that could well be a pending Pakatan seat. Of course there may be gains in additional Chinese-majority seats in Sabah and Sarawak, but I'll leave this sector to better informed people to enlighten me. One glaring omission in Gunasegaram's article has been the Indian factor in Peninsula. Remember how Uthayakuamar and his supporters and sympathizers kept telling us it was the Hindraf-galvanized Indian mass that enabled Pakatan to achieve its 2008 election wins, ... ... and how he would withdraw that Hindraf-ized Indian support for Pakatan if the coalition doesn't listen to and accept his HRP's several demands, one of which had been the right to contest in 7 parliamentary seats and 16 state seats without Pakatan's participation, based on a Free Malaysia Today's report on 14 September 2011 titled HRP demands 23 seats from Pakatan. The seven parliamentary seats he wanted were: (1) Padang Serai (Kedah) currently held by Gobalakrishnan, formerly PKR, (2) Batu Kawan (Penang) currently held by Dr Ramasamy (DAP) (3) Ipoh Barat (Perak) currently held by Kulasegaran (DAP) (4) Kota Raja (Selangor) currently held by Siti Mariah Mahmud (PAS) (5) Teluk Kemang (Negri Sembilan) currently held by Kamarul Baharin Abbas (PKR) (6) Cameron Highlands (Pahang) currently held by Devamany Krishnasamy (MIC), and (7) Tebrau (Johor) currently held by Teng Book Soon (MCA). Now, hasn't Uthayakumar just been the brightest spark in the class in asking Pakatan to meekly surrender 5 of their federal seats for his HRP to contest in GE-13, with 3 of the 5 seats held by his fellow Indians? Surely this calls for a re-reading of my post Malaysian Racism & The 3 Baskets of Crabs at my other blog BolehTalk, wakakaka. The 16 state seats he wanted were Bukit Selambau and Lunas (Kedah), Prai and Bagan Dalam (Penang), Buntong and Hutan Melintang (Perak), Port Dickson and Jeram Padang (Negri Sembilan), Tanah Rata and Ketari (Pahang), Puteri Wangsa and Tiram (Johor) and Sri Andalas, Ijok, Seri Setia and Bukit Melawati (Selangor). You can work it out how many of those seats are currently held by Pakatan. Help you with a couple: Khalid Ibrahim holds Ijok, wakakaka, and Dr Ramasamy holds Prai, wakakaka again. What do you reckon Pakatan would have told him? Maybe something like this: You claimed to have gifted mandores In 2008 with a Hindraf blank cheque Now you want us to be like whores To give in and lie down on our back Perhaps mandores we may well be Though if you expect us to give in To demands so big-headedly crazy Tambi, we'd be committing a big sin Wakakaka, and I am not sure whether Uthayakumar is still insisting on these 23 seats. But anyway, back on track, I wish Gunasegaram had analysed the Indian factor in his article. On one hand people like Uthaykumar claimed that it had been Indian support that enabled Pakatan to win such a big victory in 2008, and should that be true, then given recent analyses that about 80% of Indians have returned to the BN fold, what does that spell for Pakatan other than big trouble. On the other, which I am inclined towards, yes the Indians did contribute to the Pakatan victory in 2008 but they weren't the most impactful force behind the tsunami sweeping our political landscape. In arguing against the theory of Hindraf being the principal winning factor, I drew comparison to an earlier tsunami in 1969 when Hindraf was not even in existence (and Anwar Ibrahim was a youngish 20 something) yet which saw BN's predecessor, Perikatan (Alliance) lost humongously. 
| Gerakan celebrating its 1969 victory Syed Hussein Alatas with pipe, his arms around Lim Chong Eu | I stated that the Pakatan victory in 2008, as the victory for the loose informal pact of Gerakan-DAP-PPP (including even informal associate PAS) in 1969, happened because many voters had had enough of BN and respectively Perikatan, and were prepared to change, and not because of any particular NGO. It calls into question the theory of Hindraf being the primary earth-shaking force in March 2008. Assuming my belief is correct, and if the majority of Indian voters will be supporting BN in GE-13 as they traditionally have (yes, the Indians have been BN's 'fixed deposit'), there may be some adverse effect for Pakatan but certainly not to the extent Mr Gloom & Doom has been threatening the Pakatan 'mandores', wakakaka. 
| Najib's real 'fixed deposit', wakakaka | We also need to remember that Hindraf had not been an exclusive Uthayakumar's one-man effort but which saw front line participation by DAP members, one of whom, M Manoharan, is an ADUN who won Kota Alam Shah seat while he was behind ISA lockup as a Hindraf leader. So not all Hindraf supporters would necessarily boycott Pakatan. It's also significant to note that Manoharan won in a Chinese majority seat, defeating the BN Chinese candidate by a resounding majority of more than 7500 votes in a constituency of only 26000 voters. Thus it's likely the DAP brand rather than Hindraf label that had enabled Manoharan to become an ADUN in Selangor. 
| Manoharan | So I personally believe the Indians supporting BN, while certainly not favourable to Pakatan, will not have that drastic effect as threatened by a crab (in a basket, wakakaka). Leaving aside the Sabah and Sarawak factors, and let's not deny they will be very BIG factors, the fight in GE-13 which will produce big earth shaking results in Peninsula will be for the hearts of the Heartland. This is certainly the belief of RPK as enunciated in his post Why is Dr Mahathir such an idiot?, a title which belies the political shrewdness of the former PM. 
| as if saying "up yours, you mongrels" wakakaka | RPK wrote (extracts only): The only thing that can save Umno would be the Malay votes -- that determine roughly two-thirds of the seats in West Malaysia. And that is why what they are doing/saying is not to win the hearts and mind of the Chinese and Indian voters. It is too late to win the hearts and minds of the Chinese and Indian voters. They need to win the hearts and minds of the Malay voters. And to do that they need to do and say what they are currently doing and saying. While this may upset the Chinese and Indians, who are not going to vote for Umno anyway, it pacifies the Malays. And it is the Malays they want to pacify, not the Chinese and Indians, who have made it very clear they are not going to vote Barisan Nasional or Umno come hell or high water. READ MORE HERE |
| The long and the short of it Posted: 24 Jan 2013 06:34 PM PST 
But what will happen, say, in 2057, 100 years after Merdeka, when the children and grandchildren of those three million pendatang -- who by then may number five million and hold Malaysian identity cards because they were born in Malaysia -- all want to vote as overseas voters although they had left the country a long time ago and never once went back to Malaysia? NO HOLDS BARRED Raja Petra Kamarudin There are those who oppose the Islamic criminal law of Hudud. When we ask them as to why they oppose Hudud they will reply that it is because under the Hudud law they cut off the hands of thieves. Hence Hudud is a very barbaric law. Rather than cut off the hands of thieves they should instead be killed with a bullet in the head like what they do to highway robbers and other thieves in China, corrupt officials and female robbers included. Well, I suppose a bullet in the head is less barbaric than having to live with only one hand. Let's say for argument's sake I argue: so what if they cut off the hands of thieves? Why are you so worried about that if you are not a thief? Aren't you the ones who are complaining about the extremely high crime rate in Malaysia? Aren't you the ones alleging that the police are not doing their job? Maybe we need a law such as Hudud to solve the serious crime problem that appears to be spinning out of control. Only thieves should be worried about and oppose Hudud. If you are so opposed to Hudud then that can only mean one thing -- you are a thief. If you are not a thief then why are you so opposed to Hudud? And it appears like more non-Malays than Malays oppose Hudud. This can only mean that there are more non-Malay thieves than Malay thieves. I suppose this statement makes as much sense as the statement that if you do not support Pakatan Rakyat then you must be a Barisan Nasional supporter (if you do not support Hudud then you must be a thief). There can be no other logical reason for you to not support Pakatan Rakyat just like there can be no other logical reason for you to not support Hudud. Can you see that when we apply your same logic to another situation your logic no longer sounds logical? And that is the problem with many of you. Your logic is not universal. It can be used only to support your prejudiced view but when applied to another argument it sounds real silly. The Sedition Act and the Internal Security Act are draconian laws. Why are they draconian laws? Well, because these laws are used against the opposition, to stifle dissent, and to deny Malaysians their freedom of speech. Hence the Sedition Act and the Internal Security Act must be abolished. And if Pakatan Rakyat ever takes over the federal government this is one of the first things they must do -- abolish the Sedition Act and the Internal Security Act. However, before they abolish these laws, they must first be used against those on the 'other side'. Once those from the 'other side' have been dealt with only then should these laws be abolished. In fact, if Pakatan Rakyat takes over, we should implement Hudud and use that law to cut off the hands of those crooks from the ruling party. Once all their hands have been cut off we can then abolish the Hudud law. What are we fighting for? We are fighting for justice. And how do we get justice? We get justice by abolishing bad laws and by reforming the system. Should we do all that now? No, we do that only after we have taken revenge on our enemies. Is revenge justice? Yes, but only if taken against the other side, not if taken against our own people. It is not fair that Malaysians who have left the country for longer than five years and have not returned to the country for at least 30 days over those five years are not allowed to vote as an overseas voter. Even if those Malaysians left the country 30 or 40 years ago and never once went back to Malaysia they should still be allowed to vote (as long as they still have an identity card, of course, because you need this to vote). What happens if one million of the three million foreigners who now possess Malaysian identity cards go home to their original countries? Can they be allowed to vote as overseas voters? Your entitlement to vote depends on you possessing a Malaysian identity card. Hence if you have a Malaysian identity card then you are entitled to vote. And what happens if these people had left Malaysia more than ten years ago and never once came back to Malaysia? Should they still be allowed to vote? You may argue that they should not be allowed to vote because although they possess Malaysian identity cards they were not born in Malaysia. Ah, but then their children were. Their children possess Malaysian identity cards that show they were born in Malaysia although they left Malaysia ten years ago and now live in another country. So why can't they be allowed to vote? Back in 1957, when Malaya first gained independence, the Chinese and Indians came from China and India and were given Malaysian citizenship. Subsequently, the children of those 'pendatang' were born in the country. Hence the descendants of these pre-1957 immigrants are Malaysian born and should not be called 'pendatang'. Agreed, it is wrong to call the present generation Malaysians of Chinese and Indian descent 'pendatang'. Their parents or grandparents may have been pendatang back in 1957. But the present crop of Malaysian-born Chinese and Indians are not pendatang and should not be treated as pendatang or called 'pendatang'. But what will happen, say, in 2057, 100 years after Merdeka, when the children and grandchildren of those three million pendatang -- who by then may number five million and hold Malaysian identity cards because they were born in Malaysia -- all want to vote as overseas voters although they had left the country a long time ago and never once went back to Malaysia? Sometimes we need to look short term, such as over the next two months leading to the coming general election. Sometimes we need to look long term, say 30 years down the road. And sometimes we need to balance between short-term and long-term goals. When the government came out with its education policy it looked short term and not long term. And now, many years down the road, we are paying for this short-sighted and short-term strategy. But the damage has been done. It is not going to be that easy to rectify things. It may take a whole generation to correct our mistakes of the past -- and even then only if we are prepared to bite the bullet and are prepared to suffer the high casualty rate. Are we prepared to allow the Malays to become casualties in the interest of a better education system based on meritocracy? Neither Najib Tun Razak nor Anwar Ibrahim would dare say 'yes' to this question. Things are going to get worse before they become better. The cure may be as painful as the disease. But I am sure neither Barisan Nasional nor Pakatan Rakyat would be prepared to take the risk of a political fallout out if they try to change the education system and see Malays fall by the wayside because they are just not good enough. It is like promising no taxation and promising to give all the oil money back to the states. How would we finance the country? No doubt that type of promise is going to help win votes. But what do you do after you win the votes? To make money we need to plant oil palm trees. To plant oil palm trees we need to burn down the forests. When we burn down the forests we create an ecological problem. So we don't burn down the forests to prevent an ecological problem. But since we don't burn down the forests we can't plant oil palm trees. And because we can't plant oil palm trees we can't make money. Life is full of vicious cycles. And Malaysia can win the gold medal in vicious cycles if that happened to be an event in the Olympic games. ***************************************** Use of Sedition Act is wrong Yin Shao Loong, The Malaysian Insider Bar Council president Lim Chee Wee stated that the Sedition Act should be used on Ibrahim Ali because the latter had advocated the burning of bibles. Even though Lim acknowledged that the Bar holds that the law should be repealed, it should nonetheless be used against Ibrahim if the government is charging opposition leaders such as Karpal Singh under it. Burning any book as a political act is vulgar, uncultured and should be condemned. Invoking the use of a draconian law to punish book burning, or incitement to burn books, is a capitulation to authoritarianism. By taking this stance, Lim and the Bar he leads have undermined any claim to principled opposition to the Sedition Act. Their rationale is akin to those who proposed maintaining the Internal Security Act (ISA) so it could be used one last time against the puppet master of Operation Lallang. Even if Lim's intent was to underline how the present government selectively enforces the law, his argument was poorly chosen because it was based on the logic that two wrongs would make a right. The Sedition Act has been a convenient and objectionable tool of authoritarian power in Malaysia due to its broad applicability against anything that could be construed as raising ill-will or hostility within society or against the authorities. Anyone can claim they had feelings of ill-will or hostility raised by someone's statement or action, proceed to file a police report, and have someone investigated for sedition. Of course, the odds of successful prosecution would improve if the accused happened to be someone not favoured by the government. Historically, sedition was associated with absolutist monarchies. Undemocratic governments criminalise sedition because they fear dissent will destabilise authority based on force, heredity or property. The rule of the few over the many requires some form of institutionalised discrimination, fear and suppression of criticism. Democracies incorporate criticism into their system of government and allow the many to use their votes to initiate peaceful, orderly changes in government. As long as I have known it, the Bar Council has stood for the principled movement towards full-fledged constitutional democracy in Malaysia. Supporting the use of the Sedition Act is a backward step contrary to human rights. Lim has already noted that any book-burning act or incitement to such act can be prosecuted under those sections of the Penal Code that deal with abetment and trespass. Additionally, sections 298 and 298A of the Penal Code deal with acts designed to cause hurt on religious grounds, section 504 covers intentional insult with intent to provoke a breach of the peace, and section 505 refers to statements promoting public mischief. It is reasonable to file a police report, or call for laws to be employed, where the actions in question are criminal, excluding those legitimate forms of dissent criminalised by the Sedition Act, ISA, Printing Presses and Publications Act, and so forth. One group of citizens is opposing the barbaric act of book burning by inviting people to join in reading holy books — any books, in fact — under the trees at KLCC park on Sunday. Others have filed a police report against Ibrahim, citing many of the Penal Code sections referred to above, but without recourse to the Sedition Act or any of its repressive bedfellows. These are civilised means of opposing an uncivilised act. If we want to move Malaysia out of the shadow of authoritarianism we cannot condone the very methods of authoritarianism. This means that race-baiting, repressive laws and impunity must be abandoned in favour of principled debate, peaceful protest, accountability and reform. |
| Breaking news! Another victory for Rosli Dahlan: Court of Appeal stays AG's bid to expunge Posted: 24 Jan 2013 04:45 PM PST 
Din Merican The tenacity of lawyer Rosli Dahlan in pursuing his persecutors whom he called the "rogues in government" has to be admired. On 3rd January, all the mainstream media gleefully reported that the Attorney-General's Chambers (AGC) had succeeded to expunge six parts of Rosli's Witness Statement. The mainstream media would give wide coverage whenever the AGC scores a victory against Rosli but would be almost silent when they get walloped by Rosli. Only last week, we saw The Star newspaper defeated and humbled by Rosli. Yet, The Star made no mention of it until they had to publish the Public Apology that the court ordered against them. That is the state of disinformation, misinformation and lies in our country perpetrated by the mainstream media. They are no longer newspapers reporting news but are just instruments of propaganda. On 28 November 2012, the AGC had asked the Court to prevent Rosli from testifying in open court and also toexpunge certain parts of his witness statement relating to theCopgate Affair and other matters. On 3rd January,MalaysiaKini reported that Justice Hue Siew Kheng had ruled in favour of the AGC that the allegations made in Rosli's statement were "riddled with hearsay" and were not relevant. The parts that the AGC wanted expunged described how AGGani Patail, former IGP Musa Hassan and the MACC had conspired to fix up Rosli. It narrated IGP Musa Hassan's connection with the underworld Along loan shark syndicate; why AG Gani Patail was upset with Rosli for foiling his plans not to charge MAS's former Chairman Tan Sri Tajudin Ramli for defrauding the national airlines; also of the MACC's attempt to extort Rosli to drop his RM50miliion law suit against them. In 2011, RPK's Malaysia Today revealed that AG Gani Patailhad a "special relationship" with Tajudin's proxy, ShahidanShafie, a former police inspector who was charged for corruption in the 1990s. Tabung Haji's documents showed that AG Gani Patail and family had enjoyed the Zamrud Hajj package that costs more than RM 260,000/- bringing into question if the trip was paid by Shahidan since they all shared rooms like one big happy family. Expunging these parts of Rosli's witness statements would have meant that none of these would be revealed in court. It means that Rosli would have to go to trial without thesematerial evidence being allowed to be tendered in Court.That's why the AGC was intent on blotting out theseevidence. But despite that setback, Rosli persevered and soldiered on alone. However, the irony in the AGC's application was that they had reproduced the whole expunged questions and answers. Similarly, all the expunged parts have also been reproduced in the written judgment of Justice Hue. This is a comedy of errors! While on one part, they wanted to hide these stories from the public, on the other hand, they have reproduced all these in a public document! Where is the logic? READ MORE HERE |
| Overseas voting process has several defects, says DAP Posted: 24 Jan 2013 04:21 PM PST 
Syed Jaymal Zahiid, The Malaysian Insider DAP leaders today said there are defects in the overseas voting process and this could see Malaysians abroad denied the right to fair elections and possible vote manipulation. Four key issues were listed, among them being the Election Commission's (EC) delay in allowing those living overseas to vote, a problem that left many Malaysians abroad with little time to register as voters. "It took them so long to implement it and many Malaysians who are trying to vote now can't do so because they are not registered," DAP Socialist Youth chief Anthony Loke (picture) told reporters here, saying that the EC had also done nothing to encourage those abroad to register while the overseas voting process was being deliberated. Loke noted that a parliamentary select committee on polls reform in its preliminary findings had asked the EC to allow overseas voting more than a year ago. The polls regulator, however, only announced the decision to carry it out early this month. With Election 2013 expected to be held in March, those who register now cannot exercise their right to vote in this election. Then there is the new rule that requires overseas voters to be in Malaysia for a minimum of 30 days anywhere between April 2008 to the time Parliament is dissolved. The problem was raised last July by the My Overseas Vote (MOV) movement which said Malaysians abroad would not be able to vote if the EC does not amend the rules on voter registration and postal voting. "As long as EC does not amend the regulations, it is impossible for 95 per cent of Malaysians abroad to register as voters," MOV co-ordinator Andrew Yong had told The Malaysian Insider, saying that "there are now one million Malaysians working overseas with the majority being private sector employees." "What this does is it filters out a lot of applicants. It's just not possible. Those abroad often only come back for a few weeks at the most. Why are they adding new restrictions; that could be a hassle," Loke charged. READ MORE HERE |
| Friday sermon: ‘Enemies’ of Islam staking claim over ‘Allah’ to confuse Muslims Posted: 24 Jan 2013 04:01 PM PST 
JAKIM cited "scientific" research to back its assertion that Christians have no legitimate claim to the word "Allah". Clara Chooi, The Malaysian Insider Federal religious authorities warned Muslims nationwide today of attempts by "enemies of Islam" to confuse them into believing that all religions are the same, prolonging the debate over the usage of "Allah" by Christians even as it drives a deeper wedge between the country's two most dominant religions. In today's Friday sermon prepared by the Malaysian Islamic Development Department (JAKIM) here, Muslims were told that being too open-minded and allowing Islamic rights to be abused by other religions was a "dangerous" act. "It is very clear that, today, enemies of Islam are seeking to divert and undermine the Muslim community's faith. "They are united among themselves and are attempting, with their many tricks and ways, to stake their claim on the usage of 'Allah' in their scriptures," the sermon said. JAKIM insisted that "Allah", a word that millions of Arab Christians and those in non-Arabic-speaking lands use to describe their God, belongs to Muslims and is an exclusive right to those who profess Islam as it is clearly to prevent Muslims from becoming confused over the true identity of their God. Citing unnamed academic research, JAKIM said that the word "Allah" was never found in the Bible as God ― to Christians ― exists as the Trinity of "God the Father, God the Son and God the Holy Spirit." The general term for the Holy Trinity, said the religious department, is "The Lord" which is the English translation of biblical text. As such, JAKIM insisted that the National Fatwa Council's 2008 decision on the matter was accurate in stating that "Allah" cannot be used by those of other religions and cannot be likened to the gods of others. "We would like to say that as Muslims who believes in Allah and his messenger, then it becomes our responsibility to preserve the sanctity and defend the word 'Allah' in the best way possible, and should there be elements of insult and abuse, it should be stopped in accordance with provisions in the Federal Constitution. "Muslims must be firm in protecting the sanctity and the identity of their religion," JAKIM said in the sermon. The authority also warned that painful punishment would await disbelievers in the afterlife, noting that these "symptoms" of Islam's collapse would only destroy the glory and prestige of Muslims here. The "Allah" dispute, which first erupted after the watershed Election 2008, remains a hot-button topic in the run-up to this year's polls. Debate resurfaced last month after DAP secretary-general Lim Guan Eng, who is also the Penang chief minister, called on Putrajaya in his Christmas message to lift a ban on Malay-language bibles in Borneo Malaysia. READ MORE HERE |
| Perkasa is outsourced by Umno, says Anwar Posted: 24 Jan 2013 03:56 PM PST 
Zurairi AR, The Malaysian Insider Perkasa can get away with racial slurs and religious insults because it is backed by Umno, Opposition Leader Datuk Seri Anwar Ibrahim alleged today. Malay rights group Perkasa and its president Datuk Ibrahim Ali have been playing up racial and religious issues as Election 2013 looms, without any rebuke from the government or the ruling coalition Barisan Nasional (BN). "(Perkasa) is an organisation outsourced by Umno to fend racist and religious bigotry at the behest of Umno," Anwar (picture) claimed here. During Perkasa's convention in Penang last weekend, Ibrahim had urged Muslims to unite and burn all Malay-language bibles that contain the word "Allah" and other religious words in Arabic script. "We have not yet found a tough response by the Umno leadership nor the prime minister, nor the home minister," said Anwar. "This is, to me, disturbing ... you may have differences between PKR and Umno, Pakatan Rakyat and BN, but you have to draw the line." Anwar said that parties on both sides of the political divide can continue their political battles, but should never resort to defending racial and religious bigotry. On Wednesday, Anwar had called for Muslims nationwide to condemn Perkasa's threat to burn all Malay-language bibles. The opposition leader, a Muslim, said those who profess Islam and claim to protect "Allah" and the Quran should also defend their faith and morals by preventing the spread of racial insults, which were discouraged by the religion. Yesterday, Perkasa insisted that its president's words were actually a "wake-up call" to prevent possible violence against distributors of bibles containing the word "Allah" and other religious words in Arabic script. The group's secretary-general, Syed Hassan Syed Ali, said Perkasa was merely protecting Islam and its position, as enshrined in the Federal Constitution, and this included rejecting those who insult the religion and who try to spread their own faiths to Muslims. Ibrahim's remarks had immediately sparked furore among Christians and politicians across the political divide and invited calls on the government to cite him for sedition. The "Allah" dispute, which first erupted after the watershed Election 2008, remains a hot-button topic in the run-up to this year's polls. Debate resurfaced last month after DAP secretary-general Lim Guan Eng, who is also the Penang chief minister, called on Putrajaya in his Christmas message to lift a ban on Malay-language bibles in Borneo Malaysia. Hot on the heels of the DAP leader's remarks, several state Rulers and Islamic religious authorities reminded non-Muslims of state laws banning use of the word despite conflicting with a 2009 High Court judgment that ruled "Allah" was not exclusive to Islam. |
| Waytha under fire for silence over temples Posted: 24 Jan 2013 03:47 PM PST 
A MIC Youth leader has also questioned Hindraf's plans to 'take down another Indian' via contesting in MIC allocated seats. B Nantha Kumar, FMT Hindraf pioneer P Waythamoorthy has come under fire for his deafening silence over the Selangor government's handling of two temple issues in the state recently. Accusing Waythamoorthy of "pretending to be in the dark" over the issue, Selangor MIC Youth chief M Shanker Raj Ayanger said the Hindraf man's silence showed that he was an opportunist. "While the Malaysian Indian community is upset that the Selangor government through the Sepang Municipal Council barged into a house and broke a shrine there recently, Waythamoorthy has kept mum on the matter. "Would he have done the same if the Selangor government was run by the Barisan Nasional? "It is surprising to note that Hindraf, which claimed to safeguard Indian rights, has remained silent on the two temple issues involving the Pakatan Rakyat government" he said. He was referring to the recent case where the enforcement officers from the Sepang Municipal Council demolished a private shrine built within the compound of a house. As soon as the issue subsided, the Kajang Municipal Council issued summons and fines to the Sri Mahamariamman Temple in Kajang, for excessive noise during prayer sessions. The council has since rescinded the summons and compounds. "It looks like Waythamoorthy has deliberately overlooked these two incidents. "There were also reports that seven temples have been demolished in Selangor after Pakatan's rule began in 2008 but Hindraf has disregarded the issue. "It seems quite clear Hindraf only makes noise if it is the BN. "But if Pakatan does anything, it is silent. When you fight for the community, you must be fair and just. You must fight even if the opponent is your friend. "You are fighting for the people. But now it looks like Hindraf is only there to criticise the BN and nothing else," he told FMT. READ MORE HERE |
| Preacher argues the ‘Allah’ case Posted: 24 Jan 2013 03:34 PM PST 
An Islamic preacher argues why he disagrees with Christians using the word Allah and reprimands Muslims for not understanding their own faith. G Vinod, FMT Amid threats of burning Malay-language Bibles due to the use of the word Allah, one Islamic preacher reasons why he disagrees with Christians using the Arabic holy word to refer to God. Saba Islamic Media preacher Shah Kirit Kakulal Govindji, in a YouTube video, said the generic word for God in Arabic is not Allah, but Ilah or Rab. The 22-minute video, taken during a ceramah session at the Al-Azim mosque, shows Shah Kirit saying that he disagrees with Christians using the word Allah to refer to God as the holy word is a unique name conferred in the Quran. "When you say in English, 'man is a thief' and translate it into Malay it becomes 'lelaki itu seorang pencuri'. "But can you translate that same sentence into 'Shah Kirit itu seorang pencuri'. Does it reflect the same meaning as the English sentence earlier?" he asked. Shah Kirit then quoted the Gospel of John, chapter 14, verse 28, where Jesus has said that," For my Father is greater than I." "So can I change the word Father to Allah and say, for Allah is greater than Jesus? Would the Christians agree to it?" he said. Shah Kirit also disagreed with arguments that it was all right for Christians in Malaysia to use the word Allah as even Indonesians do it. "We are talking about Bahasa Malaysia here, not Indonesian. If that's the case, the Indonesians call their primary schools as Pancasila. Shall we change the names of our schools then?" he asked. While he agreed that Christians in Arab countries use the word Allah to refer to God, Shah Kirit said that it was due to the cultural factor. "Besides, they are referring to Bibles in the Arabic language. We re talking about Malay Bibles, not Arabic," he said. READ MORE HERE |
| Welcome to the Philippines 81st province Posted: 24 Jan 2013 11:51 AM PST 
Mahathir used the ISA and Operasi Lalang to silence his critics. He created heavy industries and installed his own cronies in these ventures. He treated the Treasury like his own private kitty, bailed out favoured people, and thought nothing of losses being borne by the taxpayers. He brainwashed Malaysians, especially the Malays, into accepting a two-tiered society. Mariam Mokhtar, Free Malaysia Today It is believed there about 1.75 million Filipinos in Sabah, who were allowed to settle in the state during Dr Mahathir Mohamad's premiership. People should be able to place their trust in the prime minister to head the elected government; some prime ministers achieve greatness, others are best forgotten. Many are mediocre, others gain international acclaim. The future of one Malaysian prime minister might well lie in a cell. His crime? When he was in power, he did not act in the interests of the country, but was consumed by a passion to further his own political interests. He was prepared to sell his country to foreign nationals. Last week, former prime minister Dr Mahathir Mohamad admitted in a press conference that he had authorised the provision of ICs to Filipinos. The Royal Commission of Inquiry (RCI) on Sabah revealed that between 1970 and 1984, around 73,000 Filipino refugees had been allowed to settle permanently in Sabah. Pundits claim that today, there may be around 1.75 million Filipinos. In 2011, the opposition alleged that around three million Indonesians had been absorbed into Malaysia and given citizenship, with Bumiputera privileges and most important of all, granted full voting rights. The Wikipedia entry for the Philippines states that there are 80 provinces which are grouped into 17 regions depending on their geographical, cultural and ethnological features. With these allegations, Peninsular Malaysia might as well be known as the 34th province of Indonesia, and Sabah should be recognised as the 81st province of the Philippines. Mahathir tried to deflect criticism from his "Project IC" by making unfair comparisons with the granting of citizenship to Malayans by Tunku Abdul Rahman. When he was stung by the criticisms of sullying the name of the Father of Independence, Mahathir tried to backpedal, but the damage was already done. Malaysians don't really care about Mahathir's racial origins, his ethnicity or his religious conviction. They do mind his deception and the manner in which he helped propel the Ketuanan Melayu myth to the detriment of all races and religions in Malaysia. He championed the Malays above everyone else, but left out other Malaysian-born citizens, and tagged them with the "pendatang" label. His adherence to his Malay bloodline, whilst ignoring his equally noble Indian ancestry, is what has probably made many people despise the Indian Muslims, through no fault of their own. Many disparaging remarks which appear to be directed at all mamaks, are in reality directed solely at Mahathir. Private kitty Mahathir used the ISA and Operasi Lalang to silence his critics. He created heavy industries and installed his own cronies in these ventures. He treated the Treasury like his own private kitty, bailed out favoured people, and thought nothing of losses being borne by the taxpayers. He brainwashed Malaysians, especially the Malays, into accepting a two-tiered society. Mahathir asked us to "Look East" because of his personal spat with the West, but unbeknown to us, he did a private deal with Margaret Thatcher in the Pergau Dam scandal. It is laughable that anyone should think the British will come and rescue Malaysia, like the cavalry charge in the cowboy movies. British Prime Minister David Cameron and his government are more interested in flogging their old weaponry to Malaysia, saving their firms in an economically stagnant Europe and rejuvenate their flagging property market with Malaysian EPF money. During Tony Blair's time, the Serious Fraud Office (SFO) was told to halt its investigations into the BAE arms sale to Saudi Arabia. Allegations of kickbacks to a Saudi prince proved embarrassing and Blair claimed that he was acting in the "national interest". Will Cameron be any different? Recently, some professionals revealed that in their student days, they were not awarded scholarships or loans for further studies because they did not show allegiance to Umno, or that their parents were not pious Umno Muslims. These are revelations from Malays who did not have the right connections but were able to scrape up just enough money to pay for their own education. Anyone who thinks Umno helps all Malays is deluded. Umno only assists Umno Malays. Read more at: http://www.freemalaysiatoday.com/category/opinion/2013/01/25/welcome-to-the-philippines-81st-province/ |
| Don’t muddy the water issue Posted: 24 Jan 2013 11:41 AM PST 
Syabas would have us believe that this has everything to do with the supposed water shortage in Selangor and the need for the Langat 2 plant and Pahang-Selangor water transfer project. This doesn't make sense, since the Langat 2 plant was slated for completion in 2014. The Wangsa Maju plant failure has nothing to do with Langat 2. Tricia Yeoh, The Sun THE water saga between the Selangor government and water operator Syabas took another turn in the latest episode of the Wangsa Maju pump station fiasco that affected more than 27,000 households in the Klang Valley. It is easy to confuse the many issues, thereby muddying them together. But first, some facts. The Wangsa Maju pump house – which is made up of four pumps and one for standby purposes – broke down on Dec 29 last year and Jan 1, and since then both parties have accused each other of being at fault. The pump house has a design capacity of 180mld (million litres per day). Syabas claims that the failure was due to "operating above its design capacity for a long period of time in recent years" (Syabas, Jan 15). Selangor state checks, however, revealed that throughout 2012, the pumps operated beyond their capacity of 200mld for only 18 days out of the whole year. The central issue here is whether or not the pumps have actually been well-maintained to operate consistently without breaking down. The responsibility to maintain these pumps falls under Syabas and not the Selangor government. According to standard operating procedure, "preventive periodic maintenance" is a basic requirement that should have been conducted by specific capable contractors. This was apparently conducted up to 2008, after which it was only done whenever a pump was damaged. Prevention is surely better than cure, something any water operator should have known at the outset. No regular checks by the appropriate technical experts were carried out, and this was the primary reason for the breakdown. Even if Syabas employees carried out routine inspections, why did they not realise the pumps were already faulty, and thereafter immediately alert their superiors? In fact, it was revealed that one of the five pumps was already reported as faulty since last year and this was not addressed. This brings us to the next issue of good governance. The water industry is regulated by SPAN (National Water Services Commission). Syabas has unfortunately demonstrated its inability to manage its equipment efficiently, when it should have investigated the root problem even before it became a problem by following SOPs and best practices. SPAN and the Ministry of Energy, Green Technology and Water should use this opportunity to correct any inefficiencies in the water delivery system. Failure to reprimand only means it is silently supporting incompetency. It is not clear whether SPAN had instructed Syabas (or rather, Puncak Niaga Sdn Bhd, the actual pump operator) to make urgent corrective measures. Added to this is a revelation in the Auditor-General's Audit Report for the operating period of 2009-2011, which showed among other things that the funds Syabas received for capital expenditure (capex) from the Selangor government were used for operating expenditure (opex). If such funds were necessary for the upgrading of water pumps, then they should not have been misallocated. Syabas would have us believe that this has everything to do with the supposed water shortage in Selangor and the need for the Langat 2 plant and Pahang-Selangor water transfer project. This doesn't make sense, since the Langat 2 plant was slated for completion in 2014. The Wangsa Maju plant failure has nothing to do with Langat 2. In earlier columns, I stated that this RM9 billion mega-project should be reconsidered in preference of other solutions like upgrading plants, rainwater harvesting, water recycling and treatment of Selangor's raw water resources. Some have also raised the question of why the Selangor government lays the blame squarely on Syabas when it holds 30% of its shares. Although this means attending board meetings and access to documents, Selangor is still the minority shareholder, and has no role in dealing with day-to-day operations. In fact, the federal government through its Finance Ministry Incorporated holds the golden share of Syabas, which allows them to flex some muscles. Nowhere in the concession agreement (which, by the way, is also signed by the federal government) does it say that maintenance of pump stations falls under the jurisdiction of the state government. Under Section 191(5) of the Water Services Industry Act 2006, the minister has the right to determine what amounts to national interest issues, and this determination would be "final and binding". This means the minister – and through its regulator SPAN – would be empowered to make the best decision to resolve the water problems of Selangor. Tricia Yeoh writes on national policy issues. |
| Family of turmeric murder case C.Sugumar reject post-mortem findings Posted: 24 Jan 2013 11:36 AM PST N. Surendran, Latheefa Koya We refer to the claim by Kajang police chief that police did not beat C.Sugumar to death and that he died of a heart attack. This statement is a blatant attempt by police to cover-up the case, with the connivance of the Serdang Hospital. Three eyewitnesses have come forward who have testified that Sugumar was chased down by police, handcuffed, beaten and smeared with turmeric. How can the police claim that there was no foul-play, when they have not even recorded the statements of these three witnesses? The claim by Serdang Hospital that Sugumar died of a heart attack is inherently incredible. Sugumar had no health problems and was only 40 years old. It is unbelievable that a healthy man should suddenly collapse and die immediately upon arrest. When we viewed the body in the mortuary, the deceased was still handcuffed and there was turmeric powder on his face. There were also lacerations consistent with a struggle against the police assailants as described by the witnesses. The police attempt to exonerate themselves by issuing false statements is thus a serious perversion of the course of justice.
It is claimed that the Serdang Hospital forensics department found that Sugumar died of a heart attack. It should be noted that the Serdang Hospital has a history of falsifying post-mortem findings in favour of the police authorities. In the A.Kugan case, Serdang Hospital falsely claimed that Kugan died of water in the lungs when in fact he had been beaten to death in police custody. The Serdang pathologist Prof Dr Abdul Karim Tajuddin was subsequently found guilty by the Malaysian Medical Council(MMC) of professional misconduct for falsifying Kugan's post-mortem findings.
Yesterday, Serdang Hospital once again breached medical ethics by refusing to let Sugumar's family see the body, on instructions from the police. The family were only allowed to see the body upon the insistence of lawyers and activists, after 4 hours of waiting. Serdang Hospital and the Health Ministry have brought shame upon the medical profession. The family of Sugumar will lodge complaints against Serdang Hospital and its pathologists with the MMC in due course.
We demand, on behalf of Sugumar's next-of-kin, that Sugumar's death be classified as murder under s.302 Penal Code. We further demand that all police officers implicated be immediately suspended and arrested to facilitate investigations. We also call upon the IGP to allow and facilitate the carrying out of a second post-mortem upon Sugumar's remains. Until the second post-mortem is carried out satisfactorily, the family will not claim the body. |
| Free education ‘possible’, say economists Posted: 24 Jan 2013 11:30 AM PST 
(The Sun Daily) - "If the government wants to do it, they just need to stop wasting money on things like BR1M, free tyres, RM100 for school children, petrol subsidy, and divert the money to tertiary education" Free tertiary education is possible if we cut down on "unproductive" spending, Malaysian economists have suggested. Their comments were solicited by theSun in the wake of national debate on the issue that has been stirred by an exchange between undergraduate K.S. Bawani, and Suara Wanita 1Malaysia (SW1M) president Sharifah Zohra Jabeen, at a forum in Universiti Utara Malaysia. The video of the exchange has gone viral on the internet. Chief Executive of Institute for Democracy and Economic Affairs (IDEAS), Wan Saiful Wan Jan said the current government is capable of reducing the cost of tertiary education. "If the government wants to do it, they just need to stop wasting money on things like BR1M, free tyres, RM100 for school children, petrol subsidy, and divert the money to tertiary education," he said. He noted that the recent "free tyres and cash rewards" seemed to take precedence above cushioning the cost of tertiary education. It is only a matter of re-juggling priorities and putting tertiary education as priority above other "unproductive" spending, he said. "The cost will be removal of the wasteful spending and we will not receive the cash handouts and subsidies anymore," he added. The national education budget has been slashed from RM50 billion in 2012 to RM37 billion in 2013, which is a drop from 20% of the total national budget to 15%. Economist, Khoo Kay Peng, speculated that this is largely associated with government cash handout programmes such as BR1M and BR1M 2.0, and the RM200 rebate for smartphones. "The cut is unnecessary. Funds spent on one-time cash handouts and rebates do not create a lasting impact on the economy," he said. Ideally, Khoo sees that education funding should occupy 20% to 22% of the GDP. Another suggestion by economists to fund free tertiary education is to cut the defence budget. The director of Centre for Policy Initiatives, Dr Lim Teck Ghee, said the expenditure used in defence can be cut back to cushion the cost of tertiary education. "If we cut back expenditure in sectors such as the defence sector where the rationale for large budgets is not sustainable and reduce the cost of doing business due to rent seeking, patronage and opaque government procurement, it can generate tens of billions annually," he said. While it woud be great to have blanket tertiary education, economists argue that it is not a civic obligation to provide free tertiary education for all, neither is it economically-wise in the long run. Wan Saiful pointed out that we already have a deficit budget and blanket free tertiary education will increase the deficit. "I must add at this point that making tertiary, or any other level of education free, is not a good move in the long term. It may not have a disastrous adverse impact now, but in the longer term the country will not be able to afford it. "The deficit spending incurred by the Najib administration will be a burden on society long after Datuk Sri Najib (Abdul Razak) and his ministers have left us," he argued. On civic-responsibility, he said education is ultimately the responsibility of parents and individuals. "It is immoral to pass that responsibility to others through the machinery of government and taxation. If we want society to help each other, than we must encourage voluntary help, not coerce people through taxation. "Our society today has become overly reliant on government so that voluntary help is diminishing," he said. Dr Lim does not favour blanket tertiary education as he said not everyone cannot afford university fees. "Students from rich families can afford to pay a portion of the tuition fees and they should be made to do so," he said. Along with easing tertiary education fees, Lim also suggested reform of the higher education sector. He noted that 10% of government expenditure is presently allocated to higher education. "We have to ask if we are getting value for our tax money being spent on higher education," he said. He highlighted large numbers of unemployable graduates, the low academic standards, and the poor quality of research especially in public colleges. Instead of free tertiary education for all, funds can be used to enhance the quality of public tertiary education system. "Free tertiary education should be for those whose parents earn a low income," said Khoo Kay Peng, who is also a political commentator. He highlighted that the government allocates RM200 million annually to retrain unemployed graduates. "It speaks volumes of a need to revamp the tertiary education system if an undergraduate has to be retrained after just spending four years on his education," he said. |
| Incorrigible UMNO leaders continue to shamelessly equate “public interest” to “UMNO ... Posted: 24 Jan 2013 11:18 AM PST 
He even defended that the project is beneficial to the public because "Umno members could get a 12 percent discount at the apartments" while ordinary bumiputras can get 7% discount. Tony Pua Despite the Prime Minister's continued assertion that UMNO has "transformed" and "learnt from the mistakes of the past", its leaders continue to be completely shameless when defending the obvious wrong doings of their past. In the latest expose by Ng Suee Lim and Shuhaimi Shafiei on the land grab by Kota Raja UMNO, the latter paid only RM1,000 in premium for 4 acres of land worth at least RM2.8 million in Section 25, Shah Alam. While the land was originally slated for building a sports and recreation complex with a community centre, the site visit had found only nearly completed apartments and shoplots. However, when queried by Malaysiakini, former Kota Raja Umno chief Amzah Umar has denied any wrongdoing over the latest allegations, saying that "the medium-cost apartments are meant for public interest." Amzah was also the former state assemblyman of Sri Muda. He even defended that the project is beneficial to the public because "Umno members could get a 12 percent discount at the apartments" while ordinary bumiputras can get 7% discount. It appears that the Animal Farm cannot be more true for UMNO – "All animals are equal, but some animals are more equal than others". In fact, Amzah had the cheek to deny that there isn't "anything unusual" in that the Umno division and MBSA only paid RM1,000 in land premiums. It is obvious that UMNO is unable to differentiate between the interest of UMNO, the party, its leaders and members, from that of the interest of the public. They have shown no remorse over the fact that such actions is no different from stealing the wealth of the people to profit UMNO and Barisan Nasional. Based on the response of Amzah and other leaders over the earlier land-grab exposes in Selangor, it cannot be more clear that if Barisan Nasional is re-elected into Government, they will continue to pillage and plunder the wealth and assets of the state at the expense of the man-on-the-street. The contrast with the Pakatan Rakyat administration cannot be more stark. After 5 years of administration, no Pakatan Rakyat component parties or its elected representatives have received a single piece of land from the state government. We call upon Selangor Barisan Nasional and UMNO leaders, to announce that if these "projects" were indeed in public interest, then all profits arising from these projects should be returned to the State Government so that the monies could then be spent on the welfare of Selangorians as well as upgrading the infrastructure of the state. Despite UMNO having robbed 5.4 million Selangorians, the Prime Minister has chosen to remain elegantly silent on the above issue. Datuk Seri Najib Razak who is also the Selangor UMNO Chief must get his house in order by explaining the land grab scandal and accepting responsility for UMNO's sins. Otherwise, his call for "transformation" is nothing by empty rhetoric to hoodwink Malaysians. |
| Awie Bakal Buka Tiga Lagi Kelab Malam Posted: 24 Jan 2013 11:14 AM PST 
mStar - "Saya bergiat dalam bidang hiburan dan tidak tahu cabang perniagaan lain melainkan cabang ini sahaja (membuka kelab malam). Takkan saya hendak jual nasi lemak yang saya tidak tahu caranya? Jadi apa salahnya saya jalankan perniagaan berasaskan hiburan? Jangan persoalkan mengenai hukum hakam hanya kerana saya seorang artis?" Ketika tindakan penyanyi dan pelakon Awie membuka kelab malam di Ipoh, Perak dipertikaikan segelintir pihak, vokalis kumpulan Wings itu sebenarnya sudah merancang untuk memperluaskan lagi perniagaannya dengan membuka tiga lagi cawangan baharu. Awie atau nama sebenarnya Ahmad Azhar Othman, 45, berkata, dia tidak akan mengendahkan kritikan orang sebaliknya mahu mengembangkan kelab malam berkenaan yang dikenali sebagai Malai Rock Station Bistro masing-masing di Kuala Lumpur, Johor dan Kuantan, Pahang tidak lama lagi. "Jangan melihat perniagaan kelab itu daripada pandangan yang cetek. Ia adalah sebuah perniagaan dan saya telah melabur ratusan ribu untuknya. "Malah saya juga merancang untuk kembangkan lagi perniagaan itu pada tahun ini selepas mendapat respons baik daripada pengunjung di Ipoh," katanya ketika dihubungi mStar Online di sini, Rabu. Awie berkata demikian sebagai mengulas laporan beberapa portal susulan perasaan tidak puas hatinya dengan pihak media yang bertanyakan perkara tersebut semasa malam gala filem Hantu Kak Limah 2: Husin, Mon & Jin Pakai Toncit dekat sini malam Selasa lalu. Awie menegaskan, masyarakat seharusnya berfikiran terbuka dan tidak mudah menjatuhkan hukum hanya kerana dia berstatus selebriti. "Saya bergiat dalam bidang hiburan dan tidak tahu cabang perniagaan lain melainkan cabang ini sahaja (membuka kelab malam). Takkan saya hendak jual nasi lemak yang saya tidak tahu caranya? "Jadi apa salahnya saya jalankan perniagaan berasaskan hiburan? Jangan persoalkan mengenai hukum hakam hanya kerana saya seorang artis?" jelasnya dalam nada kesal. Tambahnya, perniagaan pusat hiburan bukanlah sesuatu yang baharu dan sudah ramai ahli perniagaan Melayu lain turut menjalankan perniagaan berasaskan hiburan seperti itu. "Teruk sangat ke buka kelab malam? Apabila saya yang buka, semua mempertikaikan saya? Sedangkan benda ini bukannya baharu. "Di luar sana, lebih ramai orang Melayu yang berniaga kelab, hotel dan pusat hiburan lain tetapi kenapa tidak dipertikaikan? "Saya hanya berniaga bagi meneruskan kelangsungan hidup dan mencari rezeki untuk diri dan keluarga, apakah itu salah?" soalnya yang berharap isu ini tidak diperbesarkan lagi. Sementara itu, mengenai watak Husin dalam filem sekuel kepada Hantu Kak Limah Balik Rumah yang dilakonkannya itu Awie berkata, komitmen pada kali ini adalah lebih mencabar kerana dia perlu menterjemahkan Husin yang berada dalam kedukaan selepas diisytiharkan muflis. "Penceritaan filem kali ini lebih bersahaja tetapi berat. Watak Husin tidak jauh berbeza berbanding filem pertama Hantu Kak Limah Balik Rumah sebelum ini. "Cuma pada kali ini dia kurang ceria kerana berada dalam keadaan murung dan bersedih selepas diisytiharkan muflis," katanya yang baharu menamatkan penggambaran filem Zombie Kilang Biskut. |
| Feel like kicking yourself Posted: 23 Jan 2013 05:48 PM PST 
Ultimately, you are to blame. And pinning the blame on Dr Mahathir is your way of shifting the blame so that you need not kick yourself. And, soon, the next general election will be upon us. In two months time we shall know who is going to run the country for the next five years or so. And, yet again, Barisan Nasional is going to win the election. And, yet again, you are going to look for someone to blame. And this is just going to prove one thing that I have been saying for a long time -- and that is Malaysians are a bunch of losers.THE CORRIDORS OF POWER Raja Petra Kamarudin There is an English saying: you feel like kicking yourself. This describes the situation where you have been an utter fool and now feel real stupid about it. Hence you feel like kicking yourself. I have noticed that many readers seem to feel exactly like this -- they feel like kicking themselves. Judging by the comments posted in Malaysia Today, many which are deleted merely because they keep repeating the same thing over and over again, quite a number of you fall into this category. I used to be a Tun Hussein Onn critic in the days he was Malaysia's Prime Minister back in the late 1970s. That was more or less the time I started to become politically conscious and when I began to realise that all was not kosher and honky-dory in Malaysia. Then, when Tun Dr Mahathir Mohamad took over as Prime Minister, I did not care about Hussein Onn any more. He had already retired and was 'yesterday's news'. I began to channel my criticism towards Dr Mahathir -- even during the time when Anwar Ibrahim was yet to have his falling out with his master in 1998. Hence my criticism of Dr Mahathir did not commence only in 1998 when he threw Anwar into jail. It started even earlier than that, long before he and Anwar went into conflict. When Dr Mahathir handed over the reins to Tun Abdullah Ahmad Badawi in November 2003, I became a Pak Lah critic. Dr Mahathir was no longer my pet hate. He was no longer the Prime Minister. Pak Lah was. So my new target became Pak Lah. Then Pak Lah retired and handed the country to Najib Tun Razak. From that day on I no longer talked about Pak Lah. I started to target Najib. He was now the Prime Minister so he should now become the focus of my attacks. I find, however, that no one talks about Hussein Onn, the Prime Minister before Dr Mahathir, or about Pak Lah, the Prime Minister after Dr Mahathir. But you do talk about Dr Mahathir. And you talk more about Dr Mahathir's Indian ancestry than about what he did when he was Prime Minister. Even if you do talk about what Dr Mahathir did when he was Prime Minister, most times you will make that comment in the context of his Indian ancestry. It is as if Dr Mahathir is what he is or is a bad person because he has Indian blood in him. It is as if that explains why Dr Mahathir is what he is -- because he is Indian. If I were asked to psychoanalyse you, I would most likely do so as follows. Back in the late 1980s, we had already told you what we knew about Dr Mahathir, Umno and Barisan Nasional. What we told you 25 years ago is basically the same thing as what we are telling you today. However, you refused to listen. In the 1990 general election, more than 53% of you voted for Barisan Nasional, giving the opposition only 53 of the 180 seats in Parliament (or 29%). We just could not get you to kick out Barisan Nasional and give the government to the opposition. No doubt when we point this out you will reply with all sorts of excuses to justify why you did not vote opposition and instead gave the country to Barisan Nasional. The normal excuses are: there was no Internet yet at that time (so we were not well informed), the opposition was not credible enough (so we had no confidence in the opposition), the opposition had not been tested yet (so we had more confidence in Barisan Nasional), the mainstream media lied to us (so we were misinformed) and so on. Then, in the next general election in 1995, the opposition's share of Parliament seats dropped to just 30 out of 192 (which is only 15%). More than 84% of you voted Barisan Nasional. Tengku Razaleigh Hamzah soon realised that his attempt to kick out Barisan Nasional is futile. Malaysians just did not want the opposition to take over the country. They would rather that Umno and Barisan Nasional continue to rule Malaysia. Ku Li was better off just closing down his Semangat 46 and go back to Umno -- which he did soon after that in 1996. Nevertheless, many of us did not give up yet. We continued to support and vote for the opposition. In 1999, we went all out to campaign for the opposition. In fact, that same year I even went to work for Parti Keadilan Nasional. This was no longer just about supporting the opposition. We were literally working for the opposition. Unfortunately, in the 1999 general election, the opposition did even worse than in the 1990 general election. Almost 57% of you voted for Barisan Nasional (compared to 53% in 1990) and the opposition won only 23% of the seats in Parliament (compared to about 29% in 1990). The 1999 general election was supposed to have been the landmark election for Malaysia. We were supposed to have made history. But we could not even better the 1990 general election. What a letdown. And, yet again, the long list of excuses as to why you were 'forced' to vote Barisan Nasional rather than the opposition Barisan Alternatif. And the most classic excuse of all came from the non-Malays: we support you in our hearts but we have to vote Barisan Nasional for the sake of the economy. What a load of bullshit! In other words money talks, bullshit walks. And Barisan Nasional is about money while the opposition is bullshit. But we still did not give up. In November 2003, Pak Lah took over and four months later the general election was called. Dr Mahathir is a dictator. Dr Mahathir is vicious. Dr Mahathir is vindictive. Dr Mahathir is toxic. So we do not dare vote opposition when Dr Mahathir was Prime Minister. But now Pak Lah was Prime Minister. So surely all those excuses no longer applied. But no, in the 2004 general election, almost 64% of you voted for Barisan Nasional, giving them almost 91% of the seats in Parliament. This was the best ever performance for the ruling party since Merdeka. So this could not have been about Dr Mahathir this, that and the other after all, as what you told us in 1990, 1995 and 1999. I was a campaign manager in that 2004 general election. I was no longer just working for the party like in 1999. I was now 'on the ground' trying to help the opposition win. But we got whacked good and proper. We practically lost our pants. Many opposition candidates not only lost the election but lost their deposit as well. That was how bad it was. We were shocked. How could that have happened? And, yet again, a long list of excuses as to why you voted for the ruling party and not for the opposition -- the same long list of excuses that we heard in 1990, 1995 and 1999. That was when I decided we needed to change tactics. They say if you do the same thing over and over again and expect a different result that is a sign of lunacy. If we expect a different result then we need to do things differently. And that was when I decided to launch Malaysia Today and take our fight to the cyber-world. We can never win in 'conventional' warfare when we do not possess the firepower. So we need to embark upon an 'unconventional' war. And that would have to be in the Internet. I always use the Afghan Mujahideen fight against the Russians as my analogy. When they tried fighting the Russians in a conventional war they got whacked bad. Russia had tanks, helicopter gunships, rocket launchers and so on. And the Afghans suffered heavy losses. Then the Afghans changed tactics. They took the fight to where they were strongest, in the mountains. When the Russians tried to fight the Afghans in the mountains the tables turned. Eventually the Russians gave up and went home. Sun Tzu did say you must engage the enemy in your territory and not try to fight them in their territory. This was what the Afghans did. And this was what we also did in 2004 -- after we got whacked bad in the general election that year -- when we decided to engage Barisan Nasional in our territory, the Internet. Nevertheless, the opposition success in the 2008 general election was not any better than in the 1990 general election. Still 52% of you voted for Barisan Nasional, a mere 1% improvement over 1990. Yes, that's right, in spite of all that effort, in 2008 we improved only 1% over 1990, an era when there was no Internet yet. So, can the excuse that Barisan Nasional did well because there was no Internet yet at that time hold water? In 1990 there was no Internet. In 2008 the Internet had already fully matured. But in 2008 the vote improvement was only 1% over 1990. Most of you refuse to accept the fact that this is your fault. If you do then you would have to kick yourself. So you look for a scapegoat to pin the blame on. And that is why you are very nasty towards Dr Mahathir. You want to blame Dr Mahathir for your stupidity. You do not want to admit that it is you who are stupid. So you blame BTN. You blame Umno. You blame the mainstream media. You blame PAS. You blame the Islamic State. You blame Hudud. You blame the fact that Dr Mahathir has Indian blood in him. You blame the fact there was no Internet. You blame your parents who did not know any better. If you could, you would also like to blame Prophet Muhammad -- except that you are not quite sure how to do this. Ultimately, you are to blame. And pinning the blame on Dr Mahathir is your way of shifting the blame so that you need not kick yourself. And, soon, the next general election will be upon us. In two months time we shall know who is going to run the country for the next five years or so. And, yet again, Barisan Nasional is going to win the election. And, yet again, you are going to look for someone to blame. And this is just going to prove one thing that I have been saying for a long time -- and that is Malaysians are a bunch of losers. |
| Anwar: Not Lembah Pantai-bound, but certain on Permatang Pauh Posted: 23 Jan 2013 03:23 PM PST 
(The Malaysian Insider) - Denying plans to swap constituencies with daughter Nurul Izzah, PKR de facto leader Datuk Seri Anwar Ibrahim nevertheless conceded that he was not guaranteed to contest in his Permatang Pauh stronghold. The opposition leader was responding to rumours that he may instead run for the Lembah Pantai federal seat now occupied by Nurul Izzah, who is expected to face stiff challenge there from Umno's Federal Territories and Urban Well-being Minister Datuk Raja Nong Chik Zainal Abidin. "Why Lembah Pantai? I wasn't informed of this," he was quoted as saying in a Sinar Harian report, adding that Nurul Izzah will berate him if he decides to contest her seat. "God willing I will contest, but most probably there will be requests for me to consider contesting in one or two other seats," Anwar told Malay-language daily yesterday. Anwar held Permatang Pauh from 1982 until 1999, when he was convicted and jailed for corruption. The conviction was subsequently overturned. His wife, PKR president Datuk Seri Dr Wan Azizah Wan Ismail, contested and held the seat during his absence, before making way for Anwar in 2008. Election 2013 must be called by April 27, after which Parliament will automatically be dissolved and polls initiated. |
| Ibrahim Ali called up by cops Posted: 23 Jan 2013 03:08 PM PST 
(The Malay Mail) - Penang police have called up Perkasa president Datuk Ibrahim Ali over his Bible-burning remark and will call him again to record a statement in two days time. Ibrahim confirmed in a short text message to The Malay Mail that the police were following up on a police report lodged against him. Perkasa secretary-general Syed Hasan Syed Ali also DAP can 'go ahead' to obtain a court order to comple the attorney-general to act against Ibrahim over his statement calling for Muslims to 'seize and burn' copies of the Bible which contained the word 'Allah' or other Arabic words. He was responding to a report in The Malay Mail yesterday in which the DAP national chairman Karpal Singh gave the attorney-general two weeks to act against Ibrahim. However, Attorney-General Tan Sri Gani Patail had said police must investigate actual incidences of Bible0burning in order for any action to be taken. "It is their (DAP's) right to proceed with such actions. As a lawyer, he (Karpal) should be patient and should be aware of how such procedures are," said Syed Hasan. "If indeed Karpal is so concerned about such things, why doesn't he address other issues that may disrupt the nation's harmony such as with Patrick Teoh's remarks on Facebook, or the spreading of hatred by other religions towards Malays?" Syed Hasan was referring to Teoh's FB which ridiculed the Muslims, after which he posted an apology. |
| Batu Caves temple claims they’re being punished for protesting Posted: 23 Jan 2013 03:03 PM PST 
(The Star) - The Batu Caves temple committee claims it is being victimised by the Selangor government for staging a protest against the construction of a condominium near the limestone cave site last year. Sri Maha Mariamman Devasathanam committee chairman Datuk R. Nadarajah alleged the state government, through the Selayang Munici-pal Council (MPS), had made bizarre requests, including asking for a building plan of the iconic staircase that leads into the main cave. "After we protested against the condominium, MPS sent us a barrage of letters, and one of them was to dispute the safety of the staircase. "The staircase has been around since the 1930s. Millions of people have been going up and down it and there has never been a problem. "And now they want a building plan for the staircase?'' Nadarajah said here yesterday. He alleged the state government was also punishing him by scrapping his plans for an Indian cultural centre as well as made him face a lot of bureaucracy over the Batu Caves cable car project. Nadarajah claimed the development order for the cable car was approved on Dec 31 last year, but MPS was asking for the building plan again. "That will take us another year of waiting. People are already asking about the cable car,'' he said. The cable car project was announ-ced in 2011 and was expected to be completed in 2012. He reiterated that the problems began after he started speaking againt the condominium project. "I protested and they are now coming after me,'' alleged Nadarajah. Nadarajah had led a protest against the 29-storey condominium project, located just 120m next to the Lord Murugan statue, in October last year, saying the development was too close to the limestone hills. He added that he would be revealing more next week as well as showing the letters from MPS. |
| Xavier points finger at Public Complaints Bureau Posted: 23 Jan 2013 02:55 PM PST 
(The Star) - Selangor executive councillor Dr Xavier Jayakumar has alleged that the Public Complaints Bureau is responsible for the issuance of notice to the Sri Maha Mariamman temple in Pekan Bangi Lama, Selangor, to tone down the excessive noise. He said the bureau directed the Kajang Municipal Council (MPKj) to issue the summons to the temple in February last year and on Jan 8. "The bureau had directed the council to go ahead with the summons," he said. But bureau director-general Mahani Tan Abdullah denied that it had instructed MPKj to act against the temple. "My department has no authority to instruct a local council to issue summonses," she said. She said the bureau had received a complaint from a resident in Pekan Bangi Lama, who claimed that the problem of loud noise from the temple persisted despite lodging a complaint to MPKj. "We sent a letter to MPKj enquiring about the complaint made by the resident," she said. The temple was first issued a notice on Feb 17 last year and another notice was issued on Jan 8 which directed them to reduce the noise level and cease all religious activities after 6pm. MPKj has rescinded the notice. MIC Youth chief T. Mohan said Dr Xavier was attempting to shift the blame to others. "The bureau does not have the authority to dictate terms. It is very clear that the MPKj acted on their own," he said, adding that Dr Xavier should release the letter from the bureau so that everyone will know the truth. PKR Kapar MP S. Manikavasagam said Dr Xavier's statement was ridiculous as there is a directive that all issues related to places of worship had to be referred to the state government first. "The 22 councils in the state come under the purview of the state government and is he (Dr Xavier) implying that they are taking orders from the Federal Government," he said. |
| Burn the Bible, and you burn the church Posted: 23 Jan 2013 02:48 PM PST 
Pentecostal Churches of Malaysia representative Bishop Robert Judah Paul also expresses resentment against Perkasa chief's Bible burning plan. Priscillla Prasena, FMT Perkasa's plan to burn the Malay edition of the Bible, which carries the word "Allah" to refer to God, is equivalent to burning churches, the Pentecostal Churches of Malaysia representative Robert Judah Paul said today. "Burning the Bible is equivalent to burning churches and the churches have every right to bring it to their highest authority. Churches which are linked to international non-governmental organisations will seek the international voices to air their grievances… and this would reflect badly on the country," he told FMT in an interview. He said Pentecostal Christians will stand by the Catholics in protecting their religious rights if it comes to that. "Churches are united and we strongly feel it is a political move rather than a social threat," he said. Recently, Perkasa chief Ibrahim Ali announced that the organisation will seek out Malay Bibles which carries the word "Allah" and burn them. This caused a furore among Christians in the country. While the issue is more religious in nature, politicians have not missed the bandwagon, especially with the general election just around the corner. About 9% of the country's 29.1 million population are Christians, practising various denominations of Christianity. "Ibrahim made a wrong statement which incites anger and hatred among Malaysians. We, as Christians are against the statement and totally abhor what he said," he added. Robert said if Ibrahim proceeds with the burning of the Malay Bibles, the Churches will initiate legal proceedings against him. He said there are various reasons why the Malay Bible was being targeted by the ultra-Malay group. "The Sikh holy book also refers to God as Allah while some Hindu scriptures also do the same. Why target just Malay Bibles? I feel that it is because Christianity is the closest to Islam. Maybe they see Christianity as a threat to Islam. "Christians will take to the street if our voices are not heard legally. Ibrahim and whoever are behind him are very narrow-minded and are not looking at the bigger picture", he added. |
| Perkasa says it has no role in Sunday’s Bible burning Posted: 23 Jan 2013 02:44 PM PST 
It denies knowledge of Pasukan Bertindak Anti Bible Bahasa Melayu. Anisah Shukry, FMT Perkasa today distanced itself from this Sunday's Bible burning in Butterworth, saying it had no knowledge of the group behind it. "Perkasa knows nothing of the group that intends to burn Bibles this Jan 27. That is not Perkasa's programme," Perkasa secretary-general Syed Hasan Syed Ali told FMT. The programme, planned by a group calling itself Pasukan Bertindak Anti Bible Bahasa Melayu, comes hot on the heels of Perkasa president Ibrahim Ali's controversial call for Jawi-scripted Malay Bibles with the word "Allah" to be burned. The previously unknown group refers to Sunday's programme as a "festival". Its flyer reads: "Our children and grandchildren will end up being apostates if you want to wait for our impotent government to act. "To Muslims who have copies of al-Kitab, bring them over to make our Bible-burning session merrier." Commenting on this, Syed Hasan said: "Perkasa will leave this so-called Malay Bible-burning event to the police." Syed Hasan also said Perkasa was worried that physical clashes would erupt over news reports of the alleged distribution of Jawi-scripted Bibles containing the word "Allah" to Muslim pupils in Penang. "For the record," he added, "Perkasa's online membership has surged dramatically in the past three days." He claimed he had received many phone calls over the alleged distribution of the controversial Bibles and said this was why his group was stern against those attempting to proselytize among Muslims. But Penang police chief Abdul Rahim Hanafi told national news agency Bernama that all the Bibles were in the English language and did not contain the word "Allah". |
| ‘Enough with the warnings, haul up Ibrahim’ Posted: 23 Jan 2013 02:41 PM PST 
MIC Youth wants stern action against Perkasa chief, Ibrahim Ali, who has called on Muslims to burn the Al-Kitab. K Pragalath, FMT MIC Youth has urged Home Minister Hishammuddin Hussein to stop pussy-footing around the contentious call by Perkasa chief, Ibrahim Ali, to burn the Malay Bible and instead take immediate action against him. "MIC Youth wants Hishammuddin to take action against Ibrahim. "Ibrahim's irresponsible action of inciting hatred against another religion can lead to this nation's instability," said the party's Youth secretary, C Sivarraajh. He was reacting to Ibrahim who urged Muslims to burn Malay Bibles known as the Al-Kitab which bore the term"Allah". Ibrahim, who is also Pasir Mas MP, made the call on Saturday in reaction to reports that the Al-Kitab is being distributed to Muslim schoolchildren. He said this at a Perkasa convention held in Penang. Following that call, DAP chairman Karpal Singh and a group of individuals have lodged police reports. Attorney-General Abdul Gani Patail, meanwhile, told FMT that action will be taken only after the law had been breached. Describing Ibrahim's call as "outrageous", Sivarraajh said that it is time Ibrahim is brought to book since he has raised racial and religious sensitivities in the past. "Even though he has been warned many times, but he's still walking the same way and using the same old tune which made other people hate him," said Sivarraajh. In a related development, a little known group called Pasukan Bertindak Anti Bible Bahasa Melayu (Anti-Malay-Bible Action Force), urged Muslims to join in the "Malay Bible burning festivities" on Jan 27 in Penang. |
| Penang goes all out to stop ‘fiery’ festival Posted: 23 Jan 2013 02:38 PM PST 
The chief minister has asked the state police chief and the Seberang Perai Municipal Council to take action to stop the Bible-burning event. Athi Shankar, FMT Penang Chief Minister Lim Guan Eng today gave an assurance that his administration will explore all ways and means to stop the Bible-burning festival from taking place in Butterworth on Jan 27. He said that such a shameful act, if allowed to take place, would not only disgrace Penang but also the country. "The state government will do all it can to ensure this vile and abhorrent act will not take place," Lim, who is also the Bagan MP, said in his blog posting. He also urged all peace loving Malaysians, Muslims and non-Muslims alike, to pray together for peace, harmony, religious respect and goodwill to prevail this Sunday. Early this week pamphlets were allegedly distributed by a little known group called Pasukan Bertindak Anti Bible Bahasa Melayu (Anti-Malay-Bible Action Force) urging Muslims to join in the Malay Bible burning festivities at the Dewan Ahmad Badawi's municipality field in Butterworth. Lim said he has issued a directive to Seberang Perai Municipal Council (MPSP) president Maimunah Mohd Shariff to bar anyone from entering into the field to burn Bibles or any other religious documents. He has also asked state police chief DCP Abdul Rahim Hanafi to take steps to stop the festival and ensure that the image and dignity of Penang is protected. Lim and the Christian Federation of Malaysia have also received the alleged pamphlets, which had emerged following Perkasa chief Ibrahim Ali's call on Muslims to burn the Malay and Jawi versions of the Bibles containing the term "Allah" and other Islamic holy terms. Ibrahim, the Pasir Mas MP, made the call in wake of police reports lodged on alleged distribution of Bibles to Muslims pupils outside a school in Jelutong here early last week. At a press conference held after a Perkasa convention on "Economic and Education Transformation of Penang Malays" held at UiTM campus in Pematang Pauh last Saturday, Ibrahim called on Muslims to "seize and burn" such copies of the Bible if distributed to them. Police reports have been lodged against Ibrahim, the alleged distribution of the pamphlets and the alleged distribution of the Bibles to Muslims. Police have recorded statements from many people, including journalists, in connection with all three cases. Lim, the DAP secretary-general, also criticised Gerakan for joining hands with several federal government agencies to organise the Penang Run on Jan 28, which falls on Hindu grand festival, Thaipusam. READ MORE HERE |
| Of Bibles and crosses Posted: 23 Jan 2013 01:22 PM PST 
The other day, I watched a rugby game which featured one of the top clubs in Malaysia. The club is run predominantly by Malays who are Muslims of course. The players are also predominantly Malay/Muslim. Majority Allah-fearing and hold steadfast to the pillars of Islam. But emblazoned across their jerseys is the name of a well-known beer. Mohsin Abdullah, Hornbill Unleashed While some Muslims may find the symbols 'sensitive', others don't mind 'haram' advertising of beer. I MUST admit I've not heard of it before. Apparently, there's a group in Penang which is called Persatuan Mukabuku Pulau Pinang Pinang. In English that should be Penang Facebook Association. Anyway, as we know recent media reports quoted the association president – a gentleman by the name of Salleh Ismail – as saying "two men were seen circulating bibles to students including Muslim students outside a school in Jelutong, Penang". And we also know Deputy Education Minister Dr Puad Zarkashi has asked police to investigate as, said the deputy minister, "proselytisation of Muslims is against the law in the country". Datuk Seri Jamil Khir Baharom, Minister in the PM's Department meanwhile, has urged the police to "act fast as this is a very sensitive issue". That's the law of the land. Hence must be respected. Let the police probe. Without going into that particular "case", I find myself asking this question. If, for some reason, someone comes up to me and hands me a copy of the Bible, what would I do? Well I can: 1) Turn it down ie do not accept the "gift"; 2) Accept politely, say thank you, put it away somewhere and forget about it totally; 3) Read the Bible although I'm not sure if I can understand or comprehend; 4) Study it. After all, the late Ahmad Deedat, the Muslim missionary studied the Bible and the knowledge in his own words made him stronger in his belief of the Islamic faith. Some even called him the "Great Islamic Scholar of the Bible". Whether one agrees with that or for that matter Ahmad Deedate's "style" of teaching and propagating Islam is another matter. Point is he wasn't, for want of a better word, "afraid" of the Bible. Unlike many or some (definitely not all) Malay/Muslims in Malaysia. Read more at: http://hornbillunleashed.wordpress.com/2013/01/24/40685/ |
| Sabah RCI: What next? Posted: 23 Jan 2013 12:59 PM PST 
Does it not boggle the mind that in the face of such incontrovertible evidence of this massive illegal operation, Mahathir would still deny its existence? What gave him the courage to do so, if not for the fact that the Royal Commission's proceedings have virtually been blacked out by the mainstream media, while his statement of defence would be given prominence? Kim Quek Former Prime Minister Mahathir Mohamad finally admitted – in the face of overwhelming evidence – that he granted citizenship to the illegal immigrants who have flooded Sabah, but quickly added that the citizenship was granted legally. He said: "Many of them in Sabah were not there for a day or two, but 20 or 30 years and can speak Malay. They have the right to be citizens". Is that all there is to the infamous "Project M" (M stands for Mahathir) that has brought untold miseries to Sabahans: the mere granting of citizenship to qualified immigrants in the normal legal way? To get to the truth, let us hear some top officials of the Sabah National Registration Department (NRD) who gave evidence to the Royal Commission of Inquiry looking into the population explosion of Sabah. INCONTROVERTIBLE EVIDENCE · Sabah NRD assistant registrar Kee Dzulkifly Kee Abd Jalil said the special unit he was working in, illegally issued some 100,000 blue identity cards (IC) to the immigrants (blue cards are meant for citizens only), in addition to issuing 200,000 letters of approval for birth certificate for the children of immigrants. With these approval letters, they would get their birth certificates from the hospitals or district offices. These immigrants, who are all Muslims, are mainly from southern Philippines and Indonesia. Kee Dzulkifly, together with some of his fellow officers who also gave evidence collaborating Kee Dzulkifly's evidence, was subsequently detained under the Internal Security Act (ISA) for two years from 1995 to 1997, for engaging in these illegal activities. · Tamparuli NRD chief Yakup Damsah said that upon instruction from then Sabah NRD chief Abdul Rauf Sani, he and his colleagues were flown from Sabah to Kuala Lumpur, where they operated a clandestine operation in the house of Mahathir's then political secretary Abdul Aziz Shamsuddin at Kampung Pandan to illegally issue blue ICs to immigrants. Yakup said the purpose of the operation was to boost Muslims voters and to ensure they vote for Umno in the Sabah state election. His group issued 40,000 blue ICs within a month. Yakup was subsequently detained under the ISA for his illegal act. · Sabah NRD chief Ramli Kamaruddin, who succeeded Abdul Rauf, said that two weeks before the 1994 Sabah state election, he met then deputy home minister Megat Junid Megat Ayub (then home minister was Mahathir) at Hyatt Hotel in Kota Kinabalu, where he was instructed to issue temporary IC receipts to immigrants. These receipts, in the names of voters who never voted, would enable the immigrants to vote on polling day, so as to ensure a Barisan Nasional (BN) victory. Also present at the hotel was Osu Sukam, who later became Sabah chief minister in 1999. Ramli Kamaruddin was also detained under ISA for two years from 1995. · Sabah NRD deputy director Mohd Nasir Sugip testified that the department carried out the clandestine "Ops Durian Burok" from 1992 to 1995 under instruction from the state Election Commission (EC) to provide unqualified immigrants with blue ICs so that they could vote in an election. With the new ICs issued in accordance with the details provided by the EC, these Philipino and Indonesian Muslims were then planted as voters in strategic constituencies (classified as 'black' or 'grey' for BN) across Sabah to help BN win in elctions. At one time, Sabah EC director Wan Ahmad Wan Yusof handed over a list of 16,000 names and asked for these to be converted into 'Bumiputra Islam" voters. Mohd Nasir was later detained under the ISA. BLACK OUT BY MAIN STREAM MEDIA All these evidences were presented to the Royal Commission on Jan 16, third day of the hearings; whereas Mahathir claimed his innocence on the next day, Jan 17. Does it not boggle the mind that in the face of such incontrovertible evidence of this massive illegal operation, Mahathir would still deny its existence? What gave him the courage to do so, if not for the fact that the Royal Commission's proceedings have virtually been blacked out by the mainstream media, while his statement of defence would be given prominence? Despite such connivance from the mainstream media and Mahathir's brazen denials, there is no way that such staggering breach of law can be buried in this Internet age of ubiquitous information. Equally impossible to deny is Mahathir's link to these acts of treason. The two key political leaders featured in the evidence – Aziz Shamsuddin and Megat Junid – were Mahathir's closest confidante, who were also well known for their roles as henchmen to execute some of his more unsavoury schemes. At their level of political influence and status, these two henchmen would have neither the courage nor the reason to embark on such a bold venture of high treason that could easily have led their journey to the gallows, without the protection of the highest political leadership. It is as clear as daylight that these two political minions were only carrying out the wishes of their political boss. MAHATHIR IRRETRIEVABLY LINKED Project M is unparalleled in modern history in that it is a clandestine operation that has succeeded in robbing the sovereign rights of a people by massive infusion of illegal immigrants and pervasive contamination of the electoral roll with illegal voters (known as the phantom voters). The success of Project M has ensured Umno's hegemony in Sabah for almost two decades. And the original Sabahans will continue to be subjected to such rule unless the illegal immigrants and phantom voters menace is resolved. What is even more alarming is that the phantom voter cancer continues to grow right up to this day, not only in Sabah, but there is ample evidence that its malignancy has been spreading in Peninsula Malaysia, as exemplified by the thousands of dubious registered voters that surface continually, particularly in the state of Selangor. The latest evidence was uncovered by a survey carried out by the Selangor government. In a house-to-house check on the half a million newly registered voters, 135,000 of them could not be traced, for which the EC has not given any valid answer. In fact, our greatest problem is our EC, which has unabashedly acted as a political arm of Umno. Take the case of the explosive expose' uncovered by the Sabah RCI. In any democracy, the election commission would have immediately swung into emergency action, and in conjunction with other agencies such as the NRD, police and attorney general's chamber, would seek out the criminals and rectify the huge damage to restore integrity and public confidence to the electoral system. But not our EC. The latter has chosen not to react on the lame excuse that any comment would be 'subjudice' and any action would also be premature, as the RCI has not completed its findings. BONANZA FOR OPPOSITION? The same deaf and dumb tactic has also been adopted by Prime Minister Najib Razak and the component parties of Barisan Nasional. EC and BN's strategy seems to be: do nothing until the next election which will be held in probably two months' time. (Parliament stands dissolved on April 28, and polling within 60 days thereafter.) And opposition alliance Pakatan Rakyat and civil society will have to decide whether to stage another mass rally, both to force some urgent and basic electoral reforms including cleansing of electoral roll, as well as to gain political capital by swinging the middle ground further towards them. Whatever the decision on the mass rally, the opposition will certainly leave no stone unturned to publicise the moral and political bankruptcy of the incumbent political power in resorting to means most foul at perils of destroying our democracy so as to cling on to power. Thus, the Sabah RCI is turning out to be a last minute gift to the opposition after all, whatever its findings. |
| UTHM Prof Amir Hashim (UMNO) brainwash student committee to support BN! Posted: 23 Jan 2013 12:48 PM PST |
| Abbas rejects Malaysian PM visit to Gaza saying it divides Palestine Posted: 23 Jan 2013 12:26 PM PST 
(Al Arabiya News) - Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas denounced on Wednesday the Malaysian prime minister's recent visit to Gaza, saying that it "enhances division and does not serve the Palestinian interests," reported local news agency WAFA. "The Palestinian presidency announces its rejection and condemnation of the Malaysian prime minister's visit to Gaza," a statement said. Abbas's bureau called on the Malaysian government to provide "clarification," saying that Prime Minister Najib Razak called Abbas earlier and told him that Malaysia was going to provide humanitarian aid to the strip, and that he will meet a Palestinian delegation in Cairo afterwards. "[The visit] undermines Palestinian representation and reinforces the division and does not serve Palestinian interests," it continued.
The bureau considered the visit a contribution to a conspiracy aiming to "divide the Palestinian land;" one that "serves Israeli plans to keep Jerusalem isolated from the Palestinian state," the agency reported.
On Tuesday, the Malaysian prime minster pledged solidarity with the Palestinians on his first trip to Gaza, throwing his support behind reconciliation efforts between Hamas and Fatah.
Najib, who entered via the Rafah crossing from Egypt with Foreign Minister Anifah Aman and other officials, was met by Hamas prime minister Ismail Haniya. Read more at: http://english.alarabiya.net/articles/2013/01/23/262086.html |
| PM explains Gaza visit Posted: 23 Jan 2013 12:24 PM PST 
(The Star) - "Fatah was uneasy with my visit to Gaza but we explained to them that I had to make a stand to visit the area. The issue of the plight of the Palestinians in Gaza is something very close to Malaysian hearts," he said. Datuk Seri Najib Tun Razak said his visit to Gaza was a humanitarian gesture of solidarity with the plight of the people in the occupied territories and should not be misconstrued as an attempt to interfere in domestic Palestinian affairs. The Prime Minister said he had explained this to Palestine's WaqafMinister Mahmoud Habash in Cairo on Tuesday evening after returning from Gaza, following criticism over his visit by the Fatah faction of the Palestinian Authority (PA), which is opposed to its Hamas-led rivals who control Gaza. "My trip to Gaza was based on humanitarian grounds and to show our strong support for the struggle of the Palestinians. "It must not be misinterpreted as interfering with the internal affairs of Palestine but to show our concern to Palestinians especially during the eight days of violence committed by Israel in its attack in Gaza late last year," Najib told Malaysian reporters here yesterday before departing for Davos, Switzerland, where he is scheduled to attend the World Economic Forum. Hamas and Fatah have been in dispute since 2007, resulting in Gaza being controlled by Hamas and the West Bank, the other territory, which also makes up Palestine, under Fatah. Najib said besides conveying Malaysia's position to the Palestinian Minister, he had also contacted PA chairman Mahmoud Abbas by telephone on Monday night to explain the reasons for his Gaza visit before he went to the Palestinian territory the following day. "Fatah was uneasy with my visit to Gaza but we explained to them that I had to make a stand to visit the area. The issue of the plight of the Palestinians in Gaza is something very close to Malaysian hearts," he said. The Prime Minister said his original intention was to visit both Gaza and the West Bank. He explained that he was unable to go to the West Bank because unlike the Egyptian controlled border into Gaza, the entry points into the territory under Fatah were under the purview of Israel. He said Israel would have only allowed him entry if Malaysia accorded Israel official recognition, something that was against Malaysia's policy. Najib said his visit to Gaza and his meeting with Egyptian President Mohamed Morsi also allowed him an opportunity to express Malaysia's support to the Egyptian initiative to bring Hamas and Fatah closer. The rival groups signed an agreement in May last year to discuss the aim of setting up a unity government in Palestine. "Hamas and Fatah need to set up a unity government as soon as possible for their common struggle to succeed. In all my meetings, I stressed the point repeatedly that accord between the West Bank and Gaza was a precondition for the Palestinians to achieve their goal," he said. On a separate matter, Najib expressed his condolences to the family of the Malaysian killed during the hostage drama in Algeria. "I sympathise with the family. This is something that can happen and is very hard to predict. I hope his family remains strong in facing this tragedy," he said. Najib said there had been discouraging reports about the fate of the second Malaysian hostage reported missing, adding that Wisma Putra was keeping a close watch on the developments. |
| Under fire, Perkasa says bible-burning threat meant to prevent violence Posted: 23 Jan 2013 12:18 PM PST 
(The Malaysian Insider) - Despite facing heat for Datuk Ibrahim Ali's bible-burning remark, Malay rights group Perkasa have insisted their president's words were actually a "wake-up call" to prevent possible violence against distributors of bibles containing the word "Allah" and other Arabic scripts. The group's secretary-general, Syed Hassan Syed Ali, said Ibrahim has no problem facing the consequences of his remarks, including being questioned by the police due to the reports lodged against him. "To the Perkasa president, he is sure not worried about these reports... because the investigation will surely be based on truth and justice," he said in a statement sent to The Malaysian Insider. But Syed Hassan maintained that Ibrahim's statement was more to prevent possible physical violence and other untoward incidents, should these Malay-language bibles get into the hands of Muslim students. If this is seen by Muslims who view this as an attempt at apostasy, the Perkasa leader said violence could be used against the book's distributor. "I very much understand my president's statement because it is as a 'wake-up call' to all parties to prevent these untoward incidents. "This is what the president fears because then there would be a physical attack between those of different faiths... this is not good for the nation," he said. Syed Hassan also confirmed that Ibrahim has been contacted by the police over the reports lodged against the latter by several parties, including DAP chairman Karpal Singh. Investigations will commence in another day or two, he added. Karpal lodged the report on Tuesday in a bid to press Attorney-General Tan Sri Abdul Gani Patail to kickstart an investigation against Ibrahim, who came under fire after making the remarks in Penang over the weekend. The fiery Malay rights leader had called on Muslims to burn Malay language bibles that contain the words "Allah" and other religious Arabic scripts should it come into their possession. But when continuing his defence of Ibrahim's remarks here, Syed Hassan said that Perkasa has never in the past attacked Christianity. He said the group was merely protecting Islam and its position, as enshrined in the Federal Constitution, and this includes rejecting those who insult the religion and who try to spread their own faiths to Muslims. "Before this, all other races lived in peace. But today, simply because there are parties using this for political expediency, they are willing to flare the sentiments of others," he said. Read more at: http://www.themalaysianinsider.com/malaysia/article/under-fire-perkasa-says-bible-burning-threat-meant-to-prevent-violence/ |
| 'The Act of Killing' and Indonesia's Dark Past Nobody Talks About Posted: 23 Jan 2013 12:01 PM PST 
In the gangsters' role as the political bosses of North Sumatra (a province of 14 million people) they have continued to celebrate themselves as heroes, reminding the public of their role in the massacres, while continuing to threaten the survivors – and they have done so even as governors, senators, members of parliament, and, in the case of one prominent veteran of the 1965-66 genocide, as the perversely named, "Deputy Minister of Law and Human Rights". DIRECTOR'S STATEMENT By Joshua Oppenheimer Beginnings In February 2004, I filmed a former death squad leader demonstrate how, in less than three months, he and his fellow killers slaughtered 10,500 alleged 'communists' in a single clearing by a river in North Sumatra. When he was finished with his explanation, he asked my sound recordist to take some snapshots of us together by the riverbank. He smiled broadly, gave a thumbs up in one photo, a victory sign in the next.
Two months later, other photos, this time of American soldiers smiling and giving the thumbs up while torturing and humiliating Iraqi prisoners, appeared in the news (Errol Morris later revealed these photographs to be more complex than they at first appear). The most unsettling thing about these images is not the violence they document, but rather what they suggest to us about how their participants wanted, in that moment, to be seen. And how they thought, in that moment, they would want to remember themselves. Moreover, performing, acting, posing appear to be part of the procedures of humiliation.
These photographs betray not so much the physical situation of abuse, but rather forensic evidence of the imagination involved in persecution. And they were very much in my mind when, one year later, I met Anwar Congo and the other leaders of Indonesia's Pancasila Youth paramilitary movement.
Far away or close to home?
The differences between the situations I was filming in Indonesia and other situations of mass persecution may at first seem obvious. Unlike in Rwanda, South Africa or Germany, in Indonesia there have been no truth and reconciliation commissions, no trials, no memorials for victims. Instead, ever since committing their atrocities, the perpetrators and their protégés have run the country, insisting they be honoured as national heroes by a docile (and often terrified) public. But is this situation really so exceptional? At home (in the USA), the champions of torture, disappearance, and indefinite detention were in the highest positions of political power and, at the same time, busily tending to their legacy as the heroic saviours of western civilisation. That such narratives would be believed (despite all evidence to the contrary) suggests a failure of our collective imagination, while simultaneously revealing the power of storytelling in shaping how we see.
And that Anwar and his friends so admired American movies, American music, American clothing – all of this made the echoes more difficult to ignore, transforming what I was filming into a nightmarish allegory.
Filming with survivors
When I began developing The Act of Killing in 2005, I had already been filming for three years with survivors of the 1965-66 massacres. I had lived for a year in a village of survivors in the plantation belt outside Medan. I had become very close to several of the families there. During that time, Christine Cynn and I collaborated with a fledgling plantation workers' union to make The Globalization Tapes, and began production on a forthcoming film about a family of survivors that begins to confront (with tremendous dignity and patience) the killers who murdered their son. Our efforts to record the survivors' experiences – never before expressed publicly – took place in the shadow of their torturers, as well as the executioners who murdered their relatives – men who, like Anwar Congo, would boast about what they did.
Ironically, we faced the greatest danger when filming survivors. We'd encounter obstacle after obstacle. For instance, when we tried to film a scene in which former political prisoners rehearsed a Javanese ballad about their time in the concentration camps (describing how they provided forced labour for a British-owned plantation, and how every night some of their friends would be handed over to the death squads to be killed), we were interrupted by police seeking to arrest us. At other times, the management of London-Sumatra plantations interrupted the film's shooting, "honouring" us by "inviting" us to a meeting at plantation headquarters. Or the village mayor would arrive with a military escort to tell us we didn't have permission to film. Or an "NGO" focused on "rehabilitation for the victims of the 1965-66 killings" would turn up and declare that "this is our turf – the villagers here have paid us to protect them." (When we later visited the NGO's office, we discovered that the head of the NGO was none other than the area's leading killer – and a friend of Anwar Congo's – and the NGO's staff seemed to be military intelligence officers.)
Not only did we feel unsafe filming the survivors, we worried for their safety. And the survivors couldn't answer the question of how the killings were perpetrated.
Boastful killers
But the killers were more than willing to help and, when we filmed them boastfully describing their crimes against humanity, we met no resistance whatsoever. All doors were open. Local police would offer to escort us to sites of mass killing, saluting or engaging the killers in jocular banter, depending on their relationship and the killer's rank. Military officers would even task soldiers with keeping curious onlookers at a distance, so that our sound recording wouldn't be disturbed.
This bizarre situation was my second starting point for making The Act of Killing. And the question in mind was this: what does it mean to live in, and be governed by, a regime whose power rests on the performance of mass murder and its boastful public recounting, even as it intimidates survivors into silence. Again, there seemed to be a profound failure of the imagination.
Within Indonesia more generally, such openness about the killings might be exceptional. But in North Sumatra, it is standard operating procedure. For there, the army recruited its death squads from the ranks of gangsters. Gangsters' power derives from being feared, and so the thugs ruling North Sumatra have trumpeted their role in the genocide ever since, framing it as heroic struggle, while all the time taking care to include grisly details that inspire a constant and undiminished disquiet, unease, even terror of possible recurrence. (In East Java and in Bali, the death squads were recruited from religious groups, while in Central Java and elsewhere they were members of the Indonesian special forces. Unlike gangsters, those groups' power is not necessarily based on their being feared.)
In the gangsters' role as the political bosses of North Sumatra (a province of 14 million people) they have continued to celebrate themselves as heroes, reminding the public of their role in the massacres, while continuing to threaten the survivors – and they have done so even as governors, senators, members of parliament, and, in the case of one prominent veteran of the 1965-66 genocide, as the perversely named, "Deputy Minister of Law and Human Rights".
---------------------------------------- 'The Act of Killing' and Indonesia's Dark Past Nobody Talks About I was 10 minutes late when I quietly sneaked in to a room crammed with people sitting tightly to their chairs. Their eyes fixed to the screen. I have been to many independent film screenings, but this one was not like any other. There was no sign whatsoever to indicate that there's a film screening inside. It was meant to be clandestine due to the nature of the film, entitled "The Act of Killing," an award-winning documentary by British-based American filmmaker Joshua Oppenheimer.
From the invitation I received, it clearly said the screening is a closed event and not to be passed around. Prior to the screening, the attendees were asked not to spread the word on social media to avoid unwanted difficulties. "The Act of Killing" contains materials that are prone to disturb viewers, not to mention the historical facts that are still hard to accept to some people in Indonesia.
"The Act of Killing" follows the life of Anwar Congo, who unashamedly claimed himself as a fearsome executor in Medan, North Sumatera, following the alleged abortive coup by the Indonesian Communist Party (PKI).
As written in the history — or unwritten — the failed coup resulted in the witch-hunt against PKI members and alleged sympathizers. Many of them were captured, tortured and killed without legal trial. Once these alleged communists were detained, they would soon be handed to Anwar and his accomplices who would perform some of the gruesome executions ever imagined by mankind.
I'm not an expert in cinematography, but what is so interesting about "The Act of Killing," apart from the obvious topic which remains untouched for a long time, is the way Anwar's story being told. Instead of the orthodox way of making documentary by combining interviews and footage, Oppenheimer creatively re-enacted what Anwar did in the past and shot them in the film. Anwar starred and acted in a film where he re-enacted all his mischievous deeds. It's like making a documentary about Adolf Hitler and asked Der Fuhrer to act as himself in a staged scene. |
| The war begins! Posted: 23 Jan 2013 11:57 AM PST 
KL SENTRAL LRT STATION, 830 am, 23 Jan 2013 - BNYV (Youth Volunteers) is currently distributing the brochures below condemning the 2013 Alternative Budget to LRT passengers at KL Sentral Station. Changing our Mindset They should be distributing the details of Government's 2013 budget to convince the people that the government's budget is the best but they did the opposite instead.Read the PR alternative budget HERE(http://rafiziramli.com/wp-content/uploads/2012/09/Belanjawan-Pakatan-Rakyat-2013-vAkhir.pdf) |
| PAS - from Progressive to Pythonic Posted: 23 Jan 2013 12:40 AM PST KTemoc Konsiders Pythonic is the adjectival form of python. And we all know a python is a: (a) boa constrictor (snake) which kills its prey by constriction (wakakaka), or (b) spirit or demon (louder wakakaka). I'm afraid those are what non-Muslims, especially Chinese Malaysians, currently view PAS as, a demon which if it comes into power, will 'kill' its prey (the non-Muslims, wakakaka) by constricting their non-Muslim social, cultural, religious and general freedom through PAS intrusive version (interpretation) of Islamic laws and policies. As such, I wasn't surprised by The Malaysian Insider's news item Pakatan fears PAS puritans putting non-Muslim vote at risk which tells us: There is concern among Pakatan Rakyat's (PR) rank-and-file that PAS risks losing the pact's non-Muslim vote in Election 2013 due to the Islamist party's puritanical restrictions for the word 'Allah' and its gender-segregation policies in Kedah and Kelantan. Yes and no to the causes of their concerns and the likely political impact. Firstly, most Chinese (I can't say for the Indians) aren't too concerned about the restriction in the use of the Allah word per se. Really, why should they when the prohibited use of the Allah word doesn't affect their Buddhist, Taoist, Confucian or folk religious practice. It's only the Christian Chinese and some civil liberty activists who are. I'm sad to say the civil liberty activists are unfortunately in the minority. And I am equally sad to say most Chinese aren't sympathetic to the Christian religious issue - incidentally I am also one, indeed one who actually opposes the use of the Allah word in the Malay language Bible (al Kitab) - sorry. However, they have been deeply concerned about PAS' version of Islamic rules which directly affect them, such as the recent gender segregation rules (unisex hair dressing salons; couple holding hands), PAS own interpreted moral values in taking action against 2 non-Muslim men in a car watching aeroplanes taking off at KB airport, and again PAS own interpreted Islamic values in its intrusive dress codes for Chinese New Year concerts ... ... which in turn evoke earlier ugly pictures of PAS being intrusively against non-Muslim entertainment events, and the harsh draconian edicts such as stoning to death that Pak Haji Aziz threatened against unmarried mothers abandoning their newly born babies, without understanding the social issues and environment driving those women into doing so, ... ... and miscellaneous provocative issues such as prohibiting the sale of beer at non-religious associated shops (7-11) or the caning of Muslims caught drinking (because of who could be next - the non-Muslims?), etc. 
| Beyonce | Secondly, regarding possibly losing PR's non-Muslim vote in GE-13, that's already well & truly lost in Kedah. In a previous post PAS 'blesses' MCA I wrote about ..... my discussions with quite a number of Kedahans here in Australia where I have been informed that their voting families and relatives have grumbled about being 'cheated' by PAS, a belief gained from their 'experience' under a PAS Kedah government, and that they won't ever vote for PAS again. Mind you, neither my Kedah mateys nor I can say that UMNO or MCA will be the direct beneficiaries of their disgust (not just disappointment) with PAS. Those Chinese voters may well end up playing non-halal mahjung or p'ar kau all day on GE-13 election day, wakakaka, which I suppose will indirectly benefit UMNO. 
| Inul Daratista | I am of course not saying PAS won't be the next Kedah state government again, but they can take it from me they will have to achieve that minus the support of non-Muslim Chinese. Again I can't say about the voting preference of Indian Malaysians in Kedah - maybe my Indian visitors can help enlighten us on this. In November last year I posted The python hanging around the ceiling fan reflecting my concerns about a pythonic (wakakaka) PAS, and its increasing arrogance as it senses hitherto unpossessed federal power within its reach. READ MORE HERE |
| UKEC Projek Amanat Negara 2013 Posted: 23 Jan 2013 12:12 AM PST 
RAJA PETRA KAMARUDIN to talk at the Projek Amanat Negara (PAN) National Symposium of Malaysian Students 2013 Organised by the United Kingdom and Eire Council for Malaysian Students (UKEC) Theme: "Malaysia: Restoring Confidence, Paving the Way" Session: Public Policy Topic: 13th General Elections: Scrutinising Public Policy Date: 27 January 2013 (Sunday) Venue: Thistle Marble Arch, London Time: 4.10PM - 5.20PM SEE MORE HERE: http://www.facebook.com/ukeconline 
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| Man gets 5 years for insulting Islam on Facebook Posted: 22 Jan 2013 03:47 PM PST 
Members of Indonesia's Islamic Defenders Front (FPI) rally on the streets in Jakarta July 30, 2011. Members of the FPI are demanding the government to disband Ahmadiyah sect. Indonesia's Assembly of Indonesian Muslim Clerics (MUI) considers the Ahmadiyah sect to be 'heretical' for believing that Mohammad was not Islam's final prophet. — PHOTO: REUTERS (The Jakarta Post) - The Bandung State Court has decided to add one more year to the prison term of Sebastian Joe, who was sentenced to four years imprisonment for blasphemy of Islam by the Ciamis District Court in West Java. The state court decided on Tuesday to slap a higher sentence as it used the 2008 Information and Electronic Transaction (ITE) Law as a lex specialis (special law), instead of the Criminal Code (KUHP) used by the district court, said Sebastian's lawyer, Anang Fitriana, as quoted by tempo.co on Wednesday. Sebastian was reported by the Ciamis chapter of the Islamic Defender Front (FPI) last year for a Facebook status he made, which they considered insulting to Islam. Anang said that he planned to appeal the case to the Supreme Court. |
| Remember your roots, Mahathir Posted: 22 Jan 2013 03:31 PM PST 
NGO tells the former premier that he would not have been a Malaysian if Tunku had not granted citizenships to non-Malays during Merdeka G Vinod, FMT If Tunku Abdul Rahman did not grant citizenships to non-Malays during Merdeka, Dr Mahathir Mohamad would not have been a Malaysian, claimed an NGO. Malaysian Indian Progressive Association (Mipas) chairman A Rajaretinam made this known during a protest in Brickfields against Mahathir's call to probe citizenships given during Independence. The former premier said this in reaction to the damning revelations made in the Sabah RCI, which implicated his administration in granting citizenships to foreigners to reside in Sabah. Rajaretinam was hinting at Mahathir's Indian heritage, where the latter's father was an Indian Muslim immigrant. Rajaretinam said that not only did Mahathir insult the Tunku with his statement but also the entire Indian community. He added that the Indians in Malaysia got their citizenships by sacrificing their blood, sweat and tears for the sake of national development, as opposed to the immigrants in Sabah. "Our ancestors were not refugees. We were brought in by the British government to Malaya to build the country. "When you talk about plantation, railway and building roads, you will see our ancestors' sacrifice for the country," said Rajaretinam. READ MORE HERE |
| Jeffrey: Tell RCI the truth, Anwar Posted: 22 Jan 2013 03:25 PM PST 
The Sabah strongman says Anwar, being the second most powerful leader in Umno then, could not have been ignorant of what was happening in Sabah. K Kabilan, FMT Sabah's veteran politician Jeffrey Kitingan today expressed hope that Opposition Leader Anwar Ibrahim would "tell the truth" if he ends up testifying in the Royal Commission of Inquiry (RCI) probing the "Project IC" in Sabah. "I am glad he has said that he has no problem in testifying in the RCI probing into citizenship granted to immigrants in Sabah. "However I do hope he would tell the truth about his own role in the citizenship fiasco," Jeffrey told FMT today. "From what I know, he was indeed in charge of Sabah [for Umno]. He was the director of operations and was involved actively in the citizenship project," he added. "I am very sure he was in the know of what was happening in Sabah at that time." Earlier today, Anwar told reporters that he was ready to testify at the RCI but quickly added that he was also in the dark about the project. "I have no problem whatsoever. I knew for a long time the project was under the prime minister, that it did not involve a Cabinet process, so it is the full responsibility of the prime minister and finance minister. "When I was there, even I was not briefed on the issue [of providing citizenship to immigrants]," Anwar said. He also said that the RCI had not summoned him because "they know I have nothing to do with it". Yesterday, Sabah Umno liaison deputy chief Salleh Said Keruak had challenged Anwar to tell the truth about the illegal immigrants to the RCI tasked with looking into the long-standing problem in the state. He said that Anwar was duty-bound to do so as he was deputy prime minister at that particular period, adding that "he was a powerful man and knew what was going on in Sabah". In recent weeks, various quarters have asked for both former prime minister Dr Mahathir Mohamad and Anwar to be summoned by the RCI to testify on the citizenship-for-vote issue. READ MORE HERE |
| Malaysia’s judiciary is independent, says retired judge Posted: 22 Jan 2013 03:10 PM PST 
(Bernama) - Despite criticisms and accusations on the transparency and independence of Malaysia's judicial system, a retired Federal Court judge, Datuk Seri Panglima Sulong Matjeraie, said never in his years in service did anyone try to influence him in his decisions. "I have been working as a judge for 15 years and not on one occasion did any of my bosses said: 'Sulong, you decide this way and not that way'. It never happened. "In the Federal Court, there are five judges and one of us will write the judgment and then pass it to the rest of us. If we don't agree, we will be dissenting. There is no such thing where you have to follow. "Definitely, we uphold the independence of the judiciary," he told Bernama here recently. Sulong, 66, the first Sarawakian appointed as Federal Court judge, clocked out for the last time at the Palace of Justice last Friday. "To be able to administer justice according to the law is something we hold dear." As a judge, you must make sure you serve justice and ensure justice is achieved. I think we have done that," he added. Sulong said the transformation of judiciary in the country had also reduced the backlog of cases in courts. "We have been working hard. There was too much of a backlog that we had to sacrifice our personal time to clear these cases. We have to ensure justice is done expeditiously. All of us work our guts out to make sure we finish our cases," he said. Sulong was born to a humble family in 1947 in the rural town of Saratok, about 140km from Kuching. As a boy, he used to help his father to tap rubber trees and sell "kuih" in the village to earn extra pocket money. "My late father always wanted me to be an agriculture assistant where I could get 'free uniform'. I never dreamt of becoming a lawyer or a judge. "My late father always said: 'Sulong, learn to plant rubber trees. when you get older, you will have your own plantation'. "As a judge, I get free uniform too," he smiled wryly. The fourth child in a family of nine, Sulong started his working career at the tender age of 17 when he was appointed a probationary Sarawak Administrative Officer (SAO) in the Sarawak Civil Service. That was in 1964. When he was 23, Sulong was appointed the District Officer (DO) of Bintulu -now an oil and gas town. The appointment gave him the distinction of being the youngest District Officer in Malaysia. Sulong started his career in the judiciary when he was appointed a Judicial Commissioner in September 1998 in the High Court of Malaya in Johor Baharu. Two years later, he was a High Court Judge in the Kota Kinabalu High Court, Sabah. In 2007, he was a judge of the Court of Appeal in Putrajaya and in April last year, he was appointed a Federal Court Judge at the Palace of Justice, here. "My only regret was not having my father around when I was made the Court of Appeal and Federal Court Judge. He passed away few months before I was appointed as a judge," he said. Sulong's interest in law was stirred when he was in the civil service, where one of the requirements for an administrative officer to be considered for promotion was to pass the law exam. From there it was all history. To read law, Sulong went to London on a Sarawak government scholarship to study at the Inns of Court School of Law in 1971. "I am always grateful to the Sarawak state government for giving me that opportunity to further my studies. Otherwise, I don't think I could become a judge. I'm lucky. But then again, all you need to do is work hard and you can achieve any dreams you have," he said. Sulong obtained his Master of Law Degree in Mercantile Law at the University of Southampton in 1977 where the law study was made possible by his wife who supported him financially. "I'm thankful to my wife who supported me to do my Master. She was working and I was studying," he added. Sulong served the state government in various capacities, including as General Manager of Sarawak Timber Industry Development Corporation from 1979 to 1980 and as the General Manager of Bintulu Development Authority from 1980 to 1983. Sulong left the civil service in 1983 and set up his own legal firm under the name of Messrs Sulong Matjeraie & Co. in Kuching the same year. On his future and what he would like to do, Sulong said he would like to sit back first before deciding what he would like to do. "I will take a break first before beginning to do something else. Actually I have no future plan yet. First thing I will do though is rest. It has been a long journey. It has been 49 years of working," he said. His words to the Malaysia's judiciary: "They are doing a good job. I'm sure the judiciary of Malaysia will be second to none in years to come. The people here are very dedicated." |
| For God, King and Racism Posted: 22 Jan 2013 03:01 PM PST 
RAJA PETRA KAMARUDIN to talk at the Cambridge University Southeast Asia Forum (CUSEAF) For God, King and Racism Date: 30th January 2013 (Wednesday) Time: 5.30pm Venue: Mill Road Lecture Room 4, Cambridge University Religion, Race and Royalty are the 'three Rs' of Malaysian politics. Both sides of the political divide have played up the issue of race, religion and royalty to the hilt for more than 55 years since independence or Merdeka. The March 8, 2008, general election was hailed as a watershed in Malaysian political history. Fast-forward five years and we are once again anticipating another general election. How has Malaysia changed, if at all? Raja Petra will speak on the upcoming general election expected over the next two months or so, and on whether Malaysians are finally beginning to shift away from race and religion to focus on other substantive issues. SEE MORE HERE: http://www.cusu.cam.ac.uk/ |
| Dr M must be stopped Posted: 22 Jan 2013 02:19 PM PST 
Zaid Ibrahim If we follow the actions and thinking of Tun Dr Mahathir Mohamad and his supporters, then we must rectify the "errors' of the past, even if it means violating established principles of the Constitution, laws and good governance. According to them, bringing in more Muslims into Sabah in the 1990s and making them citizens was not a cynical move to help the ruling coalition win elections (although that was the immediate benefit), but to correct the mistakes of history. Simply put, the country needed to have more Muslims – even if they were foreigners from the Philippines, Pakistan or Indonesia – because Tunku Abdul Rahman "gave away" citizenship to the Chinese and Indians as part of the Merdeka agreement. Dr M somehow blames the Tunku for making citizenship "easier" for non-Malays, which he believes justifies his call for a Royal Commission of Inquiry into Tunku's decision 60 years ago. His ranting could be ignored if it weren't for the fact that it's dangerous. Dr M destroyed UMNO when it did his bidding and we must not allow him to destroy the country too. To advocate reviewing all past policies and disowning our former leaders' great sacrifices is highly irresponsible. The country's design and constitutional make-up is not like the latest Proton model for him to change at whim. Our heritage and history are ours, not his. He has lost all sense of proportion in trying to gain traction for his wayward political views to change the outcome of the General Election. Dr M was a member of the Alliance, which agreed to adopt the principle of "jus soli" in granting citizenship to non-Malays. It was a social contract that the Malay Rulers agreed to, and which the rakyat also supported, as evidenced by the Alliance's overwhelming victories in the 1955 and 1959 elections. Yet Dr M has no compunction ridiculing our pioneering leaders' great effort to forge a nation. He is bent on making race a divisive issue in this General Election and he will destroy this country if his views are not accepted. READ MORE HERE |
| Prosecute Ibrahim Ali over bible-burning call, Bar Council urges Posted: 22 Jan 2013 02:11 PM PST 
Syed Jaymal Zahiid, The Malaysian Insider Perkasa chief Datuk Ibrahim Ali should be charged under the Sedition Act for his remarks advocating the burning of bibles, Bar Council president Lim Chee Wee said today, backing an similar call by an opposition lawmaker. Lim said that although the Bar maintains the law deemed a political weapon to silence dissent, should be repealed, it must be impartially applied against Ibrahim given that authorities have charged opposition leaders under the same Act. "If sedition charges were brought against Karpal Singh, equally charges should also be brought against Ibrahim Ali ... Whilst the Bar calls for the repeal of the Sedition Act, if it were to be applied, it must be applied fairly and without discrimination. "This incident together with the contemptuous statement by another Perkasa leader against a judge and the judiciary suggest that Perkasa is allowed to behave with impunity," Lim said in a statement. Karpal, who is DAP chairman and Bukit Gelugor MP, in on trial for sedition over remarks made pertaining to the Perak constitutional crisis in 2009, for which he was accused of making statements challenging the authority of the Sultan of Perak in dissolving the Perak state assembly. He had earlier been acquitted of the charge by the High Court in 2010, but the Court of Appeal subsequently ordered him to enter his defence upon a successful appeal brought by the Attorney-General's Chambers. Lim added that if the authorities do not wish to charge Ibrahim under the Sedition Act, the Penal Code may also be applied on the Perkasa chief. "This statement by Ibrahim is an incitement or abetment to commit criminal offence under Section 107 of the Penal Code, whilst the seizure and burning of bibles is an offence under Section 441 of the Penal Code," he said. Section 441 of the Penal Code states that "Whoever enters unto or upon property in the possession of another with intent to commit an offence or to intimidate, insult or annoy any person in possession of such property; or having lawfully entered into or upon such property, unlawfully remains there with intent thereby to intimidate, insult or annoy any such person, or with intent to commit an offence, is said to commit 'criminal trespass'." "The public must be warned that this is probably a criminal offence," Lim said. READ MORE HERE |
| Citizenship-for-votes probe stirs outrage Posted: 22 Jan 2013 01:51 PM PST 
The opposition and election-reform advocates allege massive fraud in voter rolls nationwide and have seized on the testimony as proof of government vote-tampering. By Julia Zappei, FMT
KUALA LUMPUR: For years, charges have swirled that a secret Malaysian scheme gave citizenship to huge numbers of illegal migrants in a politically important state in exchange for votes for the ruling coalition. Now, an inquiry is finally airing detailed allegations that have the government on the defensive ahead of elections that pose the greatest threat yet faced by the ruling bloc that has controlled Malaysia for 56 years. A Royal Commission of Inquiry opened last week with ex-officials admitting they gave citizenship to Filipinos and Indonesians in resource-rich Sabah, one of two Malaysian states on jungly Borneo island. One former official said some 100,000 identity cards (ICs) were handed out in 1993 ahead of a crucial state election, Malaysian news reports said. Another admitted signing hundreds of thousands of ICs in the 1990s. The testimony has revived accusations of treason against former prime minister Dr Mahathir Mohamad, who is alleged to have masterminded the scheme to shore up support for his government. As head of the ruling Barisan Nasional (BN) coalition, Mahathir dominated Malaysia for 22 years with his famously hardball political tactics until he resigned in 2003. Current prime minister Najib Tun Razak is now battling to rally support for the BN ahead of polls he is expected to call within months, in an era when the coalition's power grip has slipped. But outrage over "Project IC", as the alleged scheme is widely known, is undercutting his claims that the national electoral roll is free of fraud. The opposition and election-reform advocates allege massive fraud in voter rolls nationwide and have seized on the testimony as proof of government vote-tampering. "What we are concerned about is that this is still going on. That's what we want to stop," S Ambiga, head of the clean-elections activist coalition known as "Bersih", or "Clean", told a press conference Tuesday. The outlines of "Project IC" have been whispered about for three decades and have bolstered the view of Sabah as a reliable "fixed deposit" of votes for the BN to help it weather challenges elsewhere. The government allegedly targeted Muslims from neighbouring Indonesia and the predominantly Muslim southern Philippines. Sudden growth in population More than half of Malaysia's 29 million people are Muslim ethnic Malays, but indigenous tribes, many of them Christian, predominate in Sabah. They have bridled at the foreigners, blaming them for crime, drug abuse and economic competition, and alleging their homeland was being stolen. Najib last June gave in to calls for an inquiry, but the move could backfire, said Ibrahim Suffian, head of independent polling firm Merdeka Centre, calling the revelations "explosive". "It probably will create a wave of resentment and dissatisfaction among native Sabah voters. This confirms their worst fears," he said. The population of Sabah, a region of rugged mountains and powerful rainforest rivers that is about the size of Ireland, has surged from some 600,000 citizens in 1970 to more than three million — more than double the national growth rate. READ MORE HERE |
| Subpoena Dr M, Anwar, Sabah RCI told Posted: 22 Jan 2013 01:48 PM PST 
It will be an invaluable opportunity to uncover the black operations behind elections in Malaysia, says Suaram's Kua Kia Soong. Lisa J. Ariffin, FMT Suaram today called on the Sabah Royal Commission of Inquiry (RCI) to subpoena Dr Mahathir Mohamad and Anwar Ibrahim in its ongoing probe into illegal immigrants. Suaram adviser Kua Kia Soong said the RCI "must spare no effort" in revealing how citizenships had been given out clandestinely to illegal immigrants and refugees under the Mahathir administration. Anwar was then in charge of Sabah operations. "This RCI on immigrants in Sabah is an invaluable opportunity for us all to uncover the black operations behind elections in Malaysia," Kua said in a statement. "The perpetrators of this electoral deceit must be brought to justice," he added, reiterating the need for the RCI to subpoena Dr M and Anwar. Kua then claimed the current Najib administration had only acceded to Sabahans' demands for an RCI for political mileage ahead of the 13th general election. "The RCI had been demanded by Sabahans for years… Umno just couldn't evade their demand anymore," he said. "Sabahans have had it up to there. And that is why (Najib) had to accede to their demand for a RCI if he was to try and keep his 'fixed deposit' in Sabah," he added. Implement recommendations Kua cautioned the failure of the RCI to bring this inquiry to a satisfactory conclusion "will forever bring into question the legitimacy of elections in Malaysia". READ MORE HERE |
| Allah issue: ‘Pakatan stands by Hadi’ Posted: 22 Jan 2013 01:26 PM PST  Anwar Ibrahim is firm that Pakatan Rakyat will allow non-Muslims to use the word 'Allah'. Anisah Shukry, FMT Opposition Leader Anwar Ibrahim said that Pakatan Rakyat was firm in its decision that non-Muslims were allowed to use the word "Allah". "Pakatan Rakyat in the past meeting looked through the statement made by PAS president [Hadi Abdul Awang] carefully and we took the stand that we agreed to give room [for Allah to be used by non-Muslims], but to also remind people to not misuse it," said Anwar. "So we follow what the PAS president says. And if he does not revise that statement, then that is Pakatan's decision." He was referring to a statement by PAS president Hadi Awang after the opposition pact's presidential meeting on Jan 8. Hadi had said that "Allah", which is written in the Quran, is special and cannot be translated properly to other languages. "That's why Muslims of all races refer to God as Allah. So non-Muslims can use the holy word although it may not reflect the original meeting," Hadi had said. But the PAS Syura Council said last week that non-Muslims should prevent the use of the word "Allah" in translations of their religious text. 
"Translating the word God or Lord from any non-Muslim religious texts to the word Allah cannot be allowed because it is wrong from the aspect of meaning…. therefore, it has to be prevented," PAS spiritual adviser Nik Abdul Aziz Nik Mat said in a statement. Commenting on this, Anwar said: "I've read the PAS Syura Council's statement. Its concern is the problem of the term 'Allah' used for other purposes, and that is probably where there is a difference of opinion…" But he said the difference of opinion was small and the issue as a whole had been interpreted differently by various Muslim scholars. READ MORE HERE |
Malaysia Today - Your Source of Independent News
