Sell One Law, Get Two Free?
Posted by Kit in ISA, Kee Thuan Chye on Thursday, 10 November 2011, 10:04 am
By Kee Thuan Chye
Penang Economic Monthly
IS the Internal Security Act (ISA) really going to leave us? In name as well as in spirit? Will its body be laid to rest forever and its soul consigned not to purgatory but to hell, where it will be burned to nothingness and never more be resurrected?
Or will the government of Prime Minister Najib Razak design the two laws proposed as its replacement such that the repressiveness inherent in the ISA will live on, and the ruling regime can use it to its political advantage?
These are the questions on the minds of Malaysians who have at one time or another spoken out against the ISA or campaigned for its abolition over the years. For no law has had such power in shaping aspects of its people’s personality and the socio-political culture they live in than this law that authorises detention without trial.
Even in recent times, you could hear Malaysians in private conversations lowering their voices and looking over their shoulders whenever they spoke about something that seemed slightly “sensitive” – for fear of being overheard and hauled away by some Special Branch officer who might be hiding behind a potted plant.
Read the rest of this entry »
Corporate Malaysia has failed
By Nawawi Mohamad | November 09, 2011
The Malaysian Insider
NOV 9 — Tun Dr Mahathir Mohamad was a visionary leader who forcefully guided Malaysia’s development by corporate nationalism to achieve the status of a developed nation by 2020.
He made great achievements based on the benchmarks and milestones but was also hampered with some failures, but still the situation had not been that bad; there was still light at the end of the tunnel and remains in effect to the end of his term in office.
Unfortunately the success story stops here and the derailment began. Abdullah Badawi was not able to fill the shoes of Dr Mahathir. Abdullah Badawi was lost in his own world, without any real grasp of what was going on in the country economically, financially, socially and politically.
Read the rest of this entry »
Towards a modern IT, High Tech, and High Income Malaysia
Posted by Kit in Dr. Chen Man Hin, Education, English on Wednesday, 9 November 2011, 4:12 pm
By Dr Chen Man Hin, DAP life advisor
PPMSI since its launch in 2002 to achieve a modern IT society has not made progress because of lack of purpose and unity. It was the product of the Mahathir dynasty, when PM Mahathir was pushing the idea of Bangsa Malaysia or Vision 2020.
His target of a progressive Malaysia could be achievable if the people were well versed in Mathematics and Science and they could make the country progressive like other high tech countries in Asia, like Japan, Singapore, Hong Kong, S Korea and Taiwan. And as English was the language of Science and Maths, so the quickest way was to educate our youths to speak and write in English. Hence his cabinet pushed the policy of PPMSI (teaching and learning maths and science in English). That was in 2002.
The year now is 2011, what are the results? Are the students competent in English and well versed in Maths and Science?
Unemployable graduates, with deplorable English. The results have not been encouraging. It is well known that most of the university graduates are not equipped or trained to work in the commercial and business world. They have no communicating skills and could hardly write a letter in English. The businessmen coined these graduates as ‘unemployable graduates’.
Read the rest of this entry »
Impotent rage
By Kapil Sethi | November 09, 2011
The Malaysian Insider
NOV 9 — So it’s final. No more PPSMI. Over a year of PAGE campaigning, petitioning, protesting and writing letters to the editors have come to naught. As the deputy prime minister remarked, the decision was made by the government in 2009 and it will not bow to the demands of small groups. The only concession is that those already under PPSMI will be allowed to finish their schooling under PPSMI.
So it’s final. No more arguments over amendments to the Employment Act. Three months of the Malaysian Trade Unions Congress (MTUC) campaigning, petitioning and picketing have had no impact on the government. The human resource minister called the picket illegal (November 1, The Malaysian Insider) and insisted “this is a policy issue by the government. If they picket, they are going against the law.”
Both PAGE and MTUC threatened to divert support from Barisan Nasional to the opposition if their demands were not met. The PAGE Facebook protest page garnered approximately 100,000 “Likes” while MTUC has over 800,000 members and counts on the support of 5.7 million workers. Even the Lynas controversy has managed to alienate a substantial portion of Kuantan residents, with no solution offered by the government beyond bare denials.
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Najib’s reforms in ‘dribs and drabs’, says Ku Li
Posted by Kit in Najib Razak, Razaleigh Hamzah on Tuesday, 8 November 2011, 9:47 pm
By Lee Wei Lian
The Malaysian Insider
Nov 08, 2011
KUALA LUMPUR, Nov 8 — Tengku Razaleigh Hamzah criticised the pace of reforms in the country today, saying that it was too inconsistent and there appeared to be no overall plan to transform the country and society.
The Umno veteran and president of newly registered civil society NGO Amanah (Angkatan Amanah Merdeka) said that while there have been initiatives such as the National Key Result Areas (NKRA’s), they were currently too fragmented.
“I don’t know actually because everything is done in dribs and drabs,” he said at a press conference when asked about the government’s reforms. “There is no overall plan as to how they are going to transform our country or society.”
He added that it was “very difficult” for him to gauge what is going to happen in terms of transformation unless there is “a complete reformation.” Read the rest of this entry »
PPSMI, a tough pill to swallow
— Dr Kamal Amzan
The Malaysian Insider
Nov 08, 2011
NOV 8 — This is déjà vu.
Back in Tun Abdullah Ahmad Badawi’s day, we saw many U-turns and flip flopping of government decisions.
The decision to build a crooked bridge, double tracking rail project, comes to mind. Malaysians were so tired of such fickle-mindedness that they voted the Opposition into a few states in March 2008.
Three years later, we usher in the era of PPSMI.
Within a week we saw two big announcements by the education minister. One was to uphold the abolishment of PPSMI, while the other was to extend PPSMI until 2021. Read the rest of this entry »
Chaotic catharsis
Posted by Kit in international economic crisis on Tuesday, 8 November 2011, 5:15 pm
by Hugo Dixon
Reuters
Nov 6, 2011
Chaos, drama and crisis are all Greek words. So is catharsis. Europe is perched between chaos and catharsis, as the political dramas in Athens and Rome reach crisis point. One path leads to destruction; the other rebirth. Though there are signs of hope, a few more missteps will lead down into the chasm.
The dramas in the two cradles of European civilization are similar and, in bizarre ways, linked. Last week’s decision by George Papandreou to call a referendum on whether the Greeks were in favor of the country’s latest bailout program set off a chain reaction that is bringing down not only his government but probably that of Silvio Berlusconi too.
The mad referendum plan, which has now been rescinded, shocked Germany’s Angela Merkel and France’s Nicolas Sarkozy so much that they threatened to cut off funding to Greece unless it got its act together — a move that would drive it out of the euro. But this is probably an empty threat, at least in the short term, because of the way that Athens is roped to Rome. If Greece is pushed over the edge, Italy could be dragged over too and then the whole single currency would collapse. So, ironically, Athens is being saved from the immediate consequences of its delinquency by the fear of a much bigger disaster across the Ionian Sea.
Italian bond yields, which were already uncomfortably high, shot up after the Greek referendum fiasco. Read the rest of this entry »
Malaysia remains rich but also intolerant, says new study
By Melissa Chi | November 07, 2011
The Malaysian Insider
KUALA LUMPUR, Nov 7 — Malaysia maintained its rank as the 43rd most prosperous nation, trailing behind Singapore at 16th but the latest index of overall wealth also ranked the country among the worst countries for personal freedom and democracy, while it also scored poorly for security and the educational levels of workers.
It was also found that Malaysians did not trust each other and generally did not welcome outsiders.
Overall, Malaysia was a more prosperous nation than its other Asean neighbours such as Thailand which came in at 45 out of 110 countries.
The London-based think-tank Legatum’s Prosperity Index assesses 110 countries based on performance in eight areas such as economy, personal freedom, health and social capital.
Read the rest of this entry »
Chua Soi Lek vs Lim Guan Eng
Posted by Kit in Lim Guan Eng on Tuesday, 8 November 2011, 4:25 pm
By Spencer Gan | November 08, 2011
The Malaysian Insider
NOV 8 — It is obvious that the black ops team at the MCA has been active and it believes that by beating the fear drum about hudud, Chinese voters will run away from Pakatan Rakyat into the arms of the MCA.
That is why the MCA ragsheet, The Star, has been giving great space to Chua Soi Lek, the soiled president of the MCA, on this issue.
So he now wants the DAP to explain how hudud will impact the Chinese community before seeking its support in the next elections. I prefer a more straightforward test, a test between Chua and the DAP’s Lim Guan Eng.
1) Who went to jail for standing up for a voiceless, young girl, not concerned about race or religion? Who escaped going to jail despite millions seeing him commit a criminal offence punishable by jail time?
Read the rest of this entry »
It’s raining goodies in Johor
Posted by Kit in Elections, Johore, Muhyiddin Yassin on Tuesday, 8 November 2011, 3:29 pm
By S Rutra | November 8, 2011
Free Malaysia Today
MUAR: After Pakatan Rakyat declared its intention of making inroads into Barisan Nasional’s stronghold of Johor, the ruling coalition is leaving nothing to chance, especially when it concerns Indian voters.
These voters are being showered with cash and hampers, and leading the goodie train is none other than Deputy Prime Minister Muhyiddin Yassin and Menteri Besar Abdul Ghani Othman.
An ex-MIC state leader told FMT that while the Indians here have been traditional supporters of BN, the party leaders however are not taking this granted.
“Even though in some of the constituencies, Indian voters are as low as three or five percent, they still may be the deciding factor in ensuring that Johor remains a BN fortress,” he said.
Read the rest of this entry »
Is Muhyiddin best person to “transform” Malaysian proficiency in English, maths and science as to become a global power house?
Deputy Prime Minister, Tan Sri Muhyiddin Yassin has not inspired or convinced Malaysians in his 31 months as Education Minister that he is the person to “transform” the proficiency of Malaysian students in English, maths and science for Malaysia to become a global power house in these three subjects.
This point has been further driven home for most Malaysians by his recent maladroit flip-flop over the PPSMI issue.
The greatest disservice Muhyiddin has done to Malaysian education and our international competitiveness was his decision on PPSMI, which was given Cabinet approval on 8th July 2009.
My immediate reaction (9th July 2009) was to describe the Cabinet decision on PPSMI “not a New Deal, as proclaimed by some newspaper headlines, but a Raw Deal leaving Malaysia stranded in the march towards global educational quality, excellence and competitiveness and doing a great disservice to millions of students currently in both the primary and secondary schools”. Read the rest of this entry »
Foreign varsities swoop amid Malaysia’s brain drain
Posted by Kit in Brain drain, university on Monday, 7 November 2011, 5:45 pm
By Clara Chooi
The Malaysian Insider
Nov 07, 2011
KUALA LUMPUR, Nov 7 — Malaysia will face another brain-drain threat when some of the world’s best-ranked universities descend here this Wednesday to lure more local talent abroad, London-based Quacquarelli Symonds (QS) cautioned today.
The data-gathering firm predicted Malaysian students “will be taking the opportunity to study abroad” during the QS World University Tour, which will see universities offer them attractive education packages aimed at addressing their financial concerns.
“With approximately 80,000 Malaysian students studying overseas, the country may be seeing signs of brain drain as an increasing number of students are looking overseas to pursue their higher education in Germany, France, the UK and other EU countries,” QS public relations head Simona Bizzozero said in a media release today.
The release noted that the universities recognise the students’ financial concerns in receiving overseas education and are ready to offer them scholarships and practical advice on how to apply for different aid schemes.
“Parents and students will also have the chance to have in-depth conversations with the various schools,” QS said. Read the rest of this entry »
Malaysians caught in a cultural gridlock
Posted by Kit in Human Rights, Religion on Monday, 7 November 2011, 5:38 pm
Terence Netto
Malaysiakini
Nov 6, 2011
COMMENT
At least, we have the MRT, the biggest infrastructure project in Malaysian history, on the cards to ease the traffic jams that have been building up on our roads, particularly in the Klang Valley, over the past three decades.
But what solvents are there for the cultural stalemates we increasingly encounter these days, those that threaten to render public discourse in the country an exercise in which the argumentative appear to be talking to the deaf.
Strident Muslim groups, aided and abetted by a ham-fisted police force, frowned on an annual rite of commiseration for gays, lesbians, transgender and transvestites because, they asserted, it would promote an alternative lifestyle considered repugnant in some religious traditions.
People of unconventional sexuality are outraged and their sympathisers appalled because the police have moved in to stop Seksualiti Merdeka’s annual workshop on the grounds that the project is a threat to national amity.
The ban supposedly placates Muslim sensitivities, thought to have been rendered taut by the suspicion that proponents of unconventional sexuality are pushing to have their orientation given public respect.
Muslim sensitivities are Muslim sensitivities, but in a plural society they are not the only sensitivities extant. Read the rest of this entry »
Pengalaman graduan tempatan di negara asing
— Wong Tan Kim
The Malaysian Insider
Nov 07, 2011
7 NOV — Sedang saya duduk berehat di sebuah hotel di kota Shenzhen, China teringin saya untuk menulis untuk bacaan The Malaysian Insider akan kehidupan seorang graduan tempatan di negara asing.
Saya dihantar oleh majikan saya di Malaysia untuk bertugas di kota Shenzhen. Setelah beberapa tahun berulang-alik di antara Malaysia (Johor Baru), Singapura, Hong Kong, Shenzhen dan Guangdong, saya dapati ada sesuatu yang tidak betul dengan sistem pelajaran di negara kita.
Saya seorang graduan lepasan UKM dalam tahun 80an. Saya mengikuti sepenuhnya dunia pendidikan saya di dalam Bahasa Malaysia. Saya mengikuti kuliah yang dikendalikan oleh profesor seperti Dr Shamsul Amri Baharuddin, Dr Sanusi Osman, Allahyarham Rustam Sani, Dr Noraini Othman, Dr Ting Chew Peh dan ramai lagi pensyarah yang saya sudah lupa namanya.
Saya seorang bangsa Cina yang tidak boleh membaca tulisan Cina dan menulis tulisan Cina. Saya hanya boleh bertutur Bahasa Mandarin yang ringkas. Dengan latarbelakang yang sedemikian, boleh bayangkan cabaran saya di negara China. Saya melihat saya sebagai seorang rakyat Malaysia dan bukan warga China walaupun nenek-moyang saya berasal dari China. Read the rest of this entry »
Muhyiddin is “flip flop Minister who denies that he flip-flops” on PPSMI
Deputy Prime Minister and Education Minister Tan Sri Muhyiddin Yassin’s denial that he had been inconsistent on the government policy on the teaching and learning of science and mathematics in English (PPSMI) has only made him a “flip-flop Minister who denies that he flip-flops” on PPSMI.
That Muhyiddin had “flip-flopped”, there is no need to go further than to quote the chairman of Parent Action Group for Education (PAGE) Datin Noor Azimah Abdul Rahim who told the Malaysian Insider that she was “pleasantly surprised” by Muhyiddin’s announcement on PPSMI last Friday, “pointing out that until Thursday, Muhyiddin had appeared bent on pressing on with the government’s original decision to scrap PPSMI completely next year”. (The Malaysian Insider). Read the rest of this entry »
Malaysians Abroad Should Not Vote
Posted by Kit in Bakri Musa, Elections on Monday, 7 November 2011, 10:56 am
by M. Bakri Musa
Malaysians abroad are misguided and plain wrong in agitating for exercising their right to vote in Malaysian elections.
I can the see the validity for students, diplomats and others on temporary assignment abroad demanding such rights, but then they already have them. For others, especially those who have acquired permanent resident status elsewhere, their clamor for retaining their right to vote in Malaysian elections is misplaced for at least three major reasons.
The first and most important is that since they do not live in Malaysia, they would not have to bear the burden of the consequences of their voting decision. Second, those Malaysians are essentially seeking representation without taxation; that is presumptuous. Third, since they had sought permanent residency status abroad, their focus should now be to prove to their new host country that they are deserving of such a status. Meaning, they should focus their attention, indeed loyalty, to their new adopted land. Read the rest of this entry »
Tunisia’s Islamist-led government rejects laws to enforce religion
Posted by Kit in Islam, Islamic state, Middle East/Africa on Sunday, 6 November 2011, 5:13 pm
Al Arabiya News
Saturday, 05 November 2011
Tom Heneghan
TUNIS REUTERS
Tunisia’s Islamist-led government will focus on democracy, human rights and a free-market economy in planned changes to the constitution, effectively leaving religion out of the text it will draw up, party leaders said.
The government, due to be announced next week, will not introduce sharia or other Islamic concepts to alter the secular nature of the constitution in force when Tunisia’s Arab Spring revolution ousted autocrat Zine al-Abidine Ben Ali in January.
“We are against trying to impose a particular way of life,” Ennahda leader Rachid Ghannouchi, 70, a lifelong Islamist activist jailed and exiled under previous regimes, told Reuters.
Tunisian and foreign critics of Ennahda, the moderate Islamist party that won 41.7 percent of Tunisia’s first free election on Oct. 23, have voiced fears it would try to impose religious principles on this relatively secular Muslim country. Read the rest of this entry »
When will four MCA Ministers make the formal proposal in Cabinet to make English a compulsory pass subject for SPM?
I welcome the proposal by the MCA President Datuk Seri Dr. Chua Soi Lek to make English a compulsory pass subject for SPM, although it was a decade after I had made such a proposal.
On 18th May 2002, in expressing the DAP’s full support for the then Prime Minister, Datuk Seri Dr. Mahathir Mohamad’s call to Malaysian students to master English as “necessary for communications essential to keep abreast of developments in the technical fields such as engineering and science”, I had gone one step further in proposing making pass in English compulsory in SPM, STPM and matriculation.
This is what I said some 10 years ago:
“The government has been talking about the decline of the standard of English language in the past two decades and the urgent need to arrest it, but it had nothing to show for the results. Read the rest of this entry »
Mozilla, Microsoft Withdraw Trust in Malaysian Intermediate CA
By John Ribeiro, IDG News
PCWorld
Mozilla and Microsoft said Thursday they are revoking trust in all certificates issued by Digicert, a Malaysian intermediate certificate authority (CA) , after it was found that it had issued 22 certificates with weak 512-bit keys and missing certificate extensions and revocation information.
The Malaysian company was issued an intermediate CA certificate in July, 2010 by Entrust in Dallas, Texas, which was licensed for distribution with SSL (Secure Sockets Layer) and S/MIME (Secure/Multipurpose Internet Mail Extensions) certificates.
Entrust said in a bulletin on its website that it had been discovered that Digicert Malaysia has issued certificates with weak 512-bit RSA keys and missing certificate extensions. Entrust has revoked the 512-bit certificates issued by Digicert and made them available to major browser vendors to blacklist if found appropriate, it added.
Digicert in Malaysia does not have any relationship with DigiCert, a CA based in Utah.
Read the rest of this entry »
Nazri talking through his hat!
Posted by Kit in Constitution, Human Rights, university on Saturday, 5 November 2011, 2:00 pm
By P. Ramakrishnan, Aliran’s President
4 Nov 2011
Nazri has given expression to the saying, “Talking through the hat!” That was what he was doing when he rather foolishly commented on the majority decision of the Court of Appeal which ruled in a landmark case that Section 15(5)(a) of the Universities and University Colleges Act was unconstitutional.
In spite of the Court of Appeal’s ruling, for the Minister of Law to insist that “it does not invalidate the Act” and to dismiss the Court’s decision as “an opinion in passing” is appalling and shocking, exposing his alarming ignorance of the judicial process.
Section 15(5)(a) has been invalidated as unconstitutional by the Court of Appeal ruling – which means that the provisions of that section are no longer applicable and cannot be enforced. That section, as a result of the Court’s decision, is void and invalid.
It is a binding decision and cannot be dismissed merely as “an opinion of the Court” without any consequence. Until and unless the Federal Court overturns or sets aside this ruling – thus upholding the High Court decision – no power on earth professing the democratic tradition can ignore this decision. It is as simple as that!
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