Zero tolerance for racism or zero action?
Posted by Kit in nation building on Monday, 6 September 2010, 9:58 pm
By Thomas Lee
It is nearly a month since the controversial racist remarks allegedly made by Johor school principal Siti Inshah Mansor on 12 August 2010 was highlighted in the media, but no action has so far been taken on the case.
On the contrary, the case involving 27-year-old rapper Wee Meng Chee, popularly known as Namewee, who last week uploaded a video titled “Nah” on the YouTube criticizing Siti Inshah’s alleged racist remarks uttered against students, was investigated straight away by the Malaysian Communications and Multimedia Commission (MCMC), which questioned him for more than seven hours.
It was reported that the police also went to Meng Chee’s house in Muar 15 minutes before midnight on the eve of the 53rd Merdeka celebration, leading him to post this message on his Facebook: “3 POLICE CARS FINALLY CAME TO MY MUAR HOME TO ARREST ME***** this happened 15 minutes before our 53rd National Day Celebration. YES, I’m still here but for how long more, I don’t know … my beloved MALAYSIA, where is our justice system?! (THIS IS NOT A JOKE)”.
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What social contract?
Posted by Kit in 1Malaysia, Constitution, nation building on Monday, 6 September 2010, 4:02 pm
by Clive Kessler
Malaysian Insider
September 06, 2010
“Najib warns against questioning ‘social contract’,” it is reported.
This claim is plain and simple “historical revisionism”.
To what “social contract” precisely is the PM referring?
In the 1980s a new political idea was created: that of “Ketuanan Melayu”, of Malay ascendancy, supremacy, domination.
Thereafter, especially from 2008 it has been ever more powerfully promoted, generally in association with the suggestion that a “social contract” had been entered into and constitutionally enshrined in the mid-1950s.
How was this manoeuvre executed? With what purpose and consequences? Read the rest of this entry »
Is Najib prepared to put his 1Malaysia policy to the test by leading a nation-wide “Say No to Racism” campaign starting with errant Umno leaders, government officials and Utusan Malaysia?
Although the Director-General of Education Tan Sri Alimuddin Mohd Dom has issued a circular dated August 26 to all school principals and teachers warning of action to be taken for racist remarks in schools, the absence of action against the two school principals in Johore and Kedah who had made racist remarks stands out like a sore thumb.
More than three weeks have passed and both principals had not yet been referred to the police, let alone the Attorney-General’s Chambers.
This is totally at variance with the “Zero tolerance for racism” belatedly made by the Prime Minister two weeks after the deplorable incidents involving the two school principals.
The Prime Minister should realize that the escalation of the rhetoric of race and religion makes a total mockery of his 1Malaysia slogan, one reason why there is so little national enthusiasm for the Natioal Month theme of “1Malaysia – Transforming the Nation”.
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Improve Our Schools, Not Tinker With Examinations
Posted by Kit in Bakri Musa, Education on Monday, 6 September 2010, 10:35 am
In about two weeks nearly half a million Malaysian school children will be sitting for their UPSR, the national examination taken at the end of Year Six. Today there is raging debate on abolishing this as well as the PMR (taken at Year Nine) examination. A decision is expected within weeks. There is however, minimal discussion on the timing of these examinations, administered as they are so early in the school year.
This year UPSR will be on September 20th, with PMR two weeks later. From then till the year-end holidays in late November, there will be no effective teaching or learning at these schools. With the examinations out of the way, the entire school – students and staff – will already be in holiday mode. The staff will effectively be makan gaji buta (paid but not working).
Come January when these students begin their classes, they would have already suffered through considerable attrition in their learning skills as a result of the three-month hiatus. The first few weeks if not months would be diverted to re-learning lessons of the preceding grade.
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Call for return of civility, reason and rationality in public discourse and an end to any form of racial or religious slurs in public domain particularly on the social media and Internet
Posted by Kit in IT, nation building on Sunday, 5 September 2010, 1:06 pm
The rise and frequency of instances of racial and religious slurs in the public domain particularly on the social media and the Internet must be a matter of grave concern to all Malaysians.
All right-thinking Malaysians regardless of political affiliation should join hands to call and work for a return of civility, reason and rationality in public discourse and an end to any form of racial or religious slurs particularly on the social media and Internet.
The quality of Malaysian public discourse must not be degraded and sullied by lies and falsehoods, racial bigotry and religious intolerance which can only undermine and subvert the very fabric of Malaysian society.
The Prime Minister, Datuk Seri Najib Razak has called for speedier action by the Malaysian Communications and Multimedia Commission (MCMC) against those who post racial or religious slurs and misuse the social networking websites.
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Seeing the back of Musa: An answer to a prayer
Posted by Kit in Police, Tunku Abdul Aziz on Sunday, 5 September 2010, 10:46 am
I hardly ever receive presents because, I suppose, I rarely ever give any. I do not even bother to celebrate my own birthday; it comes and goes completely unnoticed. When on the odd occasion I do receive a present for delivering an anti-corruption and ethical governance speech, I treasure it even though it is just another Royal Selangor pewter plate, to clutter my already-cluttered sitting room, collecting dust, to the annoyance of my long-suffering wife.
The present I am now writing about is infinitely more precious, a bountiful God’s munificent blessings in answer to a nation’s desperate prayer. The prayer, in short, beseeches God the Almighty to give Hishammuddin Hussein, our often “not all there” Minister of Home Affairs, the courage and wisdom to put Musa Hassan out to pasture, not so much as a normal and inevitable consequence of the ravages of time, but, in this case, his unethical baggage had grown too large for the nation to ignore. That must surely weigh heavily against his fitness for continued employment.
In an ethically more demanding society, which ours, I fear, is not, he would never have been allowed to darken the portal of Bukit Aman, let alone occupy the office of the Inspector-General of Police, a position of trust. Musa should never have been appointed the nation’s top dog in the first place, especially after his remarkable stellar performance in the infamous earlier Anwar Ibrahim trial, appearing complete with his pathetic stock in trade or prop in the shape of a decidedly grubby mattress, for the entire world to see.
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Revisiting the Bumiputera corporate equity issue
More than five years have passed since the Asli corporate study report revealed that Bumiputera ownership of corporate equity in the Kuala Lumpur Stock Exchange had exceeded the 30 per cent target.
The study’s findings of a 45 per cent Bumiputera share were based on a different method of measurement compared with the official one. Using market value as opposed to the par value valuation official method, and allocating the equity of GLCs according to racial share, the study noted that it was time to do away with the policy which had been implemented since the 1970s.
The study’s findings raised a hue and cry not only because it challenged the official data on the share equity attained by the Malay community but more importantly because it challenged the official orthodoxy.
Strong reactions from various Umno leaders at that time indicated their fury — and perhaps fear — that the Asli study negated a long-held belief on how the Bumiputera corporate equity strategy was necessary for Bumiputera economic advancement and synonymous with the interests of the Malays.
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No place for God?
By Thomas Lee
Professor Stephen William Hawking, the author of the 1988 runaway world best seller A Brief History of Time, has declared the dreadful finality that there is no place for God in theories on the creation of the Universe.
Britain’s most famous theoretical physicist and cosmologist had asserted previously that a belief in a creator was not inapposite with science, but in his latest book The Grand Design, he deduces that the so-called Big Bang was an ineluctable consequence of the laws of physics.
According to wire news reports this week, Hawking says in his new book, being serialized in The Times of London, that there is no need to invoke God to set the Universe going.
“Spontaneous creation is the reason there is something,” Hawking said in the book co-written by US physicist Leonard Mlodinow, challenging Sir Isaac Newton’s conviction that the Universe must have a designer or creator as it could not simply have emerged out of nothing and chaos.
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Some Mothers Do ‘Ave ‘Em
Posted by Kit in Teoh Beng Hock, Tunku Abdul Aziz on Saturday, 4 September 2010, 7:08 pm
What a charade. And what tragic depths of professional incompetence the recent resumption of the coroner’s inquiry into the death of Teoh Beng Hock had demonstrated for the world to see. There is a lot to laugh at in Najib’s 1Malaysia, but sadly for all the wrong reasons.
As an observer, sometimes jaundiced, of the Malaysian scene, I thought I had seen it all, but I was totally unprepared for the complete and utter mayhem of the senses that developed when Abdul Razak Musa of the MACC’s in house legal talent began his cross examination of Dr Pornthip Rojanasunand, the famous Thai pathologist. His attempt to trivialise and discredit her academic credentials was pathetic, to say the least. It backfired disastrously on him.
It showed the true measure of this sad figure of fun and ridicule who claimed to possess 24 years experience as a lawyer under the belt. I have never been impressed with experience, however long, for its own sake, not unless there is clear evidence of a string of successes to back up the claim.
Abdul Razak Musa has proved my point that years spent wallowing in the mediocrity of a professionally undemanding environment counts for naught.
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Why double standards against Namewee, questioned for over 10 hours, for his anti-racist outburst as compared to treatment for the two errant school principals?
Posted by Kit in nation building on Saturday, 4 September 2010, 4:30 pm
Four questions need to be asked in the Nameweek’s “Nah” videoclip controversy.
Firstly, is the three-minute video “Nah” uploaded on YouTube by rapper Wee Meng Chee better known as Namewee seditious? I would say no.
Secondly, is the video racist? I would also say no, unless an anti-racist response has also become “racist” in the way that former Prime Minister Tun Dr. Mahathir Mohamad wants Malaysians to believe that meritocracy has become a form of racism.
Thirdly, is the video crude, vulgar, abusive and even obscene? Yes. I have said twice publicly that I do not approve of the crude, vulgar, abusive and even obscene style used by Namewee but that is different from saying that it is seditious or racist and deserves the harshest criminal action to be taken against Meng Chee.
This is also why I cannot agree with the public stand of the MCA President Datuk Seri Chua Soi Lek who declared on National Day eve that MCA fully supports any action taken by the government against Meng Chee. Does this include action under the Sedition Act or other capital offences?
How can the MCA leadership with four Ministers in Cabinet take such an irresponsible position, giving a blank cheque to racists and extremists to set the agenda as to the punishment that should be meted out to Meng Chee? Isn’t this a gross abdication of responsibility in government?
The fourth question is whether Meng Chee is the victim of double standards by the authorities? Read the rest of this entry »
Teo says surau row nadir in her life
Posted by Kit in DAP, Islam, nation building on Saturday, 4 September 2010, 12:41 pm
By Debra Chong
September 04, 2010
The Malaysian Insider
PETALING JAYA, Sept 4 — Serdang MP Teo Nie Ching has revealed that she broke down over her surau visit controversy because she thought she had done something to make the Malays hate DAP and caused terrible hardship to the surau committee members.
The young first-term MP told The Malaysian Insider yesterday that the row had been the lowest point in her life.
But yesterday, she looked the epitome of confidence in her bold red dress and big toothy smile as she strode into the DAP national headquarters.
It was in stark contrast to the abject figure she cut a week ago after national Malay daily, Utusan Malaysia , front-paged a picture of her — a non-Muslim — addressing a Muslim group from inside the inner sanctum of a surau, dressed in a kebaya reminiscent of the Singapore Girl uniform and with her head uncovered.
The stunt earned her the Sultan of Selangor’s wrath, the paper reported.
“I cried,” the 29-year-old lawmaker admitted plainly to The Malaysian Insider in an exclusive interview, after reading the report. Read the rest of this entry »
‘Namewee is a uniting factor’
Posted by Kit in nation building on Friday, 3 September 2010, 9:55 pm
Mariam Mokhtar
Malaysian Mirror
Friday, 03 September 2010
If Namewee (Wee Meng Chee) is prosecuted for his music-video, then two mixed messages are being sent out by the government: The first is that the authorities practise double-standards. The second is that it was only because of Namewee’s ‘intervention’ that the government sat up and took racism seriously.
On Wednesday, it was reported that the rapper was being investigated by the police for sedition. Various ministers and a menteri besar also want Namewee punished for his controversial video.
In the first place, Namewee made this clip because of the government’s slow response to tackle effectively the latest racist incident. It appears that we are now united, against racism.
Far from being seditious or racist, Namewee has done the job of the government in exposing all that is ‘ugly’ about us. Read the rest of this entry »
Hishamuddin should not act both as prosecutor and judge to pass judgment that Nurul Izzah had committed the offence of sedition, dictating and usurping the powers of the Police, AG’s Chambers and judiciary
I am shocked that the Home Minister, Datuk Seri Hishammuddin Hussein has acted both as prosecutor and judge to unilaterally and arbitrarily pass judgment that the PKR MP for Lembah Pantai, Nurul Izzah Anwar has committed the offence of sedition for questioning the entrenched sensitive issue of Article 153 of the Constitution with her challenge to Perkasa to a debate on “Malaysia or Malaysaja?”
As Home Minister, with responsibility over the police, it is a gross abuse of power on his part to dictate or usurp the powers of the Police, Attorney-General’s Chambers and the judiciary by passing judgment that Nurul had committed the offence of sedition in questioning the entrenched sensitive issue of Article 153 and therefore deserves to be arrested, charged, tried and convicted for sedition.
Police reports lodged against Nurul Izzah for committing the offence of sedition by questioning Article 153 do not mean that she had done so, and it is most irresponsible and reckless on the part of Hishammuddin as Home Minister to assume that Nurul Izzah is guilty as charged in the police reports against her.
As Home Minister, Hishammuddin must be professional and rise above party politics.
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Rising racism, 53 years on
Posted by Kit in nation building on Friday, 3 September 2010, 10:38 am
This year, I became a senior citizen. I can now withdraw my EPF savings and I qualify for some discounts for travel and surprisingly even for some buffet meals at some eateries.
But as I ponder upon ‘retirement’, it is sad to see the Malaysia that I know and live in, grows increasingly uncertain, diffident and bogged down in self-made crises, one after another.
Our previously phenomenal economic growth has now trickled down in a dizzying spiral of middle-income trap – not helped by the 2008 global financial crisis.
Our foreign direct investments have dwindled as our competitiveness, our productivity, perhaps our systemic corruption and wastage, have now been exposed and called into question.
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Hardtalk or money talks? Saga of the aborted RPK interview
Posted by Kit in Media, Raja Petra Kamaruddin on Thursday, 2 September 2010, 4:21 pm
Hardtalk is a flagship BBC television programme that has gained a large global audience due to its style of tough questioning.
According to its media note, Hardtalk “asks the difficult questions and gets behind the stories that make the news — from international political leaders to entertainers; from corporate decision-makers to ordinary individuals facing huge challenges.”
This reputation of independence and fearlessly getting the stories behind the news is now blotted.
On Aug 10, Nicholas Davis Blakemore, BBC planning editor sent an e-mail note to Raja Petra Kamarudin asking if he would be interested in appearing in Hardtalk.
Following confirmation from RPK (readers can read the full correspondence here), the live interview was to have been conducted on Sept 1.
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Ersatz moderation will not suffice, PM
Posted by Kit in Najib Razak, nation building on Thursday, 2 September 2010, 4:18 pm
By G. Krishnan
Surely any right-minded Malaysian will find it impossible to disagree with the prime minister that we cannot allow racism to destroy us. And surely all of us who cherish the virtues of moderation must find ourselves whole-heartedly agreeing with the prime minister that we cannot allow extreme attitudes on racial and religious issues to compromise national unity.
As such, it is precisely for these reasons, Mr. Prime Minister that moderates such as myself continue to remain perplexed and puzzled about the glaring discrepancy that continues to persist between the messages you espouse and the reality that persists in the manner your government conducts itself.
I must admit, I was struck by your re-affirmation of the principles of the Rukun Negara; something that merely one month ago, I noted in one of my articles should be given far greater prominence in our national culture, especially in place of the religious one-upmanship.
To be precise, I stated that,
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Before Khairy demands that Wee Meng Chee be taught a lesson, will he surrender himself to the police for criminal charges to be preferred against him for his previous racist statements?
I had said that Wee Meng Chee can be faulted for being crude, vulgar, abusive and even obscene at the disgust and fury of his 3-minute rap video directed at the school principal of Sekolah Menengah Kebangsaan Tunku Abdul Rahman Putra, Kulai, Hajah Siti Inshah binti Mansor, for making racist, derogatory and seditious remarks like: “Pelajar-pelajar Cina tidak diperlukan dan boleh balik ke China ataupun Sekolah Foon Yew. Bagi pelajar India, tali sembahyang yang diikat di pergelangan tangan dan leher pelajar nampak seakan anjing dan hanya anjing akan mengikat seperti itu.”
However, the police has still to explain why they are investigating Wee for sedition when there is nothing seditious in his rap video against the Kulai and Bukit Selambau school principals for making racist slurs against students especially when the school principals concerned are still scot-free for their seditious statements.
I had myself been arrested and investigated for sedition and DAP National Chairman Karpal Singh had been arrested, charged and acquitted of sedition – just two examples of the gross abuse of powers and double-standards in the country.
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Malaysia in the Era of Globalization #30
Posted by Kit in Bakri Musa, globalisation on Thursday, 2 September 2010, 11:05 am
Chapter 4: Modern Model States
The Relevant Lessons For Malaysia (Cont’d)
A few years ago I was a guest teacher for the senior class in the school near my village in Malaysia where I once taught briefly as a temporary teacher. What an experience! I was taken aback at how passive and quiet the class was. There was no spunk or energy. In an attempt to stimulate some discussions I uttered some really silly and outrageous remarks just to get a reaction. Alas, none was forthcoming.
These students had such reverence for their teachers that they did not dare question me. More startling, when one brave soul attempted to challenge my statement, the others quickly put her down, saying in effect that questioning what I said was tantamount to being disrespectful, and thus sinful. It is this psychological effect imparted by the religious teachers that is so devastating.
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Ismail takes over from Musa as new IGP
Deputy IGP Ismail Omar 2b new IGP as Musa Hassan’s contract will not be extended 3rd time. Will Musa b apptd Ambassador to nearby country?
09/01/2010 06:06 PM
Congrats 2new IGP.DAP/PR prepared 2fully co-operate 2introduce democratic policing n create efficient, professional world-class police force
09/01/2010 06:12 PM
Ismail takes over from Musa as new IGP
By Asrul Hadi Abdullah Sani | The Malaysian Insider
September 01, 2010
KUALA LUMPUR, Sept 1 – Tan Sri Ismail Omar will replace Tan Sri Musa Hassan as the country’s new Inspector-General of Police, Home Minister Datuk Seri Hishammuddin Hussein announced today.
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Mahathir is the major obstacle to Najib’s 1Malaysia and National Transformation Agenda
Posted by Kit in 1Malaysia, Mahathir, Najib Razak, nation building, NEM, NEP on Wednesday, 1 September 2010, 1:32 pm
Former Prime Minister Tun Dr. Mahathir Mohamad blogged on the 53rd National Day eve that “today the races are more divided than ever”.
The implications of Mahathir’s statement merits attention.
Here we have the country’s longest-serving Prime Minister in fact telling the current Prime Minister, Datuk Seri Najib Razak that despite this year’s Merdeka Month theme: “1Malaysia: Transforming the Nation” and the latter’s 1Malaysia policy and National Transformation Programme for 18 months since assuming the highest office in the land in April last year, national unity and inter-racial relations had never been so bad at present as compared to any time in the 22 years Mahathir had been Prime Minister from 1981 – 2003.
Would Najib agree to this Mahathir assessment as the present Prime Minister was during those 22 years of Mahathir premiership either Pahang Mentri Besar or a Cabinet Minister, starting as Minister for Youth and Sports before being appointed to Education and later Defence portfolios – while in Umno, occupying the posts of Umno Youth Leader (especially during the Operation Lalang years) and Umno National Vice President from 1995-2003?
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