Najib should set up Royal Commission of Inquiry to investigate whether Mahathir had “wasted or burned up” RM100 billion on grandiose projects and corruption in his 22 years as Prime Minister
Posted by Kit in Mahathir, Najib Razak on Monday, 21 December 2009, 1:04 pm
Why is the government of Prime Minister, Datuk Seri Najib Razak, holding up for more than three weeks the release of 800 copies of a new biography of former Prime Minister, Tun Dr. Mahathir Mohamad by former Asian Wall Street Journal managing editor Barry Wain?
There can be no doubt that Mahathir and Najib would have already read the biography, “Malaysian Maverick: Mahathir Mohamad in Turbulent Times”.
Is either of them objecting to the release of Wain’s biography of Mahathir and want it banned like Mahathir’s “Malay Dilemma” when it was first published in 1970? This will be the irony of ironies.
Both should know that the year 2009, very soon to become 2010, in this Internet era and age of information and communications technology is very different from four decades ago in 1970 and any ban or censorship of Wain’s new biography will make it even more popular among Malaysians.
Read the rest of this entry »
Pakatan Rakyat all set to do battle for Putrajaya
Posted by Kit in Pakatan Rakyat on Monday, 21 December 2009, 12:58 pm
COMMENT
by Thomas Lee
20 December 2009
The Pakatan Rakyat (PR), the still informal political coalition comprising the DAP, PKR and PAS, has taken the first big step to formalise its status to be a viable, vibrant and vigilant alternative to the current ruling Barisan Nasional (BN) coalition.
The PR held its first national convention in Shah Alam on Saturday 19 December 2009, and made a public declaration that its set target for the next general election is nothing less than the takeover of Putrajaya.
One thousand five hundred delegates, comprising 500 grassroots leaders from all over the country representing each of the three component parties of the PR, enthusiastically heeded the clarion call to prepare for the electroral battle of Putrajaya, scheduled before early 2013 or perhaps even earlier. Read the rest of this entry »
From Copenhagen to Sabah: 1Earth, 1Climate Change; 1Najib?
Posted by Kit in environment, Letters, Najib Razak, Sabah on Monday, 21 December 2009, 8:53 am
By Saves DK
From Copenhagen to Sabah – Does the threat of Climate Change ‘change’ according to Time Zones?
Dear Prime Minister Najib Razak,
Once again, we welcome your serious and determined efforts to reduce carbon emission to help halt global warming in the interests of our future generations.
Surely, the first important step to CUTTING (rather than increasing) carbon emission is to cancel the proposed coal power plant to be built in Felda Sahabat, Lahad Datu, which is very close to the various pristine, precious natural paradise of Darvel Bay, Coral Triangle Initiative, Tabin Wildlife Conservation area and so on, which make the East Coast of Sabah one of the remaining natural treasures of the world.
You have asked for our views “on what more we can do to ensure a greener Malaysia, so that we can learn from each other.” Great! Here are some. We do not dream that you would actually ‘learn’ from humble Sabahans like us, but we would be very grateful already if you could at least be consistent in your position on climate change and coal.
Read the rest of this entry »
Copenhagen Negotiators Bicker and Filibuster While the Biosphere Burns
Posted by Kit in environment on Sunday, 20 December 2009, 8:42 pm
George Monbiot despairs at the chaotic, disastrous denouement of a chaotic and disastrous climate summit
The Guardian/UK
Saturday, December 19, 2009
by George Monbiot
First they put the planet in square brackets, now they have deleted it from the text. At the end it was no longer about saving the biosphere: it was just a matter of saving face. As the talks melted down, everything that might have made a new treaty worthwhile was scratched out. Any deal would do, as long as the negotiators could pretend they have achieved something. A clearer and less destructive treaty than the text that emerged would be a sheaf of blank paper, which every negotiating party solemnly sits down to sign.
This was the chaotic, disastrous denouement of a chaotic and disastrous summit. The event has been attended by historic levels of incompetence. Delegates arriving from the tropics spent 10 hours queueing in sub-zero temperatures without shelter, food or drink, let alone any explanation or announcement, before being turned away. Some people fainted from exposure; it’s surprising that no one died. The process of negotiation was just as obtuse: there was no evidence here of the innovative methods of dispute resolution developed recently by mediators and coaches, just the same old pig-headed wrestling.
Read the rest of this entry »
The Truths Copenhagen Ignored
Posted by Kit in environment on Sunday, 20 December 2009, 8:31 pm
by Johann Hari
The Independent/UK December 19, 2009
So that’s it. The world’s worst polluters – the people who are drastically altering the climate – gathered here in Copenhagen to announce they were going to carry on cooking, in defiance of all the scientific warnings.
They didn’t seal the deal; they sealed the coffin for the world’s low-lying islands, its glaciers, its North Pole, and millions of lives.
Those of us who watched this conference with open eyes aren’t surprised. Every day, practical, intelligent solutions that would cut our emissions of warming gases have been offered by scientists, developing countries and protesters – and they have been systematically vetoed by the governments of North America and Europe.
It’s worth recounting a few of the ideas that were summarily dismissed – because when the world finally resolves to find a real solution, we will have to revive them.
Discarded Idea One: The International Environmental Court. Any cuts that leaders claim they would like as a result of Copenhagen will be purely voluntary. If a government decides not to follow them, nothing will happen, except a mild blush, and disastrous warming. Canada signed up to cut its emissions at Kyoto, and then increased them by 26 per cent – and there were no consequences. Copenhagen could unleash a hundred Canadas. Read the rest of this entry »
The Policies of Pakatan Rakyat
Posted by Kit in Pakatan Rakyat on Saturday, 19 December 2009, 9:24 pm
The Policies of Pakatan Rakyat that was unanimously adopted today at the 1st Pakatan Rakyat Convention at Auditorium MBSA, Shah Alam.
The Policies of Pakatan Rakyat
-
Transparent and Genuine Democracy
- Constitutionalism and the Rule of Law
- Separation of Powers
- A Clean, Free and Fair Electoral System
-
Driving a High Performance, Sustainable and Equitable Economy Read the rest of this entry »
Why nobody in government starting from Najib has ever talked about “zero tolerance for corruption” to demonstrate their seriousness about battling corruption?
Posted by Kit in Corruption, Najib Razak on Friday, 18 December 2009, 8:06 pm
I visited the public display of the various laboratories of the Government Transformation Programme (GTP) at Sunway Pyramid Convention Centre, Petaling Jaya today.
I was pleasantly surprised that some of the concepts and objectives which I had espoused both in and out of Parliament have found their way into the initiatives proposed – which is a different matter about their implementation.
The laboratory on “Battling Corruption” referred to “zero tolerance for corruption” while the laboratory on “Fighting Crime” referred to battling the people’s “fear of crime”.
When I had advocated the former, it had elicited indifferent response while in the latter, there was negative reaction in the form of righteous denial there was ever the problem of the “fear of crime” among Malaysians in the country.
When visiting the various Key Performance Index (KPI) and National Key Results Area (NKRA) laboratories, the foremost question is whether there had been a real change of heart by the Barisan Nasional government, followed quickly by a flurry of other questions, such as:
Read the rest of this entry »
Why not a single Minister from MCA, Gerakan, MIC, SUPP, Sabah and Sarawak dare to be as outspoken as Nazri to speak out against racism as well as BTN and Utusan Malaysia’s racist outpourings which subverts the very basis of a multi-racial Malaysian nation?
Posted by Kit in MCA, nation building, UMNO on Thursday, 17 December 2009, 12:07 pm
Minister in the Prime Minister’s Department, Datuk Seri Nazri Aziz is proving to be a political leader of surprises, not only with his bold and courageous denunciation of Biro Tata Negara (BTN) divisive, racist and seditious indoctrination course but in speaking out forthrightly against Utusan Malaysia’s unadulterated racism.
Condemning Utusan Malaysia for its “outdated” racist propaganda, Nazri said the Umno-owned newspaper must accept that Malaysia is a multi-racial country.
It is a tragic and terrible commentary on the success of the nation-building process that 52 years after nationhood, a national daily which is owned by UMNO, the party in power in the past five decades, has refused to accept that Malaysia is a multi-racial country and continue to call Chinese as immigrants and Indians with derogatory terms like “keling”.
With such racist mindset and mentality in the corridors of power, Najib’s 1Malaysia concept and policy has no meaning whatsoever, and it is no wonder that the public preview of the 1Malaysia programme for the seven National Key Results Area (NKRA) initiatives today has to be put off.
Read the rest of this entry »
Utusan Malaysia: Messenger of hate and spite on religion and race
Posted by Kit in Letters, Media, nation building on Thursday, 17 December 2009, 11:37 am
by Dr Lim Teck Ghee
Sitting today in a small group international meeting on the subject of the linkages between religion and development being held in Phnom Penh, I am engaged in deep discussion on how to build inter-faith synergies that can effectively address the many pressing challenges of the region.
The group of 15 participants from different faiths and religions (I am possibly the sole atheist participant) includes three Muslim activist colleagues. They are the country director of Muslim Aid from Bangladesh; a Muhammadiyah senior lecturer from the State Institute for Islamic Studies in Walinsongo Semarang, Indonesia; and the executive director of a Muslim-based organization Ummah Fi Salam based in Mindanao that has been working on an interfaith programme called ‘Building Darusalam’ or ‘peace communities’.
Present also is a Muslim senior lecturer from the National University of Singapore who is actively involved with giving voice to professional Muslim women in Singapore.
Read the rest of this entry »
BTN and the price of indoctrination
Posted by Kit in Azly Rahman, nation building on Thursday, 17 December 2009, 7:02 am
By Azly Rahman
What price indoctrination? Herein lies the question on the RM550 million spent over 10 years on a civic-consciousness programme that turned out to be a project of instilling fear into the Malays – fear of their own shadow and fear of other races.
The Biro Tatanegara (BTN) courses use Russian-styled pseudo-scientific pop psychology, drawn from the work of Bulgarian mind-bending experts in ‘suggestopedia’ developed by Lozanov and Barzakov with creative visualisation para-psychological techniques, into which the mind is emptied before propaganda is funnelled.
When the mind is half-asleep, subconscious wide awake, the body is relaxed, the room darkened, the voice of the propagandist-facilitator reigns supreme, suggesting anything to ensure that the doped, docile, and domesticated mind enters a game of master-slave narrative.
Read the rest of this entry »
The postponement of the 1Malaysia NKRA concept will overshadow the public exhibition of the six NKRA initiatives tomorrow
Posted by Kit in Najib Razak on Wednesday, 16 December 2009, 2:14 pm
Malaysian Insider reports that the Cabinet has failed to reach a consensus on the National Key Results Area (NKRA) initiatives for 1Malaysia to implement racial unity and national integration proposals, resulting in the postponement of the public preview of the 1Malaysia initiative which has been scheduled for the next two days along with the display of the six other NKRA programmes.
Because of the failure of reach a consensus at the special Cabinet retreat on Sunday, the only element that will be on display will be the general framework of the 1Malaysia concept.
As it is, the Cabinet’s irresolution and indecisive action over the divisive, racist and seditious Biro Tata Negara (BTN) indoctrination course would have overshadowed the public exhibition of the seven NKRA initiatives tomorrow.
The postponement of the 1Malaysia initiative in the public presentation of Najib’s 1Malaysia concept and the other six NKRAs will have the effect of being thunderous in its absence, raising in a most fundamental manner questions of whether Najib’s 1Malaysia concept and slogan really means anything serious or different to the people apart from publicity and propaganda.
Read the rest of this entry »
Malaysia current ills and future solution?
Posted by Kit in Education, Letters, nation building on Wednesday, 16 December 2009, 10:56 am
By Michael Yeo
There are reports of mass migration of Malaysian to overseas, and the Malaysian per capita income is decreasing. The country economy lacks foreign investments due to incorrect policies taken in 1989. The Asian Tigers – Thailand, China, Taiwan, S Korea, Japan, and Vietnam is all vying for foreign investments and aggressively pursuing value-added export market. With the potential oil production in Cambodia from 2011 (estimated), Malaysia will be relegated to the bottom in the ladder. Globalisation does not discriminate against any nation, but they will shy away from countries where her Governments have acted against the flow of capital. The oil asset is fast dwindling in Malaysia.
Malaysia is going backward; this is not a surprised as bad policies in educations, corruptions, cronyism, political systems that give rise to self imposed racism are all present in this dysfunctional state. Let me elaborate:
Present political divides
Read the rest of this entry »
Why Hishammuddin continue to condone Utusan Malaysia’s utter contempt of the truth, rules and ethics of journalism, and the law in purveying unadulterated venom, poison and sedition in falsely alleging that DAP wants to create a Malaysian republic?
Posted by Kit in Law & Order, Media on Tuesday, 15 December 2009, 3:07 pm
The homily by the Home Minister, Datuk Seri Hishammuddin Hussein on what constitutes good journalism and what differentiates local journalists and “some bloggers” is mind-boggling to say the least.
Hishammudin said some bloggers, unlike local journalists, do not adhere to the rules and ethics of journalism in their bid to garner popularity.
“The local journalists adhered to ethics but these bloggers did not, and this was what differentiated the journalists from these bloggers.”
Speaking at the presentation of the 2009 ExxonMobil Journalism Awards in Kuala Terengganu last night, Hishammuddin said journalists in the country would have nothing to fear so long as their reports adhered to the ethics of journalism, adding that they would be accepted by the people.
Read the rest of this entry »
Greatest disappointment that Najib failed to “walk the talk” with concrete action whether on recognition of Unified Examination Certificate or institutionalize government funding of Independent Chinese Secondary Schools
Posted by Kit in Education, Najib Razak on Tuesday, 15 December 2009, 11:44 am
Yesterday, the Chinese press gave front page headline treatment to the Prime Minister Datuk Seri Najib Razak’s message for the 90th anniversary celebrations of the Chong Hwa Independent High School in Kuala Lumpur, but this has been replaced with deep disappointment and sadness that the Prime Minister has again failed to “walk the talk” like his “1Malaysia. People First. Performance Now” motto, his pledge to front-line transparency and to combat corruption.
Najib’s message for the Chong Hwa Independent High School 90th anniversary celebrations souvenir publication stands out as the best message ever given by any Prime Minister in the past five decades, crediting the Chinese Independent Secondary Schools as “important national assets” not only of the Chinese in Malaysia but of the country and extolling their contributions to nation building particularly in human resource development.
This has raised sky-high expectations that Najib would announce concrete actions to “walk the talk” of his message and it was a great disappointment all round that he attended the Chong Hwa Independent High School 90th anniversary dinner last night completely empty-handed.
Read the rest of this entry »
Rejected: Motion on lower Petronas profits
Posted by Kit in Oil, Parliament on Monday, 14 December 2009, 5:49 pm
Rahmah Ghazali | Dec 14, 09 4:12pm | Malaysiakini
Opposition Leader Anwar Ibrahim failed in his bid today to move a motion in the Dewan Rakyat to debate the significant dip in the profits of national oil and gas company Petronas.
Deputy speaker Wan Junaidi Jaafar decided that the matter is not sufficiently urgent to be debated, although it is an issue of public importance.
Unhappy with the outcome, Anwar (PKR-Permatang Pauh) pointed out that it is important for the House to debate an issue which will have a huge impact on the economy.
Petronas’ net profit before tax for the first half of the financial year was RM31.2 billion, compared to RM63.3 billion in the same period last year, he said.
Read the rest of this entry »
Enhancing The Role of Private Sector in Education – Part 3
Posted by Kit in Bakri Musa, Education on Monday, 14 December 2009, 9:25 am
[Third of Six Parts]
[In the preceding two parts I discussed the rationale for private sector participation in education. It would lessen the load on the public sector thus enabling it to focus more on a smaller population. The nimbleness of the private enables it to meet the rapidly changing and necessarily diverse needs of increasingly sophisticated Malaysians. Our public sector institutions are tightly controlled and heavily micromanaged from the center. As such they are unlikely to lead us to excellence, making it an imperative to nurture private institutions. In this third part I examine the role of the private as it is currently. MBM]
The Current Situation
Currently private sector participation is limited to the polar ends of the education spectrum. The private sector has unbridled access to preschool, and increasing liberalization at the post-secondary level. In between (Years 1-11), private sector participation is extremely limited and tightly controlled.
Read the rest of this entry »
The signs fore tell that Malaysia will be left behind during the rising of Asia
Posted by Kit in Dr. Chen Man Hin, Economics on Monday, 14 December 2009, 9:20 am
(Speech by Dr Chen Man Hin, DAP life adviser to members of the Hakka Association of Negri Sembilan in Seremban on 13th December 2009)
I am most honoured to be invited to attend the formation of the Negri Sembilan Hakka Association, which will include all the hakka clans to form a single body.
Hakkas originated from Kwang Chow and Fukkien provinces, and are comprised of several clans, Moi Kong, Fui Choo, Char Yong, Hoi Look Foong
Although mandarin is the common language, there are different dialects among the chinese in Malaysia.
| Dialect | Population |
|---|---|
| Hokkien | 1,848,211 |
| Hakka | 1,679,027 |
| Cantonese | 1,355,541 |
| Teochew | 974,573 |
| Mandarin | 958,467 |
| Hainanese | 380,781 |
| Min Bei | 373,337 |
| Foochow | 249,413 |
| Total | 7,819,350 |
Najib should come out with clear-cut statement that 1Malaysia does not mean “Ketuanan Melayu” or “Malay supremacy” and declare that all Malaysians whether Malay, Chinese, Indian, Orang Asli, Kadazan or Iban are all co-owners of Malaysia
Posted by Kit in Najib Razak, nation building on Sunday, 13 December 2009, 2:54 pm
The Prime Minister, Datuk Seri Najib Razak has directed all his ministers to end the polemics on the divisive, racist and seditious Biro Tata Negara (BTN) courses.
He said he himself would evaluate BTN’s training modules and arrive at a decision on them later.
Shouldn’t the decision on the divisive, racist and seditious BTN indoctrination course be the collective decision of the Barisan Nasional leadership rather than the decision of one man, even if he is the Prime Minister?
This demonstrates an exacerbation of an already very unhealthy, undemocratic and dangerous concentration of power in the hands of the Prime Minister at the expense of the collective decision of the Cabinet and the Barisan Nasional parties.
Even putting aside for the moment the issue of the divisive, racist and seditious BTN indoctrination course which engenders racial hatred and illwill totally inimical to the nation-building objective to foster national unity and Malaysian consciousness, the issue of what Najib’s 1Malaysia really means cannot be evaded any longer.
Read the rest of this entry »
BTN must leave all campuses beginning with UiTM and MRSM
Posted by Kit in Azly Rahman, nation building on Sunday, 13 December 2009, 9:20 am
By Azly Rahman
Mara means “to advance (forward)”. It is the opposite of “retreat” and the declaration of defeat. It does not mean Undur.
Universiti Teknologi MARA (UiTM) must live up to its name. So must its younger brother Maktab Rendah Sains MARA. It is in the interest of the public to suggest good ideas for reform – and to advance.
In my lifetime I have been affiliated with both organisations. I taught in the former institution and I was schooled in the latter. Whether a product of historical accident or not, I am proud of my experiences in both. Maybe, there is a reason for things to happen. I came from a poor family and was given the chance to have an education I wish many more Malaysians had, my parents included.
Read the rest of this entry »
Malaysia an ‘oil cursed’ country
Posted by Kit in Economics, nation building, Razaleigh Hamzah on Saturday, 12 December 2009, 3:10 pm
by Tengku Razaleigh Hamzah
Dec 12, 09
(Speech by former finance minister and Umno vice-president Tengku Razaleigh Hamzah at the one-day Young Corporate Malaysians Summit this morning)
In a speech I made in April this year, I spoke of where we stand in our developmental path and what I felt we must do to move forward.
I need to revisit that argument in order to develop it further.
We are stagnating. The signs of a low-growth economy are all around us. Wages are stagnant and the cost of living is rising.
We have not made much progress in becoming a knowledge and services based economy.
According to the World Bank, Malaysia’s share of GDP contributed by services was 46.2 percent in 1987. Ten years later, that share had grown by a mere 0.2 percent.
Between 1994 and 2007, real wages grew by 2.6 percent in the domestic sector and by 2.8 percent in the export sector, which is to say, they were flat over that 13-year period.
Meanwhile, our talent scenario is an example of perverse selection at its most ruinous. We are failing to retain our own young talent, people like yourselves, let alone attract international talent to relocate here, while we have had a massive influx of unskilled foreign labour. They now make up 30 to 40 percent of our workforce.
Alone in East Asia, the number of expatriate professionals here has decreased. Alone in East Asia, private sector wage increases follow government sector increases, instead of the other way around. We are losing doctors and scientists and have become Southeast Asia’s haven for low-cost labour.
I said that we are in a middle-income trap, stuck in the pattern of easy growth from low-value-added manufacturing and component assembly and unable to make the leap to a knowledge-intensive economy. Read the rest of this entry »
