First five months of Najib’s “1Malaysia. People First. Performance Now” slogan ends with MACC and Malaysian Police neck-to-neck as to which key national institution has lower public confidence and esteem
Posted by Kit in Corruption, Najib Razak, Police on Friday, 4 September 2009, 4:20 pm
Yesterday morning, the Malaysian Anti-Corruption Commission (MACC) Deputy Chief Commissioner Datuk Abu Kassim Mohammad was the special guest of the Star online live chat.
During Abu Kassim online chat, the newspaper carried an online opinion poll which produced the following results at 12.30 noon before it was taken off line:
1. How would rate the MACC’s performance so far in fighting corruption? (image)
Good – 3%
Fair – 0%
Poor – 98%2. Should MACC only ‘interview’ suspects during office hours? (image)
Yes – 79%
No – 6%
Depends on the situation – 15%3. How would rate the MACC’s handling of Teoh Beng Hock’s case? (image)
Good – 0%
Fair – 4% Read the rest of this entry »
Politicians are rats from gutter. And people?
Posted by Kit in Augustine Anthony on Friday, 4 September 2009, 12:42 pm
By Augustine Anthony
I remember watching a movie sometime ago in which two friends were engaged in a conversation of a peculiar topic. The woman comes from an ideal family as opposed to the man who is from a family that has gone through indescribable hardship.
In the conversation the woman poses a question to the man,
The woman: If a wolf enters a house of a farmer and takes the farmer’s child away into the woods and eats up the child, do you think the wolf is bad?
The man: The answer depends on the question asked. Since the question is about the character of the wolf, you need to be a wolf yourself to get the right answer.
Perhaps in law one will call this a subjective test rather than an objective test as absolute certainty in human affairs is an unreliable guide thus a dangerous master.
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Hishammuddin’s defence and justification of cowhead demonstration equivalent to his insensitivity in wielding the keris at Umno Youth General Assembly
Posted by Kit in Law & Order, UMNO on Thursday, 3 September 2009, 10:26 am
Utterly incredible!
Datuk Seri Hishamuddin Hussein as Home Minister has done the equivalent of wielding the keris at the Umno Youth General Assembly for three consecutive years as Umno Youth leader which had been accepted by Barisan Nasional leaders as a major factor in the political tsunami of the March 8 general election last year!
It would appear that Hishammuddin is determined to make another unforgettable contribution which would ensure that the uncompleted political changes in the political tsunami of the March 8 general last year could be fully accomplished in the next general elections.
Yesterday, Hishammuddin usurped the roles of the Attorney-General and the police to defend and justify last Friday’s cow-head demonstration in Shah Alam, totally insensitive to the insult and profanity of such an act of sacrilege to Hindus in the country.
Read the rest of this entry »
Vision 2020…not bloody likely!
Posted by Kit in Economics, Hussein Hamid on Thursday, 3 September 2009, 9:11 am
Mahathir unveiled the Vision of 2020 plan for Malaysia in 1991. Malaysia was to become an industrialized nation and be considered a high-income economy. Najib refined (that is double speak to mean ‘no can do lah’) that vision: “It is clear that our Vision 2020 objective has to be refined to remain viable,” Najib said. “Being richer alone does not define a developed nation. There are important social and quality-of-life measurements that must be factored in when considering our objectives and successes.” Malaysia needs to “redefine and recalibrate” how and when it will achieve Vision 2020, Najib told reporters after the speech. That doesn’t necessarily mean a change in the timeline, he said.
I would have agreed with him in principal had he not put in the “that does not necessarily mean a change in the timeline” proviso. I am no economist but let us just use common sense to look at realities.
Let us look at the differences between salaries earned, the cost of a vehicle and a house between 1973 and 2009.
| YEAR | increase | ||
| 1973 | 2009 | ||
| 1.3 liter Japanese Car | 7,000 | 60,000 | 8.5 |
| Double Story House | 45,000 | 300,000 | 6.6 |
| Engineer Salary | 1,000 | 2,000 | 2 |
The 42 MACC Panel members should meet in emergency session on whether Ahmad Said is fit and competent to continue as MACC Chief Commissioner or they should call for his dismissal
Posted by Kit in Corruption on Wednesday, 2 September 2009, 12:19 pm
The Malaysian Anti-Corruption Commission Chief Commissioner Datuk Seri Said Ahmad Hamdan has shown himself to be completely callous and heartless over the mysterious death of Teoh Beng Hock who went to the 14th floor MACC headquarters on July 16 to co-operate with its investigations but ended up as a corpse on the fifth floor.
Ahmad Said told Sin Chew that he had been informed that there had been ten cases of people investigated by Hong Kong’s Independent Commission Against Corruption (ICAC) who threw themselves off from high-rise buildings since the establishment of ICAC and there was nothing he could do if people investigated cannot withstand the pressure.
The implication of Ahmad Said’s statement is crystal clear – he is blaming Teoh’s death on suicide for being unable to withstand the pressure of investigation by the MACC, seeking justification in the alleged ten cases in Hong Kong of people “throwing themselves off high-rise buildings” following ICAC investigations.
Perak State Assembly
Live updates @limkitsiang
01:45 PM
Perak State Assembly 2nd Sept at Hotel Heritage adjourned sine dine
01:44 PM
Adun Sungai debated. Motion amended 2include demand 4immediate release of 7 arrested n t contract for IGP Musa Hassan should not be renewed
01:41 PM
Emergency motion 2 condemn police highandedness hotly debated. Among speakers ADUN lubok merbau, pokok assam, teja, hutan melintang, canning
12:59 PM
One of the 7 arrested K Ananthan DAP Chairman Lok Lim Garden suffers ashmatic attack. Being sent to Ipoh GH
12:31 PM
Assembly adopted report of Public Accounts Committee. Now debating report of Privileges Committee.
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He looks like KPI Minister, sounds like KPI Minister but is he KPI Minister?
Posted by Kit in Muhyiddin Yassin, Najib Razak, nation building on Tuesday, 1 September 2009, 2:02 pm
In his first National Day message, the Prime Minister Datuk Seri Najib Razak called on Malaysians to “repair the bridges and tear down the divisive walls” that exist among the races.
Najib blamed “opportunistic people” who had exploited the friction among the people to cause the bridges, which were painstakingly built by the nation’s founding fathers, to become shaky.
Najib has hit the crisis of nation-building in Malaysia on the head, except that he is still in denial as to the “opportunists” who have been most guilty of undermining nation-building efforts – when the culprits are to be found within the Barisan Nasional and not outside.
For instance, will Umno leaders particularly Deputy Prime Minister and Deputy Umno President Tan Sri Muhyiddin Yassin be prepared to respond to Najib’s National Day call and apologise for erecting divisive walls and damaging bridges resulting in greater national divisions and heightened racial and religious polarization after the March 8 general elections last year and in particular in the five months of Najib premiership with its 1Malaysia slogan?
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Bumpy stretch ahead for Malaysia
Posted by Kit in nation building on Tuesday, 1 September 2009, 12:09 pm
By Cheong Suk-Wai | Singapore Straits Times
AUG 29 – In early May 1969, Australian anthropologist Clive Kessler rode his motorcycle through Kelantan hamlets for 30km to the nearest telephone box. He then called his parents in Sydney and told them: “You’re going to hear about trouble in a few parts of Malaysia in the next few days, but not where I am.”
Sure enough, Malaysia’s bloodiest civil strife erupted. Dr Kessler, who was then there to observe Islamist politics, had predicted it in an article he wrote to the press and in an interview he gave the Times of London in April 1969.
Now 67, the emeritus professor of sociology and anthropology at the University of New South Wales in Sydney has been a Malaysia watcher for more than 40 years and published prodigiously on it, including two books.
He had taught at the London School of Economics (LSE) and then Columbia University in New York city from the late 1960s till 1980. In that time, he worked closely with such lions in his field as LSE’s Maurice Freedman and Raymond Firth as well as Princeton’s Clifford Geertz.
He got in touch with me initially about my published review of his compatriot Anthony Milner’s book, The Malays. In the review, I had wrongly attributed to Dr Kessler the view that if the Malay cannot make something of himself, he will try to bend others to his will. Dr Kessler was gracious about my unwitting error and we got to talking about Malaysia in Subang Jaya, Selangor, at the tail end of his two-month sojourn there recently.
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Tolerance..
Posted by Kit in Hussein Hamid, nation building on Tuesday, 1 September 2009, 11:55 am
You will never know what it is like to be discriminated against because you are rich or poor or because of your colour, race or religion until you have experience it your self. I was in London in the 60’s and London then still had pockets of areas where you would be treated differently because you are Asian. You will be waiting to be served at these places and you will be ignored until the ‘white’ have been served first. You would go look at a flat that you saw advertised in the local papers and be told that “it is taken”. Invariably we Asians found ourselves living in houses where there were other Asian tenants.
We Asian in turn used to mock the blacks and called them “Gagak” or crows and the whites we sometimes called them “Babi”. In one memorable episode me and some friends were on the London bus and we were referring to the gentleman in a bowler hat sitting behind us as “Babi this and Babi that”…Then as his stop came he stood up behind us with his briefcase and umbrella and politely told us “ Tolong beri laluan ini Babi nak jalan”. He must have been one of those colonial masters that came to administer Malaysia.
My unpleasant experiences in London with discrimination, however slight, made me realize that it was unpleasant to be discriminated against – for any reason. Coming back to KL around the early 70’s brought me head on with the ‘bumiputra’ and NEP situation that gave so much hope and expectations of good things to come for us Malays, regardless of our standing in life. My memories of these times are a bit hazy but one experience can capture the essence of those times. At the apex of my time doing “Project Acquisition” I had two penthouses costing me RM30 thousand a month, two Generals and back up staff under my payroll. Read the rest of this entry »
Malicious website spreading lies
A new website reported Karpal ‘unconscious but in stable condition’ in Penang home. Rubbish! Just spoke to Karpal in KL.
08/31/2009 05:27 PM
Acceptance over Tolerance : The severed head of sacred cow.
Posted by Kit in Augustine Anthony, nation building on Monday, 31 August 2009, 3:24 pm
By Augustine Anthony
I must thank a local TV Channel for reminding me about the 8 values of 1 Malaysia in their talk show on the 52nd Merdeka Day with Lee Lam Thye (Tan Sri) and Dr. Chandra Muzzaffar as their guests.
Something that one of the hosts said attracted me more than all other insignificant murmurings and mutterings. The body languages of everyone present seem to suggest that one of the 8 values and that is “Acceptance” as opposed to tolerance should be the new approach that all Malaysian should embrace.
A quick check on the prime minister’s website 1Malaysia.com reveals the following:-
“ACCEPTANCE
On the importance of acceptance over tolerance
I think there’s quite a big difference between the two (tolerance and acceptance). I think when you say you tolerate, you don’t quite like it, but you accept it because you have no choice. But if you talk in terms of acceptance, it indicates a state of mind that you are embracing something positively. I think it’s important for us to migrate from this concept of mere Read the rest of this entry »
Voters Drawing the Line
Posted by Kit in Bakri Musa, Muhyiddin Yassin, UMNO on Monday, 31 August 2009, 3:20 pm
By M. Bakri Musa
In the heyday of UMNO the joke was that the party could field a dog as an election candidate and it would still win. The party leaders must still harbor that delusion for in the recent Permatang Pasir state by-election they fielded a disbarred lawyer. This time however, voters wisely drew the line at the dog.
The surprise was not that Rohaizat Othman successfully hoodwinked UMNO leaders to secure the nomination rather how easily those senior leaders were taken in by this shyster. Now that their candidate has been thrashed, those UMNO leaders were belatedly bemoaning the fact that their chosen man had been less than truthful to them. That is the quality of UMNO top leadership, folks!
Even after the sordid details of the man’s sleazy professional past and checkered personal life had surfaced, UMNO leaders still vigorously defended their choice. They had the nerve to suggest that those critics were trying to smear the UMNO candidate. Those UMNO leaders obviously did not realize that their man was already soiled.
Reflection on Muhyiddin
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The Myth Of A Moderate Malaysia
Posted by Kit in nation building, Religion on Monday, 31 August 2009, 3:15 pm
By Sadanand Dhume, 08.31.09, 12:00 AM ET | Forbes
Canings, cows’ heads and ethnoreligious apartheid.
If you’re looking for an image that captures the conflict between fervent Islam and basic human decency, look no further than the Malaysian city of Shah Alam, about 15 miles west of Kuala Lumpur.
On Friday, a group of about 50 men, agitated by plans to relocate a 150-year-old Hindu temple to their neighborhood, made their feelings clear by staging a protest march from a mosque to a government building. Amidst the usual cries of “Allahu Akbar” and “takbeer,” the protesters deposited the freshly severed head of a cow–an animal sacred to Hindus–before the building’s gate. The group’s leaders made threatening speeches and, perhaps caught up in the spirit of the moment, hammed it up for the cameras, stepping and spitting on the cow’s head. The police–who have been known to arrest people for such crimes as attending a candle light vigil or wearing black in support of the opposition–stood by and watched.
Ironically, those scanning the globe for a Muslim-majority country that inspires neither dread nor despair often alight upon Malaysia. Until a few years ago, the Southeast Asian nation boasted the world’s tallest building, the iconic 88-story Petronas Towers. Powered by electronics, palm oil and petroleum, Malaysia is the world’s 20th-largest exporter, ahead of Sweden, Australia and India. Per capita income, about $14,000 in purchasing parity terms, is about the same as in Argentina. Apart from the obvious prosperity of downtown Kuala Lumpur, the casual visitor notices the comforting trappings of a British colonial past–a parliament, a judiciary, a professional police force.
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Let all patriotic Malaysians regardless of party come together to save Najib’s 1Malaysia from heading for the rocks 150 days after becoming Prime Minister
Posted by Kit in Najib Razak, nation building on Sunday, 30 August 2009, 4:17 pm
52nd National Day message
Recent events, particularly in the past few weeks, cannot but raise the concern and even alarm of Malaysians who want to see the evolution of a Bangsa Malaysia after half a century of nationhood – as Malaysia is only just a decade from the Vision 2020 deadline of achieving a Bangsa Malaysia out of the diverse races, languages, cultures and religions in the country to become a fully developed nation in 2020.
Of late, there is not only a recrudescence of the irresponsible politics of race and religion, the exploitation of the race and religion cards have reached new intensity utterly reckless of their damage to the multi-racial, multi-religious, multi-lingual and multi-cultural fabric of Malaysian society.
As a result, there is a further polarization of race and religion with the hardening of intolerant attitudes and stances, creating situations unseen or unheard of in the previous history of the nation – like the cowhead sacrilege in Shah Alam on Friday where a group protesting against the construction of a Hindu temple threatened bloodshed and committed the ultimate act of religious insensitivity, insult and profanity to Hindus by severing the head of a cow and stomping on it.
Let all patriotic Malaysians of goodwill recognize the danger signals to our plural society. Let all patriotic Malaysians regardless of party come together to save Prime Minister Datuk Seri Najib Razak’s 1Malaysia motto from heading for the rocks 150 days after becoming Prime Minister to stave off divisive and centripetal forces from further dividing and polarizing Malaysians along race and religious lines. Read the rest of this entry »
Malaysia in past weeks suffered unprecedented battery of adverse world media coverage which gravely undermine our international competitiveness and goal to become developed high-income country
Posted by Kit in nation building, Sarawak on Sunday, 30 August 2009, 12:13 pm
In the past weeks, Malaysia suffered from an unprecedented battery of adverse world media coverage which gravely undermine our international competitiveness by frightening off intending foreign investors and highly detrimental to the national goal to become a developed high-income country.
The latest incident which has put Malaysia in a very bad light internationally is the global media coverage of yesterday’s Shah Alam cow-head sacrilege in a protest against the construction of a Hindu temple, something which had not happened in 52 years of Malaysian nation building and raising the grave question whether the country is moving towards greater religious intolerance and polarization – and what this means to Prime Minister Datuk Seri Najib Razak’s 1Malaysia slogan.
Other adverse international media coverage of Malaysia in the past weeks include:
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The caning sentence imposed by a Pahang Syariah Court on part-time model Kartika Seri Dewi Shukarno’s for consuming beer;
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News of government decision to restrict Muslims from attending the concert of international pop sensation Black Eye Peas;
Cow-head politics: Fear not, those who misrepresent Islam
Posted by Kit in Azly Rahman, Islam, nation building on Sunday, 30 August 2009, 11:19 am
By Azly Rahman
In the name of Allah Most Gracious Most Compassionate
1. By Al-‘Asr (the time).
2. Verily! Man is in loss,
3. Except those who believe (in Islâmic Monotheism) and do righteous good deeds, and recommend one another to the truth (i.e. order one another to perform all kinds of good deeds (Al-Ma’rûf)which Allâh has ordained, and abstain from all kinds of sins and evil deeds (Al-Munkar)which Allâh has forbidden), and recommend one another to patience (for the sufferings, harms, and injuries which one may encounter in Allâh’s Cause during preaching His religion of Islâmic Monotheism or Jihâd, etc.).
— Surah AlAsr (Time)
For Muslims (those who submit to the Will of Allah) and those who are embarking on a journey of peace, Ramadan is a time for deep reflection and contemplation on the sufferings of the self and of others. It is a month in which the oftentimes arrogant, boastful, aggressive self retreats to this Inner Cave and work hard towards cleansing the body, the mind, the spirit, and the soul. It is a long but reflective journey Muslims believe must be taken.
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The cow-head sacrilege an ominous warning that Najib’s first National Day celebration as Prime Minister will go down as a Black National Day if the genii of racism and religious chicanery are allowed to get out of the bottle
Posted by Kit in nation building on Saturday, 29 August 2009, 12:04 pm
All patriotic Malaysians of goodwill and reason must condemn in the strongest possible terms the cowhead sacrilege in Shah Alam yesterday where a group of protestors claiming to be residents of Section 23 in the area protested the construction of a Hindu temple and threatened bloodshed and committed the ultimate act of religious insensitivity, insult and offence to Hindus by severing the head of a cow and stomping on it.
If such an ultimate act of religious insensitivity, insult and offence had been committed against Islam, Utusan Malaysia would have gone to town not only with full front-page coverage and denunciation, probably half the newspaper today would be devoted to it. Why the thundering silence from Utusan Malaysia?
In other multi-religious societies, such an ultimate act of religious insensitivity, insult and offence to one of the major religions in the country would have led to mayhem, riots and loss of lives and it bespeaks of the high degree of maturity, mutual tolerance, goodwill and co-existence that cool heads had prevailed in the response to such a deplorable act of sacrilege.
In a multi-religious society, the act of sacrilege to one religion must be regarded as an act of sacrilege to all other religions and the entire nation.
Let this serve as a overarching consensus of all political parties, mass media, NGOs and Malaysians if we cherish and love this nation.
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Call on Police and MACC to make public the number of reports which had been lodged against MACC (previously ACA) officers for abuse of power and use of physical force for past 12 months
Posted by Kit in Corruption on Friday, 28 August 2009, 11:53 pm
At the Teoh Beng Hock Inquest at the Shah Alam Court this morning, the counsel for the Malaysian Anti-Corruption Commission (MACC) Datuk Abdul Razak Musa asked the Coroner Azmil Muntapha Abas to issue a gag order to stop me from making unfair criticisms of the MACC arising from inquest proceedings.
He pointed out that I was present at the inquest and that I had criticized the MACC over what transpired at the inquest.
This was objected by the Gobind Singh Deo, counsel for Teoh’s family members and Malik Imtiaz Sarwar, counsel for the Selangor State Government who argued that the inquest does not have such unbridled powers.
The Coroner declined to issue such a gag order. Read the rest of this entry »
Punishing the Body or the Person? Why Some Cannot Accept Physical Punishments
Posted by Kit in Farish Noor on Friday, 28 August 2009, 3:00 pm
By Farish A. Noor
In his book ‘Torture and Modernity: Self, Society and State in Modern Iran’ (1994), the scholar Darius Rejali looks at how the processes of torture and punishment have evolved over the centuries in Iran, from the period of the Qajar dynasty all the way to the regime of the Shah and the Islamic Revolutionary government. He makes one interesting and important observation which remains relevant to all of those who are concerned about the use of corporal punishment and torture by modern states today: that corporal punishment dates back to the medieval era where the popular perception of punishment was that it was a public spectacle that ought to be enacted upon the body of the individual, and not the subject him/herself.
In this respect, the modes of torture and punishment that were used in pre-modern Iran were no different from the modes of punishment that were used in China, India, Africa or Europe. Throughout the world during the pre-modern era the popular understanding of punishment was that it was meant to be a form of public humiliation, operating through the mode of public violence, that was intended to compel the guilty to repent and alter his/her ways through the threat of violence and force. Hence we see how in medieval Europe, Asia and the Arab world the modes of public punishment were all equally gory and bloody: Heads were chopped off, bodies were impaled, whipped, burned, branded, broken, quartered and sliced to pieces. Most of these punishments were carried out in public, ostensibly as a ‘lesson’ to others. But as many modern psychologists have pointed out, these public spectacles of violence also served the voyeuristic inclination of those who relished the sight of bodies being violated in public, and were thus also forms of bizarre public pornography.
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MACC should produce proof that Teoh Beng Hock had received RM112 “kickback” or it should withdraw and apologise for the allegation defaming the dead
Posted by Kit in Corruption, Crime on Thursday, 27 August 2009, 3:25 pm
Malaysian Anti-Corruption Commission (MACC) bias and prejudice towards DAP and Pakatan rakyat must be deplored in the strongest possible terms.
The most recent evidence of such bias and prejudice was evident from the testimony of MACC investigator DSP Mohd Anuar Ismail at the Teoh Beng Hock inquest yesterday.
Although the coroner Azmil Muntapha Abas had ordered Anuar’s unfair and prejudicial testimony yesterday to be expunged, the damage had been done.
The Star online for instance carried the report with the heading “Officer claims Teoh was on the take” which is still accessible just minutes ago. The Sun headline today is: ”Testimony on alleged kickbacks expunged”.
Yes, the details of Anuar’s allegations have been alleged but the allegation proper remains, viz: Teoh was corrupt and guilty of “kickbacks”!
In alleging that Beng Hock was “on the take” and had received “kickbacks” MACC had not only defamed the dead but posthumously elevated Teoh’s role from being a witness to a suspect or even a person accused of corruption!
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