Posted on by Kit

‘He looks like PM, sounds like PM, is he PM?’

(Media Conference Statement at DAP PJ Hqrs on Thursday, 14th February 2008 at 12 noon)

Abdullah ends his first term as PM with his credibility, reputation and reform pledges in tatters with his 12-hour somersault of “no” and then “yes” to dissolution of Parliament yesterday

Datuk Seri Abdullah Ahmad Badawi has ended his first term as Prime Minister with his credibility, reputation and reform pledges in tatters with his 12-hour somersault of “no” and then “yes” to dissolution of Parliament yesterday.

It has given powerful illustration of Lingam-speak – “He looks like the Prime Minister, he sounds like the Prime Minister, but no one can say 100% that he is the Prime Minister”!

In his press conference yesterday announcing the dissolution of Parliament. Abdullah tried to explain why he had ended his first term as Prime Minister with a lie on Tuesday night categorically denying that Parliament would be dissolved yesterday and yet doing precisely the opposite 12 hours later in seeking an audience with the Yang di Pertuan Agong to dissolve Parliament.

Abdullah explained he could not give any clue to the date as he needed to get the consent of the Yang di Pertuan Agong first before he could make the announcement.

Agreed. But has Abdullah to tell a lie, declaring: “The Cabinet meeting will go on, go on and go on” after dismissing suggestion that yesterday’s Cabinet meeting will be the last for the llth parliamentary term?

Need Abdullah be reminded that what he had done is totally against the Islam Hadhari which he had propounded as Prime Minister and Chairman of the Organisation of Islamic Conference (OIC)?

What is also shocking is the triple disrespect and insensitivity in dissolving Parliament on the 7th day of the Chinese New Year, because:

• It is the auspicious Day of Ren – a day when Chinese take time to reflect on their inter-personal relationships with others and be resolute to be a better & wiser person or “Ren”;

• Insensitivity of the 9th Day of the Chinese New Year – Pai Tian Gong, the birthday of the Jade Emperor and a major event for the Hokkiens in Penang.and Malaysia; and

• Insensitivity of Chap Goh Mei to mark the end of the 15-day Chinese New Year celebrations.

What is even more shocking is the defence of this triple disrespect and insensitivity of the Chinese New Year by the Chinese leaders in the Barisan Nasional like Ong Ka Ting and Koh Tsu Koon, illustrating their totally marginalized role in the Barisan Nasional decision-making process when they could not even convince the Prime Minister to wait for eight days before dissolving Parliament so as not to commit another cultural and religious insensitivity in a matter of three months after the holding of the Umno general assembly on Deepavali last November.

45 Replies to “‘He looks like PM, sounds like PM, is he PM?’”

  2. Of course if looks like the PM, sounds like the PM, he has got to be the PM! Only the PM has powers to make an aboutface turn to precipitate the dissolution of Parliament; only he has preogative to once again ignore religious and cultural sensitivites of any group. He has got to be the PM lah! :)

  11. We are giving Badawi too much credit to say that he could do the spin on his own. A person who flunked entrance statistics could not possibly do that. It is the 4th floor boys who is behind the spin. Which explains why Badawi needed to get away as much as he could with his new wife – to ease the pressure on everyone involved in the spin.

    To be fair, the BN is also facing this dilemma for the first time – the “now-you-see-it, now-you-don’t” syndrome of leadership of the den of thieves.

  12. When Pak Lah said that parliament would not be dissolved on Feb. 13, he was actually looking at Feb. 13, 2005 which was a Sunday. Then his SIL reminded him that this is Year 2008. That explained his about-turn. Boy, no words can describe how dumb this biggest of liars is.

  17. The puppeteers are all from UMNO Youth – and who hold key positions as principal private secretaries to the PM in his various ministerial capacities. Why do you think he needs to hold so many portfolios when it is clear he wants to run away from the country at every opportunity ?

  18. Vote for the oppositons , put an end to BN’s political arrogance.

    As for the non-Malays , it would be a big-big mistake if you think that MCA, MIC or Gerakan can voice out your dissatisfactions about your citizen’s rights.

    Wee Meng Chee’s rap song has proven that not only that MCA don’t support what he says , infact, MCA asked him to apologise and in return , Meng Chee was threaten by the governement that his citizenship be revoked .

    Are the government trying to imply that we Chinese or Indians cannot voice out our dissatisfactions even though it is the truth?.

  19. AAB, all this while i respect you as a leader in this country,,,but then….eh!!!! you are a DAMN BIG MOTHER OF ALL LIARS!
    SHAME ON YOU! no longer you can get the support from me and my family, that its! SHAME ON YOU!!!!!

  21. Well as they say, “If something looks like a duck, walks like a duck, sounds like a duck, then it must be duck”. To equate Abdullah to a duck will be an insult to the community of ducks. He does not look like anything.

    Abdullah Badawi, by the way, should not be referred to as the country’s prime minister but rather in his personal capacity. Parliament has been dissolved, hasn’t it not??

  24. He is a good man. I remember the first time I attended his Hari Raya at PWTC in 2000. Before that I never missed Tun M’s Raya at his official residence at Seri Perdana. He and his wife would greet and shake hands with every one who arrives at his home. Even his sons and Marina shook hands with us. My wife and two kids enjoy and look forward to Raya with Dr M. My children particularly loved to roam about in the huge gardens; we have no luxury of a large garden at our terraced house. Then Dr. M moved to Putrajaya which was too far for us. That was when we attended Pak Lah’s Raya open house at PWTC which was our last to PWTC Raya It was a long and agonising queue in stuffy and crowded corridors to reach the banquet halls. We had to carry the kids for fear of them being trampled by the crowd. The wall fans were working but not good enough. Finally we got our food and drinks and got seated at the tables. We started eating. Then, the sounds of drums and Pak Lah had begun to tour the tables to shake hands. He was led by a group of well-dressed people. HE MISSED OUR TABLE. Imagine how sad we were and I told our kids he probably was tired and could not go to all tables. Could it be the group leaders who “missed” our table? I was quietly unhappy. How can Pak Lah miss our table? I would not like to be seen as a racist but we were Chinese. He is a good man; he probably missed our table by mistake. However, I have not attended his rayas since then.

  25. Pertinent questions to think about:

    1. Can we trust him to run the country for another term? Is he good for the country or is he creating a big mess, creating a maze of corridors leading nowhere?

    2. Is being “nice” the only criteria to be be a PM? I am nice too.

    3. Is he effective? What has he really achieved?

    4. Is he really looking into the problems affecting the country? e.g. loss of confidence in the judiciary, religious hegemony and polarisation, racial integration etc?

    5. Does he inspire confidence? Or is he seen as a clown?

    6. Does he provide strong leadership or is he being manipulated?

    7. Does he talk sense? Or just produces mumbo-jumbo all the time?

    8. Has his government provided good corporate governance of accountability, transparancy and integrity?

    9. Just what does he stand for? Where is he going and where is he taking us?

    10. Is he in control? Can he control? Can he manage? Are you comfortable to be “led” by someone who manages by “inspiration”, “feng shui” and “numerology”? You trust such a person?

    11. Is number 13 good for the country? It adds up to 4, death and calamity for some communities.

    12. Besides talking continuously about “Islam Hadhari” which nobody understands or appreciates, does he have any other topic to speak on?

  26. Anwar said Abdullah was rushing to the polls after his approval ratings dropped to an all-time low.

    “Malaysians are hard hit by rising prices, rampant crime, endemic corruption and heightened ethnic tensions. The longer that Barisan Nasional waits, the more seats it stands to lose in the general election,” he said in a statement.

    “Denying me the opportunity to contest demonstrates that the four-year track record of the Abdullah administration has been so banal, disappointing and characterised by failure that it can ill-afford to take any chances by allowing for a truly democratic electoral process.”

    http://www.channelnewsasia.com/stories/afp_asiapacific/view/328717/1/.html

  27. Erm…

    SPR will cheat again and again…

    My dad and I had the same address, yet we are voting in different constituency…

    My next door neighbour? Even worse… sent some 20km away… My gosh…

    Wherever we are… say NO to BN!!

  30. Colonel Says: Yes, all Ministers should not be referred to as Ministers but as MPs from their respective constituencies.

    Hello, wannabe, which authority are you quoting from?

    Colonel Says: correction not as MPs since there is no Parliament right now. so maybe just representatives.

    Huh, representatives? MPs? ministers? You better make up your mind la. But then do you have one? See, you only write two lines, and they have shown enough of your incongruity and incoherence, pathetic, pathetic, and pathetic.

  31. His ‘12-hour somersault of “no” and then “yes” to dissolution of Parliament’ is no big election issue.

    Technically, the earlier “no” was of course a “lie” if by a lie is meant an untrue statement at variance with what is actually on one’s mind which is intended to deceive and beguile those receiving the statement.

    However in context this is no big deal if one proceeds on basis of acceptance of the convention that it is PM’s prerogative to pick the timing to dissolve parliament at such time and upon such circumstances he deems most opportune for the coalition he leads to the Opposition’s disadvantage. Of course whether such a convention is fair in context of a democracy is another separate issue. Even in UK such a convention still subsists.

    I mean if you accept such a convention and everyone tries to second guess, preempt and gainsay him to predict he would dissolve parliament on the 13th (his favourite number) what do you expect him to say? If it were supposedly his privilege by convention not to be second guessed and pre-empted he would surely prevaricate (eg he’s seeking an audience with the Yang di Pertuan) if not tell an outright lie, more in a good humoured fashion of telling everyone not to try usurping this privilege he has in determining that “magic” date! The other alternative to not “lying” would be to bad humouredly tell reporters, “don’t ask me the question that is my privilege not to let people know until the last moment!” Actually no one is really deceived : for months the imminence of election was preempted, only that we knew not the exact date.

    Any attack on “his credibility, reputation and reform pledges” – that they are “tatters” – must surely rest on other surer foundations than this less than ‘24 hour somersault of “no” and then “yes” to dissolution of Parliament’. (I am sure there’s no lack of material in other more important areas to question credibility and reputation in context of reform pledges broken).

    Also dissolving parliament on the 7th day of the Chinese New Year is again no big deal as I am unable to fathom how this alone is “disrespectful” to Malaysian Chinese. It is disrespectful if one inconveniences the group celebrating their festivities. But the day of dissolution of parliament is NOT polling date, which could be up to 60 days thereafter, I think, and as it turns out the Election Commission (EC) determined that Nomination day is fixed on Feb 24, the 12th general election on March 8, a Saturday coinciding with the school holidays – after “Chap Goh Mei marking the end of the 15-day Chinese New Year celebrations”.

    The real issues of substance on timing of dissolving parliament on 13th that we ought to be concerned with and vigilant about (and to raise during campaigning) are:

    (1) whether the election commission’s finalisation of electoral roll of 10,922,139 voters (in nation of more than 26 million) involves significant disenfranchising of many (staying in known opposition areas) who have registered as voters and yet do not find their names based on the electoral roll or if the names are in they were supposed to vote in another state;

    (2) the issue of purposely excluding Anwar from standing for contest which he is eligible a month later from general election date; and

    (3) BN using resources of govt. to campaign, money politics, manipulation of postal votes and other issues raised by Bersih.

  33. Jeffrey Qc

    Dissolution of Parliament so general elections could be, it is true, belongs to the Prime Minister alone and he does not need to say when he would exercise his prerogative.

    Still under the circumstances, we would be justified in asking if he should have shown greater sensitivity to the cultural and religious issues of races other than his own.

  34. I have promoted and groom managers and leaders for years and let me tell you that you can tell someone is not going to be good by certain personal character. The one key thing I look at is percision. Leaders have an emotional intelligence to be precise. They have an instinct when something is just not right. If you see that person making up things like little lies then it eventually lead to big lies and big mistakes because the world is highly competitive and complex now and its those little things that can add up to disaster. Its how cars can have small disastrous defects, electronics equipment fail, food contaminated.

    Badawi is a disaster waiting to happen, if not already happening (PKFZ) and not revealed yet.

  36. Just to illustrate my point further,

    Yesterday, Badawi said he could not give name of the list of candidates because he has not received the list from the state liason chiefs. He then when on to say ‘how can he give names if he has not seen the list’.

    This is a lie for anyone that knows how these things work. What Badawi has not gotten is the final list that will be used to submit the candidates. He already have seen most of what is on the list a while already.

    So read carefully his statement and you realize he lied as a matter of factly. This is a persistent pattern. The man does not even know it when he does it and worst he thinks others don’t see it.

    Again, a disaster waiting to happen.

  38. Pak Lah famous words:-
    “Kerja dengan saya dan bukan untuk saya”

    Work with him and not for him…….
    if you look deeply he really meant….
    it would actually sound as :-

    “Duit kamu duit saya, duit saya duit saya”
    Your money is my money and my money is my money……

  39. Dr. Mahatir would have said it tactfully and with lots of Oomph! instead of resorting to such an OBVIOUS NAKED lie! Even a 3 years old can tell this is lying. You don’t say you can just tell anything to the pressmen as you like, buddy, you are actually telling the whole world! Wake up! You are not in Lingam’s house lah. This may well proved the existing of 1 term gentlemen agreement that he denied… conveniently.
    1 term CUKUP lah. We need one who can talk straight to the point and Walk the Talk. Jangan main main.

  42. No, he ain’t no PM but a caretaker PM since he dissolution of parliament. He is an imposter. He likes to impersonate President Bush of USA by having his own Air Force One jet costing RM 100 million plus jet at the expense of the Rakyat. He dares to call his wife the First Lady of Malaysia, another blatant lie and impersonation again of First Lady Laura Bush of USA. This DOLLAH imposter will keep on impersonating others if given a mandate again, which I think we should deny him this GE to prevent him from impersonating again permanently. So the message is clear, he ain’t no PM but and imposter PM.!! MALAYSIA BOLEH TANPA PAK DOLLAH !!!!

  44. look at the TVC BN made with short speech clips from the past PMs…i must say, our Pak Lah really carry no leader style, he looks more like a Ketua Kampung than a PM…he has motivated me to vote him out of PM office!

  45. wats the problem of all of u, respect pak lah. if other people give u a nickname like moron, idiot. is like ur parents and teachers teach u to be such LC!!!!!!!!!!!! without pak lah, u wont know wats really happening around the country: corruption, bribe and transparency.

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