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Hanoi ASEAN Summit should take a strong stand to demand free, fair and inclusive elections in Myanmar allowing participation by Aung San Suu Kyi or ASEAN should withhold recognition of legitimacy for election result

The 16th ASEAN Summit currently being held in Hanoi should take a strong stand to demand free, fair and inclusive elections in Myanmar allowing participation by Burmese democracy icon Aung San Suu Kyi or ASEAN should withhold recognition of legitimacy for the Myanmese election result.

Malaysian Prime Minister Datuk Seri Najib Razak said in Hanoi yesterday that all countries, including Malaysia, must play their part for the concept of ASEAN community to become a reality.

He said ASEAN must take the multilateral resolutions agreed at the regional stage seriously if the grouping is to realize the ASEAN community by 2005.

Najib and all ASEAN leaders must be mindful that the ASEAN community is based on three pillars, economic, political and socio-cultural, in particular the human rights commitments made by all the ASEAN governments in the ASEAN Charter “to strengthen democracy, enhance good governance and the rule of law, and to promote and protect human rights and fundamental freedoms” (Section 7).
Continue reading “Hanoi ASEAN Summit should take a strong stand to demand free, fair and inclusive elections in Myanmar allowing participation by Aung San Suu Kyi or ASEAN should withhold recognition of legitimacy for election result”

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I was angry, real angry in Parliament (video)

I was angry, real angry when I spoke in Parliament during the 2009 Supplementary budget committee stage debate of the Prime Minister’s Department yesterday morning at the “blind and brute” Barisan Nasional simple majority in rejecting my motion on Wednesday (April 7, 2010) to refer the BN MP for Pasir Salak, Datuk Tajuddin Abdul Rahman to the Committee of Privileges over his lies and baseless allegation that “pemimpin Pulau Pinang” frequently visited Singapore and Hong Kong to “sell national secrets” and that I was former political officer to Lee Kuan Yew as well as over the mindless passage of a motion by the UMNO MP for Kuala Krau Datuk Ismail Said to refer the PAS MP for Pokok Sena Datuk Mahfuz Omar to the Committee of Privileges over the “Umno Apco, Apco Umno” chant – resulting in Parliamentary proceedings going out of control which had to be adjourned more than an hour earlier as scheduled.

Part 1

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Malaysia in the Era of Globalization #9

By M. Bakri Musa

Chapter 2: Why Some Societies Progress, Others Regress

Culture and Geography: An Experiment of Nature

In Guns, Germs, and Steel Diamond describes an experiment of nature to illustrate the influence of geography on culture. The vast expanse of the Pacific Ocean contains myriads of islands that are populated by Polynesians. They all have a common ancestry and in the millennium surrounding the birth of Christ their descendents independently colonized and inhabited the various islands. These range from large land masses (New Zealand, Hawaii) to tiny atolls; their geology ranges from volcanic soil to limestone outcroppings; and their climate from lush tropical (Guam) to subtropical (Hawaii) and temperate (New Zealand and Chatham Islands). As these islands were separated by vast expanse of ocean, there were minimal subsequent interactions between the various settlers. They were thus left to chart their own future, conditioned by their unique physical environments. The original Polynesians shared the same culture, language, biology, and state of technological development. They were all familiar with domesticated plants and animals; indeed they brought these species along with them as they settled the various islands.
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1st class – Independent MPs; 2nd class – BN MPs

by Asrul Hadi Abdullah Sani | The Malaysian Insider

KUALA LUMPUR, April 8 — Datuk Seri Nazri Aziz said the prime minister’s decision to bring two independent lawmakers to the US was because “the Barisan Nasional (BN) wants to maintain its majority in Parliament.”

Bayan Baru MP Datuk Seri Zahrain Hashim and Kulim-Bandar Baharu MP Zulkifli Noordin — both former PKR lawmakers — will be part of the Malaysia-United States Caucus to be launched by the prime minister next Wednesday

“It is like this because the Opposition is practising bloc voting so we must make sure that BN at every moment… must have more lawmakers than them.

“Because of that, I have made the decision not to send BN Members of Parliament to follow the prime minister. We have decided that during a Parliamentary sitting, we won’t allow any BN Members of Parliament to leave the country,” he told reporters in Parliament today.
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Meeting of Sabahans in Klang Valley postponed from April 18 to May 16 KL/Selangor Chinese Assembly Hall because of Hulu Selangor by-election

Two weeks ago on March 25, 2010 I had announced a meeting of Sabahans in the Klang Valley at the Petaling Jaya Civics Centre on April 18, but this has now been postponed to Sunday May 16 at 2 pm at the KL/Selangor Chinese Assembly Hall because of the Hulu Selangor by-election, whose nomination is April 17 and polling April 25.

The idea of a meeting of Sabahans in Klang Valley is the result of my two recent visits to the Sabah interior together with DAP MPs Hiew King Cheu (Kota Kinabalu), Teo Nie Ching (Serdang), Lim Lip Eng (Segambut) and Jimmy Wong, DAP Sabah state Assemblymen for Sri Tanjong, including Kota Belud, Tuaran, Keningau, Tambunan, Sepanggar, Donggongon and Kampong Inobong in Penampang for first-hand information about the neglect of socio-economic rights and development as well as the frustrations of the people of Sabah.

Wherever we went, we encountered concerns about the plight of Sabahans stranded in the Klang Valley, particularly following media reports early this year of homeless Sabahans who had to scavenge for food from garbage bins outside restaurants in the Klang Valley.

Sabahans back home were shocked that Sabah youths, who had gone to the national capital to seek greener pastures, were roaming the streets and relying on food served by NGOs and on leftovers in dustbins for an additional meal.
Continue reading “Meeting of Sabahans in Klang Valley postponed from April 18 to May 16 KL/Selangor Chinese Assembly Hall because of Hulu Selangor by-election”

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Scholarships for top scorers

By Dr.Chris Anthony

Stretching to help fairly all who deserve

The government’s decision to spend RM1.24bil to award scholarships to 1,500 top SPM students may be laudable but spending such a hefty sum on a relatively small number of students to undertake their first degree programmes abroad is unwise. High performers must be rewarded appropriately but the money spent must be prudent to benefit as many as possible.

Why can’t our top scorers be sent to do their pre-university courses and basic degrees in local institutions? By sending the best to local universities, which cost much less, not only more students can be sponsored but at the same time also help improve the standards in our own local universities which is on the decline in recent years. How can we elevate our universities to the status of world renowned institutions like Oxford, Cambridge, Harvard and many others, when we keep sending our best overseas? This would only boost the foreign universities at the expense of our own.

It must be borne in mind that high achieving students make up far less than 10% of students. The vast majority are average performers who should also be catered for adequately. There are also many who do badly or even fail their examinations and it is equally important to cater for the special needs of these category of students as well. Spending all we have on a few top students and neglecting the vast majority who obtain mediocre results will be detrimental to the nation. It will be this majority who are considered mediocre who will be form the bulk of the workforce in the future.
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1MALAYSIA: Najib’s Camelot?

By Tunku Abdul Aziz

If, by 1Malaysia, the Prime Minister is merely invoking the undoubted virtue of, and the equally vital necessity for all of us to strive to live in peace and harmony, then I believe he is more than a half a century wide of the mark. Living peacefully together, cheek by jowl is something we are rather good at, and frankly we do not politicians, particularly those from race-based parties to tutor us on this.

In the interest of self-preservation, we have been doing just that finding accommodation with our racially and culturally assorted neighbours.. And, so, it is not entirely surprising that the same Malaysians that Prime Minister Najib is so desperately anxious to unite should feel a little peeved, and confused especially when rumour has it that enormous sums of public money – dare I venture to mention slush funds, have been expended to mount a campaign that has all the appearance of a damp squid, with apologies to all the squids of this world.

Malaysians are fed up with being continually bombarded and harangued by Najib on his slogan the significance of which he is not sure about. To the millions of us preoccupied with making ends meet on a daily basis in Najib’s economic haven, 1Malaysia cannot be disguised as anything but what it is; a hellishly wasteful and hollow symbol by any reckoning. And, that is putting it as charitably as I can.
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APCO row brings House down

Parliament had 2b adjourned abruptly bcos of breakdown of proceedings from BN attempt 2misuse majority 2refer PAS MP 2clmtt of privileges
04/07/2010 05:31 PM

All bcos Mahfuz said UMNO APCO, APCO UMNO I warned that if BN is allwd 2abuse its majority chaos will b order of day in Msian Parl
04/07/2010 05:35 PM

Parliamentary proceedings jammed 4over an hr bcos of unprecedented n improper abuse of BN majority. Standing Orders thrown into garbage bin
04/07/2010 05:46 PM

Unending arguments going on between PR MPs n chair since resumption with deputy speaker wan junaidi losing control of dewan proceedings
04/07/2010 05:53 PM

BN MPs yelling n banging table from their seats I urged Parliament shd drawback from precipice n not 2plunge Parliament into abyss of chaos
04/07/2010 05:59 PM
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Five issues for Najib to prove he is serious about “inclusive growth” to Sabahans

Finally, I want to end with a special reference to Sabah as ordinary Sabahans feel that they had been marginalised and left out of the national development and progress for since the formation of Malaysia some five decades ago.

If the Prime Minister is serious and sincere about inclusive growth, the Federal government should make Sabahans feel a full and equal part of 1Malaysia,and I recommend five priority areas for its immediate attention and action:

  1. Satisfactory resolution to the long-standing problem of illegal immigrants in Sabah, causing the Sabah population to multiply from some 400,000 during the formation of Malaysia in 1963 to over three million today. During his visit to Sabah last September, the Prime Minister had promised resolution of the illegal immigrant problem and this seems to have been completely forgotten.

  2. Eradication of poverty in Sabah. Barisan Nasional had promised to eradicate poverty in 2000 but it is now 2010 and Sabah has the highest poverty rate in the country.

  3. Massive development of basic infrastructure in Sabah to provide roads, piped water, electricity and broadband to Sabahans.

    4. Continue reading “Five issues for Najib to prove he is serious about “inclusive growth” to Sabahans”

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Lowest Chinese and Indian representation in the civil service in the 53-year history of Malaysia – 5.8% Chinese and 4% Indians as at end of 2009

The other two factors which can cause the failure of NEM as identified by the NEAC are:

  • Reform programmes have often met with strong resistance from powerful and vested interests, which subsequently forced their derailment; (Perkasa the extremist right-wing racist organization is one such “vested interests”) and

  • The implementing authorities failed to stay the course, either due to a lack of political will or inherently administrative weaknesses.

Although NEM proposes a “big push” in policy actions and initiatives to kick-start the transformation process, what ‘big results” have been achieved in the 1Malaysia concept in the past one year?

How can the public have confidence in the Economic Transformation Programme (ETP) when there is no seriousness or commitment by Barisan Nasional leaders in the 1Malaysia Government Transformation Programme (GTP), as demonstrated by the Deputy Prime Minister Tan Sri Muhyiddin Yassin who had declared himself “Malay first and Malaysian second”?

It is sad and tragic that despite my challenge, not only Umno Ministers ran for cover, Ministers from MCA, Gerakan, MIC and other BN component parties also dare not declare that they are Malaysians first and their race whether Malay, Chinese, Indian, Kadazan or Iban second in keeping with the 1Malaysia concept.
Continue reading “Lowest Chinese and Indian representation in the civil service in the 53-year history of Malaysia – 5.8% Chinese and 4% Indians as at end of 2009”

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In sympathy with Matthias Chang

By Martin Jalleh
(Martin Jalleh (MJ) responds to a letter purportedly written by Matthias Chang (MC) before he chose to go to jail after being charged for contempt of court by the Kuala Lumpur High Court.)

MC: Message from Matthias Chang. To My Dearest Friends and Colleagues

MJ: Dear Matthias, I was shocked that you have been charged for contempt of court. You must in synergy with your former boss who was most contemptuous of the courts!

MC: I have fought against injustice throughout my life and as a practising lawyer

MJ: Perhaps it would be more accurate to say throughout your pre-political-secretary life? The rest of your life you have been faithfully fighting for your former Master, Mahathir.

MC: …upholding justice when there are abuses by the judiciary
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Does Najib Really Care for the Country?

by Kee Thuan Chye

Just the other day, I was engaged in a debate with a couple of friends about whether Najib Razak cares for the country.

They were insistent that he doesn’t. They reasoned that he was interested only in preserving his selfish interests. That included making as much as he could from his position as Prime Minister.

I rejoined by saying that surely, no one would want to take on the stresses of being the leader of a country merely for the sake of self-aggrandisement and material gain. He must also want to do something for the country, like taking it to greatness as he perceives it. Even if we don’t agree with his vision, the fact that he has one indicates some kind of caring. I said I found it hard to believe that any leader who had some decency in him would just reap whatever he wanted from the country and be content to let it go to ruin.

In Najib’s case specifically, I said he must have some primordial connection to this land he was born in, some love for tanah tumpah darahnya. He must subscribe to the notion of this being tanah Melayu, the land of his forefathers and his people, the only such land in the world. What’s more, he has pedigree. He is the son of a former prime minister. Would any son of a country’s former leader want to do worse than his father and be compared unfavourably?
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Najib adopting extraordinary construction methods – building his 1Malaysia house with roof first then pillars without floor as NEM Part 2 has been deferred further from 10th Malaysia Plan to third quarter of the year

(Updated)

1. Ballooning budget deficit – Parliament has been presented with two sets of supplementary estimates, the second supplementary estimates for 2009 totalling RM11.36 billion (i.e. RM8.98 billion for Operating and RM2.39 billion for Development), after the earlier first RM10 billion supplementary estimates and the first supplementary estimates for 2010 totalling RM12 billion for both operating and development.

We are debating the second supplementary estimates for 2009 Budget which will be followed by the debate on the first supplementary estimates fo 2010 Budget.

These two sets of supplementary estimates before the current meeting of Parliament are most surprising, as the country was told by the Prime Minister cum Finance Minister Datuk Seri Najib Razak when presenting the 2010 budget on 23rd October 2009 that the fiscal budget of the Federal Government had reached a peak at 7.4% of GDP in 2009, and that the fiscal budget is expected to decline to 5.6% of GDP in 2010.

With these two sets of supplementary estimates, Malaysia’s budgeting has again gone awry with the budget deficit in 2009 shooting to as high as 7.9 per cent of GDP in 2009 and over 7% in 2010.
Continue reading “Najib adopting extraordinary construction methods – building his 1Malaysia house with roof first then pillars without floor as NEM Part 2 has been deferred further from 10th Malaysia Plan to third quarter of the year”

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From PERKASA to pekasam?

by Azly Rahman

I am following with interest the development of the collaboration between non-governmental organisations and political parties. I try to analyse the role of local NGOs and international NGOs viz-a-viz the parties they augment or even sabotage.

In a free country such as Malaysia, we will see more of the interplay between hegemonic and counter-hegemonic forces as they deal with angelic or demonic political groups.

It is not easy to read this as we members of the public are always presented with perceptions in this endless game of invented realities. I wish Malaysians are by now well-equipped with the skills of critical media analysis and in political economics to engage in intelligent discussions on the politics of the day.

How would one read the media hype over Perkasa? How might one read Dr. Mahathir Mohamad’s patronage of this interesting group? How about the pledge by the retired and aged Umno leader to uphold the struggle on the rights of the Malays? How do these go with the neverending story of the present regime to hold on to power as the 13th general elections greet us?
Continue reading “From PERKASA to pekasam?”

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I am Malaysian first

By Kee Thuan Chye

I am proud to call myself Malaysian first and Chinese second. And if I were to tell other Chinese Malaysians that, I don’t think they will shun me.

Even if they do, so be it. Let them. If they are so narrow-minded as not to see the beauty of calling oneself Malaysian first, I don’t want to have anything to do with them.

I have two children to whom I have given Malaysian names, i.e. Malay, Indian and Chinese names. It is my contribution to Bangsa Malaysia. Their identity cards bear their full names.

In both cases, their Malay name comes first. And that is the name my wife and I call them by. We call our daughter Soraya and our son Jebat. To us, Malay names are also Malaysian names, and our children are Malaysian. We have no hang-ups about it.

Now, why can’t this be the norm in this beautiful, rich, multi-racial nation – a nation that is beautiful and rich because of its many races and cultures? Why must we separate ourselves into divisive categories? Why can’t we take the inclusive approach, consider each of our fellow citizens as being part of a whole, as part of us instead of as the Other?
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The Labu and Labi Team of Najib and Muhyiddin (Part 2)

By M. Bakri Musa

[Second of Four Parts]

The Best Team

The Razak-Ismail duo lasted just a month shy of three years, prematurely cut short by the sudden but not unexpected death of Tun Ismail. At first glance they had all the ingredients for a divisive and acrimonious relationship. One was a lawyer the other, a physician; two professionals not known to get along well with each other. Members of the two professions view society differently; likewise their approaches to problem solving. Lawyers cross examine their witnesses; doctors get a history from their patients. Lawyers assume their clients would lie; physicians implicitly trust theirs. Attorneys’ clients may think it is in their interest to lie; patients however risk their lives if they were to mislead their physicians.

What made the Razak-Ismail team worked remarkably well was that both were true professionals as well as consummate politicians in the best traditional mold. It was this combination that made their partnership blossomed. As professionals they were able to separate their personal feelings to address the problems at hand; as accomplished politicians they were skillful in the art of compromise, a fine sense of politics as the art of the possible. They were able to sink whatever personal, political and professional differences and ambitions they harbor in order to best serve their client: the nation.
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Najib marks his first anniversary as PM by setting the bad example of BN abuses of power in the forthcoming Hulu Selangor by-election

Datuk Seri Najib Razak has established a new precedent in marking his first anniversary as Prime Minister by setting the bad example of Barisan Nasional abuses of power in the forthcoming Hulu Selangor parliamentary by-election.

Najib visited Hulu Selangor yesterday and announced a new RM32 million housing project, involving 250 units, on a 14ha site at Soeharto Felda.

I support government housing projects for Felda settlers to uplift their living standards but as a Prime Minister who had listed fighting corruption as one of his six priority areas, Najib should be very circumspect in his actions to ensure that he is not guilty of political and electoral corruption in using government funds and promises of specific development projects to win votes in the Hulu Selangor by-election.

This is the first example.

During his visit in Hulu Selangor yesterday, Najib had to “buy insurance” to manufacture a very enthusiastic and rousing public reception – by bringing along 120 students who played the role as his band of “cheerleaders”, puncturing the Prime Minister’s walkabouts with shouts of 1Malaysia.
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Mainstream media were also full of superlative praises for Abdullah in his first year as PM – what happened to him?

Today marks the first anniversary of Datuk Seri Najib Razak as the sixth Prime Minister with all the mainstream media singing peans of praise for his first year as Prime Minister.

The mainstream media were also full of superlative praises for Datuk Seri Abdullah Ahmad Badawi in his first year as Prime Minister – but what has happened to him?

It will be better for Najib and the country if the Prime Minister is more anchored to reality and realize that after his first 12 months as Prime Minister, nothing much as changed apart from a surfeit of sloganeering.

In less than a year, Najib’s 1Malaysia slogan and concept has been torn to smithereens by his own Cabinet and the question now is whether the second pillar of his premiership, the New Economic Mode (NEM), would suffer the same fate as his 1Malaysia slogan.

How different is the NEM from NEP – New Economic Policy – which has landed the country in a middle-income trap, with the Malaysian economy suffering stagnation while other countries have either caught up or overtaken us in the league of economic development?
Continue reading “Mainstream media were also full of superlative praises for Abdullah in his first year as PM – what happened to him?”

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The father, the son and the fighting spirit

Malaysian blogs
Extract from“Does it matter if you are Malaysian first or Chinese first or manusia first?”
“The Obnoxious 5xmom”

It doesn’t help that our Chief Minister is super laser tongue and he just have to go on and on to refute BN’s politicians. It is made worse when UMNO leaders are so used to our previous, gracefully silent Chief Minister who will smile his way through even the most humiliating moments. They forget that now, they have the father, the son and the fighting spirit to bite on their tails over the slightest thing.

The best is, if you ask the CM some provocative questions, it will get him to blast BN even more. Sometimes, I enjoy being a CJ because it is fun to ask things to get him to say what I have in mind but don’t have the power or the immunity to say it. So, put in some tricky questions and tadaaa….it is yet another world vs Lim Guan Eng drama.

Frankly, I never think of myself as a Chinese first or Malaysian first. But if leaders like our DPM said it loud and then, supported by the PM who quoted the constitution that they think it is alright to put their race before the nationality, then, we have to be worried. They have that superior air around them and that makes the rest of us, the dan lain-lain manusia to be second grade, or even third grade. It is unacceptable, don’t you think so?

It is not about dismissing who they are. It is about how secured and comforted we, the citizens, feel under their leadership. I don’t think I like what the DPM had uttered. No no. Time for all of us to think carefully where we stand. Continue reading “The father, the son and the fighting spirit”

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Gerakan National Central Committee should convene emergency meeting to give ultimatum to Koh Tsu Koon to declare he is “Malaysian first and Chinese second” or be removed as Gerakan President

The Gerakan Youth Secretary-General Dominic Lau had rightly come out with a public position criticizing Deputy Prime Minister, Tan Sri Muhyiddin Yassin for his declaration that he is “a Malay first and then only a Malaysian”, asking him to be Deputy Prime Minister for all Malaysians and not just for the Malays; cautioning him to be mindful of the fact and reality that Malaysia is a multi-racial and multi-religious society and warning him not to forget the lessons of the March 8 “political tsunami” in the 2008 general elections where the people have made clear that they wanted a government for all Malaysians and not just for anyone ethnic group. (Chinese Malaysiakini 3.4.10)

This statement by the Gerakan Youth Secretary-General shows that there are still people at least in Gerakan Youth who have not completely lost their sense of idealism and national service in politics, especially as Gerakan national leaders like the previous Gerakan President Tun Dr. Lim Keng Yaik had repeatedly declared that Gerakan’s mission is nothing less than to achieve a Malaysian Malaysia.

The Gerakan National Central Committee should follow up on this statement by the Gerakan Youth Secretary-General to convene an emergency meeting to give an ultimatum to the Minister for 1Malaysia Government Transformation Programme Roadmap, Tan Sri Dr. Koh Tsu Koon to declare that he is “Malaysian first and Chinese second” or be removed as Gerakan President.
Continue reading “Gerakan National Central Committee should convene emergency meeting to give ultimatum to Koh Tsu Koon to declare he is “Malaysian first and Chinese second” or be removed as Gerakan President”