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Budget 2013: Federal government subsidies go up in flames while poor Malaysians watch

By Teh Chi-Chang, CFA
Executive Director
REFSA (Research for Social Advancement)
Friday, 12 October 2012

We write to rebut Dr Lim Teck Ghee’s assertion that “There is little empirical research to back up what has become an increasingly popular line of argument” that blanket subsidies such as for cheap petrol and sugar “benefit upper-class Malaysians who consume much more than their poorer cousins[1]”.

These are the basic facts:

  1. The federal government subsidy bill is expected to exceed RM42 billion this year.

  2. If we can agree that subsidies should go only to the poor, and we define the poor as the bottom 1/3rd of households, there will be 2.3 million households or nearly 10 million Malaysians[2] who will get subsidies.

  3. RM42 billion is enough to give these bottom 1/3rd of households RM1,650 per month – which will more than double their current incomes of RM1,500 per month!

Continue reading “Budget 2013: Federal government subsidies go up in flames while poor Malaysians watch”

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Christian monsters in Malaysia

— Terence Martin
The Malaysian Insider
Oct 12, 2012

OCT 12 — With the elections just around the corner, it seems that the battle for the Malay votes is heating up to unprecedented levels.

A number of prominent politicians has fashioned themselves as defenders of Islam in order to entice the huge vote banks of the Muslim electorate.

In order to protect the akidah of Muslims, they need a bogeyman. A convenient fall guy to stir the emotions of Muslims in the country.

Take a bow Malaysian Christians… Continue reading “Christian monsters in Malaysia”

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The NFC tale continues

— Fikri Osman
The Malaysian Insider
Oct 11, 2012

OCT 11 — Just when you think it’s safe to read what is happening in Malaysia, you get a spin of the National Feedlot Centre (NFC) saga.

In her defamation suit against several PKR leaders, Datuk Seri Shahrizat Abdul Jalil had her day in court yesterday to give her side of the story.

And what a tale it was, or a yarn as the case may be.

But the facts are simple when it comes to the NFC. Taxpayers lost RM250 million and public funds were used for the purchase of condominiums and whatever else.

Some Umno leaders might have defended her family’s use of public funds but it remains indefensible. And troubling that they can’t differentiate right from wrong. Continue reading “The NFC tale continues”

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Where is Najib’s “natural abhorrence” of corruption when as PM he could be completely indifferent about RM40 million “black money” attempted to be smuggled into Malaysia – whether for Sabah Chief Minister or Sabah UMNO?

The Minister in the Prime Minister’s Department, Datuk Seri Nazri Aziz invites national and international disbelief when in a written parliamentary reply to Batu MP Chua Tian Chan he said that investigation papers submitted to the Attorney-General by the Malaysian Anti-Corruption Commission (MACC) show that RM40 million a Sabah businessman was caught with in trying to smuggle into Malaysia from Hong Kong were political contributions to the state Umno and not for Chief Minister Musa Aman and that “no element of corruption was proven”.

On August 22, 2008, Sabah DAP officials comprising DAP MP for Kota Kinabalu Hiew King Cheu, DAP Sabah State Assemblyman for Sri Tanjong Jimmy Wong Sze Phin and Sabah DAP leader Edward Mujie lodged a police report at the Dang Wangi police station in Kuala Lumpur to demand that the Anti-Corruption Agency (before its replacement by MACC) investigate the allegation which had appeared in the press and Internet about a Hong Kong seizure of S$16 million cash and arrest of Michael Chia, a confidante of Sabah Chief Minister Datuk Seri Musa Aman at the Hong Kong International Airport on August 14, 2008 for alleged money trafficking and laundering before boarding flight bound for Kuala Lumpur.

More than four years after the event, Sabahans and Malaysians are now asked to believe that the RM40 million was not meant for Musa’s “personal use” as they were meant for Sabah UMNO – which contradicted media reports at the time that Chia had allegedly told the Hong Kong authorities that the money belonged to Musa. Continue reading “Where is Najib’s “natural abhorrence” of corruption when as PM he could be completely indifferent about RM40 million “black money” attempted to be smuggled into Malaysia – whether for Sabah Chief Minister or Sabah UMNO?”

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Menjelang PRU, musuh ulangi pujukan

— Abd Shukur Harun
The Malaysian Insider
Oct 11, 2012

11 OKT — Semakin hampir PRU Ke-13, semakin rancak desakan dan pujukan supaya PAS memutuskan hubungan dengan DAP sekaligus menarik diri dari Pakatan Rakyat, kerana DAP didakwa menolak Islam.

Desakan ini tidak sekedar datang dari musuh PAS — Umno/BN — bahkan datang dari segelintir yang amat kecil jumlahnya dari ahli PAS yang keliru dan kecewa atas sebab tertentu.

Juga mereka yang tidak memahami sejarah PAS dan tidak memahami secara mendalam konsep dan pengertian Tahalluf-Siasi (Pakatan PAS dengan parti lain).

Tahalluf-siasi, seperti saya katakan dalam tulisan saya dulu, bukan rekayasa sembarangan, tidak juga ijtihad perseorangan, jauh sekali didorong oleh kepentingan duniawi.

Tetapi ia dicetuskan sebagai suatu ijtihad jamai’e (Ijtihad kumpulan) PAS setelah diadakan muzakarah antara ulama dan pemimpin tertinggi PAS dengan ulama di peringkat antarabangsa, khususnya termasuk pemimpin Ikhwanul-Muslimin dan pemimpin ulama sedunia, Dr Yusuf Al-Qaradhawi. Continue reading “Menjelang PRU, musuh ulangi pujukan”

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The good news… and the bad

Rom Nain
Malaysiakini
Oct 8, 2012

After a couple of weeks or so of unrelenting inanity, enough to make me wax lyrical (well, almost) in this column, I thought of writing something nice, inoffensive, light-hearted even, this week.

After all, two Malaysian court decisions this past week certainly gave many of us reason to cheer.

The judgment for the five ex-ISA detainees in the illegal detention suit they brought against the regime, for one, must have been the perfect pick-me-up for many of us.

The KL High Court found that the five had been detained unlawfully and in bad faith in 2001 and reportedly awarded them ‘RM15,000 each, for every day of their detention under Section 73 of the Internal Security Act, as well as RM30,000 each as aggravated damages’.

Altogether, in the Oct 2 judgment, five former ISA detainess, then Reformasi activists, including the irrepressible Hishamuddin Rais (left), PAS’ Hulu Selangor assemblyperson Saari Sungib and PKR’s Batu MP Chua Tian Chang, better known as Tian Chua, were awarded a total of RM4 million. Continue reading “The good news… and the bad”

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Years of living precariously in Malaysia

Mustafa K. Anuar
The Malaysian Insider
Oct 10, 2012

Oct 10 — Malaysians are living in the grip of fear, not necessarily because of the spike in crime. Perceived or otherwise. Nor is it necessarily because of the number of deaths on the road which has risen over the years.

And certainly not because of two jet engines — as well as large amounts of money — that have somehow flown out of the country.

No. It is because there are “devils” — in various manifestations and aberrations — lurking in modern-day and technology-savvy Malaysia.

Why, quite recently Malaysians were warned by the federal government — which is visibly concerned for the common good of ordinary Malaysians especially those who can be quite impressionable — of the cunning and naughty attempts by “foreign elements” to topple the present-day government through their funding of non-governmental organisations (NGOs) such as Suaram, Centre for Independent Journalism (CIJ) and online newspaper Malaysiakini.

Indeed, this is an issue of national import that would not and should not escape the rapt attention and deep concern of serious newspapers worth their salt. This explains why dailies such as the influential and socially responsible Utusan Malaysia had front-paged this plot in the hope that fellow Malaysians would be patriotic enough to be on high alert and to defend their beloved country when the occasion arises. Continue reading “Years of living precariously in Malaysia”

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Mahathir lwn Soros

— Sakmongkol AK47
The Malaysian Insider
Oct 10, 2012

Oct 10 — Kenyataan Dr Mahathir semakin hari semakin bizarre. Orang Melayu kata macam buang tebiat. Sewel, biul dan merapu. Terbaru Dr Mahathir berkata mengundi Pakatan Rakyat bererti mengundi Soros dan mengundi Soros bererti penaklukan semula. Re-colonisation.

Makna nya kalau Anwar PM- maka Soros dibelakang nya. Haji Hadi, Kit Siang semua menjadi antek neo-kolonialisme. Begitu? Rakyat Malaysia yang 29 juta ini apa pula? Anak kambing? Who are you trying to kid DR Mahathir? ( kid =anak kambing). Keluarga Shahrizat anggap kita lembu. Mahathir anggap kita anak kambing.

Siapa Soros? Kita tahu dia seorang yang kaya dan membuat pelaburan melalui beberapa syarikat milik nya terutama flagship company nya- Quantum Funds. Dia guna kekayaan nya untuk membantu pertubuhan dan gerakan2 mendapat kemerdekaan. Dia juga seorang dermawan yang terkemuka membantu rakyat yang buta huruf, kebuluran dan yang ditimpa mala petaka.

Dr Mahathir kata dia tak bagus dan penyangak. Tapi jutaan rakyat dalam negara yang duduk dibawah pemerintah yang zalim menganggap Soros sebagai anugerah Tuhan kepada mereka.

Kepada Dr Mahathir Soros penyangak. Tapi Dr Mahathir menulis suatu surat kepada Soros dengan nada yang merayu rayu ajak berjumpa untuk menyelesaikan masaalah ekonomi secara bersama. Kalau Soros ini jahat mengapa Dr Mahathir tulis surat kepada Soros dan kemudian nya berjumpa? Boleh jadi inilah agaknya maksud lebih baik berkawan dengan syaitan yang dikenali daripada malaikat yang tidak dikenali. Syaitan mesti kenal geng seangkatan dengan nya. Continue reading “Mahathir lwn Soros”

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Spyware Leaves Trail to Beaten Activist Through Microsoft Flaw

By Vernon Silver
Bloomberg
Oct 10, 2012

On a Monday in July, Ahmed Mansoor sat in his study in Dubai and made the mistake of clicking on a Microsoft Word attachment that arrived in an e-mail, labeled “very important” in Arabic, from a sender he thought he recognized.

With that click, the pro-democracy activist unwittingly downloaded spyware that seized on a flaw in the Microsoft Corp. (MSFT) program to take over his computer and record every keystroke. The hackers infiltrated his digital life so deeply they still accessed his personal e-mail even after he changed his password.

Since then, Mansoor, 42, an electrical engineer and father of four, says he has suffered two beatings by thugs in September during his campaign for citizens’ civil rights in the Persian Gulf federation of the United Arab Emirates. While those assailants remain unknown, researchers say they’ve figured out what was behind the virtual assault.

The spyware that penetrated his laptop appears to be a Western-made surveillance tool sold to police and intelligence agencies that’s so powerful it can turn on webcams and microphones and grab documents off hard drives, according to the findings of a study being published today by the University of Toronto Munk School of Global Affairs’ Citizen Lab.

Mansoor’s predicament shows how nations have rapidly moved beyond the surveillance of phone and e-mail transmissions to rifle through the most intimate details stored by personal computers and the smartphones that citizens carry with them everywhere. The tools, which can peer into people’s living rooms and access rough drafts of love letters, business strategies or plans for street demonstrations, mark the latest escalation in a digital arms race between governments and the people they watch. Continue reading “Spyware Leaves Trail to Beaten Activist Through Microsoft Flaw”

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UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon should explain whether Dmitri Vlassis’ praises for Malaysian government’s anti-corruption campaign reflects the official stand of the world body and UNODC

In the past few days, I have been receiving negative reactions from Malaysians to the recently-held 6th annual conference and general meeting of the International Association of Anti-Corruption Authorities (IAACA) in Kuala Lumpur, and in particular the praises given by the highest-level representative from the United Nations anti-corruption agency to the Malaysian government for its anti-corruption campaign.

During the IAACA Conference in Kuala Lumpur last weekend, Dmitri Vlassis, the head of the UN’s Corruption and Economic Crime Branch of the United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime (UNODC), commended the Malaysian government for its “serious efforts” at tackling corruption.

This has horrified anti-corruption campaigners in Malaysia as they regard this as a major blow by the United Nations anti-corruption agency undermining their efforts to get the Najib government to have the political will to really walk the talk to fight corruption, in particular “Grand Corruption” involving VVIPs, especially top political and public personalities.

Furthermore, they are mystified as to how the Malaysian government could merit praise for its anti-corruption efforts when from the 17-year history of Transparency International (TI) Corruption Perception Index (CPI), Malaysia’s ranking and score for 2011 on both counts is lowest on record – ranking No. 60 and score of 4.3 when in 1995 Malaysia was ranked No. 23 and attained a score of 5.32 in 1996. Continue reading “UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon should explain whether Dmitri Vlassis’ praises for Malaysian government’s anti-corruption campaign reflects the official stand of the world body and UNODC”

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What’s keeping Malaysia’s Opposition together?

— Bridget Welsh
The Malaysian Insider
Oct 10, 2012

Oct 10 — What keeps the Malaysian opposition Pakatan Rakyat (People’s Alliance) together? The quick answer often given is the common search of political power.

While power frames the relationships between three disparate political parties – Islamist PAS, secular-committed Democratic Action Party and the umbrella reform-oriented PKR of Mr Anwar Ibrahim – it is not the glue of the opposition alliance. Were this the case, PAS would have left the coalition when UMNO floated the offer of joining the government in 2008 and intense jockeying took place within PAS.

The answer lies in the three parties’ shared moral compact. Pakatan Rakyat is an alliance of profoundly different backgrounds, with secularists, theocrats, conservatives and progressives working together. In a world wracked with tensions over religion and misunderstandings, Malaysia’s opposition stands out in bucking international trends of difference. Continue reading “What’s keeping Malaysia’s Opposition together?”

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Global Economic Crisis: The Largest Economy In The World Is Imploding

Michael Snyder
ETF Daily News
October 7th, 2012

A devastating economic depression is rapidly spreading across the largest economy in the world. Unemployment is skyrocketing, money is being pulled out of the banks at an astounding rate, bad debts are everywhere and economic activity is slowing down month after month. So who am I talking about?

Not the United States – the economy that I am talking about has a GDP that is more than two trillion dollars larger. It is not China either – the economy that I am talking about is more than twice the size of China.

You have probably guessed it by now – the largest economy in the world is the EU economy. Things in Europe continue to get even worse. Greece and Spain are already experiencing full-blown economic depressions that continue to deepen, and Italy and France are headed down the exact same path that Greece and Spain have gone.

Headlines about violent protests and economic despair dominate European newspapers day after day after day. European leaders hold summit meeting after summit meeting, but all of the “solutions” that get announced never seem to fix anything. In fact, the largest economy on the planet continues to implode right in front of our eyes, and the economic shockwave from this implosion is going to be felt to the four corners of the earth. Continue reading “Global Economic Crisis: The Largest Economy In The World Is Imploding”

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War on corruption

— Lim Sue Goan
The Malaysian Insider
Oct 09, 2012

OCT 9 — Deputy Prime Minister Tan Sri Muhyiddin Yassin believes that Malaysia will be successful in its war on corruption. This is an over-optimistic view.

The government seems to have strengthened its efforts in fighting corruption, including enforcing the Whistleblower Protection Act, establishing special corruption courts, listing those who have been successfully prosecuted for corruption offences on the MACC website, making public the bidding results of government projects, reducing business licences, and 128 corporates have signed the Corporate Integrity Pledge (CIP) to prevent corrupt practices in their companies. However, corruption remains serious, as the government has neglected loopholes in the law that have enabled corrupt practices among senior officials. There is no mandate requiring that senior officials declare their assets and the anti-corruption movement lacks credibility.

The impression of the general public on anti-corruption is, only small fish are convicted and even if the big ones are caught and charged, they would be released as senior officials involved in corruption know how to make themselves “innocent”. Continue reading “War on corruption”

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IMF warns of fresh global crisis unless eurozone finds a fix

Phillip Inman in Tokyo
The Guardian
8 October 2012

World economic outlook warns of fresh downturn as European ministers asked to try and promote growth

The International Monetary Fund has urged Eurozone leaders to act swiftly in response to the debt crisis in Greece and Spain, or risk dragging down the global economy with another financial crisis.

The IMF warned that the situation was grave and could escalate into a wider downturn unless national leaders ended their disputes with a long-lasting deal. As eurozone finance ministers met in Luxembourg for crisis talks and the launch of the euro’s permanent rescue fund, the IMF urged Europe and the US to promote growth to help major developing economies like China, Brazil and India .

The Washington-based lender said at the start of its annual meeting, in Tokyo, that the “downside risks are judged to be more elevated than in the April 2012 or September 2011 world economic outlook reports”. The annual assessment of the global economic situation said it was not clear whether the situation was another bump in the road to recovery or a worsening of the situation. “The answer depends on whether European and US policymakers deal proactively with their major short term economic problems,” it said. Continue reading “IMF warns of fresh global crisis unless eurozone finds a fix”

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Najib – a man trying to do a woman’s job

by Mariam Mokhtar
Malaysiakini
Oct 8, 2012

It is wrongly believed that when women speak, men only hear nagging.

The tragic prime minister Najib Abdul Razak, who is under intense pressure at home, should refrain from bringing his domestic problems into the workplace. For him to dismiss the need for a women’s rights movement in Malaysia is premature and daft.

Millions of women in Malaysia face violence, intimidation and other prejudices, in private, at work and in public. The instruments of the state and the Syariah Court have failed to deal with their problems.

The PM opined that “equality has been given from the start”for Malaysian women.

In the first instance, neither he nor his party gave women that equality. It was the British colonial administration which gave the women of Malaya schooling. Despite that, they still had to fight for jobs, demand equal pay and battle other forms of discrimination. Continue reading “Najib – a man trying to do a woman’s job”

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Corruption: The more things change…

— Qiu Yaofeng
The Malaysian Insider
Oct 08, 2012

OCT 8 — The deputy prime minister said at the weekend that Malaysia’s gains in the Corruption Barometer (CB) over the previous two years showed Putrajaya’s fight against graft was paying off.

Tan Sri Muhyiddin Yassin noted that 49 per cent of Malaysians polled in 2011 by Transparency International (TI) thought that the government’s efforts to stamp out corruption were “effective”, up from 28 per cent in 2009.

But the Umno No. 2 conveniently forgot to mention that the proportion of those who responded positively rose by only one percentage point from 2010 to 2011.

So even if the poll were accepted at face value, this suggests Barisan Nasional’s (BN) anti-graft campaign has hit a brick wall, at least as far as the voting public is concerned.

But what is even more underwhelming is the fact that getting 49 per cent of the respondents to say the government has made the right moves is actually not an improvement at all. Continue reading “Corruption: The more things change…”

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The Havoc Education Reform Inflicts: Education Blueprint 2013-2025 (Part 4 of 5)

By M. Bakri Musa | October 7th, 2012
www.bakrimusa.com

Fourth of Five Parts: Roar of An Elephant, Baby of a Mouse

[In the first three parts I critiqued the Blueprint’s recommendations; specifically its failure to recognize the diversity within our school system and thus the need to have targeted programs, the challenge of recruiting quality teachers, and the link between efficiency efficacy, and quality. In this Part Four, I discuss the major areas the report ignores.]

Education Blueprint 2013-2025 lacks clear authorship. The document carries forewords by Najib, Muhyyiddin, and the ministry’s Secretary-General as well as its Director General, while the Appendix credits a long list of those involved in this “robust, comprehensive, and collaborative effort,” but the Blueprint itself is unsigned.

It is also impossible to tell who actually is in charge of this whole reform effort. According to the complicated box-chart diagram, the entire endeavor was anchored in a 12-member “Project Management Office” (PMO) that reported to the Ministry’s Director-General as well as to an 11-member “Project Taskforce” that in turn reported to Muhyyiddin. Both the PMO and Taskforce are manned exclusively by ministry officials. Then there are the local and international panels of experts.
Continue reading “The Havoc Education Reform Inflicts: Education Blueprint 2013-2025 (Part 4 of 5)”

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‘Utusan lied about church ticking off Penang CM’

By Lee Long Hui | 1:54PM Oct 8, 2012
Malaysiakini

Two Christian leaders quoted by Utusan Malaysia as having criticised the Penang chief minister, have slammed the report as a “complete lie”.

Lutheran Evangelical Church bishop Solomon Rajah and former Council of Churches Malaysia (CCM) president Thomas Philips (right) said their words had been taken out of context in the report headlined ‘Church is not a place for politics’.

They have demanded a retraction of the report published in the Sunday edition, Mingguan Malaysia, and a public apology from the Umno-owned Utusan in its next edition.
Continue reading “‘Utusan lied about church ticking off Penang CM’”