Day: April 27, 2013

New Straits Times today carried the following report: “Tsu Koon throws challenge to Kit Siang and Guan Eng on hudud”.

Tan Sri Dr Koh Tsu Koon, who is Gerakan President, “threw a challenge” to me and DAP secretary-general Lim Guan Eng “to make a formal stand on hudud, the Islamic law”.

Koh said both DAP leaders “had not made it clear whether they supported or opposed PAS’ stand on hudud or left the matter to the party’s national chairman, Karpal Singh”.

I am surprised by Koh’s statement, as he has got a Ph.D and having been Penang Chief Minister for nearly two decades, he should be more knowledgeable and literate than ordinary Gerakan and Barisan Nasional leaders and members. Continue reading “8-Day to 13GE Polling Day – Tsu Koon invited to Gelang Patah daily press conference at 11.30 am tomorrow and I will explain to him my stand on hudud”

Oleh kerana masih ada pemimpin politik UMNO dan BN serta cybertroopers upahan mereka yang masih menyebarkan fitnah tentang DAP, saya ingin menjelaskan bahawa DAP adalah sebuah parti politik yang sah yang terbuka kepada semua bangsa dan kaum. Jika DAP bertindak di luar undang-undang atau melanggar Perlembagaan Persekutuan, tentu DAP sudah lama diharamkan.

DAP adalah parti pelbagai kaum, sentiasa membuka pintu dan peluang adil kepada orang Melayu. Yang menjadi masalah kepada DAP ialah UMNO dan BN telah lama menggunakan media dan alat-alat kerajaan untuk menyebarkan fitnah kononnya DAP adalah parti cauvinis Cina dan bersifat perkauman.

Fitnah ini diulang-ulang sehingga ada orang keliru dan tidak sedar bahawa UMNO lah yang menutup pintu kepada orang bukan Melayu menyertainya, MCA pula tidak membenarkan orang bukan Cina menyertai dan MIC tidak membuka pintu kepada orang Melayu atau Cina. Jadi BN yang mengamalkan politik berasaskan kaum.

Namun, saya lega sekarang kerana semakin ramai orang Melayu sudah sedar tentang fitnah UMNO dan BN yang disiarkan melalui media. Semakin ramai orang Melayu tidak percayakan laporan oleh Utusan Malaysia, TV3, Berita Harian dan lain-lain media yang dikawal ketat oleh UMNO dan BN.
Continue reading “DAP parti pelbagai kaum, sentiasa membuka pintu dan peluang kepada orang Melayu”

by Mark Baker
Editor-at-Large, The Age

Anwar Ibrahim once seemed a certainty to rule Malaysia. Then came his arrest and imprisonment. Now, with his party shaking up the establishment, is he set to finally fulfil his ambition? By Mark Baker.

It’s nearing midnight in Penang. In a park surrounded by decaying concrete apartment blocks, a swelling crowd waits patiently amid the sticky heat and pungent aromas of food stalls, traffic fumes and open drains. This is a poor Malay neighbourhood, but there are Chinese and Indians here, too, a representative cross-section of multiracial Malaysia.

Suddenly a slim figure in dark trousers and white shirt emerges from the darkness through a side gate and the crowd erupts in jubilation, clapping, cheering and sounding horns. A squad of armed security men guides him through the crush and up towards the fluorescent glare of a makeshift stage. “There have been attacks by provocateurs at other meetings. We have to be careful,” says a senior aide. Continue reading “Winds of change”

by Martin Jalleh

by Stan CH Lee

Recently DPM Muhyiddin Yassin proudly announced that Malaysia’ branding is something that is real, rooted in reality. Not something that it aspires to be.

1Malaysia?

I guess he has to justify the staggering amounts paid to some Israeli PR firm for massaging the image. He obviously believes the guy who said “Get a good creative person and he can make a stinking dead elephant smell like perfume.” To be sure, good creative work can even wipe a dark past clean, but for this to work, the subject must have already started on the road to redemption. You could have been a scoundrel in your younger days, but are now a responsible member of society. If you continue in your merry old ways, it shows up jarringly against the branding.

Bikin tak serupa cakap, they say. Continue reading “Can you smell the elephant in the room?”

by Martin Jalleh

by P Ramakrishnan
ALIRAN

The joy of receiving RM500 has been fleeting. Now, the coffee shops, market traders, hawkers and food courts have all increased their prices, and the pain will not go away, observes P Ramakrishnan.

The Barisan Nasional is feeding opium to the people through BR1M. The people then become deluded into believing that a lot of money is being given out. Indeed they feel elated and happy clutching the RM500 that is dished out to them.

At that moment – after waiting in long queues and sweating in an uncomfortable environment – when they finally receive the RM500, they feel that they are suddenly rich. For the poor people this has a big impact. Continue reading “BR1M brings misery”

by Bridget Welsh
Malaysiakini
2:08PM Apr 25, 2013

GE13 SPECIAL In caretaker Premier Najib Abdul Razak’s political targeting, one group has received special attention – civil servants. Why would those in the heart of government garner such special focus for an election? The reality is that in Malaysia’s close electoral races, civil servants can be decisive in shaping the final tallies. This is one of the groups that I will be highlighting as decisive in this campaign.

Over the past few years Najib’s administration has worked to stem the erosion of support from his traditional base of government employees with mixed results.

A decisive constituency

Civil servants make up 1.4 million voters, or 10.5 percent of the electorate. The civil service is made up of senior appointments, the police, army personnel, teachers, and a variety of industrial and manual (IMG) groups. There are also an estimated 657,000 government pensioners. Continue reading “People or party? Wooing civil servants”