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Shooting police into isolation

By Frankie D’Cruz | July 31, 2013
The Malay Mail Online

JULY 31 — Amid the outpouring of widespread public spleen over public security, gun violence is running riot and fuelling the explosive tone of rising crime.

After a brutal stretch of 15 shootings since April – the most high profile involving Monday’s assassination of the founder of Arab Malaysia Bank Hussain Ahmad Najadi, you’d have expected the incidents to bring notice to an epidemic of gun crimes.

Sadly, the gun crisis hasn’t prodded the authorities to come together to contain the culture of violence and the easy availability of firearms in Malaysia.

Gun crime isn’t a new and distinct issue but the recent cases suggest that carrying of a firearm has become increasingly common place.

We speculate criminals get their guns from a neighbouring country. We theorise observable patterns to gun crime. What we know for sure is that gun crime is a sign of collapsed civil life.
Continue reading “Shooting police into isolation”

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The Boris Yeltsin to Najib’s glasnost

– Sakmongkol AK47
The Malaysian Insider
August 01, 2013

Readers may be interested to read an abridged version of an interview I had with The Malaysian Insider, here.

I spoke freely about a number of issues. One of these includes the future of Malays and what Mahathir is doing to imperil the social structure in Malaysia by distorting the issues.

If I may expand. Najib will fail in his glasnost style of politics because he hasn’t got the ground troops in the support power structures. He has the institutions, the means which are given legislative muscle- but the people to implement his ideas are not there.

His world is full of tenured sycophants. Tenured in the sense that as far as these people get bits and pieces of economic and business entitlements- they sing like canary of Najib. In order to make his ideas take root, he needs the manpower with enough zeal, dedication, honesty and commitment to carry out the ideas.

Sadly, he has a modicum of talent and even then, the talented ones like KJ, Nurjazlan are viewed with suspicion and envy. Najib has got two chances – slim and none. Look at what happened to Gorbachev. Najib has old man Boris Yeltsin in the form of Dr Mahathir hovering around him. Old man Boris would very much like to put a Putin with enough aggression to control the politics. He is cultivating several- Muhyiddin, Shafie Apdal, and eventually the son. Yes, Mukhriz is now being trained to take over.

The Umno ground stands in opposition to Najib. What he has is, perception that is media created mostly that his policies are working. The Umno ground isn’t buying his Glasnost style. They want assertiveness and power talk. This is where, the man who can walk on water – Dr Mahathir – comes in.

What Dr Mahathir has done is to set the tone and the theme for the coming Umno elections. His message: – In order to check and balance the emergence of an assertive Chinese community, the next batch of Umno leaders must be the most Malay of Malays. They must be aggressive, strident and bellicose. Continue reading “The Boris Yeltsin to Najib’s glasnost”

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Why my friend Chetz made that video

From Aneesa Alphonsus
FMT LETTER
August 1, 2013

Chetz Togom or Maznah Mohd Yusof is my best friend. Today, she’s being harassed, hounded and harangued for a video she made three years ago on how she spent that particular Hari Raya with her dogs. I was there when the video was shot and since TV stations are not taking the trouble to find out why she made that video, I’m going to tell them and all the others who are screaming for Chetz’s blood why she made that video.

It was late morning when she took her dogs for a walk. When she came home, Chetz cleaned herself, then she washed the dogs’ paws as she planned on bringing them into the house for some treats. When I asked her why she did it this way, she said, “No special reason, I just want people to know that having dogs isn’t a dirty thing. We clean them and we clean ourselves well.”

That was it. It has nothing to do with all the fuss about “ambik air sembahyang dengan anjing” (taking abolution with the dogs) that some irresponsible media quarters are harping on as are some bloggers who don’t know head or tail, pun not intended, about the situation.

Then there is the question of the takbir Raya. Chetz put it in the video because it reminds her of her late grandmother who raised her, plus the fact that it is significant to Hari Raya. What is the harm in that? How does this show disrespect to Islam? Continue reading “Why my friend Chetz made that video”