Day: September 21, 2013

– Izmil Amri Ismail
The Malaysian Insider/Roketkini.com
September 20, 2013

Ya, berapa nilai Melayu dalam DAP? Lebih spesifik, berapa nilai politisi Melayu dalam DAP? Sekupang, dua kupang, atau lima kupang? Atau adakah lebih daripada itu? Siapa yang menentukan nilai; dan kalau pun nilai itu boleh ditentukan, bagaimana caranya?

Untung sebenarnya DAP ditakdirkan untuk mengadakan pemilihan semula. Dengan kemenangan besar DAP sebagai sebahagian daripada koalisi Pakatan Rakyat pada PRU-13, 5 Mei lalu, pasti ramai personaliti yang ingin menyendeng dan bermesra dengan parti ini. Parti yang sebelum PRU-13 dilihat sebagai sebuah parti Cina dan tidak begitu mesra Melayu.

Dengan kemenangan tiga wakil rakyat Melayu pada PRU agak susah untuk musuh politik DAP menggunakan hujah ‘parti Cina’. Arakian maka semakin galaklah sekalian Melayu untuk kian mampir dan mengikut serta dalam perjuangan DAP.

Ini adalah perkembangan yang amat sihat dan membanggakan. Jenuh sungguh parti itu berusaha bagi menarik minat Melayu menyertai parti serta menjenamakan DAP sebagai sebuah parti berbilang kaum. Penyertaan kian ramai orang Melayu ke dalam DAP kini sudah bukan lagi bahan berita. Sudah jadi perkara biasa. Continue reading “Berapa nilai Melayu dalam DAP?”

Malaysiakini
Sep 21, 2013

Former inspector-general of police Abdul Rahim Mohd Noor warned that Malaysia will become a laughing stock if the government adamantly refuses to allow Chin Peng’s remains to be brought into the country.

“There is a hue and cry from the public not to even allow his ashes (back into Malaysia). My God… This is stretching the argument a bit too far. It’s a bit naive I think.

“If the government – the authorities – succumb to this public pressure not to allow Chin Peng’s ashes to be brought back, I think, we are making Malaysia a laughing stock to the whole world,” he said in an interview aired on BFM yesterday. Continue reading “‘Barring Chin Peng’s ashes makes us laughing stock’”

by Dr. Chen Man Hin
21.9.2013

The Malaysian government’s continued refusal to allow the remains of deceased Chin Peng to be buried in his home town in Malaysia is a blot on the humanity of Umno leaders.

The reason for their stubborn refusal was that Chin Peng caused the death of thousands of Malay police personnel in the guerrilla war from 1948 to 1989.

It is not true that Chin Ping killed them in cold blood. There was a guerrilla war going on at that time.

Chin Peng was the leader of the Malayan Liberation Front, which was part of the world communist movement.

It is relevant to point out that there was another guerrilla war going on in Vietnam from 1955 to 1975, between the Vietnam National Liberation Front and the American army in Vietnam, with war casualties running into tens of thousands for the Americans and hundreds of thousands for the Vietnamese. Continue reading “Insurgency war from 1948 to 1989 a war between ideologies not race”

By Kee Thuan Chye
Yahoo! News
21.9.2013

The pettiness of the Government has not been so clearly exposed as it is now over the issue of whether the former Communist leader Chin Peng’s ashes should be allowed into Malaysia to be buried in the land he loved and fought for. Even the police – who should have better things to look out for like the increasing incidences of crime – are putting out alerts to prevent the ashes from being brought back from Thailand, where he died. As if these ashes were lethal and could, by some preternatural means, maim the Malaysian populace.

Imagine this. Police personnel stationed at every entry point into Malaysia from Thailand, including at airports, going through the bags of everyone coming in. As if they have nothing better to do. But then, for all we know, the ashes might have been sent to someone in, say, Indonesia instead, and this person comes into Malaysia with it, unchecked. How stupid can it get?

Meanwhile, the authorities still quibble over the trivia that Chin Peng was not Malaysian because he could not produce the necessary documents to prove he was so, but it seems more likely that they did not want to let him return, full stop. Continue reading “Chin Peng Deserves a Place in His Country”

By Jose Mario Dolor De Vega
Free Malaysia Today
September 21, 2013

A democratic society seeks to unleash the creativity of all its citizens and to celebrate the extraordinary achievements of its most gifted and dedicated, not otherwise.

COMMENT

I refer to the utterly insightful and undeniably powerful essay of Jeswan Kaur, ‘Pak Samad isn’t the problem here’, published in FMT on Sept 8.

I beg the indulgence of the reader and may I be allowed to add a few words of concurrence and to explicate my own take on the whole matter.

According to the National Cultural Policy of the Australian government, the role of the artist is as follows:

“A democratic society seeks to unleash the creativity of all its citizens and to celebrate the extraordinary achievements of its most gifted and dedicated. The value of creativity is something that is increasingly recognised and valued. Creativity is an essential attribute in an increasing number of occupations.

“The most gifted artists, however, take the ability to imagine, adapt, empathise and collaborate to another level through training, practice, discipline and courage. The extraordinary achievements that come when the most gifted individuals combine capacity and skill is something we recognise.”

From this description, we can deduce that artists are creative people and that their creativity is necessary for the development of one’s society. Further said, creativity is something that must be recognized and valued by the said society that produced the artist. Continue reading “Pak Samad – always the people’s artist”