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Najib will split the country

K. Siladass
1st October 2015

Prime Minister cum President of UMNO Dato Seri Najib Razak has now openly supported the Red Shirt claiming that the Malays have been slapped many times and the 16th September Red shirt rally was the answer. This goes to show, Najib was from the beginning supporting the Red shirt rally and his initial reaction of an innocent bystander was all a gimmick.

What Najib has conveniently ignored is the fact that the non-Malays have been knocked on their heads many times and what we have is inaction to bring the culprits to the books. Leaving this aside, it would have been expected of Najib to come up with sound reasoning rather than this “slap” allegation which is closer to infantile attitude.

Now it is clear that Najib needed this Rally to show those who opposed him here and the whole world that he has a large following who support him. Sadly, the actual fact is that the Malays themselves find Najib’s attitude shocking, if not embarrassing. Continue reading “Najib will split the country”

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The 1965 genocide and rise of Suharto

– Tommy Thomas
The Malaysian Insider
1 October 2015

Fifty years ago, as a young student, I was saddened to learn of an attempted coup in Indonesia, which within a few months overthrew President Sukarno.

Although the newly established Malaysia (Singapore had just exited the Federation) was under Confrontation, and Indonesia was the enemy, I was always a fan of Sukarno.

During the dark days of the Cold War – the Cuban missiles crisis occurred less than 3 years earlier – Sukarno, together with Nehru, led the non-aligned movement. Continue reading “The 1965 genocide and rise of Suharto”

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With the approach of a “perfect storm” of combined political, economic and nation-building crises, Malaysia needs statesmen and stateswomen from both sides of the political divide to save Malaysia and not racists, opportunists and charlatans

The signs of the coming of a “perfect storm” of combined political, economic and nation-building crises hitting Malaysia are to be seen everywhere except to the blind and bigots.

The latest sign of the coming of the “perfect storm” in Malaysia is the Reuters report yesterday quoting the Indonesian Finance Minister, Bambang Brodjonegoro saying that Indonesia will seek to shield itself from the spread of any financial contagion from Malaysia by improving market sentiment and using government borrowing to boost dollar inflows.

He expressed worries of Indonesian investors as the twin declines in the rupiah and reserves had revived memories of the Asian financial crisis of the late 1990s, as well as concerns about contagion from Malaysia “which is in the grips of an escalating political and financial crisis linked to a struggling state investment fund”.

This is evidence that the Malaysian governance has become not only a threat to our own national well-being but also a threat to the economic well-being of neighbouring ASEAN nations.

We should stop the pretence that everything is fine with Malaysia, what with Malaysia climbing two spots in the Global Competitiveness Report 2015-2016, (which is nothing much to boast about in a closer study of the latest World Economic Forum ranking) or that there is nothing for Malaysians to be shy or ashamed in having their Prime Minister, Datuk Seri Najib Razak as the first serving head of government in the world to be investigated as a kleptocrat under the US Kleptocracy Asset Recovery Initiative 2010 with the twin scandals of the RM50 billion 1MDB and RM2.6 billion “donation” in Najib’s personal banking accounts. Continue reading “With the approach of a “perfect storm” of combined political, economic and nation-building crises, Malaysia needs statesmen and stateswomen from both sides of the political divide to save Malaysia and not racists, opportunists and charlatans”

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Soft spot for the British

– M. Bakri Musa
The Malaysian Insider
30 September 2015

The British replaced the Iberians and Dutch in Malaysia. Those colonialists carved up the Malay world among themselves, with Malaysia fortunately falling under the British while the larger archipelago going to the Dutch and the Philippines to the Spaniards.

I say “fortunately”, considering the fate of the Indonesians and Filipinos. For whatever reason the British were much more benign, or less malevolent.

Among the consequential differences, while our Indonesian brethren had to fight for their independence, Malaysians opted for the more civilised and considerably less traumatic route of negotiations. Continue reading “Soft spot for the British”

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Twitter Plans to Go Beyond Its 140-Character Limit

By Kurt Wagner and Jason Del Rey
ReCode
September 29, 2015

Twitter is building a new product that will allow users to share tweets that are longer than the company’s 140-character limit, according to multiple people familiar with the company’s plans.

It’s unclear what the product will look like, but sources say it would enable Twitter users to publish long-form content to the service. Users can already tweet out blocks of text with products like OneShot, but those are simply images, not actual text published on Twitter. A Twitter spokesperson declined to comment.

The 140-character limit has been one of Twitter’s trademark features since day one. It has long been scrutinized by those outside the company, and many have argued over the years that Twitter should expand it. It has also been a topic of discussion internally at Twitter for years, according to multiple sources, and has resurfaced in recent months under interim CEO Jack Dorsey as the company has been exploring new ways to grow its user base. Continue reading “Twitter Plans to Go Beyond Its 140-Character Limit”