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Are we really independent?

P Gunasegaram
Malaysiakini
Mar 29, 2013

QUESTION TIME On the eve of the general election, it is appropriate to take a moment to reflect on how independent are we really.

What a moment it must have been when Malaysia (then Malaya) achieved independence from the British on Aug 31, 1957 and the flag of the newly independent country was raised.

At five years old, I was too young to remember what it was like then but have vague memories of my brother getting lost on a family visit to Kuala Lumpur town during the celebrations and being taken care of by policemen, before he was reunited with our parents.

It must have held so much hope for Malayans of all races and religions who put aside their differences to work for the formation of a new nation.

Tunku Abdul Rahman declared himself the happiest prime minister in the world and was proud of the fact that independence was achieved via negotiation without a single drop of blood being shed.

To be sure there were differences and in the years before independence there was much debate and agonising over how a disparate country of Chinese and Indian immigrants, many of whom had nowhere else but Malaya to call home, were to be integrated with the majority Malay community.

But there was a plan and everyone stuck to it and the country became independent. The communist threat had been beaten back although it would take until the sixties before they were more or less completely vanquished.

We were independent but how free were we? And did not independence mean freedom as well? Continue reading “Are we really independent?”

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Malaysia’s looming election – Video nasties

Economist
Mar 23rd 2013 | KUALA LUMPUR

– A two-year election campaign nears its climax

WITH a tight election coming up, it is politics as usual in Malaysia—only more so. This month alone has seen the opposition accused of colluding in a foreign invasion of the state of Sabah in Borneo; the death of a private investigator, reviving stories of the grisly murder in 2006 of a beautiful Mongolian woman linked to a friend of the prime minister, Najib Razak; the leader of the opposition, Anwar Ibrahim, denying that he was one of two men appearing in grainy pictures online in an affectionate clinch; and a film shot on hidden cameras that appears to show large-scale corruption in the government of the other Malaysian state in Borneo, Sarawak.

Sailing blithely above the mud and filth that make Malaysian political waters so murky, Mr Najib went on national television on March 19th to deliver the scorecard on the “transformation programme” his government has implemented. He had a good story to tell, of robust economic growth of 5.6% in 2012, poverty virtually eliminated, inequality reduced and 400 legal cases against corruption initiated. And he was able to announce that a scheme to give cash handouts to poorer households will become an annual event.

All should be set fair, you might think, for Mr Najib’s ruling coalition, the Barisan Nasional (BN), to romp home again at the election, as it has done in every ballot since independence in 1957. Mr Najib is expected to dissolve parliament any day now, with the voting to follow in mid-April after a brief official campaign period (the unofficial one has now lasted two years or more). If he does not dissolve parliament, its term will expire at the end of April, and the election must then be held by the end of June.

In fact, the outcome is in doubt, for the first time in Malaysia’s history. Continue reading “Malaysia’s looming election – Video nasties”

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Who Knows What the Truth is These Days?

By Kee Thuan Chye
Yahoo Newsroom
Mon, Mar 11, 2013

How do you decide what is truth and what is falsehood as the build-up to Malaysia’s 13th general election hots up? So many bizarre twists and turns have emerged in recent days that Malaysians must be in a state of shock and awe.

First, businessman Deepak Jaikishan openly alleged that Prime Minister Najib Razak and his wife Rosmah Mansor were involved in forcing private investigator P. Balasubramaniam to make a second statutory declaration to contradict his first, which had implicated Najib in the murder of Mongolian model Altantuya Shaariibuu.

Then Bala returned from exile earlier this year to affirm that he stood by his first statutory declaration, reinforcing the revelations made by Deepak about how the second declaration came about.

The latest twist is Azlan Mohd Lazim’s announcement that Opposition Leader Anwar Ibrahim is innocent of the charge of having sodomised Azlan’s son, Saiful, and that Anwar is the victim of a political conspiracy. Taking everyone by surprise, including apparently Saiful as well, the father attests that his son was “used by several unscrupulous individuals”, including a special officer of Najib’s, to tarnish Anwar’s image. Continue reading “Who Knows What the Truth is These Days?”

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Don’t fear the consequences of change

Anwar Ibrahim
Malaysiakini
Mar 12, 2013

COMMENT

The present Umno-BN government of Najib Abdul Razak is living on borrowed time. It doesn’t want to admit it but its legitimacy is now totally in question because constitutionally, its full term has expired.

The people’s patience is tested to the limit here by the audacity of a government that goes on ruling without a mandate.

A number of bogus analysts and self-appointed doomsday prophets, especially those driven by very personal agendas, have warned that Malaysia will descend into political and economic chaos in the event of a Pakatan Rakyat victory.

On the other hand, the more genuine and independent observers have expressed greater optimism. For instance, the original ‘Dr Doom’, Prof Roubini, says that our economy will stay robust even with a change in government.

We know that a mandate for change is not limited to the political sphere though it is true that without that mandate, economic management itself will be off to a false start.

When Indonesia made that break from military autocracy to constitutional democracy, much of the focus of the free world was on how its economy would weather the transition.

And in their case, transition would stretch for years and indeed the fruits of that initial process of political upheaval are for all to see.

In the case of the Arab Spring, the major worry remains the lack of clearly defined policies that would set the road map to economic recovery and growth.

They are still finding their way and it won’t be an easy way but that is no excuse for rejecting freedom and democracy.

Certainly, political stability is a key factor, and I might just emphasise the most crucial factor in setting the direction and objectives of economic management. Continue reading “Don’t fear the consequences of change”

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Of instant websites, anonymous emails and political mudslinging

The Malaysian Insider
Mar 04, 2013

MARCH 4 — As the country enters the home stretch before Election 2013, many Malaysians have been receiving emails from people with strange sounding names like Abrihim Malawaki.

Using anonymous names much like those in the infamous letters from so-called former Nigerian military generals imploring us to help them unlock millions of dollars, these letters provide links instead to equally anonymous websites set up overnight to attack Datuk Seri Anwar Ibrahim and the opposition Pakatan Rakyat (PR).

While there is nothing wrong with criticising Anwar and the opposition parties, the anonymous nature of these emails and the websites being promoted raises serious questions about their credibility and who is behind the attacks.

This strategy of demonisng Anwar bears striking resemblance to the one employed against him in the international media in a campaign that was apparently funded by the Malaysian government.

Last week, it was revealed that Putrajaya’s media strategist APCO Worldwide covertly financed international media reports in a campaign against Anwar after Election 2008, filings to the United States Department of Justice had revealed. Continue reading “Of instant websites, anonymous emails and political mudslinging”

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Covert Malaysian Campaign Touched A Wide Range Of American Media

Outlets from Huffington Post to National Review carried pieces financed by the Malaysian government. An international campaign against Anwar Ibrahim.

By Rosie Gray | March 1, 2013 at 12:35pm EST
BuzzFeed

A range of mainstream American publications printed paid propaganda for the government of Malaysia, much of it focused on the campaign against a pro-democracy figure there.

The payments to conservative American opinion writers — whose work appeared in outlets from the Huffington Post and San Francisco Examiner to the Washington Times to National Review and RedState — emerged in a filing this week to the Department of Justice. The filing under the Foreign Agent Registration Act outlines a campaign spanning May 2008 to April 2011 and led by Joshua Trevino, a conservative pundit, who received $389,724.70 under the contract and paid smaller sums to a series of conservative writers.

Trevino lost his column at the Guardian last year after allegations that his relationship with Malaysian business interests wasn’t being disclosed in columns dealing with Malaysia. Trevino told Politico in 2011 that “I was never on any ‘Malaysian entity’s payroll,’ and I resent your assumption that I was.”

According to Trevino’s belated federal filing, the interests paying Trevino were in fact the government of Malaysia, “its ruling party, or interests closely aligned with either.” The Malaysian government has been accused of multiple human rights abuses and restricting the press and personal freedoms. Anwar, the opposition leader, has faced prosecution for sodomy, a prosecution widely denounced in the West, which Trevino defended as more “nuanced” than American observers realized. The government for which Trevino worked also attacked Anwar for saying positive things about Israel; Trevino has argued that Anwar is not the pro-democracy figure he appears.
Continue reading “Covert Malaysian Campaign Touched A Wide Range Of American Media”

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Stop lying, Mahathir

— Othman Wahab
The Malaysian Insider
Feb 26, 2013

FEB 26 — Tun Dr Mahathir Mohamad does protest too much. He says all this talk by Datuk Seri Anwar Ibrahim and the opposition about him and nepotism is slander and that he is clean and his sons are self-made businessmen.

I can only imagine that mixing around with the likes of Datuk Ibrahim Ali has made the former prime minister believe that all Malaysians have the IQ of Ibrahim.

The simple reality is that we don’t need Anwar to tell us what we know about you. All we need to do is remember the crony capitalism which you promoted, bumped up IPP contracts for certain cronies, a sweetheart deal to take over the national airline by another crony (who incidentally had a string of legal suits against him by government entities miraculously settled because he knew too much about your dealings and promises to him), the bailout of Konsortium Perkapalan during the financial crisis by MISC.

Oh yes, we also remember your pathetic performance at the Royal Commission of Inquiry on the Lingam video where you suddenly had amnesia. But thankfully the commissioners saw through your act and named you and your friends (Lingam and Vincent Tan) as parties who subverted the course of justice.

Mahathir, you have never declared your assets to Malaysians. We still don’t know how you bought that nice home in the Mines or why is it that the likes of Syed Mokhtar and others love lending their private jets to you or taking you on six-star holidays jaunts. Continue reading “Stop lying, Mahathir”

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22 questions for Dr M, again

P Gunasegaram
Malaysiakini
Feb 14, 2013

QUESTION TIME I became a journalist at the Business Times, then a standalone newspaper, in 1978.

Three years later in 1981 Dr Mahathir Mohamad became prime minister of Malaysia, its fourth, succeeding Hussein Onn.

I have followed his career quite closely since and frankly I am not impressed. He started off with promise – and promised a lot – but fulfilled none if any.

In fact I would go so far as to say that he was positively the worst prime minister this country has ever had.

Through destruction of institutions such as an independent judiciary, running roughshod over civil servants, bringing his brand of power, patronage and poor economics into decision making, and making use of oppressive laws he used an iron fist to rule and in the process brought more harm to this country than any other person alive or dead.

Much of the problems of Malaysia can be traced back to him and he has made it difficult for his successors to make major changes going forward, much of which would involve unwinding processes and linkages he had put in place before. Continue reading “22 questions for Dr M, again”

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Pengiraan Detik 69 Hari ke PRU13 – Mahathirisme kembali lagi dengan kengerian dan kejahatan

Mahathirsime kembali lagi, dengan kengerian dan kebinatangan bersamanya.

Manifestasi terkini kembalinya Mahathirisme adalah melalui tuduhan liar di dalam politik Malaysia – bahawa pemimpin Oposisi Datuk Seri Anwar Ibrahim adalah dalang sebenar di dalam penipuan “kewarganegaraan untuk undi” di Sabah pada tahun sembilan puluhan yang dikenali sebagai “Projek M”.

Bilakah mantan Perdana Menteri Tun Dr. Mahathir Mohamad mula menyedari yang Anwar merupakan dalang projek yang dinamakan “Projek M” sempena namanya?

Jelas bukan pada 16 Januari, 2013 apabila pendedahan di Suruhanjaya Siasatan Diraja (RCI) Sabah terhadap pendatang tanpa izin melibatkan dua orang kanan Mahathir, bekas Timbalan Menteri Dalam negeri, Megat Junid Megat Ayub dan bekas Setiausaha Politik Abdul Aziz Shamsuddin dalam penipuan “Projek M” dari tahun 1990 – 1995 yang mengeluarkan beratus ribu kad pengenalan biru palsu dan surat pengesahan surat beranak sebagai tukaran untuk undi kepada pendatang tanpa izin.

Bukan juga pada hari berikutnya pada 17 Januari apabila buat pertama kalinya dalam dua dekad Mahathir secara terbuka mengakui kewujudan “Projek M” tetapi mempertahankannya sebagai mengikut undang-undang berdasarkan hujah pendatang tanpa izin Filipina boleh berbahasa Melayu dan “mempunyai hak untuk menjadi warga negara”, sambil melemparkan penghinaan kepada nama baik Tunku Abdul Rahman dengan menuduh Bapa Malaysia telah melakukan perkara yang lebih buruk kerana memberikan kewarganegaraan kepada satu juta orang yang tidak layak sebelum Merdeka, rungutan yang tiada siapa menjadikannya satu isu. Continue reading “Pengiraan Detik 69 Hari ke PRU13 – Mahathirisme kembali lagi dengan kengerian dan kejahatan”

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69-Day Countdown to 13GE – Mahathirism rides again with all its attendant horrors and monstrosities

Mahathirism rides again, with all its attendant horrors and monstrosities intact.

The latest manifestation of the full-throttled return of Mahathirism is one of the wildest accusations in Malaysian politics – that Opposition leader Datuk Seri Anwar Ibrahim was the real mastermind in the “citizenship-for-votes” scams in Sabah in the nineties known as “Project M”.

When did former Prime Minister Tun Dr. Mahathir Mohamad discover that Anwar was the mastermind of the project named infamously after him as “Project M”?

Clearly not on January 16, 2013 when revelations at the Sabah Royal Commission of Inquiry (RCI) on illegal immigrants implicated two of Mahathir’s closest confidantes, former Deputy Home Minister, Megat Junid Megat Ayub and former political secretary Abdul Aziz Shamsuddin in the “Project M” scams from 1990 – 1995 to issue hundreds of thousands of fake blue identity cards and false letters of approval for birth certificates in exchange for votes to illegal immigrants.

Nor on the following day on January 17 when for the first time in two decades, Mahathir publicly admitted the existence of “Project M” but defended it as lawful on the ground that the Filipino illegal immigrants could speak Malay and “have the right to be citizens”, while casting a serious slur on the memory and good name of Tunku Abdul Rahman by alleging that Bapa Malaysia had done worse by giving citizenship to one million unqualified people before Merdeka, lamenting that no one had made it an issue.

Nor for the next two weeks until January 31 when Mahathir suddenly announced that Anwar was the real mastermind of “Project M” responsible for the “citizenship-for-votes” scam in Sabah, although admitting having no proof to back his claim. Continue reading “69-Day Countdown to 13GE – Mahathirism rides again with all its attendant horrors and monstrosities”

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Once a pushover, Pakatan sniffs power

By Dan Martin
AFP/FMT
January 30, 2013

Speculation is rife that Pakatan could win enough in the polls to lure ruling coalition defectors and form a government.

KUALA LUMPUR: After bloodying the government’s nose in 2008 elections, a more experienced and organised Malaysian opposition is eyeing the once-unthinkable: toppling one of the world’s longest-serving governments.

Malaysians vote soon with the formerly hapless opposition buoyed by a new track record of state-level government, signs of growing voter support, and what its leader Anwar Ibrahim calls a sense of history in the making.

“I am convinced, Inshallah (God willing), that we will win government,” Anwar told AFP, evoking the winds of change that powered the “Arab Spring” elsewhere in the Muslim world.

“Of course we call it a ‘Malaysian Spring’, but our method is elections (not uprisings).”

Prime Minister Najib Tun Razak is expected to call a fresh vote in weeks, pitting his Malay-dominated Barisan Nasional coalition against Anwar’s multi-ethnic opposition alliance Pakatan Rakyat.

The 57-year-old ruling bloc enjoys deep pockets, mainstream media control, an electoral system the opposition says is rigged, and a record of decades of economic growth under its authoritarian template.

Few expect the opposition to win the 112 parliamentary seats needed to take power. The three-party alliance won 82 seats in the 2008 polls, up from 21, stunning the BN with its biggest-ever setback.

But speculation is rife that Pakatan could win enough in the polls — which must be held by late June — to lure ruling coalition defectors and form a government.

“Before this year, many were in denial about Pakatan’s potential. Today, we see society beginning to accept that the possibility (of a BN defeat) is real,” said Wan Saiful Wan Jan, who runs the independent Malaysian think tank IDEAS.

The country’s stock market has trembled recently over the uncertainty as opinion polls suggest the vote will be tight. One recent survey put Najib and Anwar neck-and-neck as prime ministerial candidates.

In a Jan 12 show of force, the opposition held a rally that drew clsoe to 100,000 people.

“I think it’s very close, and the party that makes the least mistakes will be the party that wins,” said S Ambiga, , head of Bersih, an NGO coalition that has organised large public rallies for electoral reform. Continue reading “Once a pushover, Pakatan sniffs power”

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77-Day Countdown to 13GE – The last weapon to save UMNO/BN coalition from being sent to Opposition benches is to force a split in Pakatan Rakyat by driving apart PAS and DAP

The last weapon to save UMNO/Barisan Nasional coalition from being sent to the Opposition benches in Parliament in the 13th general elections is to force a split in Pakatan Rakyat by driving apart PAS and DAP.

It is a reflection of the degree of desperation of UMNO/BN leaders, propagandists and spin doctors about their prospects of retaining Putrajaya in the 13GE which is looming ever nearer that they have revealed their hand by publicly putting in black-and-white their hope and strategy.

One of the chief UMNO/BN media spin doctors yesterday postulated that “Pakatan parties may go own way”, on the ground that “With chances of capturing Putrajaya slim, Pas and DAP may want to just wrest the states they fancy”.

He fancied:

“IS there a case to be made that DAP and Pas may be privately ditching the idea of taking over Putrajaya and are preparing themselves to keep the spoils of March 2008 instead? Continue reading “77-Day Countdown to 13GE – The last weapon to save UMNO/BN coalition from being sent to Opposition benches is to force a split in Pakatan Rakyat by driving apart PAS and DAP”

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Nation’s destiny in our hands

KJ John
Malaysiakini
Jan 22, 2013

In an earlier column I had postulated that the nation may be moving in the right direction after the last general election, but I had questioned whether we were moving at the right speed.

I still believe that Najib Abdul Razak has tried his absolute best to move our ‘Titanic’ in the right direction, but unfortunately his own team has been his worst enemy to date.

Even Dr Mahathir Mohamad plays wayang kulit with Najib, although in less public ways than he did with Abdullah Ahmad Badawi.

Actually, the opposition and NGOs have been better friends to him. At least they do not seem to shoot him below the belt, other than to highlight the unfortunate legacies that already surround and continue to haunt him.

Therefore I do think it is time to give the other side a chance regardless of how many uncertainties there in our minds and hearts. Yes, maybe we have to even let things slide a bit more before they can really improve. What other choice do we have as a people who have been told to “listen, listen, listen” for almost 54 years. Continue reading “Nation’s destiny in our hands”

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Pengiraan Detik 80 Hari ke PRU13 – Tolak politik penipuan dan pembohongan UMNO/BN

Tahniah kepada Anwar kerana memenangi saman fitnahnya ke atas Utusan Malaysia, surat khabar di Malaysia yang sedang mencipta sejarah dunia sebagai akhbar paling banyak tewas di dalam saman fitnah terhadap personaliti Pakatan Rakyat.

Penipuan dan pembohongan terhadap Pakatan Rakyat telah menjadi makanan harian Utusan Malaysia, sebagai lidah rasmi UMNO, sehingga ke tahap Utusan Malaysia kelihatan lebih sebagai “Surat Tipu” berbanding “Surat Khabar”.

Tetapi Utusan Malaysia bukan satu-satunya “Surat Tipu” di Malaysia walaupun ia adalah contoh terburuk dari kalangan media perdana UMNO/Barisan Nasional.

Dengan pendekatan harian pilihan raya umum ke-13, pemimpin UMNO/Barisan Nasional dan alat propaganda mereka, baik media perdana mahupun penyangak cybertroopers, akan berkerja lebih masa untuk mewujudkan penipuan dan pembohongan.

Seluruh rakyat Malaysia tidak kira kaum, agama, tempat, umur atau jantina, bersatu di dalam PRU13 akan datang menolak politik penipuan, pembohongan dan penyalahgunaan oleh UMNO/BN.

Amat menyedihkan apabila bukan sahaja yang hidup, malah yang telah meninggal dunia juga turut menjadi mangsa politik penipuan dan pembohongan sedemikian. Continue reading “Pengiraan Detik 80 Hari ke PRU13 – Tolak politik penipuan dan pembohongan UMNO/BN”

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80-Day Countdown to 13GE – Reject politics of lies and falsehoods of UMNO/BN

Congrats to Anwar for today winning his defamation lawsuit against Utusan Malaysia, the newspaper in Malaysia which is making world history in piling up the most number of lost defamation suits against Pakatan Rakyat personalities.

Lies and falsehoods against Pakatan Rakyat have become the staple diet of Utusan Malaysia, the mouthpiece of UMNO, to the extent that Utusan Malaysia is more a “Lies-Paper” rather than a “News-Paper”.

But Utusan Malaysia is not the only “Lies-Paper” in Malaysia although it is the worst example of the stable of UMNO/Barisan Nasional mainstream media (MSM).

With the daily approach of the 13th general elections, UMNO/Barisan Nasional leaders and their propaganda mouthpieces, whether mainstream media or rogue cybertroopers, will be working overtime to pump out lies and falsehoods.

Let all Malaysians, regardless of race, religion, territory, age or gender, unite in the forthcoming 13GE to reject the politics of lies, falsehoods and abuses of UMNO/BN.

It is sad that not only the living, but even the dead, have also become casualties of such politics of lies and falsehoods. Continue reading “80-Day Countdown to 13GE – Reject politics of lies and falsehoods of UMNO/BN”

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Pengiraan Detik 86 Hari ke PRU13: PR tidak perlu bermain permainan menaikkan nama sendiri dengan menjatuhkan orang lain bersama BN kerana KL112 tanpa ragu lagi adalah peransang semangat untuk UBAH dalam PRU13 yang semakin hampir dan PR cuma perlu bergerak terus

Selepas tergamam dan membisu pada hari Sabtu sesudah berlangsungnya perhimpunan KL112 yang bersejarah melihatkan ratusan ribu rakyat Malaysia daripada berbilang kaum, agama dan tempat berada di Stadium Merdeka, dan juga membisu sepanjang hari Ahad, pemimpin UMNO/Barisan Nasional telah memapu bersuara kembali dan kelam-kabut mahu meminimakan gelombang politik yang terhasil daripada KL112.

Perdana Menteri Datuk Seri Najib Razak jelas kelihatan tertekan dengan kejayaan dan kemananan KL112 sehingga menumpang nama terhadap kejayaan perhimpunan mega Pakatan Rakyat sewaktu menjadi tuan rumah Malam Penghargaan Media perhimpunan agung UMNO 2012.

Selepas berbincang dengan strategis beliau sepanjang hari Ahad untuk mengira kos politik kepada UMNO/BN terutamanya bagi PRU13, Najib kembali dan mengisytiharkan secara terbuka semalam bahawa KL112 menunjukkan kejayaan reformasi politik dan kerajaan yang beliau telah lakukan sejak menjadi Perdana Menteri selama empat tahun.

Najib dilihat mengelak untuk menerangkan mengapa perhimpunan Bersih 2.0 dan Bersih 3.0 yang diadakan juga semasa beliau menyandang jawatan perdana menteri menjadi tragedi polis dan kerajaan BN, memandangkan KL112 telah membuktikan tanpa ragu bahawa rakyat Malaysia adalah manusia yang cintakan keamanan yang hanya mahu melaksanakan hak mereka untuk berhimpun dan meluahkan secara bebas serta kedua-dua perhimpunan Bersih 2.0 dan Bersih 3.0 boleh menjadi model antarabangsa perhimpunan aman jika tidak kerana kesombongan dan tekanan daripada polis serta kerajaan. Continue reading “Pengiraan Detik 86 Hari ke PRU13: PR tidak perlu bermain permainan menaikkan nama sendiri dengan menjatuhkan orang lain bersama BN kerana KL112 tanpa ragu lagi adalah peransang semangat untuk UBAH dalam PRU13 yang semakin hampir dan PR cuma perlu bergerak terus”

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86-Day Countdown to 13GE: PR does not have to play the game of one-up-manship with BN as KL112 is undeniably a major morale booster for UBAH in 13GE which is around the corner and PR should just move on

After being dumbstruck and eerily silent on Saturday after the historic KL112 rally of over a hundred thousand Malaysians of all races, religions and regions at Merdeka Stadium and the whole of Sunday, UMNO/Barisan Nasional leaders have suddenly found their voices and are stumbling over themselves to minimise and play down the political tidal waves released by KL112.

Prime Minister Datuk Seri Najib Razak was clearly too distraught by the success of the peaceful holding of KL112 to claim credit for the Pakatan Rakyat mega-rally when hosting the UMNO general assembly 2012 Media Appreciation Night on Saturday night itself.

After closeting with his strategists the whole of Sunday to calculate the political costs to UMNO/BN particularly in the forthcoming 13GE, Najib has sufficiently recovered from the political setbacks to publicly declare yesterday that the KL112 exemplifies the success of the political and government reforms he had initiated since becoming Prime Minister some four years ago.

Najib conspicuously omitted to explain why the Bersih 2.0 and Bersih 3.0 rallies held also during his premiership were such police and BN government disasters, as KL112 has proved beyond a shadow of doubt that Malaysians are peace-loving people who only want to peacefully exercise their right to free assembly and expression and both Bersih 2.0 and Bersih 3.0 rallies would have been international models of peaceful assemblies if not because of high-handed and repressive police and government actions. Continue reading “86-Day Countdown to 13GE: PR does not have to play the game of one-up-manship with BN as KL112 is undeniably a major morale booster for UBAH in 13GE which is around the corner and PR should just move on”

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Myth of “UMNO is Malay; Malay, UMNO” Forever Shattered!

M. Bakri Musa

While UMNO apologists and sycophants in academia, blogosphere, and mainstream media quibbled over such minutia as the number of participants at last Saturday’s massive KL112 (January 12, 2013) rally, two facts are indisputable. First, that peaceful and largely Malay demonstration, the largest the nation had ever witnessed, forever shattered the myth that UMNO is Melayu, and Melayu, UMNO. Second, given a modicum of respect by and without provocation from the authorities, Malaysians are quite capable of partaking in peaceful rallies.

On this second point the authorities, specifically the police under its new leadership, are finally learning that water tankers, personnel with anti-riot gears or tear gas canisters, and other crude displays of power often precipitate rather than prevent violence. BERSIH 3.0 demonstrated that very clearly.

The size and orderliness of the rally, together with the bravery and determination of the participants, was reminiscent of the transformative event of over 66 years earlier, the opposition to the Malayan Union Treaty. That altered the course of our history. Insha’ Allah (God willing), last Saturday’s rally too, will.

The power imbalance between those demanding change and those in power back in 1946 was enormous. Then it was mostly illiterate and unsophisticated Malay peasants facing the much superior and more formidable colonial authorities. Yet in the end, right won over might, and justice prevailed!

Today, while the UMNO Government is detested to the same degree as the old colonials, it is nowhere as sophisticated wielder of power as the British. Meanwhile, those clamoring for change are far more worldly, more committed, and in far greater numbers than their adversary, UMNO and its supporters. More importantly, unlike the colonials, today’s UMNO government is crippled with corruption and incompetence while also being crude wielders of power. All the more we should expect that right and the truth, as well as justice, will again prevail. Continue reading “Myth of “UMNO is Malay; Malay, UMNO” Forever Shattered!”

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MACC panel no power to review probes, claims Mat Zain

The Malaysian Insider
Dec 22, 2012

KUALA LUMPUR, Dec 22 — Retired senior policeman Datuk Mat Zain Ibrahim questioned today a Malaysian Anti-Corruption Commission (MACC) panel chief’s recent explanation to close the file on P. Balasubramaniam’s controversial sworn statement over the 2006 murder of Mongolian Altantuya Shaariibuu.

The former KL Criminal Investigation Department chief said Tan Sri Hadenan Abdul Jalil and the Operations Review Panel (PPO) the latter chairs have no power to review MACC’s prosecution cases, based on the MACC Advisory Board’s previous response to him in a separate case.

“PPO has no power to review a case decision,” the ex-police veteran said today in an open letter to Inspector-General of Police Tan Sri Ismail Omar, urging the latter to act on the ongoing storm over Balasubramaniam’s (picture) two conflicting statutory declarations (SDs) that has implicated several top-ranking government officials and politicians.

Mat Zain was responding to Hadenan’s explanation two days ago stating that prominent lawyer Tan Sri Cecil Abraham — who also sits on the PPO — was not part of the graftbuster review team that had closed the file on the former private eye’s controversial second sworn statement over the 2006 murder.

Hadenan said the case, which was linked to that of carpet merchant Deepak Jaikishan, had been presented at a PPO pre-meeting on November 8.

“Tan Sri Hadenan’s statement should be questioned,” Mat Zain said. Continue reading “MACC panel no power to review probes, claims Mat Zain”

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Malaysia poised for pivotal polls

By Simon Roughneen
Asia Times
21st December 2012

Ahead of what reform campaigners believe will be Malaysia’s “dirtiest ever elections”, the long-ruling United Malays National Organization (UMNO) has engineered something of a clean-up. In recent months, it has reformed some old and oft-derided laws, such as allowing indefinite detention without trial and forcing local newspapers to apply each year for a publication permit, a stipulation that encouraged self-censorship.

UMNO and its allies have governed Malaysia consecutively since achieving independence from colonial rule, a longevity not usually associated with electoral democracies. UMNO and its Barisan Nasional (BN) coalition survived the last election in 2008, though it ceded its two-thirds parliamentary majority for the first time and lost five out of 13 federal states to the opposition, a coalition of three parties led by controversial former UMNO firebrand Anwar Ibrahim that includes the Islamic party PAS and the Chinese-dominated Democratic Action Party (DAP).

While some in the Malaysian opposition and rights groups have criticized the recent reforms as piecemeal electioneering for next year’s vote, there are indications that the government has made some real positive changes, particularly regarding the overhaul of certain emergency laws and repealing the old Internal Security Act, a law which has in the past been used against the government’s political opponents. Continue reading “Malaysia poised for pivotal polls”