Category: General

By Jessica Mendoza
Christian Science Monitor
February 21, 2015

Dubai Torch tower fire: Witnesses said that the quick actions of the city’s civil defense and police departments led to a safe, orderly evacuation of residents.

A fire that ripped through a luxury residential tower in Dubai’s Marina district early Saturday morning engulfed several stories and displaced hundreds, but caused no casualties, according to multiple news reports.

A number of people were treated for minor injuries by ambulances at the scene, The Associated Press reported.

The blaze, which broke out around 2 a.m. in the 86-story Torch tower building, appeared to have started on the 50th floor, according to CNN. High winds fanned the flames and scattered debris on nearby streets.

First responders evacuated residents before turning their attention on the fire, which took 12 fire engines and several hours to put out, the BBC reported. Continue reading “Dubai Torch tower fire: Why no one died”

By Azrul Mohd Khalib | MMO
September 9, 2014

Datuk Seri Najib Razak, I, like many Malaysians around the country, support your call to repeal the Sedition Act of 1948.

There are periods in history when we are at the right place, at the right time and are called upon to act. To do what our conscience tells us as necessary because only we can. Times like these are few and far in between, when we are called to action to make right that which is wrong, heal that which has been hurt and practise that which we speak of. This is one such opportunity.

The 1948 Sedition Act is a piece of colonial era legislation which was born during a time when our penjajah, the English, intended to suppress dissent, maintain power and continue the oppression and subjugation of the people of Malaya.

It was intended to extinguish the flame of democracy which burned brightly amongst those who yearned for freedom and a better future for everyone in this country. It is an instrument born of fear, insecurity, is against democratic principles and aimed to tyrannise the ruled and to see and treat the rakyat as the enemy. It was used on the people who fought for this country’s independence. Continue reading “Datuk Seri, please do the right thing”

By Ashley Fantz, CNN
July 17, 2014

(CNN) — A Malaysia Airlines flight from Amsterdam to Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia, has crashed in eastern Ukraine, Russian news agency Interfax reported Thursday.

Malaysia Airlines confirmed that it lost contact with Flight 17 and that the plane’s last known position was over Ukrainian airspace, the airline said on Twitter.

The aircraft was “shot down” over Ukraine by “terrorists” operating a Buk surface-to-air missile system, according to the Facebook page of Anton Gerashchenko, adviser to the Ukrainian Interior Ministry. There were 280 passengers killed as well as 15 crew members, Gerashchenko’s post reads.

“We do not exclude that the plane was shot down and confirm that the Ukraine Armed Forces did not fire at any targets in the sky,” Ukrainian President Petro Poroshenko said, according to his website. Continue reading “Malaysia Airlines flight crashes in Ukraine”

By Ahmad Tempe
MAY 21, 2014 | TMI

Henry A Kissinger pernah menyebut “university politics are vicious precisely because the stakes are too small”. Ini membawa erti yang politik di universiti itu ganas kerana pertaruhannya kecil.

Tidak perlu cari mat kaki demo atau “pemberontak” seperti Khalid Ismath jika mahu mentafsirkan “keganasan” politik di Universiti Teknologi Mara (UiTM). Cukup sekadar kita temuramah mat-mat kaki “dating” atau mat “dota” dan mereka akan menjawab: “Ala, UiTM ni kita kena sokong kerajaan (baca:Umno/BN), kalau tidak susah kita nanti.”

Hari ini, Persatuan Alumni UiTM Malaysia secara tiba-tiba lantang mengingatkan calon DAP Teluk Intan, Dyana Sofya Mohd Daud supaya berhenti menggunakan nama UiTM dalam tujuan kempen kerana UiTM sepatutnya “bebas”. Tulisan ini bukanlah bertujuan untuk membela atau mengangkat si Dyana.

Saya juga bukanlah hendak menjadi batu api atau bertelagah dengan geng-geng alumni ini. Tetapi, hendak bebas itu bebas yang bagaimana?

Semua orang tahu UiTM mempunyai “pusat latihan tidak rasmi Umno”. Siapa tidak tahu proses untuk menjadi calon Majlis Perwakilan Pelajar (MPP) UiTM pun ketat? Mesti mesra kerajaan? Hendak berahsia bagaimana lagi?

Sebelum ini pun UiTM pernah menjadi medan kempen bagi Umno/BN apabila Datuk Seri Najib Razak hadir untuk berucap serta menabur janji kepada mahasiswa UiTM di samping menjamu makanan enak-enak (baca: KFC). Continue reading “Alumni UiTM mudah lupa”

Kow Gah Chie
Malaysiakini
Apr 25, 2014

After his sedition conviction, Karpal Singh had uttered these famous words, “You knock out one Karpal, a hundred Karpal Singhs will rise.”

His long-time friend and political colleague Lim Kit Siang recalled this quote during the memorial service held for the late politician, who was killed in an accident on April 17, in Kuala Lumpur last night.

However, Lim had a grander vision.

The DAP supremo wanted to see not a hundred but thousands of Karpals rising up to the fight.

“I promise to continue his fight… Karpal’s dream is to uphold the rule of law, justice, good governance as well as a united and harmonious Malaysia… This will be our dream… and to make it a reality in the next general election,” he added.

Lim also said millions are still grieving over Karpal’s death and this reflected how great a man he was. Continue reading “Kit Siang: Let thousands of Karpals rise”

BY Looi Sue-Chern | TMI
April 17, 2014

Tears flowed as Bukit Gelugor MP Karpal Singh’s body arrived at the Raja Permaisuri Bainun Hospital in Ipoh, Perak, at 7.25am today for a post-mortem following an accident near Gua Tempurung in Perak, early this morning.

His wife Gurmit Kaur, sons Jagdeep Singh Deo and Gobind Singh Deo, and daughter Sangeet were joined by DAP secretary-general Lim Guan Eng and other leaders at the hospital.

All of them broke down in tears as Karpal’s body was removed from the van and taken into the mortuary, which was just opened yesterday.

Karpal, who would have turned 74 in June, was believed to have been travelling from Kuala Lumpur to Penang to attend a court hearing scheduled for this morning.

Police said the multipurpose vehicle was badly-damaged after losing control following a collision with a lorry on KM301.6 of the North-South Expressway about 12.40am this morning.

Police said he died on the spot. There were four other occupants in Karpal’s Toyota Alphard, which has the iconic number plate KS9898. Continue reading “Tears flow as Karpal’s body arrives at Ipoh hospital”

By Adam K. Raymond
New York Times
1st April 2014

Three and a half weeks after Malaysia Airlines Flight 370 vanished from the sky, the world is still waiting to find out what happened. Searching millions of square miles for broken plane parts is, of course, no simple task, but it’s only been complicated by the Keystone Cops routine put on by the Malaysian government. Upon news that officials couldn’t even correctly quote the four words uttered by the co-pilot before all communication with MH370 was lost, here’s a timeline of Malaysia’s mistakes since the plane disappeared.

March 8: Immigration officials allow two passengers to board flight MH370 with stolen passports.

March 8: The Malaysian military fails to notice that that the plane has made a sharp left turn, even though it flew over a radar facility. Continue reading “A Timeline of the Malaysian Government’s Many, Many MH370 Screw-Ups”

Chris Brummitt and Gillian Wong, Associated Press | April 1, 2014 10:19 AM ET
National Post

KUALA LUMPUR, Malaysia — It may mean little to investigators that the last words air traffic controllers heard from the lost jetliner were “Good night, Malaysian three-seven-zero,” rather than “All right, good night.” But to Malaysian officials whose credibility has been questioned almost from the beginning, it means a great deal.

Malaysian officials said more than two weeks ago that “All right, good night,” were the last words, and that the co-pilot uttered them. They changed the account late Monday and said they are still investigating who it was that spoke. The discrepancy added to the confusion and frustration families of the missing already felt more than three weeks after Malaysia Airlines Flight 370 disappeared.

“This sort of mistake hits at the heart of trust in their communications. If Malaysia is changing what the pilot said, people start thinking, ‘What are they going to change next?” said Hamish McLean, an expert in risk and crisis communication at Griffith University in Brisbane, Australia.

“Information is in a crisis is absolutely critical. When we are dealing with such a small amount of information its needs to be handled very carefully,” he said.

Authorities have been forced on the defensive by the criticism, the most forceful of which has come from a group of Chinese relatives who accuse them of lying about — or even involvement in — the plane’s disappearance. In part responding to domestic political criticism, defence minister Hishammuddin Hussein has taken to retweeting supportive comments on Twitter. He has twice in recent days proclaimed that “history would judge us well” over the handling of the crisis. Continue reading “Flight MH370 Malaysian officials struggle with credibility after changing last words heard from lost aircraft”

By Gordon Rayner, and Nick Collins
Telegraph
24th March 2014

With all hope now lost of finding their loved ones alive, relatives of the 239 people on board flight MH370 were increasingly expressing anger and resentment towards those they believe are to blame for the failure to locate the missing aircraft.

By singling out the UK Air Accidents Investigation Branch and the British satellite firm Inmarsat as the source of the information that confirmed the Boeing 777 went down in the Indian Ocean, Malaysia’s prime minister may have directed part of that anger towards Britain.

The AAIB, working with Inmarsat, provided the only credible information on the Malaysia Airlines flight’s whereabouts, but a series of delays meant ten crucial days were lost before search teams began looking in the southern Indian Ocean, where it now seems certain the aircraft went down. Continue reading “MH370: Britain finds itself at centre of blame game over crucial delays”

(Speech 4 in Dewan Rakyat when taking part in the debate on Motion of Thanks for the Royal Address on Thursday, 13th March 2014)

Malaysia’s future lies in the hands of ordinary heroes who dare to stand up for racial and religious harmony, clean elections and a better education system – ordinary Malaysians like Azrul Mohd Khalib, Ally Hazran Hashim, Siti Kassim, Major Zaidi Ahmad and Mohd Nor Izzah – who are the salt of the earth who will ensure that Malaysia will achieve her greatness and not become a failed state.

Azrul, Ally and Siti Kassim were involved in the “Walk for Peace” movement among ordinary Malaysians regardless of race or religion who care about the country to push for national healing in the face of the worst racial and religious polarization in the nation’s 56-year history.

It all started on Sunday, January 5 this year outside Our Lady of Lourdes Church in Klang where the nearly 1,000 Catholics who turned up for Sunday mass had expected an angry mob of Muslims protesting against the possible use of the word ‘Allah’ but instead met a group of progressive Muslims bearing flowers to express solidarity and preparedness to defend the Church from the planned protest.

Among the progressive Muslims who turned up was social activist Datin Paduka Marina Mahathir. Continue reading “Malaysia’s future in hands of ordinary heroes who dare to stand up for racial and religious harmony, clean elections and a better education system”

Yesterday, in the first part of my commentary on Awang Selamat’s column “Pihak berkuasa kita!” in Mingguan Malaysia of Sunday, 2nd March 2014, I said my first immediate thought on reading the column was that it was a classic case of “Thief shouting thief”.

This is because the column by Awang Selamat, the collective pen name of the Utusan editors, not only reeked of hypocrisy but clearly had the ignoble objective of distracting attention from their incessant incitement of racial and religious hatred through lies and falsehoods with “immunity and impunity” to pit race against race and religion against religion in Malaysia.

Awang revived the allegation that the DAP is funding the so-called Red Bean Army (RBA) of 3,000 cybertroopers with a budget of RM100 million to RM1 billion in the past six years and attacked the authorities for practising double standards in giving the DAP and the RBA “the grand licence to do extreme provocation” especially through the Red Bean Army of 3,000 cybertroopers “insulting the Malays, Islam, security forces, civil servants and the country”. Continue reading “Utusan’s revival of the discredited fairy tale of DAP-funded Red Bean Army of 3,000 cybertroopers is a desperate bid by UMNO cyber mercenaries not to be excluded from the UMNO cyberwar funding running into hundreds of millions of ringgit”

“Thief shouting thief” is what I immediately thought of when I saw the Awang Selamat column in Mingguan Malaysia today entitled “Pihak berkuasa kita!”, as it not only reeks of hypocrisy but clearly had the ignoble objective of distracting attention from their incessant incitement of racial and religious hatred through lies and falsehoods with “immunity and impunity” to pit race against race and religion against religion in Malaysia.

Awang Selamat, the collective pen name of the Utusan editors, today made the preposterous and outrageous claims that government agencies were “strengthening” extremist cells in the country by letting the opposition DAP and its alleged “Red Bean Army” (RBA) run free.

The authorities were also attacked for practising double standards for failing to haul up and prosecute DAP leaders or members of the RBA the party purportedly runs for allegedly insulting the Malays, Islam, security forces, civil servants, and the country.

Awang claimed: “In Malaysia, if you want to insult and flare up extremism, join DAP. As the most racist party, DAP has a grand licence to do extreme provocation. Continue reading “Utusan Malaysia guilty of “Thief Shouting Thief” reeking of hypocrisy and to distract attention from their incessant incitement of racial and religious hatred through lies and falsehoods with “immunity and impunity””

– Koon Yew Yin
The Malaysian Insider
February 14, 2014

Recently, I received a reference to a new book written by two migrant Malaysian brothers who have lived abroad for more than 10 years with advice for would-be migrants.

Their advice included tips, such as never taking things for granted, never burn your bridges, to be objectively optimistic and the importance of financial freedom amongst the various freedoms.

These tips are useful in any major decision you make about life and career.

In fact, many “how to succeed” books – whether they deal with the stock market or changing jobs – offer similar or variants of this advice, although the advice may be presented in different languages and styles.

The most important point that the book seems to emphasise is that every country has its good and bad points.

This again is sensible. Continue reading “Should you migrate? The 64,000-dollar question”

by Elizabeth Zachariah
The Malaysian Insider
January 18, 2014

“The prime minister’s sudden and unexpected announcement regarding the value of kangkung has caused all kinds of chaos across the country. Panic selling has resulted in plummeting prices and soaring tempers,” says a brief about the video, alluding to the fiery political climate in the country just eight months after the General Election 2013. Continue reading “Kangkung now hot topic in comedy and satirical humour”

– Lim Teck Ghee
The Malaysian Insider
January 11, 2014

When news of the establishment of the National Unity Consultative Council (NUCC) came out, many sceptics felt that this latest government effort to bring in a larger group of stakeholders – ostensibly to help resolve the rapidly growing divisions in society – was simply a hollow exploitation of public opinion. In fact I had written to a colleague who was named as one of its members to say “congrats, or is it condolences, if the NUCC proves as most expect it to be, another political wayang”.

Whether the area of concern has been in economics, the police, interfaith relations or education, all previous consultative councils, panels and task forces have failed to produce decisive action and genuine reforms to arrest the deterioration in governance – the main cause of the fault lines in the country’s social cohesion.

The recent statement by the chairman of the NUCC, Tan Sri Samsudin Osman on the latest religious controversy, however, does offer a glimmer of hope that the NUCC may be the exception among the various bodies appointed during the last decade – all of whom have been failures in pushing back regressive policies which are plunging the country into insolvency, political turmoil and social strife. Continue reading “Can the national unity council be sustained?”