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Muhyddin’s seven-para statement has smashed Najib’s six-para PMO Statement on Cabinet position on RM42 billion 1MDB scandal into smithereens

Within 42 hours of the meeting of UMNO Divisional chiefs in Kuala Lumpur at 3 pm tomorrow Sunday), the Deputy Prime Minister and UMNO Deputy President, Tan Sri Muhyiddin Yassin has thrown a bomb to shatter the facade of UMNO and Cabinet unity which the Prime Minister’s Datuk Seri Najib Razak’s PMO Communications Unit had carefully crafted with a six-paragraph statement after the Cabinet meeting on Wednesday on the RM42 billion 1MBD scandal.

Muhyiddin’s seven-paragraph statement late last evening has smashed Najib’s six-para PMO Statement on the Cabinet position on the RM42 billion 1MDB scandal into smithereens. Continue reading “Muhyddin’s seven-para statement has smashed Najib’s six-para PMO Statement on Cabinet position on RM42 billion 1MDB scandal into smithereens”

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Are 1MDB’s woes revealing a fractured Najib government?

COMMENTARY BY THE MALAYSIAN INSIDER
6 March 2015

The Cabinet might have tried to put up a united front over debt-heavy 1Malaysia Development Bhd’s (1MDB) financial woes but it took Tan Sri Muhyiddin Yassin just 48 hours to crack that façade.

His seven-paragraph statement tonight made three points not found in the Prime Minister’s Office (PMO) statement on Wednesday which said, “Cabinet expressed confidence that no wrong-doing has been committed within 1MDB, and their desire for the company to be allowed to implement the proposed outcomes of its strategic review.”

Muhyiddin’s points were simple for a company that reportedly sits on a RM51 billion asset base that can cover its RM42 billion debts.

For him, there should not be any bailout of 1MDB if it involves public funds, the Auditor-General must verify 1MDB’s accounts from 2009, and that the Public Accounts Committee (PAC) should carry out an independent probe. Continue reading “Are 1MDB’s woes revealing a fractured Najib government?”

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Pakatan Rakyat leaders must be vigilant on the watch-out for UMNO/BN agent provocateurs who are trying to wreak maximum damage to destabilise, divide and destroy Pakatan Rakyat unity to distract attention from mounting UMNO/BN woes

Pakatan Rakyat leaders must be vigilant on the watch-out for UMNO/BN agent provocateurs who are trying to wreak maximum damage to destabilise, divide and destroy Pakatan Rakyat unity to distract attention from mounting UMNO/BN woes.

The responsibility of UMNO/BN agent provocateurs for the recent assaults on PAS leaders, like PAS MP Dr. Hatta Ramli and Dr. Dzukefly Ahmad have not and cannot be ruled out – which is why Pakatan Raykat leaders should be very careful about what they say and do in public.

It is very unfortunate that the Kelantan PAS Deputy Mentri Besar and Deputy Commissioner (I) Datuk Mohd Amar Abdullah had adopted such a negative attitude as to say that the door was closed to DAP in its bid to stop PAS from bringing its hudud Bill to the Kelantan State Assembly, and that there will be no more talk with DAP, claiming that he had explained the reasons behind the Kelantan hudud amendment to DAP’s top leaders at least four times.

He even asked: “What more do they want?”
Continue reading “Pakatan Rakyat leaders must be vigilant on the watch-out for UMNO/BN agent provocateurs who are trying to wreak maximum damage to destabilise, divide and destroy Pakatan Rakyat unity to distract attention from mounting UMNO/BN woes”

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Nasib Umno dan BN kini seperti pernah dialami kerajaan empayar Inca

Nur Jazlan
The Malaysian Insider
4 March 2015

Banyak yang diperkatakan mengenai Umno, satu-satunya parti politik yang ditubuhkan sebelum negara mencapai kemerdekaan dan kini menjejaki usia tujuh dekad serta sudah pasti bagi pucuk pimpinannya pada masa sekarang adalah dengan terus melaungkan kejayaan Umno mendapat 88 kerusi dalam pilihan raya umum (PRU) ke-13 lalu.

Kejayaan Umno itu sudah berusia dua tahun dan hanya tinggal tiga tahun lagi sebelum parti orang Melayu ini akan berdepan semula dengan rakyat dalam PRU14 dan ketika ini, suasana di peringkat akar umbi terus resah gelisah dengan apa yang berlaku di peringkat bawahan, situasi berbeza dengan peringkat atasan terutamanya di Pusat Dagangan Dunia Putra (PWTC) dan Putrajaya yang berterusan dibuai mimpi indah.

‘Mimpi indah’ orang Melayu akan berterusan menyokong Umno dan keluarlah segala statistik dan perangkaan bagi membuktikan ‘mimpi indah’ itu sedangkan hakikatnya, sokongan orang Melayu di kawasan bandar dan luar bandar terus terhakis. Continue reading “Nasib Umno dan BN kini seperti pernah dialami kerajaan empayar Inca”

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Gerakan and MCA reacted even more ferociously than PAS and UMNO to my suggestion of postponement of bill on hudud implementation in Kelantan State Assembly because they have completely lapped up UMNO plot to use the issue to break Pakatan Rakyat

Yesterday, I suggested the postponement of a bill to amend the 1993 Kelantan Syariah Criminal Code which is scheduled to be presented to the Kelantan State Assembly meeting beginning on March 18, as up to date, the bill has not been presented to the Pakatan Rakyat Leadership Council for study, as was decided by all the Pakatan Rakyat leaders from DAP, PKR and PAS at the meeting of Feb. 8.

This is to give adequate time for the Pakatan Rakyat parties to study the proposed amendment bill, but even more important, not to provide Prime Minister and UMNO President Datuk Seri Najib Razak and UMNO strategists the political life-line and the opportunity to further their “UG” (unity government between UMNO and PAs) and “hudud” political games solely to save themselves and to destabilize, divide and destroy Pakatan Rakyat unity and remove the challenge to replace UMNO/BN in Putrajaya in the 14th General Elections.

I am not really surprised that the strongest objection to my postponement proposal has not come from either PAS or UMNO, but from Gerakan and MCA. Within hours, the Gerakan reacted in outrage at the suggestion.

Why? This is because MCA and Gerakan leaders had been salivating at the prospect of Kelantan State Assembly passing an amendment bill by the PAS Kelantan State Government to the 1993 Kelantan Syariah Criminal Code with the support by Kelantan UMNO State Assemblymen, because they planned to use the Kelantan State Assembly passage of the hudud bill to launch a publicity offensive to attack the DAP. Continue reading “Gerakan and MCA reacted even more ferociously than PAS and UMNO to my suggestion of postponement of bill on hudud implementation in Kelantan State Assembly because they have completely lapped up UMNO plot to use the issue to break Pakatan Rakyat”

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As amendment bill to the 1993 Kelantan Syariah Criminal Code has not yet been presented to Pakatan Rakyat Leadership Council for study, suggest deferment of any presentation to Kelantan State Assembly this month

Overnight, the political position of Datuk Seri Najib Razak seemed to have undergone a sea-change for the worse, particularly with the London Sunday Times report on Sunday, March 1, 2015 that its joint in-depth investigations into the RM42 billion 1MDB scandal with Sarawak Report website had been completed and they had obtained access to thousands of documents and emails relating to 1MDB, including its initial joint venture with the little known oil company PetroSaudi International from 2009.

As the news portal Asian Sentinel as aptly headlined its report, “Emails Blow Malaysia’s 1MDB Fund Wide Open”, the joint investigations by Sunday Times London and Sarawak Report had foiled abrupt attempts by 1MDB at the end last year to call in all of its computers, employee laptops and servers to wipe them clean of all emails.

This evening, in an email interview with Malaysiakini, Sarawak Report editor and founder Clare Rewcastle Brown confirmed that she is in possession of “thousands documents” on the dealings of 1MDB and businessman Taek Jho Low’s role in the 1MDB which were neither “forged nor hacked” material.

Although these are body blows to Najib politically, he remains a paradox of being a very weak Prime Minister whose major policy initiatives had all been dismal failures but a strong UMNO President largely because no strong UMNO contender has emerged to threaten his position – unlike his predecessor Tun Abdullah Badawi who was both a weak Prime Minister as well as a weak UMNO President, setting the stage for his easy replacement.

However, the political dynamics and disequilibrium both inside UMNO and outside will increase in intensity, focusing immediate attention not only on the forthcoming national UMNO Divisional Meeting on March 8 but also on the Kelantan State Assembly scheduled to meet on March 18.

The greater the political pressures on Najib arising from a host of political, economic, financial and family scandals, the more Machiavellian UMNO leaders and strategists will be to distract public attention from their political woes, which means the doubling up of plots and conspiracies to try to destabilize, divide and destroy PAS and Pakatan Rakyat as promoting “UG” (Unity Government between UMNO and PAS) and the false lure of Kelantan UMNO State Assemblymen offering support to Kelantan PAS for hudud implementation in the Kelantan State Assembly this month. Continue reading “As amendment bill to the 1993 Kelantan Syariah Criminal Code has not yet been presented to Pakatan Rakyat Leadership Council for study, suggest deferment of any presentation to Kelantan State Assembly this month”

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Hudud: Umno has trapped and shackled Pas

— P Ramakrishnan
The Malay Mail Online
March 2, 2015

MARCH 2 — No one dreamt that Pas would be easily enticed to cooperate with Umno. But Umno has its hidden agenda to break up Pakatan Rakyat in order to weaken the opposition.

It has promised to support Pas when the hudud bill is tabled on 18 March in the Kelantan state assembly. This is being taken as support for hudud — which is utterly fallacious.

What choice has Umno in this issue? Can it vote against the Pas hudud bill? It cannot! It has to prove to the Malays that it is for hudud. It would be suicidal for Umno not to vote with Pas. There are no two ways about it for Umno.

It is merely hoodwinking Pas into thinking that it is helping the Islamist party to implement hudud in Kelantan.

Umno’s strategy is meant not only to weaken Pakatan Rakyat by successfully creating dissension within the coalition, it has an ulterior motive as well. It is also to drive away non-Malay support for Pas, which was given freely on the basis of Pakatan’s agreed common platform. Continue reading “Hudud: Umno has trapped and shackled Pas”

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MCA and Gerakan have degenerated to be the most unprincipled parties in their history – even backing UMNO’s “UG” conspiracy and supporting Kelantan UMNO State Assemblymen to vote for PAS hudud implementation in Kelantan State Assembly

Malaysian politics is going through one of the most tumultuous periods in the nation’s history – there is not only convulsion in UMNO, but also convulsion in PAS largely instigated by UMNO leaders and strategists with a two-pronged objective to distract attention from UMNO’s political turmoils as well as to divide and split PAS and Pakatan Rakyat with the false lure of “UG” government and hudud implementation in Kelantan.

This is the first time in Malaysian politics where political turmoils are taking place in UMNO and PAS at the same time. In the past, such political turmoils in UMNO and PAS had never coincided at the same time.

This time, the whole picture is also muddied with UMNO pro-actively instigating divisions within PAS and Pakatan Rakyat with the false lure of “UG” “unity government between UMNO and PAS) and UMNO support of PAS hudud implementation in Kelantan.

A new factor in the current political turmoil in the country is that Barisan Nasional component parties, in particular MCA and Gerakan, have degenerated to their most unprincipled stand in their party history – to the extent that MCA and Gerakan could even back UMNO’s “UG” conspiracy and support Kelantan UMNO State Assemblymen to vote for PAS hudud implementation in the Kelantan State Assembly later this month. Continue reading “MCA and Gerakan have degenerated to be the most unprincipled parties in their history – even backing UMNO’s “UG” conspiracy and supporting Kelantan UMNO State Assemblymen to vote for PAS hudud implementation in Kelantan State Assembly”

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PAS-Umno unity: A bait and a bullet

Zurairi AR
The Malay Mail Online
March 1, 2015

MARCH 1 — Last week, Umno decided to not contest in the Chempaka by-election for the sake of “Muslim unity.” The seat fell vacant after the death of PAS spiritual adviser Nik Abdul Aziz Nik Mat.

Deservedly, the suggestion was lauded by PAS information chief Mahfuz Omar not only with open arms, but with a cynical suggestion for Umno to just abstain from any future elections to end politicking and social schism, insisting that Malaysia would end up “more peaceful” afterwards.

Since when has Umno cared about “unity” in any sense? In the decades it has ruled the country, Umno has unashamedly leaned on divisive racial politics and policies.

Increasingly in recent years, Umno and Barisan Nasional (BN) have even condoned divisive and incendiary remarks and actions of people friendly to them, doing nothing to quell racial and religious schisms but instead perpetuating them.

Umno is only showing its true colours. It has little interest in “national unity”, caring more about just “Muslim unity.” Continue reading “PAS-Umno unity: A bait and a bullet”

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Will Najib survive the March 8 Umno divisional leaders’ solidarity meeting?

The single political issue in the country after the Federal Court’s 5-0 dismissal of Anwar Ibrahim’s appeal in Sodomy II on February 10, resulting his fourth incarceration in his 47 years of public life and struggle for freedom, democracy, human dignity and good governance should be: “Quo Vadis, Anwar?”

Instead, the question has swiftly become “Quo Vadis, Najib?”

National focus should be on the “March to Freedom” ceramah to restore freedom for Anwar Ibrahim on March 7, but attention has now suddenly swerved to whether Najib could survive the Umno divisional leaders’ meeting on March 8.

This is most extraordinary as the UMNO Division Meeting of March 8 is being called to show solidarity and support for Najib and not to ditch him.

Why is there such sudden change of political focus and climate in UMNO?

This is a reflection of the turbulent times in UMNO. Continue reading “Will Najib survive the March 8 Umno divisional leaders’ solidarity meeting?”

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Pakatan Rakyat’s disintegration would mean Umno rules by default

― Liew Chin Tong
The Malay Mail Online
FEBRUARY 27, 2015

FEBRUARY 27 ― The potential disintegration of Pakatan Rakyat would mean Umno can continue its 60-year rule without challenge from a credible alternative or replacement. Umno has ruled the country since the first Federal Election on July 27, 1955.

The 2008 and 2013 elections have clearly shown that Malaysia is now in a 50-50 two-coalition competition, as far as elections are concerned. Yet the ruling coalition led by Umno is trying very hard to turn the clock back to a time when it was the sole power holder.

To turn the clock back, redelineation of electoral boundaries is high on the agenda of Umno leaders and the Election Commission. A constitutional amendment with two-thirds majority approval is required to increase the number of parliamentary seats. But Barisan Nasional has only 134 seats, which is 14 seats away from the two-thirds threshold.

So how can Umno do this? Continue reading “Pakatan Rakyat’s disintegration would mean Umno rules by default”

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UMNO decision to stay out of Chempaka by-election welcome but it should be forerunner to promote a virtuous cycle of national unity and reconciliation

The decision announced by the UMNO President and Prime Minister, Datuk Seri Najib Razak after the UMNO Supreme Council meeting last night that UMNO will stay out of the Chempaka state by-election in Kelantan is most welcome although not for the reasons given.

Najib said that the decision was for the sake of Muslim “unity” as well as to allow the federal government to focus on its flood relief, rehabilitation and reparation works still in progress.

It is sad that 58 years after Merdeka, and six years after the launching of his 1Malaysia signature policy, Najib has retreated to talk about Muslim unity instead of Malaysian unity.

The UMNO decision to stay out of Chempaka by-election should be a forerunner to promote a virtuous circle of moderation, tolerance, national unity and reconciliation, after a most prolonged, cacophonous and divisive period where the rhetoric of hate, intolerance, extremism and bigotry whether of race or religion, have held sway in the public domain raising disturbing questions about the future of Malaysia. Continue reading “UMNO decision to stay out of Chempaka by-election welcome but it should be forerunner to promote a virtuous cycle of national unity and reconciliation”

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Sport, sodomy and Sirul

By Mariam Mokhtar
Malaysiakini
Feb 23, 2015

Khairy Jamaluddin, the Umno Baru Youth chief, is smarter than we credit him. The fiercely ambitious Oxford graduate is taking the initiative and showing Umno Baru that he can lead.

Prime Minister Najib Abdul Razak is facing his worst nightmare. His spectre is a Malaysian in an Australian detention centre. Khairy needs to prove that he will be ‘prime minister material’ if the top post becomes vacant.

Khairy is showing signs of being bored with his day job as the youth and sports minister. After Malaysia’s dismal performance in the Olympics, the Commonwealth Games and the Asian Games, Khairy’s focus should be on promoting and improving our performance in sport. He should engage more young Malaysians.

Proving that he has too much time on his hands, the minister has instead organised a roadshow. His co-star is the lead prosecutor in the Sodomy II trial, Muhammad Shafee Abdullah (right). They are trying to convince the public that opposition leader Anwar Ibrahim’s guilty verdict was a just one.

There is probably an ulterior motive to the roadshow. Shafee has his sights set on being the next attorney-general, whilst Khairy is taking pole position in the race to be the prime minister. Continue reading “Sport, sodomy and Sirul”

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Sodomy II is not Saiful v Anwar

– Nawawi Mohamad
The Malaysian Insider
18 February 2015

To everyone who thought that Sodomy II is the case of opposition leader Datuk Seri Anwar Ibrahim versus his former aide Mohd Saiful Bukhari Azlan – you got it wrong.

Sodomy II is Umno versus Anwar. Saiful is just the pawn who played his part and after the first stage of the plan to jail Anwar was accomplished, the next stage and the rest of the stages were taken care of by Umno.

Everyone in the team against Anwar – the police, doctors, chemist and judges – are government servants appointed by the arms of the Umno-Barisan Nasional (BN) government. Tan Sri Muhammad Shafee Abdullah was also under the government’s payroll. So could they really be fair and independent?

We have witnessed a concerted effort during the trial of the Altantuya murder case that no one asked the duo Sirul Azhar Umar and Azilah Hadri who gave the order to kill and get the motive of the murder despite knowing that they were paid to kill.

Similarly the whole exercise in the Sodomy II trial, everyone wanted to make sure that every event, evidence, person and witness involved, no matter what, must lead to the jailing of Anwar. Continue reading “Sodomy II is not Saiful v Anwar”

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With old guards bowing out, how will Barisan and Pakatan change?

BY ANISAH SHUKRY
The Malaysian Insider
17 February 2015

Old guards in Malaysia’s political parties are slowly leaving the scene paving the way for younger leaders to come forward, but between the ruling Barisan Nasional (BN) and the opposition Pakatan Rakyat (PR), the pace of rejuvenation differs vastly.

Both sides have hugely respected and influential stalwarts but the number has dwindled down to one each – in BN, Tengku Razaleigh Hamzah is the sole veteran still in active politics as Gua Musang MP and in PR, Gelang Patah MP Lim Kit Siang is still DAP adviser.

In PR, there is potential now for younger leaders to rise and develop even more responsibilities with the passing of PAS’s Datuk Nik Abdul Aziz Nik Mat and DAP’s Karpal Singh, as well as the incarceration of PKR de factor leader Datuk Seri Anwar Ibrahim.

In BN, party’s top posts are filled with second-generation leaders, such as Datuk Seri Najib Razak, the Umno president and prime minister, and Datuk Seri Hishammuddin Hussein, an Umno vice-president and defence minister.

But the crucial difference between the two coalitions was that with BN, the party’s rejuvenation process seems to have come to an abrupt stop with Najib’s generation, while in PR, younger leaders continue to join the coalition and rise up the ranks, analysts said. Continue reading “With old guards bowing out, how will Barisan and Pakatan change?”

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The Economist: Umno will backslide with Anwar out of the way

The Malay Mail Online
February 13, 2015

KUALA LUMPUR, Feb 13 ― Datuk Seri Anwar Ibrahim’s incarceration is detrimental to Malaysia as a weakened opposition reduces Umno’s motivation to reform, The Economist wrote today.

Calling it a “setback for the whole country”, the London-based business magazine pointed out that the opposition leader’s absence bolster’s the ruling coalition that is already “becoming a mere shell for an Umno ever more beholden to Malay-nationalist forces”.

In Election 2013, Umno reinforced its dominance over Barisan Nasional by winning more seats owing to rural Malay voters even as its partners suffered from reduced support from other ethnic communities.

“Mr Anwar, a political chameleon whose real beliefs are sometimes hard to pin down, has many critics, but he could at least credibly lead a coalition that bridges Malaysia’s ethnic divides.

“That is why his incarceration is a dark day not just for Malaysia’s opposition, but for Mr Najib and the country itself,” it wrote. Continue reading “The Economist: Umno will backslide with Anwar out of the way”

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Umno will regret its Anwar ‘vendetta’ in GE14, says WSJ

The Malay Mail Online
FEBRUARY 12, 2015

KUALA LUMPUR, Feb 12 — In an opinion piece today, financial daily Wall Street Journal (WSJ) criticised the Federal Court’s decision to convict Opposition Leader Datuk Seri Anwar Ibrahim for sodomy, calling it a “Pyrrhic victory” for ruling party Umno.

In its bid to stop Anwar from becoming a prime minister, WSJ said Umno had damaged Malaysia’s reputation and the fabric of society, both of which will return to haunt the ruling party in the next general election.

“Umno’s decades-long vendetta against Mr Anwar has brought discredit on Malaysia’s government and political culture,” said the article titled “Malaysia’s Anwar Shame”.

“It is likely to accelerate the ruling party’s loss of support from a maturing population repulsed by such dirty tricks. Prime Minister Datuk Seri Najib Razak’s failure to call an end to this farce is a stain on his legacy.”

According to WSJ, Umno had resorted to a trumped-up charge against Anwar recycled from the playbook of former prime minister Tun Dr Mahathir Mohamad, rather than fight Anwar “fairly”. Continue reading “Umno will regret its Anwar ‘vendetta’ in GE14, says WSJ”

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Tunku and Pak Samad are quintessential Malaysians who must be the models for Malaysians to emulate if we want Malaysia to succeed as a truly developed nation by 2020

This is a “double honour” gathering, to remember a statesman Tunku Abdul Rahman, the first Prime Minister of Malaysia and to celebrate a national laureate, Pak Samad, not just because they share the same birthday on February 8, but because they are quintessential Malaysians, the embodiment of what a Malaysian should be, transcending race, religion and region, representing what is best for decent and civilized human beings, espousing the causes of truth, freedom, justice and dignity for all.

Tunku and Pak Samad should be models for all Malaysians to emulate if we want Malaysia to succeed as a truly developed nation by 2020, as envisaged by Vision 2020.

A quintessential Malaysian is a rare commodity in Malaysia today, although we are in the fifth decade of nationhood – 57 years after Merdeka in 1957 and 51 years after the formation of Malaysia in 1963.

I am reminded of Charles Dickens’ Tale of Two Cities (my Form Four textbook – and it is another sign of worsening times in Malaysia that our students today do not have such textbooks anymore) and how the novel started, which seemed also to describe the national situation in Malaysia today, viz:

“It was the best of times, it was the worst of times, it was the age of wisdom, it was the age of foolishness, it was the epoch of belief, it was the epoch of incredulity, it was the season of Light, it was the season of Darkness, it was the spring of hope, it was the winter of despair, we had everything before us, we had nothing before us, we were all going direct to heaven, we were all going direct the other way.”

Continue reading “Tunku and Pak Samad are quintessential Malaysians who must be the models for Malaysians to emulate if we want Malaysia to succeed as a truly developed nation by 2020”

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Instead of rage and rant over the racism and hypocrisy of the Ismail Sabri episode, scorn and mockery will be more powerful weapons which can even bring down the entire edifice of Najib premiership

Three serious political disasters afflicted the Najib premiership in the past two months:

· * firstly the botch-up in all the three phases of response, relief and reconstruction of the disaster management plan and preparedness of the Federal Government in the Floods 2014, the worst floods catastrophe in living memory, as the damages in terms of 25 dead, a million flood victims with a quarter million in the various flood relief centres and billions of ringgit losses could have been minimised;

· * secondly, the shameful episode of the Home Minister, Datuk Seri Zahid Hamidi’s infamous letter to the US Federal Bureau of Investigationhs (FBI) vouching for the character of alleged gambling kingpin Paul Phua, standing trial in Las Vegas, Nevada for illegal gambling, in contradiction of previous earlier police report to FBI and even more serious, without the knowledge or approval of the Police, the Foreign Ministry or the Prime Minister, and being caught red-handed with lie after lie like the denials by previous Home Ministers that they had written similar letters and with the Cabinet kept completely in the dark and dare not do what is right on the matter; and

· *Thirdly, the craven and dishonest stand of the 35 Ministers in the Najib Cabinet 2015 on the racist call by the Minister for Agriculture and Agro-based Industry, Datuk Ismail Sabri, to Malay consumers to boycott Chinese businesses was not targeting Chinese traders alone, but aimed at all traders – which reminds one immediately of Hans Christian Andersens immortal tale of The Emperor’s New Clothes.

Of the three political disasters afflicting Prime Minister Najib and his Cabinet, it is the third episode which is capable of bringing down the entire edifice of the Najib premiership down in ruins. Continue reading “Instead of rage and rant over the racism and hypocrisy of the Ismail Sabri episode, scorn and mockery will be more powerful weapons which can even bring down the entire edifice of Najib premiership”

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Don’t allow extremists to tear the country apart

– Salleh Said Keruak
The Malaysian Insider
1 February 2015

Umno Supreme Council Member Puad Zarkashi has urged the Home Ministry and the Malaysian Communications and Multimedia Commission to investigate the masterminds behind Free Malaysia Today, The Malaysian Insider and MalaysiaKini, which he said are fuelling an internal crisis in Umno.

Batu Kawan Umno vice-chairman, Datuk Khairuddin Abu Hassan, responded to this by saying, “Ow! Stop tickling me, Puad Zarkashi. No one can split Umno if the party has leaders of quality, particularly those who champion the people”.

Khairuddin added that any crisis in Umno could only be because of a weak party leadership.

This public debate between Puad and Khairuddin is just one more of many that have cropped up of late. It appears like the opposition need not do anything any more. All they need to do is to sit back and allow the Umno leaders to slander each other.

There are many issues more important than fighting one other. In Penang, 33 Indians were detained on allegations that they were planning to start a riot during the Thaipusam celebrations.

This is very alarming and is a matter that should not be taken lightly. Any riot in Penang will very quickly spread to the rest of Malaysia and without laws such as the ISA that allow for pre-emptive detention the authorities would be hard-pressed to act until it is too late.

Chinese-Muslim preacher Ridhuan Tee is also not helping with his fiery and very inflammatory statements. This just raises the sentiments of the people even further and fuels the hatred that already exists between some Malays and non-Malays.

Religion is a very dangerous weapon to use and once conflict is triggered it is very difficult to stop it. Continue reading “Don’t allow extremists to tear the country apart”