Quintessence of Mahathirism– pure Machiavellianism, perverse illogic and most cunning to distract attention from the core issue

It is the quintessence of Mahathirism – pure Machiavellianism, perverse illogic and most cunning to distract attention from the core issue.

This was what Tun Dr. Mahathir Mohamad produced in his blog yesterday when claiming to welcome my proposal that the Prime Minister, Datuk Seri Najib Razak set up a Royal Commission of Inquiry to investigate into the allegation by Barry Wain’s new biography, “Malaysian Maverick: Mahathir Mohamad in Turbulent Times” that the former Prime Minister had wasted or burned up to RM100 billion on grandiose projects and corruption in his 22 years as PM.

He even sweetened his welcome by insisting that such a commission should not be made up of government nominees, but should instead have as members “impeccable people including foreigners and members of Transparency International.”

How many instances can Mahathir quote of the occasions when he had followed such precepts in his 22 years as Prime Minister to probe into financial scandals or serious allegations of abuses of power? Continue reading “Quintessence of Mahathirism– pure Machiavellianism, perverse illogic and most cunning to distract attention from the core issue”

Pakatan Rakyat Policy

By Vincent Lee

I do not know whether this feedback can reach you YB but i hope it will.

I have read the details of the policy of Pakatan Rakyat and it sounds very impressive. It seems like its the opposite of BN policy.

As a voter, especially a loyal supporter of Pakatan Rakyat, I wish to suggest a few feedback. No matter how good is a policy, its implementation is even more important. And what is even more importance is to setup a team of watchdog to oversee the implementation.

For example when you mention to reform the EPF. Who will implement them? The board member of EPF I suppose? I’m a guy from the corporate sector and I don’t think the members of the board which get used to BN regime for decades can reform itself. Of course I’m not suggesting that the board members been replace as it may trigger a lot of misunderstanding that PR are power crazy. May I suggest that the senior member of Labour Unions be the watchdog for the implementation. At least 3 of them from 3 different unions. This is of course based on the logic, the best person that take care of the labour’s money is the labour himself. This way is even more effective if you can rotate the members within the watchdog panel every 2 or 3 years to avoid any abuse.
Continue reading “Pakatan Rakyat Policy”

LKS tweets reply to M

Am in Tokyo on private visit. Will give blog response 2Mahathir.
12/23/2009 09:49 PM

Mahathir wants Wain’s book 2b released forthwith.Who really believe Mahathir? Or is Najib or Hisham culprit blocking “Maverick M”‘s release?
12/23/2009 09:45 PM

Why Mahathir don’t sue me now if I had libelled him calling for RCI into Barry Wain’s RM100 billion allegation in his book Maverick M?
12/23/2009 09:39 PM

Why his suit conditional on outcome of RCI into Barry Wain’s allegation when M will do utmost 2block RCI though claiming support publicly?
12/23/2009 09:35 PM
Continue reading “LKS tweets reply to M”

Missing jet engines spark crisis in Malaysia

By Kevin Brown in Singapore | Financial Times
Published: December 22 2009 13:58 | Last updated: December 22 2009 13:58

The Malaysian government is facing a fresh corruption crisis after officials admitted that two US-made fighter jet engines had disappeared from an air force base after apparently being illicitly sold by military officers to a South American arms dealer.

Najib Razak, prime minister, said there would be a full investigation of the thefts, which happened in 2007 and 2008, when he was defence minister. However, opposition parties accused the government of covering up the incidents.

Lim Kit Siang, parliamentary leader of the opposition Democratic Action party, said the authorities had been “super slow” and claimed that the prime minister’s response had painted “a frightening picture of a government of thieves”.
Continue reading “Missing jet engines spark crisis in Malaysia”

What a way to end 2009 – the missing RM50 million RMAF jet engines which exposes high-level thievery, government topsy-turvydom and sheer lack of professionalism in defence, police and Attorney-General’s Chambers casting long shadow on Najib’s GTP

What a way to end 2009 and the first uncompleted year of the new Prime Minister, Datuk Seri Najib Razak – two missing RM50 million RMAF jet engines which exposes high-level thievery, government topsy-turvydom and sheer lack of professionalism in defence, police and Attorney-General’s Chambers, casting a long shadow on Najib’s Government Transformation Programme (GTP).

Many questions cry out for answer on the scandal of the missing jet engines as they are not an unobtrusive object that could be easily squirrelled away, with each explanatory statement by the Prime Minister, the Defence Minister Datuk Seri Dr. Ahmad Zahid Hamidi, the air force and the police raising more questions.

Najib gave the assurance that action would be taken against those responsible for the missing Royal Malaysian Air Force (RMAF) jet engines – the powerplants to the F-5E Tiger II fighter and RF-5E Tigereye reconnaissance jets – saying: “Let us investigate. Whoever is in the wrong will be held responsible.”

Why is the Prime Minister still talking in the future tense, when the action for the missing RMAF jet engines took place in May last year, and RMAF had lodged a report with the police on Aug 4 last year?
Continue reading “What a way to end 2009 – the missing RM50 million RMAF jet engines which exposes high-level thievery, government topsy-turvydom and sheer lack of professionalism in defence, police and Attorney-General’s Chambers casting long shadow on Najib’s GTP”

Enhancing The Role of Private Sector in Education – Part 4

By M. Bakri Musa

[Fourth of Six Parts]

[In the first three parts I discussed the rationale and advantages of private sector participation in education, and reviewed the current experience in Malaysia. In this fourth essay, I survey the experiences elsewhere for useful lessons that could be relevant To Malaysia.]

The Experiences Elsewhere

In formulating a policy that would envisage a greater role for the private sector, it is worthwhile to review the experiences elsewhere.

Private Schools

In America, everyone is entitled to free publicly-funded education from K-12 years. In fact schooling for this age group is compulsory. While the government is not directly involved in preschool there are many publicly-funded programs targeted for children of disadvantaged families.
Continue reading “Enhancing The Role of Private Sector in Education – Part 4”

Najib should set up Royal Commission of Inquiry to investigate whether Mahathir had “wasted or burned up” RM100 billion on grandiose projects and corruption in his 22 years as Prime Minister

Why is the government of Prime Minister, Datuk Seri Najib Razak, holding up for more than three weeks the release of 800 copies of a new biography of former Prime Minister, Tun Dr. Mahathir Mohamad by former Asian Wall Street Journal managing editor Barry Wain?

There can be no doubt that Mahathir and Najib would have already read the biography, “Malaysian Maverick: Mahathir Mohamad in Turbulent Times”.

Is either of them objecting to the release of Wain’s biography of Mahathir and want it banned like Mahathir’s “Malay Dilemma” when it was first published in 1970? This will be the irony of ironies.

Both should know that the year 2009, very soon to become 2010, in this Internet era and age of information and communications technology is very different from four decades ago in 1970 and any ban or censorship of Wain’s new biography will make it even more popular among Malaysians.
Continue reading “Najib should set up Royal Commission of Inquiry to investigate whether Mahathir had “wasted or burned up” RM100 billion on grandiose projects and corruption in his 22 years as Prime Minister”

Pakatan Rakyat all set to do battle for Putrajaya

COMMENT
by Thomas Lee
20 December 2009

The Pakatan Rakyat (PR), the still informal political coalition comprising the DAP, PKR and PAS, has taken the first big step to formalise its status to be a viable, vibrant and vigilant alternative to the current ruling Barisan Nasional (BN) coalition.

The PR held its first national convention in Shah Alam on Saturday 19 December 2009, and made a public declaration that its set target for the next general election is nothing less than the takeover of Putrajaya.

One thousand five hundred delegates, comprising 500 grassroots leaders from all over the country representing each of the three component parties of the PR, enthusiastically heeded the clarion call to prepare for the electroral battle of Putrajaya, scheduled before early 2013 or perhaps even earlier. Continue reading “Pakatan Rakyat all set to do battle for Putrajaya”

From Copenhagen to Sabah: 1Earth, 1Climate Change; 1Najib?

By Saves DK

From Copenhagen to Sabah – Does the threat of Climate Change ‘change’ according to Time Zones?

Dear Prime Minister Najib Razak,

Once again, we welcome your serious and determined efforts to reduce carbon emission to help halt global warming in the interests of our future generations.

Surely, the first important step to CUTTING (rather than increasing) carbon emission is to cancel the proposed coal power plant to be built in Felda Sahabat, Lahad Datu, which is very close to the various pristine, precious natural paradise of Darvel Bay, Coral Triangle Initiative, Tabin Wildlife Conservation area and so on, which make the East Coast of Sabah one of the remaining natural treasures of the world.

You have asked for our views “on what more we can do to ensure a greener Malaysia, so that we can learn from each other.” Great! Here are some. We do not dream that you would actually ‘learn’ from humble Sabahans like us, but we would be very grateful already if you could at least be consistent in your position on climate change and coal.
Continue reading “From Copenhagen to Sabah: 1Earth, 1Climate Change; 1Najib?”

Copenhagen Negotiators Bicker and Filibuster While the Biosphere Burns

George Monbiot despairs at the chaotic, disastrous denouement of a chaotic and disastrous climate summit

The Guardian/UK
Saturday, December 19, 2009

by George Monbiot

First they put the planet in square brackets, now they have deleted it from the text. At the end it was no longer about saving the biosphere: it was just a matter of saving face. As the talks melted down, everything that might have made a new treaty worthwhile was scratched out. Any deal would do, as long as the negotiators could pretend they have achieved something. A clearer and less destructive treaty than the text that emerged would be a sheaf of blank paper, which every negotiating party solemnly sits down to sign.

This was the chaotic, disastrous denouement of a chaotic and disastrous summit. The event has been attended by historic levels of incompetence. Delegates arriving from the tropics spent 10 hours queueing in sub-zero temperatures without shelter, food or drink, let alone any explanation or announcement, before being turned away. Some people fainted from exposure; it’s surprising that no one died. The process of negotiation was just as obtuse: there was no evidence here of the innovative methods of dispute resolution developed recently by mediators and coaches, just the same old pig-headed wrestling.
Continue reading “Copenhagen Negotiators Bicker and Filibuster While the Biosphere Burns”

The Truths Copenhagen Ignored

by Johann Hari
The Independent/UK December 19, 2009

So that’s it. The world’s worst polluters – the people who are drastically altering the climate – gathered here in Copenhagen to announce they were going to carry on cooking, in defiance of all the scientific warnings.

They didn’t seal the deal; they sealed the coffin for the world’s low-lying islands, its glaciers, its North Pole, and millions of lives.

Those of us who watched this conference with open eyes aren’t surprised. Every day, practical, intelligent solutions that would cut our emissions of warming gases have been offered by scientists, developing countries and protesters – and they have been systematically vetoed by the governments of North America and Europe.

It’s worth recounting a few of the ideas that were summarily dismissed – because when the world finally resolves to find a real solution, we will have to revive them.

Discarded Idea One: The International Environmental Court. Any cuts that leaders claim they would like as a result of Copenhagen will be purely voluntary. If a government decides not to follow them, nothing will happen, except a mild blush, and disastrous warming. Canada signed up to cut its emissions at Kyoto, and then increased them by 26 per cent – and there were no consequences. Copenhagen could unleash a hundred Canadas. Continue reading “The Truths Copenhagen Ignored”

The Policies of Pakatan Rakyat

The Policies of Pakatan Rakyat that was unanimously adopted today at the 1st Pakatan Rakyat Convention at Auditorium MBSA, Shah Alam.

The Policies of Pakatan Rakyat

  1. Transparent and Genuine Democracy

    1. Constitutionalism and the Rule of Law
    2. Separation of Powers
    3. A Clean, Free and Fair Electoral System
  2. Driving a High Performance, Sustainable and Equitable Economy Continue reading “The Policies of Pakatan Rakyat”

Why nobody in government starting from Najib has ever talked about “zero tolerance for corruption” to demonstrate their seriousness about battling corruption?

I visited the public display of the various laboratories of the Government Transformation Programme (GTP) at Sunway Pyramid Convention Centre, Petaling Jaya today.

I was pleasantly surprised that some of the concepts and objectives which I had espoused both in and out of Parliament have found their way into the initiatives proposed – which is a different matter about their implementation.

The laboratory on “Battling Corruption” referred to “zero tolerance for corruption” while the laboratory on “Fighting Crime” referred to battling the people’s “fear of crime”.

When I had advocated the former, it had elicited indifferent response while in the latter, there was negative reaction in the form of righteous denial there was ever the problem of the “fear of crime” among Malaysians in the country.

When visiting the various Key Performance Index (KPI) and National Key Results Area (NKRA) laboratories, the foremost question is whether there had been a real change of heart by the Barisan Nasional government, followed quickly by a flurry of other questions, such as:
Continue reading “Why nobody in government starting from Najib has ever talked about “zero tolerance for corruption” to demonstrate their seriousness about battling corruption?”

Why not a single Minister from MCA, Gerakan, MIC, SUPP, Sabah and Sarawak dare to be as outspoken as Nazri to speak out against racism as well as BTN and Utusan Malaysia’s racist outpourings which subverts the very basis of a multi-racial Malaysian nation?

Minister in the Prime Minister’s Department, Datuk Seri Nazri Aziz is proving to be a political leader of surprises, not only with his bold and courageous denunciation of Biro Tata Negara (BTN) divisive, racist and seditious indoctrination course but in speaking out forthrightly against Utusan Malaysia’s unadulterated racism.

Condemning Utusan Malaysia for its “outdated” racist propaganda, Nazri said the Umno-owned newspaper must accept that Malaysia is a multi-racial country.

It is a tragic and terrible commentary on the success of the nation-building process that 52 years after nationhood, a national daily which is owned by UMNO, the party in power in the past five decades, has refused to accept that Malaysia is a multi-racial country and continue to call Chinese as immigrants and Indians with derogatory terms like “keling”.

With such racist mindset and mentality in the corridors of power, Najib’s 1Malaysia concept and policy has no meaning whatsoever, and it is no wonder that the public preview of the 1Malaysia programme for the seven National Key Results Area (NKRA) initiatives today has to be put off.
Continue reading “Why not a single Minister from MCA, Gerakan, MIC, SUPP, Sabah and Sarawak dare to be as outspoken as Nazri to speak out against racism as well as BTN and Utusan Malaysia’s racist outpourings which subverts the very basis of a multi-racial Malaysian nation?”

Utusan Malaysia: Messenger of hate and spite on religion and race

by Dr Lim Teck Ghee

Sitting today in a small group international meeting on the subject of the linkages between religion and development being held in Phnom Penh, I am engaged in deep discussion on how to build inter-faith synergies that can effectively address the many pressing challenges of the region.

The group of 15 participants from different faiths and religions (I am possibly the sole atheist participant) includes three Muslim activist colleagues. They are the country director of Muslim Aid from Bangladesh; a Muhammadiyah senior lecturer from the State Institute for Islamic Studies in Walinsongo Semarang, Indonesia; and the executive director of a Muslim-based organization Ummah Fi Salam based in Mindanao that has been working on an interfaith programme called ‘Building Darusalam’ or ‘peace communities’.

Present also is a Muslim senior lecturer from the National University of Singapore who is actively involved with giving voice to professional Muslim women in Singapore.
Continue reading “Utusan Malaysia: Messenger of hate and spite on religion and race”

BTN and the price of indoctrination

By Azly Rahman

What price indoctrination? Herein lies the question on the RM550 million spent over 10 years on a civic-consciousness programme that turned out to be a project of instilling fear into the Malays – fear of their own shadow and fear of other races.

The Biro Tatanegara (BTN) courses use Russian-styled pseudo-scientific pop psychology, drawn from the work of Bulgarian mind-bending experts in ‘suggestopedia’ developed by Lozanov and Barzakov with creative visualisation para-psychological techniques, into which the mind is emptied before propaganda is funnelled.

When the mind is half-asleep, subconscious wide awake, the body is relaxed, the room darkened, the voice of the propagandist-facilitator reigns supreme, suggesting anything to ensure that the doped, docile, and domesticated mind enters a game of master-slave narrative.
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The postponement of the 1Malaysia NKRA concept will overshadow the public exhibition of the six NKRA initiatives tomorrow

Malaysian Insider reports that the Cabinet has failed to reach a consensus on the National Key Results Area (NKRA) initiatives for 1Malaysia to implement racial unity and national integration proposals, resulting in the postponement of the public preview of the 1Malaysia initiative which has been scheduled for the next two days along with the display of the six other NKRA programmes.

Because of the failure of reach a consensus at the special Cabinet retreat on Sunday, the only element that will be on display will be the general framework of the 1Malaysia concept.

As it is, the Cabinet’s irresolution and indecisive action over the divisive, racist and seditious Biro Tata Negara (BTN) indoctrination course would have overshadowed the public exhibition of the seven NKRA initiatives tomorrow.

The postponement of the 1Malaysia initiative in the public presentation of Najib’s 1Malaysia concept and the other six NKRAs will have the effect of being thunderous in its absence, raising in a most fundamental manner questions of whether Najib’s 1Malaysia concept and slogan really means anything serious or different to the people apart from publicity and propaganda.
Continue reading “The postponement of the 1Malaysia NKRA concept will overshadow the public exhibition of the six NKRA initiatives tomorrow”

Malaysia current ills and future solution?

By Michael Yeo

There are reports of mass migration of Malaysian to overseas, and the Malaysian per capita income is decreasing. The country economy lacks foreign investments due to incorrect policies taken in 1989. The Asian Tigers – Thailand, China, Taiwan, S Korea, Japan, and Vietnam is all vying for foreign investments and aggressively pursuing value-added export market. With the potential oil production in Cambodia from 2011 (estimated), Malaysia will be relegated to the bottom in the ladder. Globalisation does not discriminate against any nation, but they will shy away from countries where her Governments have acted against the flow of capital. The oil asset is fast dwindling in Malaysia.

Malaysia is going backward; this is not a surprised as bad policies in educations, corruptions, cronyism, political systems that give rise to self imposed racism are all present in this dysfunctional state. Let me elaborate:

Present political divides
Continue reading “Malaysia current ills and future solution?”

Why Hishammuddin continue to condone Utusan Malaysia’s utter contempt of the truth, rules and ethics of journalism, and the law in purveying unadulterated venom, poison and sedition in falsely alleging that DAP wants to create a Malaysian republic?

The homily by the Home Minister, Datuk Seri Hishammuddin Hussein on what constitutes good journalism and what differentiates local journalists and “some bloggers” is mind-boggling to say the least.

Hishammudin said some bloggers, unlike local journalists, do not adhere to the rules and ethics of journalism in their bid to garner popularity.

“The local journalists adhered to ethics but these bloggers did not, and this was what differentiated the journalists from these bloggers.”

Speaking at the presentation of the 2009 ExxonMobil Journalism Awards in Kuala Terengganu last night, Hishammuddin said journalists in the country would have nothing to fear so long as their reports adhered to the ethics of journalism, adding that they would be accepted by the people.
Continue reading “Why Hishammuddin continue to condone Utusan Malaysia’s utter contempt of the truth, rules and ethics of journalism, and the law in purveying unadulterated venom, poison and sedition in falsely alleging that DAP wants to create a Malaysian republic?”