The recent Pakatan Rakyat related scandals in Selangor, convinced what neutral critics and political analyst (active and those armchair analyst ) suspected when Pakatan came to power in 4 or rather 5 states, that nothing much is going to change and reforms remains in the lips of politicians from the Opposition and never really took off.
The worst, Pakatan are repeating the same blunders committed by BN, going to the extend of imitating BN way of doing things, despite all those reformist chants and sloganeering in the statements and ceramahs.
Being a resident in Selangor, I have not seen much change for more than 2 years now. The honeymoon period was long over. The honeymoon period should have been the time where Pakatan should have done a comprehensive review of the state government workings, policies and make necessary changes or in their own words, reforms.
Agreed that there were several feel good Rakyat friendly policies in place but ‘merakyatkan ekonomi’ really means nothing, when it comes to real policies or opportunities benefiting the Rakyat at large, economically.
The recent reports, counter reports, sacking, accusations, tweets or rather mistweets over supports letters only goes to show that Pakatan politicians are no different from BN. I remember that during the PKFZ scandal, the opposition went to town accusing Minister of transport, Chan Kong Choy of corruption and abuse of power for issuing support letters to companies involved in the project to secure loans and contracts.
As usual, there were noises from Mr Lim Kit Siang calling for Royal Commision of Enquiry on PKFZ. What about Selangor support letters issue? It was said that support letters were issued to contractors to win contracts worth millions. That is what was reported, what about those which went unreported or undeclared. Lim Kit Siang should seek appointment with Sultan of Selangor and demand for a Royal Commission of Enquiry. Why the silence when Kit Siang slams BN over any thing that goes wrong in this country, the next moment it happens.
When talking about reforms, if this issue was not reported (initially there was accusations that the MCA owned newspaper, The Star , was simply making up stories to destabilise the DAP powered state government), nothing would have been done to change or eliminate issuance of ‘support letters’ , because there was no intention to reform in the first place. MB Khalid was jolted when The Star headlined the story, admitting that investigation has been going on for 2 weeks ( about a month now, with no new updates) with no one asked to go on leave or suspended, inviting accusations that there were attempts to cover up the issue and gross lack of transparency over the whole affair.
Even the appointment of councilors were chaotic. Until now no one know how the selection process works and it turns out, they did another BN, no transparency whatsoever and in usual Malaysian style, the appointments were made late and changes were made in the last minutes. Even their ally, PSM was left bewildered with the omission of their own candidate.
Sand theft and illegal mining also shown the that the state government has learnt how to make money and contribute well in advance towards high income economy. Never miond that it benefits a small group of people working for the state government company, KKSB, which does nothing but works as a middleman between the actual sand mining companies and the state government. KKSB is nothing but a poor imitation of BN held state government companies which do nothing but act like blood sucking middlemen.
What would be the role of the Jabatan Tanah in all these, watch your newborn (KKSB) mint money and pay their staff 6 months of bonus over a year. KKSB’s contribution towards high income economy is 10 years ahead of the Najib’s plan. And very few companies around the world pay 6 months of bonus within a year of operations. As far as I know, only some lucky Skim Cepat Kaya companies have achieved that feat.
What has the state government done with the apparent mismanagement of sand mining activity and also the state government’s company’s role in it? The SELCAT hearing, completed in record 3 days, did not even ask for full fledged investigation to be carried out neither did they invite MACC to investigate. Evidences offered by own PKR MP, Manikavasagam was rejected due to some silly technicalities. Aren’t they interested in getting to the bottom of the issue, I don’t think so. Perhaps members of SELCAT, were worried some of them would have been dragged into the issue as perhaps, they would have issued supports letters to related companies which they can't even remember now.
Not much information has been much has been forthcoming ever since. No one knows if anyone was penalized or changes forthcoming in the company, except for statements blaming BN for even bigger scams during their days in power. Didn’t the Rakyat sent BN packing for all their misdeeds? What is the point of blaming BN again and again.
Now the state government plans a 15Million Ringgit information(or propaganda) blitz to give Rakyat a clearer picture of state governments workings, policies and achievements. I don’t know how this benefits the Rakyat. In Selangor where, broadband and internet access are reasonably high, nobody really reads mainstream media or watches RTM for example and with the fact that all Pakatan Parties’ newsletters or bulletins are readily available in the market, is this spending necessary. Kelantan, with lesser access to the net, Astro and even newspapers have managed to hold Kelantan for so long.
And finally, look at the behaviors of the key ADUNs and EXCO members. Their denials, counter denials, accusations, tweets, statements and media play only proves that every one of them are only interested to safeguard the own position. They are not even worried about repercussions and party image when about going public defending themselves. Where are the party dicipline and party media communication procedures?
Where is CEO, sorry, should be MB, Khalid in all these, only the EXCO members know. He is apparently not in the know of most of the things happening around him and he appears to be as confused and indecisive in the mould of Abdullah Badawi.
How all these resonate with ‘Competency, Accountability and Transparency, I really don’t know? Maybe the architect of CAT, Emperor Lim Guan Eng has the answers and perhaps he, in his own arrogant style, can lecture some of his DAP comrades what those principles are in reality, if it was ever practiced in the first place.
By the way, Penang State Government promised that their leaders would undertake Asset declaration exercise. They delayed it claiming that standard form was not provided by federal government. If I am not mistaken, that was slightly more two years ago. Yet Mr Guan Eng’s government still appears not to have the ‘Competency’ to come up with a simple ‘Asset Declaration’ form and do not feel ‘Accountable’ to the promise that they made to the Rakyat. No one actually asked for it then.
Perhaps they now feel that the there is no need to practice ‘Transparency’ as their Pakatan counterparts in other states, after more than two years of governing, do not believe in those slogans anymore.
Monday, August 9, 2010
Tuesday, June 1, 2010
Tamil Nesan, MIC and Samy Velu
In Their Own Pandora
One word sums up it all. Both the party and it’s leader is irrelevant, a word made famous during sodomy 1 trials by Judge, the late Augustine Paul.
MIC and Samy appear to live in their own world. While I know for sure that the GAS movement will not have impact on him, I am baffled that Samy is ignorant of numerous show of disgust by fellow Indians in the country. Only someone with thick skin can endure such abuses and insults throughout the country, not just by Indians but also by other races who are equally baffled that this unwanted leader is still around, helming the party when most of his contemporaries have retired and even some are resting in peace.
What is more baffling is that MIC members, who appear to share the same planet as Samy, still believe in Samy and still thinks MIC is relevant to the Indian community.
When Kamalanathan won the Hulu Selangor parliament seat, it make them big headed and more convinced that MIC is relevant when everyone knows that the Indian votes had hardly returned to BN. It was the Malays who won it for Kamalanathan.
Samy Vellu’s claims of 600,000 membership of MIC are all a sham. MIC branch leaders open branches by getting copies of identity card of Indians all over their area. Branch leaders pay the membership fees and maintain the records to keep their branches active.
Only the old guards, who have benefited directly from Samy Velu are still supporting and worshipping him, perhaps also due to the fact that Samy also means ‘God” .
My estimate is MIC has only about less than 50,000 hardcore supporters or rather Samy cult followers.
Tamil Nesan
Since the emergence of GAS movement, MIC’s family owned paper, Tamil Nesan, went on the offensive with numerous declaration of support for Samy Vellu by various state, divisional and branch chairman, who appear to revere Samy as a king or even god.
Numerous lies are propagated by the newspaper, whose Managing Director is none other than MIC’s prince, Vel Paari. Even on Monday, 31st May, the front page had a huge picture of an almost empty hall in Mines, where the GAS event was held. The report says that hardly 2000 people turned up and most of whom who turned up was Indian Nationals and Indonesians who works for Klang based businessman, Ohms Thiagarajan.
A quick glance at other newspapers in newsstands tells you a completely different story. The hall was full at about 4pm and even one can see a full turnout from the prime time news in TV. Who is Tamil Nesan trying to fool. Tamil Nesan thinks that the Indians are an ignorant lot and will believe what it says. The newspaper is now helmed by a reporter who was jailed before for defaming Samy Vellu. Now this man is using Tamil Nesan to slam Samy’s detractors. How ironic and things change when people develop thick skin like Samy. Maybe money and survival make people work for their one time enemy.
Tamil Nesan also published several sponsored full page advertisements of Birthday wishes for Samy’s wife Indrani. If anyone reads the wishes narrated, one would believe that Indrani is bigger than Queen Elizabeth or Mother Theresa combined. Never before I have seen people sucking up to irrelevant leaders and their wifes in such a way. Indrani has been described as 1st lady, model mother (to Vel Paari, yucks), model woman, holier than thou person etc. It was sickening to read such things when the whole of Malaysia knows that Indrani is nothing but another politician wife.
Tamil Nesan has no worthy news to offer, their front pages are either dedicated to glorifying MIC leaders, Samy or his son Vel Paari, or their partner in crime, youth leader or rather Youth ‘liar’, T.Mohan. Front page are also often dedicated to slam ex-deputy, Dato S. Subramaniam and other critics. It has the lowest circulation amongst Tamil dailies and I believe only hardcore Samy supporters buy the paper.
Other MIC Leaders
I am equally baffled with the silence from other MIC leaders. They should know by now that nobody supports MIC and their leaders. Either they are deaf or dumb enough not to realise this. Their leaders have also not learn their lessons. During the Hulu Selangor by elections, MIC leaders have yet to fulfill many of their promises. Some tried to misappropriate funds given by BN, some gave worthless cheques while some purposely wrote incorrect names in the cheques, causing cheques to be returned. People in Hulu Selangor is more disgusted with MIC now.
This is a one man party and most of those in CWC owe Samy a lot for their current position in the party, therefore most do not want to go against their King. It appears that in their minds, never mind what the Rakyat says, Samy is more important than anything else in their Pandora.
Samy purported successor, Palanivel does not enjoy widespread support and seen as weak. Only Minister Subramaniam enjoy has some respect among Malaysians. Will he speak up and do something. Nobody thinks he will as he owe both Samy and Palanivel for his post now, both in Cabinet and the party.
So nothing is going to change even if Palanivel takes over. Najib should realise that he can’t rely on Samy’s party. In the hindsight, as suggested by T.Mohan, MIC should just leave BN or UMNO should find ways to expel MIC. Only then MIC will realise that they are nobody without BN’s support.
Samy Vellu’s Biggest Achievement
Dr Mahathir urged Samy to call it a day many times over, sarcastically highlighting Samy’s record breaking tenure. Apart from this record, Samy will be remembered as the who caused Indian community to split. There was no other Indian political party before Samy took over MIC. Now we have almost a dozen of Indian based political parties and hundreds of Indian based NGO, just because MIC is ineffective. All because of his grip on MIC and his inability to face dissent in his own party.
On a lighter note, his other achievement and potentials are listed here.
One word sums up it all. Both the party and it’s leader is irrelevant, a word made famous during sodomy 1 trials by Judge, the late Augustine Paul.
MIC and Samy appear to live in their own world. While I know for sure that the GAS movement will not have impact on him, I am baffled that Samy is ignorant of numerous show of disgust by fellow Indians in the country. Only someone with thick skin can endure such abuses and insults throughout the country, not just by Indians but also by other races who are equally baffled that this unwanted leader is still around, helming the party when most of his contemporaries have retired and even some are resting in peace.
What is more baffling is that MIC members, who appear to share the same planet as Samy, still believe in Samy and still thinks MIC is relevant to the Indian community.
When Kamalanathan won the Hulu Selangor parliament seat, it make them big headed and more convinced that MIC is relevant when everyone knows that the Indian votes had hardly returned to BN. It was the Malays who won it for Kamalanathan.
Samy Vellu’s claims of 600,000 membership of MIC are all a sham. MIC branch leaders open branches by getting copies of identity card of Indians all over their area. Branch leaders pay the membership fees and maintain the records to keep their branches active.
Only the old guards, who have benefited directly from Samy Velu are still supporting and worshipping him, perhaps also due to the fact that Samy also means ‘God” .
My estimate is MIC has only about less than 50,000 hardcore supporters or rather Samy cult followers.
Tamil Nesan
Since the emergence of GAS movement, MIC’s family owned paper, Tamil Nesan, went on the offensive with numerous declaration of support for Samy Vellu by various state, divisional and branch chairman, who appear to revere Samy as a king or even god.
Numerous lies are propagated by the newspaper, whose Managing Director is none other than MIC’s prince, Vel Paari. Even on Monday, 31st May, the front page had a huge picture of an almost empty hall in Mines, where the GAS event was held. The report says that hardly 2000 people turned up and most of whom who turned up was Indian Nationals and Indonesians who works for Klang based businessman, Ohms Thiagarajan.
A quick glance at other newspapers in newsstands tells you a completely different story. The hall was full at about 4pm and even one can see a full turnout from the prime time news in TV. Who is Tamil Nesan trying to fool. Tamil Nesan thinks that the Indians are an ignorant lot and will believe what it says. The newspaper is now helmed by a reporter who was jailed before for defaming Samy Vellu. Now this man is using Tamil Nesan to slam Samy’s detractors. How ironic and things change when people develop thick skin like Samy. Maybe money and survival make people work for their one time enemy.
Tamil Nesan also published several sponsored full page advertisements of Birthday wishes for Samy’s wife Indrani. If anyone reads the wishes narrated, one would believe that Indrani is bigger than Queen Elizabeth or Mother Theresa combined. Never before I have seen people sucking up to irrelevant leaders and their wifes in such a way. Indrani has been described as 1st lady, model mother (to Vel Paari, yucks), model woman, holier than thou person etc. It was sickening to read such things when the whole of Malaysia knows that Indrani is nothing but another politician wife.
Tamil Nesan has no worthy news to offer, their front pages are either dedicated to glorifying MIC leaders, Samy or his son Vel Paari, or their partner in crime, youth leader or rather Youth ‘liar’, T.Mohan. Front page are also often dedicated to slam ex-deputy, Dato S. Subramaniam and other critics. It has the lowest circulation amongst Tamil dailies and I believe only hardcore Samy supporters buy the paper.
Other MIC Leaders
I am equally baffled with the silence from other MIC leaders. They should know by now that nobody supports MIC and their leaders. Either they are deaf or dumb enough not to realise this. Their leaders have also not learn their lessons. During the Hulu Selangor by elections, MIC leaders have yet to fulfill many of their promises. Some tried to misappropriate funds given by BN, some gave worthless cheques while some purposely wrote incorrect names in the cheques, causing cheques to be returned. People in Hulu Selangor is more disgusted with MIC now.
This is a one man party and most of those in CWC owe Samy a lot for their current position in the party, therefore most do not want to go against their King. It appears that in their minds, never mind what the Rakyat says, Samy is more important than anything else in their Pandora.
Samy purported successor, Palanivel does not enjoy widespread support and seen as weak. Only Minister Subramaniam enjoy has some respect among Malaysians. Will he speak up and do something. Nobody thinks he will as he owe both Samy and Palanivel for his post now, both in Cabinet and the party.
So nothing is going to change even if Palanivel takes over. Najib should realise that he can’t rely on Samy’s party. In the hindsight, as suggested by T.Mohan, MIC should just leave BN or UMNO should find ways to expel MIC. Only then MIC will realise that they are nobody without BN’s support.
Samy Vellu’s Biggest Achievement
Dr Mahathir urged Samy to call it a day many times over, sarcastically highlighting Samy’s record breaking tenure. Apart from this record, Samy will be remembered as the who caused Indian community to split. There was no other Indian political party before Samy took over MIC. Now we have almost a dozen of Indian based political parties and hundreds of Indian based NGO, just because MIC is ineffective. All because of his grip on MIC and his inability to face dissent in his own party.
On a lighter note, his other achievement and potentials are listed here.
Tuesday, April 27, 2010
Hulu Selangor : No Winners
Now that the battle is over, various armchair analyst and critics from both ends have provided their take on the Hulu Selangor by-elections. Let me provide my view now.
Having been to some of the campaigns as well as talking to mostly Pakatan Supporters throughout the campaign period, the results came as a shock. I was constantly told by Pakatan Supporters that Zaid is very likely to win although from the events that unfolded during the campaign period, I reminded them that it was still 50:50.
Pakatan Supporters, some of whom are local PKR leaders in Serendah with contacts in other small towns like Batang Kali, Kuala Kubu Baru, Sg Choh etc , were confident that PKR will definitely win over Chinese and Indian votes. This is despite Millions that were thrown around by Najib and the BN battalion. They were also confident that Indians will still vote for PKR despite the candidate being another Indian.
They were largely correct. Indians and Chinese took whatever BN gave and still voted for PKR’s Zaid although there is a marginal shift in Indian votes towards BN. Character assassination on Zaid did not really work amongst the non-malay voters. Chinese and Indians still remember Zaid as a man of principles.
So what actually went wrong for Pakatan.
1. As for the candidate, for once Pakatan looked quite arrogant as compared to BN. Kamalanathan did his walkabout in simple attire and running shoes while Zaid went about in his luxury car, says a friend of mine. Perception matters, have we heard enough on this about UMNO leaders before. It appears that PKR is also muda lupa..
2. As for the campaigns, there were largely not interesting. While Chinese can appreciate national issues, the malays and Indians did not. Who cares about APCO when the state government can even resurface the road next to my house, says a Pakatan Supporter. Stolen jet engines, Submarine, Teoh Beng Hock , Kugan etc did not resonate well with the Malays. This is where they lost.
3. Anwar’s association with Jewish leaders were already well known, therefore Malays did not buy his APCO argument.
4. Who will buy your argument when you have people like ‘lori sampah’ Gopalakrishan of Padang Serai talking nonsence half the time. Issues were not carefully chosen to suit the audience.
5. Campaigns were ad-hoc, not well coordinated and at times, the speakers were either not on time or never turned up.
6. PAS campaigns were more focusing on defending Zaid. ‘Allah menyanyangi orang yang bertaubat’ goes one of the sentence. PAS talking about lack of development in Hulu Selangor since independence till Pakatan took over in the last elections does not hold water. Hulu Selangor is far more developed than Kelantan.
7. Local PKR leaders were too demanding, especially Indians. These leaders were holding their sponsors (upper PKR leaders) to ransom. First they were given RM 10,000 to run their operations centre (Bilik Gerakan) and also persuade voters in that particular area, then when Zaid’s drinking issue came about, they went on to demand another RM 10,000 claiming that it would be difficult to persuade voters.
8. Some local PKR leaders were also involved in negotiating with MIC and even Makkal Sakhti party, seeking cash in return of support, even after claiming their dues from PKR sponsors.
9. Some PKR Indians supporters claimed money from both Pakatan and BN for putting up posters around their towns. Talk about party loyalty.
10. PKR and Pakatan Rakyat state government did not do much in Hulu Selangor since the last general elections, despite promise of change for better during the campaign. Being a regular visitor there, even the basic infrastructure was not maintained.
11. Giving out land titles and funds to schools and temples, while were accepted by the residents in Hulu Selangor, they were thought to be no different from BN in terms of vote buying since they are only seen during the elections.
11. Pakatan Rakyat state government did not bother to do anything about the land issue in Felda Sungai Buaya, despite promising to do something in the last general elections. Here they lost about 700 votes to BN.
12. MB Khalid hardly visited this area since taking over the state government. He came to Felda Sungai Buaya for the first time ever on Saturday Morning, asking residents to be cautious and not sign any documents. The same afternoon, Najib came and gave out compensation to some residents and more importantly a plan to develop the land, something viable now since a new highway exit will be constructed by PLUS nearby.
13. PKR Indian leaders were more involved in the Ceramahs rather than site and house visits while MIC leaders were more hands on and were more on the ground, despite facing hostile and sometimes abusive crowd.
14. Pakatan Rakyat and it’s economic advisor did not have any plans on improving the living standards, investments and more job opportunities in Hulu Selangor. They were mostly interested in politicizing everything in their campaigns.
BN on the other hand, in my opinion, did not win anything. Votes for them that really made the difference were from Felda Sungai Buaya (700 votes) and also postal votes, another 700. Other than this, there was no significant shift in votes.
BN is still the champions in the Felda area, however they have failed to win over the Chinese and Indians in the townships. Throwing around millions should have resulted in at least 7-8,000 majority. It didn’t, therefore BN should learn that money can’t buy votes any longer. The Chinese community, despite benefiting millions, did not favour BN at all. Their anger towards UMNO and their leaders are still present.
Najib’s various initiatives such as Government Transformation Plan, New Economic Model, walk about may have brought about a feel good factor but the Chinese appear to want concrete results, more than mere rhetoric. They are also clearly offended with various slip of the tongue and racial slurs by UMNO leaders.
As for the Indians, they are generally still anti-MIC, although they are warming up to Najib. Most of them in Hulu Selangor are blind Pakatan Supporters who are now complaining about Pakatan Rakyat state governments failure to live up to their promises.
Only the PKR ‘Mandore’ Xavier Jeyakumar is popular for giving out funds to various temples and schools. But there were general discontent that that is not what they actually want. They want a better living standard and more job opportunities, something that is not very evident in Hulu Selangor since Pakatan Rakyat took over. One disappointed hardcore Pakatan Rakyat supporter from Felda Sungai Buaya lamented that the comments from one UMNO leader on ‘Indian being beggars’ was proven during the elections when many Indians took money from BN and voted blindly for them (BN).
In the end, this is no vote of confidence for Najib and certainly not for his deputy not this is a victory for Pakatan Rakyat in many areas as claimed by their supporters. Both parties have to remember that during the general elections, they will not be able to have such resources to go around with in the first place. They will also not have all their heavyweight leaders around for all ceramahs around the country within the traditionally short campaign period.
Therefore what they do between now and the next elections matters. If anything, the clear winners were Kamalanathan, who can hold his head high for a very decent debut while Hulu Selangor residents were the main beneficiary from the goodies thrown at them by opposing sides.
Having been to some of the campaigns as well as talking to mostly Pakatan Supporters throughout the campaign period, the results came as a shock. I was constantly told by Pakatan Supporters that Zaid is very likely to win although from the events that unfolded during the campaign period, I reminded them that it was still 50:50.
Pakatan Supporters, some of whom are local PKR leaders in Serendah with contacts in other small towns like Batang Kali, Kuala Kubu Baru, Sg Choh etc , were confident that PKR will definitely win over Chinese and Indian votes. This is despite Millions that were thrown around by Najib and the BN battalion. They were also confident that Indians will still vote for PKR despite the candidate being another Indian.
They were largely correct. Indians and Chinese took whatever BN gave and still voted for PKR’s Zaid although there is a marginal shift in Indian votes towards BN. Character assassination on Zaid did not really work amongst the non-malay voters. Chinese and Indians still remember Zaid as a man of principles.
So what actually went wrong for Pakatan.
1. As for the candidate, for once Pakatan looked quite arrogant as compared to BN. Kamalanathan did his walkabout in simple attire and running shoes while Zaid went about in his luxury car, says a friend of mine. Perception matters, have we heard enough on this about UMNO leaders before. It appears that PKR is also muda lupa..
2. As for the campaigns, there were largely not interesting. While Chinese can appreciate national issues, the malays and Indians did not. Who cares about APCO when the state government can even resurface the road next to my house, says a Pakatan Supporter. Stolen jet engines, Submarine, Teoh Beng Hock , Kugan etc did not resonate well with the Malays. This is where they lost.
3. Anwar’s association with Jewish leaders were already well known, therefore Malays did not buy his APCO argument.
4. Who will buy your argument when you have people like ‘lori sampah’ Gopalakrishan of Padang Serai talking nonsence half the time. Issues were not carefully chosen to suit the audience.
5. Campaigns were ad-hoc, not well coordinated and at times, the speakers were either not on time or never turned up.
6. PAS campaigns were more focusing on defending Zaid. ‘Allah menyanyangi orang yang bertaubat’ goes one of the sentence. PAS talking about lack of development in Hulu Selangor since independence till Pakatan took over in the last elections does not hold water. Hulu Selangor is far more developed than Kelantan.
7. Local PKR leaders were too demanding, especially Indians. These leaders were holding their sponsors (upper PKR leaders) to ransom. First they were given RM 10,000 to run their operations centre (Bilik Gerakan) and also persuade voters in that particular area, then when Zaid’s drinking issue came about, they went on to demand another RM 10,000 claiming that it would be difficult to persuade voters.
8. Some local PKR leaders were also involved in negotiating with MIC and even Makkal Sakhti party, seeking cash in return of support, even after claiming their dues from PKR sponsors.
9. Some PKR Indians supporters claimed money from both Pakatan and BN for putting up posters around their towns. Talk about party loyalty.
10. PKR and Pakatan Rakyat state government did not do much in Hulu Selangor since the last general elections, despite promise of change for better during the campaign. Being a regular visitor there, even the basic infrastructure was not maintained.
11. Giving out land titles and funds to schools and temples, while were accepted by the residents in Hulu Selangor, they were thought to be no different from BN in terms of vote buying since they are only seen during the elections.
11. Pakatan Rakyat state government did not bother to do anything about the land issue in Felda Sungai Buaya, despite promising to do something in the last general elections. Here they lost about 700 votes to BN.
12. MB Khalid hardly visited this area since taking over the state government. He came to Felda Sungai Buaya for the first time ever on Saturday Morning, asking residents to be cautious and not sign any documents. The same afternoon, Najib came and gave out compensation to some residents and more importantly a plan to develop the land, something viable now since a new highway exit will be constructed by PLUS nearby.
13. PKR Indian leaders were more involved in the Ceramahs rather than site and house visits while MIC leaders were more hands on and were more on the ground, despite facing hostile and sometimes abusive crowd.
14. Pakatan Rakyat and it’s economic advisor did not have any plans on improving the living standards, investments and more job opportunities in Hulu Selangor. They were mostly interested in politicizing everything in their campaigns.
BN on the other hand, in my opinion, did not win anything. Votes for them that really made the difference were from Felda Sungai Buaya (700 votes) and also postal votes, another 700. Other than this, there was no significant shift in votes.
BN is still the champions in the Felda area, however they have failed to win over the Chinese and Indians in the townships. Throwing around millions should have resulted in at least 7-8,000 majority. It didn’t, therefore BN should learn that money can’t buy votes any longer. The Chinese community, despite benefiting millions, did not favour BN at all. Their anger towards UMNO and their leaders are still present.
Najib’s various initiatives such as Government Transformation Plan, New Economic Model, walk about may have brought about a feel good factor but the Chinese appear to want concrete results, more than mere rhetoric. They are also clearly offended with various slip of the tongue and racial slurs by UMNO leaders.
As for the Indians, they are generally still anti-MIC, although they are warming up to Najib. Most of them in Hulu Selangor are blind Pakatan Supporters who are now complaining about Pakatan Rakyat state governments failure to live up to their promises.
Only the PKR ‘Mandore’ Xavier Jeyakumar is popular for giving out funds to various temples and schools. But there were general discontent that that is not what they actually want. They want a better living standard and more job opportunities, something that is not very evident in Hulu Selangor since Pakatan Rakyat took over. One disappointed hardcore Pakatan Rakyat supporter from Felda Sungai Buaya lamented that the comments from one UMNO leader on ‘Indian being beggars’ was proven during the elections when many Indians took money from BN and voted blindly for them (BN).
In the end, this is no vote of confidence for Najib and certainly not for his deputy not this is a victory for Pakatan Rakyat in many areas as claimed by their supporters. Both parties have to remember that during the general elections, they will not be able to have such resources to go around with in the first place. They will also not have all their heavyweight leaders around for all ceramahs around the country within the traditionally short campaign period.
Therefore what they do between now and the next elections matters. If anything, the clear winners were Kamalanathan, who can hold his head high for a very decent debut while Hulu Selangor residents were the main beneficiary from the goodies thrown at them by opposing sides.
Tuesday, April 20, 2010
Hulu Selangor : Pakatan's Personal Attacks & Hypocrisy
I am again bemused with Pakatan supporters. When put on a defensive mode, they suddenly turn into some right thinking clean and positive supporters. They have the cheek to call others hypocrites.
They have forgotten that they were equally bad, naughty and ugly before. Who started all these name calling, blatant accusations and personal attacks in the first place.
No less that Malaysian’s mudah lupa, Don’t we remember how they ostracized Dr Mahathir when Anwar was sacked. All kind of accusations were made up without any shred of evidence. Some of It includes that he has a Chinese wife, another wife in Singapore, Israeli Bank Accounts and many more.
And even in the recent past, who were accusing Najib and Rosmah of murder. Have they forgot that a little napoleon MP from Pakatan Rakyat super-imposed Najib Image seen to be seated along side Altantuya. What was that then? Was he punished for his misdeeds? No..
Name calling and personal attacks are a norm in Pakatan Speeches during ceramah. Even the ones I attended recently were full of nasty name calling and personal attacks. That was just during a normal “Selamatkan Pakatan Rakyat” (actually it was ‘Selamatkan Malaysia” road show. I remember the same happened in many of the ceramah during the last general elections.
It is just that Zaid is being accused of many un Islamic habits, Pakatan Rakyat supporters were put on defensive mode mainly because they are unable to defend him. They demand that campaign must be clean and ethical. Have they ever been ethical in the past ? and even present, where they have started publishing some other minister seen drinking in their blogs.
Even Zaid has started his personal attacks today, claiming that UMNO guys are avid gamblers, not sure if this includes him and his de facto leader, Anwar. Anwar on the other hand, is an expert in this, just that his fanatical supporters are blinded by his rhetoric to realise the difference between fair comments and personal attack.
Have Pakatan bloggers ever been ethical and polite in the past. I reckon that it is about time they reap what they sow. they started it all, and they started this way back in 1998. Some of the accusations were really ridiculous, mainly designed to fool the least educated Malays, condemn UMNO and inadvertently to boost opposition’s Islamic credentials.
Pakatan Rakyat is even fast losing their grip on the web. More and more BN friendly blogs have emerged and has become even more popular than hard core Pakatan Blogs, the statistics shows it all. Anwar even begged his facebook friends to bring in more members while his arch enemy, Dr Mahathir has far more facebook friends without making any effort or even being active on the political front.
People like me have become increasingly tired of all these lies propagated by Pakatan and BN to a certain extend that they are not likely to believe what they read and see all that are available in the internet. Although a large number of Pakatan Rakyat supporters still believe in lies propagated by their leaders and condone personal attacks on their enemies, rational thinking Malaysians, who are not necessarily BN supporters, are equally large in numbers out there.
They can see who are in the right or wrong and who the hypocrites are. In this current game of personal attacks, Pakatan Rakyat is clearly the world leader for decades while their fanatical supporters are the biggest hypocrites now.
They have forgotten that they were equally bad, naughty and ugly before. Who started all these name calling, blatant accusations and personal attacks in the first place.
No less that Malaysian’s mudah lupa, Don’t we remember how they ostracized Dr Mahathir when Anwar was sacked. All kind of accusations were made up without any shred of evidence. Some of It includes that he has a Chinese wife, another wife in Singapore, Israeli Bank Accounts and many more.
And even in the recent past, who were accusing Najib and Rosmah of murder. Have they forgot that a little napoleon MP from Pakatan Rakyat super-imposed Najib Image seen to be seated along side Altantuya. What was that then? Was he punished for his misdeeds? No..
Name calling and personal attacks are a norm in Pakatan Speeches during ceramah. Even the ones I attended recently were full of nasty name calling and personal attacks. That was just during a normal “Selamatkan Pakatan Rakyat” (actually it was ‘Selamatkan Malaysia” road show. I remember the same happened in many of the ceramah during the last general elections.
It is just that Zaid is being accused of many un Islamic habits, Pakatan Rakyat supporters were put on defensive mode mainly because they are unable to defend him. They demand that campaign must be clean and ethical. Have they ever been ethical in the past ? and even present, where they have started publishing some other minister seen drinking in their blogs.
Even Zaid has started his personal attacks today, claiming that UMNO guys are avid gamblers, not sure if this includes him and his de facto leader, Anwar. Anwar on the other hand, is an expert in this, just that his fanatical supporters are blinded by his rhetoric to realise the difference between fair comments and personal attack.
Have Pakatan bloggers ever been ethical and polite in the past. I reckon that it is about time they reap what they sow. they started it all, and they started this way back in 1998. Some of the accusations were really ridiculous, mainly designed to fool the least educated Malays, condemn UMNO and inadvertently to boost opposition’s Islamic credentials.
Pakatan Rakyat is even fast losing their grip on the web. More and more BN friendly blogs have emerged and has become even more popular than hard core Pakatan Blogs, the statistics shows it all. Anwar even begged his facebook friends to bring in more members while his arch enemy, Dr Mahathir has far more facebook friends without making any effort or even being active on the political front.
People like me have become increasingly tired of all these lies propagated by Pakatan and BN to a certain extend that they are not likely to believe what they read and see all that are available in the internet. Although a large number of Pakatan Rakyat supporters still believe in lies propagated by their leaders and condone personal attacks on their enemies, rational thinking Malaysians, who are not necessarily BN supporters, are equally large in numbers out there.
They can see who are in the right or wrong and who the hypocrites are. In this current game of personal attacks, Pakatan Rakyat is clearly the world leader for decades while their fanatical supporters are the biggest hypocrites now.
Tuesday, April 13, 2010
Hulu Selangor : Vote Buying Endorsed By Pakatan Rakyat??
As expected, PM Najib and his cabinet members descended upon Hulu Selangor as soon as the pervious MP was laid to rest.
Although campaigning should not start until the nomination day, both BN and Pakatan has started lobbying hard for votes. Their understanding of campaigning rules is limited to not putting up posters and banners until the nomination day. Everything else is not forbidden.
BN leaders, who has to attend parliament and also other commitments managed to make frequent ad-hoc visits to Hulu Selangor. MB Khalid on the other hand, relocated his whole Exco team to Hulu Selangor in order to campaign and work at the same time. He is using Kuala Kubu Bahru district office as his own, so does his team members.
BN, with Najib’s visit, has, as expected, playing Santa Claus, throwing in the goodies for the local voters, with the announcement of a housing project for Felda Settlers. Not to be outdone, Selangor State government announced land grants in various forms (lease, TOL) etc for the local folks.
Not surprisingly, the Santa Clause appointed to dish out the goodies are based on their race, more than anything else, except for those with high position like PM Najib or MB Khalid. Despite the regular claims and utterances of ‘multi racial, ‘inclusiveness’, ‘Malaysian First’, both Pakatan And BN’s campaign strategy is very much based on race and nothing else.
PKR Indian Mandore (title given by Uthayakumar’s Hindraf ) Xavier Jeyakumar, has been busy. He is the most popular Indian PKR leader in the country. Not a day goes by without news reports of him dishing out grants for Tamil Schools and Temples around Selangor. Even MIC owned Tamil Nesan, which in recent months has been trying to revive it’s flagging circulation, provides regular coverage on Xavier's activities. Xavier, two days ago, presented mock cheques, few millions in value, to various schools and temples in Hulu Selangor. This received wide coverage in the Tamil Newspapers.
Hindraf had for many months dismissed Xavier’s tokenism and asks Pakatan to provide land for Tamil School and Temples. Strangely, Pakatan, despite State Governments power over land matters have not been doing this. A friend pointed out that what the Indians want is not only land but permanent annual grants, not piece meal handouts that is being dished out by Xavier.
A case to point is Johor State Government providing the state Hindu Sangam a land for their office and RM 200,000 grant for next 7 years. With these, there is no need to beg the state government every year.
Samy Vellu & Palanivel, on the other hand has been going to similar places visited by his Pakatan Counterparts, often ridiculed and shouted at. There was also a local man almost beaten up by MIC members for questioning Samy openly during a gathering at Sg Choh last week. A temple there even refused Samy’s pledge for funds, saying that they have been taken care by PKR.
Indians here claims, at least from what I hear from an influential local PKR leader in Serendah, that local leaders are being enticed by both PKR and BN with money, promises of grants, contracts, lands etc. He says that PKR is of no short of funds for the campaign. When asked for the source of funds, he says both State Government and PKR has ‘enough’ funds to run a campaign in equal measure with BN, although we all know that they cannot match BN’s federal government promises on projects.
The consensus amongst Indians here, apart from some hard core party loyalist from both sides, take whatever that is being dished out, no matter who is giving them but vote for who you like. Sounds like a good idea.
Before the last general elections, Pakatan Rakyat cried foul over massive indirect vote buying by BN. I am astounded that MB Khalid openly says that he wants and is doing exactly the same. No one from other Pakatan component parties denounced such indirect vote buying practices. Such hypocrisy!! Another case of Malaysians muda lupa..
I am quite bewildered with the silence from the Election Commission. After the announcement of the nomination and by-election date, there has been a complete silence from them. Why aren’t they chastising both BN and Pakatan over early campaigning and indirect vote buying?
Whatever happened to Coalition for Free and Fair Elections (BERSIH) Why don’t they take to the streets condemning the vote buying by both sides. Why also a silence from all those ‘credible’ NGOs such as Aliran, Suaram and like minded BN critics and bloggers?
Why Lim Kit Siang did not post an article in his blog with a kilometer long title ‘ SPR SHOULD REQUEST THE KING TO FORM ROYAL COMMISSION OF ENQUIRY TO INVESTIGATE MASSIVE VOTE BUYING ACTIVITY IN HULU SELANGOR BY BOTH BARISAN NASIONAL AND PAKATAN RAKYAT’ Kit Siang or rather Anwar (who is an expert now in writing to the King) should write to the King on this or might as well admit that he is such a hypocrite, unlike MB Khalid whose honesty deserved either praise or condemnation, depending on which side your are aligned to.
Perhaps, Pakatan’s candidate, Zaid Ibrahim should explain if the vote buying before even the nomination day is a common policy adopted by Pakatan Rakyat!! As for the Hulu Selangor residents, it cannot be a better time to celebrate and enjoy the goodies and still vote for whom they like.
Although campaigning should not start until the nomination day, both BN and Pakatan has started lobbying hard for votes. Their understanding of campaigning rules is limited to not putting up posters and banners until the nomination day. Everything else is not forbidden.
BN leaders, who has to attend parliament and also other commitments managed to make frequent ad-hoc visits to Hulu Selangor. MB Khalid on the other hand, relocated his whole Exco team to Hulu Selangor in order to campaign and work at the same time. He is using Kuala Kubu Bahru district office as his own, so does his team members.
BN, with Najib’s visit, has, as expected, playing Santa Claus, throwing in the goodies for the local voters, with the announcement of a housing project for Felda Settlers. Not to be outdone, Selangor State government announced land grants in various forms (lease, TOL) etc for the local folks.
Not surprisingly, the Santa Clause appointed to dish out the goodies are based on their race, more than anything else, except for those with high position like PM Najib or MB Khalid. Despite the regular claims and utterances of ‘multi racial, ‘inclusiveness’, ‘Malaysian First’, both Pakatan And BN’s campaign strategy is very much based on race and nothing else.
PKR Indian Mandore (title given by Uthayakumar’s Hindraf ) Xavier Jeyakumar, has been busy. He is the most popular Indian PKR leader in the country. Not a day goes by without news reports of him dishing out grants for Tamil Schools and Temples around Selangor. Even MIC owned Tamil Nesan, which in recent months has been trying to revive it’s flagging circulation, provides regular coverage on Xavier's activities. Xavier, two days ago, presented mock cheques, few millions in value, to various schools and temples in Hulu Selangor. This received wide coverage in the Tamil Newspapers.
Hindraf had for many months dismissed Xavier’s tokenism and asks Pakatan to provide land for Tamil School and Temples. Strangely, Pakatan, despite State Governments power over land matters have not been doing this. A friend pointed out that what the Indians want is not only land but permanent annual grants, not piece meal handouts that is being dished out by Xavier.
A case to point is Johor State Government providing the state Hindu Sangam a land for their office and RM 200,000 grant for next 7 years. With these, there is no need to beg the state government every year.
Samy Vellu & Palanivel, on the other hand has been going to similar places visited by his Pakatan Counterparts, often ridiculed and shouted at. There was also a local man almost beaten up by MIC members for questioning Samy openly during a gathering at Sg Choh last week. A temple there even refused Samy’s pledge for funds, saying that they have been taken care by PKR.
Indians here claims, at least from what I hear from an influential local PKR leader in Serendah, that local leaders are being enticed by both PKR and BN with money, promises of grants, contracts, lands etc. He says that PKR is of no short of funds for the campaign. When asked for the source of funds, he says both State Government and PKR has ‘enough’ funds to run a campaign in equal measure with BN, although we all know that they cannot match BN’s federal government promises on projects.
The consensus amongst Indians here, apart from some hard core party loyalist from both sides, take whatever that is being dished out, no matter who is giving them but vote for who you like. Sounds like a good idea.
Before the last general elections, Pakatan Rakyat cried foul over massive indirect vote buying by BN. I am astounded that MB Khalid openly says that he wants and is doing exactly the same. No one from other Pakatan component parties denounced such indirect vote buying practices. Such hypocrisy!! Another case of Malaysians muda lupa..
I am quite bewildered with the silence from the Election Commission. After the announcement of the nomination and by-election date, there has been a complete silence from them. Why aren’t they chastising both BN and Pakatan over early campaigning and indirect vote buying?
Whatever happened to Coalition for Free and Fair Elections (BERSIH) Why don’t they take to the streets condemning the vote buying by both sides. Why also a silence from all those ‘credible’ NGOs such as Aliran, Suaram and like minded BN critics and bloggers?
Why Lim Kit Siang did not post an article in his blog with a kilometer long title ‘ SPR SHOULD REQUEST THE KING TO FORM ROYAL COMMISSION OF ENQUIRY TO INVESTIGATE MASSIVE VOTE BUYING ACTIVITY IN HULU SELANGOR BY BOTH BARISAN NASIONAL AND PAKATAN RAKYAT’ Kit Siang or rather Anwar (who is an expert now in writing to the King) should write to the King on this or might as well admit that he is such a hypocrite, unlike MB Khalid whose honesty deserved either praise or condemnation, depending on which side your are aligned to.
Perhaps, Pakatan’s candidate, Zaid Ibrahim should explain if the vote buying before even the nomination day is a common policy adopted by Pakatan Rakyat!! As for the Hulu Selangor residents, it cannot be a better time to celebrate and enjoy the goodies and still vote for whom they like.
Thursday, April 8, 2010
Hulu Selangor - 50:50
I have been to Hulu Selangor, Felda and Bandar Sungai Buaya to be precise for the last 3 general elections since my wife is a voter there. I do have many relatives and friends there.
Like everywhere else then, rural areas like Hulu Selangor are bastion of BN. The MIC candidate, G Palanivel has been the MP for 4 terms before he lost marginally in the 2008 elections. BN on the other hand won all three state seats in Hulu Selangor, but not without a tough fight with Pakatan Rakyat.
Palanivel used to gloat that Hulu Selangor constituency is huge and difficult to manage. He always says that Hulu Selangor is bigger than Perlis. Actually, there is nothing much to show in his 4 terms there. Much of the development in the area is attributed to former Selangor MB, Muhammad Taib.
Palanivel, I was reliably informed, was arrogant, at least his assistants were. Since he claimed that Hulu Selangor was bigger than the smallest Sultanate (Perlis) in the country, he behaved like a Sultan. He distanced himself from the populace and busy with his government post and left constituency work to his arrogant assistants.
Even after the last elections, Palanivel did not bother to continue his service. Only when the news trickled in that the incumbent PKR MP was seriously ill, Palanivel sprung into action and reactivated his service centre. His motives are evident, more so after winning the deputy president seat at the MIC elections.
Apart from hard core MIC supporters, Indians in the Hulu Selangor do not support him. Despite the huge campaign for him in the party mouth piece, Tamil Nesan, the fact remains that he does not enjoy the support of both Indians and Malays in the area.
Indians who has turned their support to Pakatan Rakyat in the last elections are confused. A large number of them no longer have faith in Pakatan Rakyat since they do not see much change in their area under the Pakatan Rakyat government and an absent MP.
However, on the other hand they see that their option is limited to their most hated personality, Samy Vellu and his proxy crony Palanivel. Most of those in this category, have somewhat embraced changes that PM Najib is trying to implement for the good of all, but they cannot forgive Samy Vellu and his cronies for their past misdeeds. They might still vote for Pakatan if BN candidate is from MIC.
This has led to emergence of at least 5 hopeful independent candidates, most of whom are ex-MIC local leaders, who was once close ally of Palanivel. These developments are surprisingly not reported in English or Malay dailies and news portals.
The declaration on intent to contest in the Tamil Newspapers by these independents were mainly to harass Palanivel and pressure BN to change their candidate, although at least 2 of them might actually contest. There were also allegations in Tamil Nesan, MIC’s mouth piece that former Deputy President, Dato S. Subramaniam, is behind these candidates with the intention of splitting the Indian votes, which could become crucial. Subra denied the allegations reiterating that he has no intention to cause BN to fail. These are some of fights that take place in the sidelines where old foes have a chance to be in the limelight once again.
If one where to go to some of the towns within the constituency, only the blind would not be able to see various banners, posters hung around towns on Rawang, Serendah and Batang Kali opposing Palanivel’s candidacy.
In Bandar Sungair Buaya, where majority of the Felda settlers had their land robbed by a developer which had since been folded, their message is clear ‘ Solve our land issue if you want our votes’ These settlers had enough of both BN and Pakatan’s failure to solve their felda land problem. Read here for more of this particular issue.
Pakatan Rakyat Indians supporters on the other hand are banking on an Indian candidate to be fielded so that Indians votes will definitely favor them should Palanivel is fielded. Selangor Exco Francis Xavier has been to this constituency many times, often to provide state government grants to Hindu Temples, one of the piece meal initiatives ‘ala BN’ of the Selangor State Government.
Xavier appears in the Tamil Newspapers (including Tamil Nesan) almost everyday, to the extend that Hindraf accuses him of being publicity crazy PKR ‘Mandor’. Hindraf is not convinced of the state government’s piece meal efforts and has been pushing for permanent land and grants for temples and Tamil Schools.
Despite all these, the sentiment in the ground is that if Palanivel is fielded, Pakatan Rakyat candidate, provided he/she is a local is sure to win. Although Anwar’s popularity has taken a dip, some local leaders do have some support, so does the Chinese, who have not be taken in by Najib’s various promises. They are still likely to vote for Pakatan Rakyat candidate. Pakatan will have slim chance of winning if they field any ‘parachute’ candidate such as Zaid Ibrahim, who does not appear enjoy the support of the Malays.
BN’s chances are definitely higher is they field any other young MIC candidate and even candidate from UMNO. But their trump card may lie with another huge personality in the state.
If ever, former MB, Muhammad Taib is fielded, Pakatan might as well withdraw from the contest. Muhammad Taib is still hugely popular with all the communities, who still remember him for his service as Batang Kali Adun and also Selangor MB. Unlike Palanivel, Muhammad Taib is humble, easy going and has done a lot for all races there.
I was told that even hard core Pakatan Supporters in the constituency are willing to vote for him.
Najib has announced that the candidate would be from MIC. He chose not to announce Palanivel as the candidate, chances are he might have others in his mind. Recent visits by Samy Vellu and Palanivel to various areas in Hulu Selangor has not been well received, in fact one of the visit to Sg Choh ended up with a fight (again not reported by English or Malay media, mainstream or portals). These news might have reached Najib, hence his refusal to name the candidate yet. We’ll wait and see..
Like everywhere else then, rural areas like Hulu Selangor are bastion of BN. The MIC candidate, G Palanivel has been the MP for 4 terms before he lost marginally in the 2008 elections. BN on the other hand won all three state seats in Hulu Selangor, but not without a tough fight with Pakatan Rakyat.
Palanivel used to gloat that Hulu Selangor constituency is huge and difficult to manage. He always says that Hulu Selangor is bigger than Perlis. Actually, there is nothing much to show in his 4 terms there. Much of the development in the area is attributed to former Selangor MB, Muhammad Taib.
Palanivel, I was reliably informed, was arrogant, at least his assistants were. Since he claimed that Hulu Selangor was bigger than the smallest Sultanate (Perlis) in the country, he behaved like a Sultan. He distanced himself from the populace and busy with his government post and left constituency work to his arrogant assistants.
Even after the last elections, Palanivel did not bother to continue his service. Only when the news trickled in that the incumbent PKR MP was seriously ill, Palanivel sprung into action and reactivated his service centre. His motives are evident, more so after winning the deputy president seat at the MIC elections.
Apart from hard core MIC supporters, Indians in the Hulu Selangor do not support him. Despite the huge campaign for him in the party mouth piece, Tamil Nesan, the fact remains that he does not enjoy the support of both Indians and Malays in the area.
Indians who has turned their support to Pakatan Rakyat in the last elections are confused. A large number of them no longer have faith in Pakatan Rakyat since they do not see much change in their area under the Pakatan Rakyat government and an absent MP.
However, on the other hand they see that their option is limited to their most hated personality, Samy Vellu and his proxy crony Palanivel. Most of those in this category, have somewhat embraced changes that PM Najib is trying to implement for the good of all, but they cannot forgive Samy Vellu and his cronies for their past misdeeds. They might still vote for Pakatan if BN candidate is from MIC.
This has led to emergence of at least 5 hopeful independent candidates, most of whom are ex-MIC local leaders, who was once close ally of Palanivel. These developments are surprisingly not reported in English or Malay dailies and news portals.
The declaration on intent to contest in the Tamil Newspapers by these independents were mainly to harass Palanivel and pressure BN to change their candidate, although at least 2 of them might actually contest. There were also allegations in Tamil Nesan, MIC’s mouth piece that former Deputy President, Dato S. Subramaniam, is behind these candidates with the intention of splitting the Indian votes, which could become crucial. Subra denied the allegations reiterating that he has no intention to cause BN to fail. These are some of fights that take place in the sidelines where old foes have a chance to be in the limelight once again.
If one where to go to some of the towns within the constituency, only the blind would not be able to see various banners, posters hung around towns on Rawang, Serendah and Batang Kali opposing Palanivel’s candidacy.
In Bandar Sungair Buaya, where majority of the Felda settlers had their land robbed by a developer which had since been folded, their message is clear ‘ Solve our land issue if you want our votes’ These settlers had enough of both BN and Pakatan’s failure to solve their felda land problem. Read here for more of this particular issue.
Pakatan Rakyat Indians supporters on the other hand are banking on an Indian candidate to be fielded so that Indians votes will definitely favor them should Palanivel is fielded. Selangor Exco Francis Xavier has been to this constituency many times, often to provide state government grants to Hindu Temples, one of the piece meal initiatives ‘ala BN’ of the Selangor State Government.
Xavier appears in the Tamil Newspapers (including Tamil Nesan) almost everyday, to the extend that Hindraf accuses him of being publicity crazy PKR ‘Mandor’. Hindraf is not convinced of the state government’s piece meal efforts and has been pushing for permanent land and grants for temples and Tamil Schools.
Despite all these, the sentiment in the ground is that if Palanivel is fielded, Pakatan Rakyat candidate, provided he/she is a local is sure to win. Although Anwar’s popularity has taken a dip, some local leaders do have some support, so does the Chinese, who have not be taken in by Najib’s various promises. They are still likely to vote for Pakatan Rakyat candidate. Pakatan will have slim chance of winning if they field any ‘parachute’ candidate such as Zaid Ibrahim, who does not appear enjoy the support of the Malays.
BN’s chances are definitely higher is they field any other young MIC candidate and even candidate from UMNO. But their trump card may lie with another huge personality in the state.
If ever, former MB, Muhammad Taib is fielded, Pakatan might as well withdraw from the contest. Muhammad Taib is still hugely popular with all the communities, who still remember him for his service as Batang Kali Adun and also Selangor MB. Unlike Palanivel, Muhammad Taib is humble, easy going and has done a lot for all races there.
I was told that even hard core Pakatan Supporters in the constituency are willing to vote for him.
Najib has announced that the candidate would be from MIC. He chose not to announce Palanivel as the candidate, chances are he might have others in his mind. Recent visits by Samy Vellu and Palanivel to various areas in Hulu Selangor has not been well received, in fact one of the visit to Sg Choh ended up with a fight (again not reported by English or Malay media, mainstream or portals). These news might have reached Najib, hence his refusal to name the candidate yet. We’ll wait and see..
Friday, March 26, 2010
PR 'Selamatkan Malaysia' Roadshow 22nd March - A Review
I had the opportunity to attend Pakatan Rakyat roadshow with the theme ‘Selamatkan Malaysia’ at Selayang Stadium on 22nd March.
Pakatan Rakyat were confidently expecting 10,000 people, but there were actually only about 3,000 people gathered there, perhaps they would have attracted more if it was held on weekend. When I arrived at the entrance of the stadium, a 4 page leaflet was handed to me. The contents were an opening statement by PKR Secretary claiming conspiracy on Anwar’s sodomy case.
The 2nd and 3rd page is all about Pusrawi Hospital medical report indicating the accuser, Saiful was not sodomised, no matter that no one has verified if the reports were in fact authentic and true . I think that is for the Doctor concerned to testify, if he is called for the trial and also the judge to determine if indeed the medical report was true. For PKR to distribute these leaflets, some say it is contempt of court, I see it as a desperate attempt to win public opinion. More so when there’s hardly anyone bothered to show support during the recents court hearings.
Segambut MP, Lim Lip Eng was on the rostrum when I arrived. He spoke about lost jet engines, which he claims to be worth millions, together with the allegation that it should be been more people involved citing that it would have been impossible for two people to carry the 2 engines, weighing probably a tone each, out of the warehouse.
As far as I know, the trial of the 2 individuals charged for the theft has yet to start, but the Segambut MP, despite being one of the more hardworking Pakatan MPs, chose to politicise and speculate on the incident. Can Pakatan Rakyat guarantee that there will be no theft of such assets when they are in power one day. I don’t think so. These allegations and speculations will one day definitely backfire on them when it happens under their watch.
He also spoke about the non diving Submarine, which he claims he saw in Sabah on his recent visit. He says that the government did not test the submarine before purchasing it, citing analogy of routine test drive that we undertake before we purchase a car. The MP has conveniently omitted the fact that the submarine actually dived all the way without a hitch from France before developing problems in Malaysia. He also failed to enlighten the crowd that the same submarine is already used by Spain, Brazil, France and Chile. Good example of how to manipulate issues to your advantage.
Dr Hatta Ramli came next, harping on the One Malaysia, One Israel issue which needs no further elaboration. He was bent on claiming that APCO was headed by Jewish stakeholders, therefore it was unIslamic and demanded that the government terminate their contract. No one spoke about One India campaign, which started was back in 1997. Why only one Israel, what else if not for scoring some political points. His speech was however, rather inaudible, but I do not think he spoke anything significant apart from the One Malaysia, One Israel issue. It’s not that we expected him to speak about some national or international policies!.
Ronnie Liu came next, with the MC introducing him that someone who was alleged to be corrupt but there are no case against him by police or MACC. Hmm.. how come MACC is made to sound credible here… Ronnie went on saying that in the cabinet line up, none of the Ministers are clean, at least none of the Ministers have declared that they were clean, he says. No evidence or even a hint was provided to back his claims.
This reminded me on the ‘Asset Declaration’ circus by the Pakatan Rakyat Selangor where an ‘income declaration’ rather than asset declaration was published. The ‘Income Declaration’ is now not available at the state government website, or at least I can’t find it despite a through search of the website. As far as I can remember, the MB did not declare his shares in Guthrie on that statement. Other Pakatan State governments have chosen to ignore this promise as per their standard of ‘Competency, Accountability and Transparency”.
Can Mr Ronnie Liu declare that all Pakatan Rakyat MPs are clean? He can’t and he never will, as Pakatan Opposition leader himself appears to have wealth beyond his means. Mr Ronnie should have harped on other issues. He also spoke about Middle Malaysia, Pas For all and One Malaysia. His idea of One Malaysia is equality for all appeared not well received by the Malay majority crowd.
Ronnie also made a false statement. He claimed that the country petroleum reserves will be depleted in 3-4 or 5 years time. Recent report says that our reserves will be depleted in 2017 if no new reserves are found. This is probably a genuine mistake on his part but when he kept on quoting the same figure over and over again, I had the impression that he is deliberately trying to mislead the crowd. His main argument was that the government is bankrupt of ideas on how to survive without the petroleum money.
Teresa Kok came next, introduced as Senior State Government Exco with muted response from the audience. She spoke about all state government’s programs which amplified ‘Merakyatkan Ekonomi’ theme. She also spoke that he water bill is so low due to the ‘free water’ policy by the state government.
What she failed to highlight that the free water is not actually reaching the poor and other target groups residing in flats and apartments. I myself have not paid water bills for months as the bill is still in the negative due to the policy. I do not need the subsidy while a friend of mine in an apartment nearby continues to pay in full as the apartment does not have individual water meters. The state government shown no interest to solve this while continuing to trumpet that the free water benefits the poor when it is actually not.
She also spoke about various freebies and handout initiated by the State Government, some which are no different than what BN has done in the past. She also spoke about the 50 Million Micro-Credit fund, apparently created by the recovery of dues from Talam Corporation. There are various disputes and issues of transparency on the Talam debt and recovery. The state government has yet to respond to it, but yet they chose to publicise the Micro Credit fund more than explaining how the fund will come about. No other details or mechanism of the fund was revealed.
She also spoke about Investments brought in by the State Government. The figures are also currently being challenged by the state opposition. Teresa spoke glowingly on their achievement, ignoring the fact that they did not achieve their own target.
The were round of applause though when she mentioned that the State government is close to resolving issues faced by Bukit Botak residents, not without blaming the previous BN state government for the source of the problems.
I left when Teresa was mumbling about BN was corrupt of ideas etc. I wonder how the crowd lasted that long, the speeches were boring and unenthusiastic. It was unlike the ones held early last year at the same venue with MB Khalid present where the crowd were bigger, more responsive and enthusiastic.
I can summarise by saying that actually the Selangor State Government, while maybe more efficient and transparent selectively, they are equally bankrupt of ideas. TheMP who took the stage manipulated issues to their advantage and deliberately chose not to explain issues and disputes challenged by BN and others. I must say that the ‘matured’ and gullible crowd may yet believe them. Overall, the quality of the arguments, explanation and information were poor and pathetic, so was the crowd response.
This campaign should be now renamed as ‘Selamatkan Pakatan Rakyat’ instead, looking at serious allegations against their past conduct, being revealed in installments by their ex-members and not really BN.
Pakatan Rakyat were confidently expecting 10,000 people, but there were actually only about 3,000 people gathered there, perhaps they would have attracted more if it was held on weekend. When I arrived at the entrance of the stadium, a 4 page leaflet was handed to me. The contents were an opening statement by PKR Secretary claiming conspiracy on Anwar’s sodomy case.
The 2nd and 3rd page is all about Pusrawi Hospital medical report indicating the accuser, Saiful was not sodomised, no matter that no one has verified if the reports were in fact authentic and true . I think that is for the Doctor concerned to testify, if he is called for the trial and also the judge to determine if indeed the medical report was true. For PKR to distribute these leaflets, some say it is contempt of court, I see it as a desperate attempt to win public opinion. More so when there’s hardly anyone bothered to show support during the recents court hearings.
Segambut MP, Lim Lip Eng was on the rostrum when I arrived. He spoke about lost jet engines, which he claims to be worth millions, together with the allegation that it should be been more people involved citing that it would have been impossible for two people to carry the 2 engines, weighing probably a tone each, out of the warehouse.
As far as I know, the trial of the 2 individuals charged for the theft has yet to start, but the Segambut MP, despite being one of the more hardworking Pakatan MPs, chose to politicise and speculate on the incident. Can Pakatan Rakyat guarantee that there will be no theft of such assets when they are in power one day. I don’t think so. These allegations and speculations will one day definitely backfire on them when it happens under their watch.
He also spoke about the non diving Submarine, which he claims he saw in Sabah on his recent visit. He says that the government did not test the submarine before purchasing it, citing analogy of routine test drive that we undertake before we purchase a car. The MP has conveniently omitted the fact that the submarine actually dived all the way without a hitch from France before developing problems in Malaysia. He also failed to enlighten the crowd that the same submarine is already used by Spain, Brazil, France and Chile. Good example of how to manipulate issues to your advantage.
Dr Hatta Ramli came next, harping on the One Malaysia, One Israel issue which needs no further elaboration. He was bent on claiming that APCO was headed by Jewish stakeholders, therefore it was unIslamic and demanded that the government terminate their contract. No one spoke about One India campaign, which started was back in 1997. Why only one Israel, what else if not for scoring some political points. His speech was however, rather inaudible, but I do not think he spoke anything significant apart from the One Malaysia, One Israel issue. It’s not that we expected him to speak about some national or international policies!.
Ronnie Liu came next, with the MC introducing him that someone who was alleged to be corrupt but there are no case against him by police or MACC. Hmm.. how come MACC is made to sound credible here… Ronnie went on saying that in the cabinet line up, none of the Ministers are clean, at least none of the Ministers have declared that they were clean, he says. No evidence or even a hint was provided to back his claims.
This reminded me on the ‘Asset Declaration’ circus by the Pakatan Rakyat Selangor where an ‘income declaration’ rather than asset declaration was published. The ‘Income Declaration’ is now not available at the state government website, or at least I can’t find it despite a through search of the website. As far as I can remember, the MB did not declare his shares in Guthrie on that statement. Other Pakatan State governments have chosen to ignore this promise as per their standard of ‘Competency, Accountability and Transparency”.
Can Mr Ronnie Liu declare that all Pakatan Rakyat MPs are clean? He can’t and he never will, as Pakatan Opposition leader himself appears to have wealth beyond his means. Mr Ronnie should have harped on other issues. He also spoke about Middle Malaysia, Pas For all and One Malaysia. His idea of One Malaysia is equality for all appeared not well received by the Malay majority crowd.
Ronnie also made a false statement. He claimed that the country petroleum reserves will be depleted in 3-4 or 5 years time. Recent report says that our reserves will be depleted in 2017 if no new reserves are found. This is probably a genuine mistake on his part but when he kept on quoting the same figure over and over again, I had the impression that he is deliberately trying to mislead the crowd. His main argument was that the government is bankrupt of ideas on how to survive without the petroleum money.
Teresa Kok came next, introduced as Senior State Government Exco with muted response from the audience. She spoke about all state government’s programs which amplified ‘Merakyatkan Ekonomi’ theme. She also spoke that he water bill is so low due to the ‘free water’ policy by the state government.
What she failed to highlight that the free water is not actually reaching the poor and other target groups residing in flats and apartments. I myself have not paid water bills for months as the bill is still in the negative due to the policy. I do not need the subsidy while a friend of mine in an apartment nearby continues to pay in full as the apartment does not have individual water meters. The state government shown no interest to solve this while continuing to trumpet that the free water benefits the poor when it is actually not.
She also spoke about various freebies and handout initiated by the State Government, some which are no different than what BN has done in the past. She also spoke about the 50 Million Micro-Credit fund, apparently created by the recovery of dues from Talam Corporation. There are various disputes and issues of transparency on the Talam debt and recovery. The state government has yet to respond to it, but yet they chose to publicise the Micro Credit fund more than explaining how the fund will come about. No other details or mechanism of the fund was revealed.
She also spoke about Investments brought in by the State Government. The figures are also currently being challenged by the state opposition. Teresa spoke glowingly on their achievement, ignoring the fact that they did not achieve their own target.
The were round of applause though when she mentioned that the State government is close to resolving issues faced by Bukit Botak residents, not without blaming the previous BN state government for the source of the problems.
I left when Teresa was mumbling about BN was corrupt of ideas etc. I wonder how the crowd lasted that long, the speeches were boring and unenthusiastic. It was unlike the ones held early last year at the same venue with MB Khalid present where the crowd were bigger, more responsive and enthusiastic.
I can summarise by saying that actually the Selangor State Government, while maybe more efficient and transparent selectively, they are equally bankrupt of ideas. TheMP who took the stage manipulated issues to their advantage and deliberately chose not to explain issues and disputes challenged by BN and others. I must say that the ‘matured’ and gullible crowd may yet believe them. Overall, the quality of the arguments, explanation and information were poor and pathetic, so was the crowd response.
This campaign should be now renamed as ‘Selamatkan Pakatan Rakyat’ instead, looking at serious allegations against their past conduct, being revealed in installments by their ex-members and not really BN.
Thursday, February 18, 2010
Anwar Need Not Apologise...
Recently, Opposition Leader apologized to his audience during one of the ceramah. It is very rare to hear Anwar apologise to his supporters or the Malaysian Public. He never apologized for his Sept 16 Opera, which destablised the country for months. He also never apologized for all his conflicting statements and also his corrupt past when he was in BN.
Now all of a sudden he apologises for something petty such as selecting the wrong candidates for the past general elections. His hard core supporters will definitely forgive him, as Malaysians ‘mudah lupa’.
I think Dr Mahathir is the one who should apologise. He did the country no favours when he first invited Anwar to UMNO and as a result, the country political situation has always been unstable ever since Anwar was sacked in 1998.
No opposition leader has inflicted such damage to the country’s image as Anwar did. He criss-crossed the globe saying nothing nice about the country and its leaders. Never mind that he himself got elected by very same undemocratic election system. Never mind that for 16 years, he did nothing to reform the government’s various institutions, never mind that for the same number of years, he controlled the press and helped to build a ‘racist’ newspaper.
Never mind that using the same patronage system, he, his family and friends became rich. Never mind that he defended malay rights to the hilt, BTN, all the repressive laws and the NEP. Has he ever apologized, never. He just reformed himself overnight, just because he was sacked and could not achieve his ambition to become the Prime Minister. He would have never changed anything that was favorable to him if he eventually became the Prime Minister.
The weak opposition then took advantage to befriend him, knowing well Anwar has got substantial grassroots Malay support. Never mind that the first person to accuse Anwar of sodomy and abuse of power is none other than Anwar’s lead counsel for the current trial, Karpal ‘the lion’ Singh. For political power, anything goes. Malaysians ‘mudah lupa’, so Malaysian politicians can change their colours, minds and parties whenever they want.
Apart from Mahathir, the voters who blindly voted for PKR candidates should apologise. You deserve the candidates you voted for. Why ask him/her to step down now. Why no one demanded that the Bota assemblyman to quit when he first crossed over to PKR. Such hypocrisy in Pakatan Rakyat. Elected representative shall remain just that. If people vote for the party, then we don’t need candidates, just vote for the party symbol and let the political party place any representative and have options to change them as and when they like. With this, even by elections will become unnecessary and we can save loads of money.
Malaysia deserves a better opposition leader. There are many within Pakatan Rakyat but I think many talented leaders simply can’t talk and act dramatically like Anwar, hence they are sidelined. Some of them are doing impressive work in their constituency but as they say, in politics, perception matters, not facts. If one were to compile all the facts and track record, rather than rhetoric, Anwar’s achievement as Opposition leader is nothing but a disappointment.
He would probably get some Oscars or Anugerah Seri Angkasa for his stage play, dialogue and (mis)direction, but records show he has not done much since he became the opposition leader. Every state that is governed by Pakatan Rakyat has nothing significant to show eg The same system of political patronage is in place, local councils are filled by mostly local party leaders and race based.
Like Karpal Singh said (telling the truth, emotionally) Anwar should just step down and make way for others. Pakatan Leaders always ask government officials to quit even when they are just being investigated for something. Perhaps, they should ask Anwar to step down until his trial is over. Lim Kit Siang would have done a better job, of course if he avoids calling for Royal Commission of Inquiry for almost everything that goes wrong, everyday and if he can brush up his verbal communication skills.
Or rather, Pakatan Rakyat should emulate BN, where their leaders are replaced (except for Samy Velu) and more importantly, inclusion of young leaders. Except for Guan Eng, we are tired, forced to see and hear from the same old faces in Pakatan Rakyat.
In summary, Anwar need not apologise, Malaysians ‘mudah lupa’ voters should!, Pakatan Rakyat leaders should apologise, for accepting and supporting him all these years, knowing well his track record in BN and current performance and failures in Sept 16 project and losing Perak state government.
Now all of a sudden he apologises for something petty such as selecting the wrong candidates for the past general elections. His hard core supporters will definitely forgive him, as Malaysians ‘mudah lupa’.
I think Dr Mahathir is the one who should apologise. He did the country no favours when he first invited Anwar to UMNO and as a result, the country political situation has always been unstable ever since Anwar was sacked in 1998.
No opposition leader has inflicted such damage to the country’s image as Anwar did. He criss-crossed the globe saying nothing nice about the country and its leaders. Never mind that he himself got elected by very same undemocratic election system. Never mind that for 16 years, he did nothing to reform the government’s various institutions, never mind that for the same number of years, he controlled the press and helped to build a ‘racist’ newspaper.
Never mind that using the same patronage system, he, his family and friends became rich. Never mind that he defended malay rights to the hilt, BTN, all the repressive laws and the NEP. Has he ever apologized, never. He just reformed himself overnight, just because he was sacked and could not achieve his ambition to become the Prime Minister. He would have never changed anything that was favorable to him if he eventually became the Prime Minister.
The weak opposition then took advantage to befriend him, knowing well Anwar has got substantial grassroots Malay support. Never mind that the first person to accuse Anwar of sodomy and abuse of power is none other than Anwar’s lead counsel for the current trial, Karpal ‘the lion’ Singh. For political power, anything goes. Malaysians ‘mudah lupa’, so Malaysian politicians can change their colours, minds and parties whenever they want.
Apart from Mahathir, the voters who blindly voted for PKR candidates should apologise. You deserve the candidates you voted for. Why ask him/her to step down now. Why no one demanded that the Bota assemblyman to quit when he first crossed over to PKR. Such hypocrisy in Pakatan Rakyat. Elected representative shall remain just that. If people vote for the party, then we don’t need candidates, just vote for the party symbol and let the political party place any representative and have options to change them as and when they like. With this, even by elections will become unnecessary and we can save loads of money.
Malaysia deserves a better opposition leader. There are many within Pakatan Rakyat but I think many talented leaders simply can’t talk and act dramatically like Anwar, hence they are sidelined. Some of them are doing impressive work in their constituency but as they say, in politics, perception matters, not facts. If one were to compile all the facts and track record, rather than rhetoric, Anwar’s achievement as Opposition leader is nothing but a disappointment.
He would probably get some Oscars or Anugerah Seri Angkasa for his stage play, dialogue and (mis)direction, but records show he has not done much since he became the opposition leader. Every state that is governed by Pakatan Rakyat has nothing significant to show eg The same system of political patronage is in place, local councils are filled by mostly local party leaders and race based.
Like Karpal Singh said (telling the truth, emotionally) Anwar should just step down and make way for others. Pakatan Leaders always ask government officials to quit even when they are just being investigated for something. Perhaps, they should ask Anwar to step down until his trial is over. Lim Kit Siang would have done a better job, of course if he avoids calling for Royal Commission of Inquiry for almost everything that goes wrong, everyday and if he can brush up his verbal communication skills.
Or rather, Pakatan Rakyat should emulate BN, where their leaders are replaced (except for Samy Velu) and more importantly, inclusion of young leaders. Except for Guan Eng, we are tired, forced to see and hear from the same old faces in Pakatan Rakyat.
In summary, Anwar need not apologise, Malaysians ‘mudah lupa’ voters should!, Pakatan Rakyat leaders should apologise, for accepting and supporting him all these years, knowing well his track record in BN and current performance and failures in Sept 16 project and losing Perak state government.
Wednesday, February 10, 2010
Anwar started it all
Finally we have a closure on the Perak Crisis. It was a legally, constitutionally right but morally wrong judgment.
While Pakatan Rakyat leaders threw phrases like 'the end of democracy', 'start of absolute monarchy' etc, the fact remains that they started it all with Anwar's ambition to become Prime Minister and the real crisis or rather circus started when Bota Assemblyman crossed over to PKR in Jan 2009.
Anwar, Lim Kit Siang, MB Nizar and Lim Guan Eng were jubilant when this happened. Only Karpal was silent. When Anwar start counting number of MPs that he claims are crossing over right after the 2008 general elections, no one from Pakatan Rakyat said that the move and strategy was morally wrong.
I can imagine what would have happened if the reverse would have happened in Perak i.e BN retains Perak in 2008 general elections, 3 BN Aduns cross over Pakatan Rakyat. MB Tajol Rosli fails to dissolve the state Assembly, Sultan of Perak asks Tajol Rosli to resign where he refuses, later Nizar is sworn In as new MB from Pakatan. Later BN files case and at the end, MB Nizar is declared the rightful MB.
What would have been the reaction of Pakatan Rakyat leaders? They would have reacted the same way they did when the Bota Assemblyman defected to PKR, they would have shouted 'Gelombang Baru', 'Harapan Baru' etc. They would have criss-crossed the whole of Perak holding thousands of 'ceramah' during the impasse to win over public support for the cross overs.
They would claims that BN is corrupt, racist etc to justifiy their support for cross-over. They would have informally legitimised cross overs in the eyes of public. The would have justified their wins in Bukit Selambau and Bukit Gantang as proof of public support.
In summary, Pakatan Rakyat Leaders would have been certainly singing a different tune if the roles were reversed. Lim Kit Siang should request for formation of Royal Commission of Inquiry to find out the root cause of the fall of Pakatan Rakyat state Government Of Perak. Before he can even start, let me tell him that all fingers are pointed at their great leader, Anwar ' Sivaji the Boss' Ibrahim.
While Pakatan Rakyat leaders threw phrases like 'the end of democracy', 'start of absolute monarchy' etc, the fact remains that they started it all with Anwar's ambition to become Prime Minister and the real crisis or rather circus started when Bota Assemblyman crossed over to PKR in Jan 2009.
Anwar, Lim Kit Siang, MB Nizar and Lim Guan Eng were jubilant when this happened. Only Karpal was silent. When Anwar start counting number of MPs that he claims are crossing over right after the 2008 general elections, no one from Pakatan Rakyat said that the move and strategy was morally wrong.
I can imagine what would have happened if the reverse would have happened in Perak i.e BN retains Perak in 2008 general elections, 3 BN Aduns cross over Pakatan Rakyat. MB Tajol Rosli fails to dissolve the state Assembly, Sultan of Perak asks Tajol Rosli to resign where he refuses, later Nizar is sworn In as new MB from Pakatan. Later BN files case and at the end, MB Nizar is declared the rightful MB.
What would have been the reaction of Pakatan Rakyat leaders? They would have reacted the same way they did when the Bota Assemblyman defected to PKR, they would have shouted 'Gelombang Baru', 'Harapan Baru' etc. They would have criss-crossed the whole of Perak holding thousands of 'ceramah' during the impasse to win over public support for the cross overs.
They would claims that BN is corrupt, racist etc to justifiy their support for cross-over. They would have informally legitimised cross overs in the eyes of public. The would have justified their wins in Bukit Selambau and Bukit Gantang as proof of public support.
In summary, Pakatan Rakyat Leaders would have been certainly singing a different tune if the roles were reversed. Lim Kit Siang should request for formation of Royal Commission of Inquiry to find out the root cause of the fall of Pakatan Rakyat state Government Of Perak. Before he can even start, let me tell him that all fingers are pointed at their great leader, Anwar ' Sivaji the Boss' Ibrahim.
Wednesday, February 3, 2010
Indian Stupidity- Part 2
Stop the unruly acts during Thaipusam
The Star- 3rd February (letters)
BATU Caves is one of the more popular tourist spots in our country. It is also a holy place for thousands of Hindus who flock there during the Thaipusam festival to fulfil their vows.
I was at Batu Caves during Thaipusam this year, and was saddened by the many unsavoury incidents I witnessed.
First of all, the behaviour of some teenagers in the crowd who did not even care about pregnant women, babies and small children irked me. Where have their values gone?
Another sad thing was the consumption of alcohol which caused great discomfort to others who could not concentrate on their prayers.
I think people who visit the Batu Caves temple during Thaipusam without any intention to pray should not enter the holy site.
UTHAYAKUMAR TECHINAMOORTHY,
Kuala Lumpur.
END -----------------------------------------------------------------------------
The above lament by one devotee is not a new phenomenon. I wrote about this in 2002 and not much has changed, which also means the Indian Malaysian public manners and attitude never changed much over the decades.
This year, I have seen things which are even worse. For example there was a group who was carrying the ‘kavadi’ for fun, parading it around until the compound with no intention to complete the prayers. They made lots of noises to attract attention. It was already chaotic, but the public, the bystanders, were more interested to view the antics of these stupid Indians, who have no respect and regards for the religion. In a way, instead of condemning them, the public were in fact encouraging such act, as a form of entertainment.
As for the Temple authorities, they were more interested to make money, who cares if the so-called devotees are adhering to the religious norms. No representative from the two rival Hindu Councils and Hindu Sangam ( why two! Indians what - Have to be divided) were making any statements or reminders asking devotees to behave or adhere to religious norms. What we see at Thaipusam in Malaysia differs from those of in India, hence most of the so-called religious practices are man-made, here by creative Malaysian Indians.
While the above writer mentioned about behavior of teenagers, the adults are no different. It’s their own despicable attitude that encourages the young to emulate them in the first place. Most of the rituals and practices presented for world view that day are never forced upon by the religion. It was on their own will and creativity. Last year there were kavadi’s with Liverpool and Manchester United. So much for Indian creativity. I can only wish that the Indians channel their creativity towards other meaningful endeavors, like their children education.
Some spend thousands on kavadi that is never compulsory. Imagine how much funds that can be accumulated and channeled towards more meaningful causes from just one day.
As for the temple authorities at Batu Caves, they were more interested in reaping profit from the biggest show in Malaysia. They allow stalls to be put up almost ¾ of the temple compound, leaving little space for people to walk about. They also put up a huge fun-fair to add some light hearted entertainment following to some serious religious undertakings by the devotees.
Who is listening? No one, because nobody likes change and nobody wants to change. What about it leaders, even they, including the higher educated ones, don’t want Indians to change. Because as long as Indians remain stupid, these equally stupid politicians can continue to fool them and take advantage to advance their narrow agenda. The religious leaders on the other hand, does not want to make enemies with politicians, who controls most of the temples in the country, hence they tend to keep quiet.
The Star- 3rd February (letters)
BATU Caves is one of the more popular tourist spots in our country. It is also a holy place for thousands of Hindus who flock there during the Thaipusam festival to fulfil their vows.
I was at Batu Caves during Thaipusam this year, and was saddened by the many unsavoury incidents I witnessed.
First of all, the behaviour of some teenagers in the crowd who did not even care about pregnant women, babies and small children irked me. Where have their values gone?
Another sad thing was the consumption of alcohol which caused great discomfort to others who could not concentrate on their prayers.
I think people who visit the Batu Caves temple during Thaipusam without any intention to pray should not enter the holy site.
UTHAYAKUMAR TECHINAMOORTHY,
Kuala Lumpur.
END -----------------------------------------------------------------------------
The above lament by one devotee is not a new phenomenon. I wrote about this in 2002 and not much has changed, which also means the Indian Malaysian public manners and attitude never changed much over the decades.
This year, I have seen things which are even worse. For example there was a group who was carrying the ‘kavadi’ for fun, parading it around until the compound with no intention to complete the prayers. They made lots of noises to attract attention. It was already chaotic, but the public, the bystanders, were more interested to view the antics of these stupid Indians, who have no respect and regards for the religion. In a way, instead of condemning them, the public were in fact encouraging such act, as a form of entertainment.
As for the Temple authorities, they were more interested to make money, who cares if the so-called devotees are adhering to the religious norms. No representative from the two rival Hindu Councils and Hindu Sangam ( why two! Indians what - Have to be divided) were making any statements or reminders asking devotees to behave or adhere to religious norms. What we see at Thaipusam in Malaysia differs from those of in India, hence most of the so-called religious practices are man-made, here by creative Malaysian Indians.
While the above writer mentioned about behavior of teenagers, the adults are no different. It’s their own despicable attitude that encourages the young to emulate them in the first place. Most of the rituals and practices presented for world view that day are never forced upon by the religion. It was on their own will and creativity. Last year there were kavadi’s with Liverpool and Manchester United. So much for Indian creativity. I can only wish that the Indians channel their creativity towards other meaningful endeavors, like their children education.
Some spend thousands on kavadi that is never compulsory. Imagine how much funds that can be accumulated and channeled towards more meaningful causes from just one day.
As for the temple authorities at Batu Caves, they were more interested in reaping profit from the biggest show in Malaysia. They allow stalls to be put up almost ¾ of the temple compound, leaving little space for people to walk about. They also put up a huge fun-fair to add some light hearted entertainment following to some serious religious undertakings by the devotees.
Who is listening? No one, because nobody likes change and nobody wants to change. What about it leaders, even they, including the higher educated ones, don’t want Indians to change. Because as long as Indians remain stupid, these equally stupid politicians can continue to fool them and take advantage to advance their narrow agenda. The religious leaders on the other hand, does not want to make enemies with politicians, who controls most of the temples in the country, hence they tend to keep quiet.
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