Exposing The "Tong Tahi" ?

Hantu Laut

I am against clamping down on publications that the government is not happy with in exposing its "tong tahi" literally the "sewers."

I have mentioned in my earlier article that the rightful thing to do is to sue the newspaper for defamation which Felda already has.Stopping its publication only make the people more suspicious that the government has something to hide.

If the allegation is not true than the government should publish Felda's audited account in one of the MSM to counter the lies spread by the opposition.

Felda's accounts should not be a secret.It is a company owned by the people particularly the Felda's settlers and the accounts should be made readily available to the public.

Losing money in business is a common thing as long as there were no wrongdoings the people would not be losing their heads..Government should not be intimidated to not telling the public the truth.

People can accept genuine losses from doing business but not if someone is stealing from the company.Such crimes should be exposed and the perpetrators punished according to the law.

I am afraid UMNO hasn't change, the BN hasn't changed and the Prime Minister hasn't changed.

If they think this is still the best way to run the nation than my sympathy goes out to them.

Many thanks to the Minister of Home Affairs Datuk Seri Hishamuddin Onn for his "No political agenda behind action on publications" explanation here.

“It is better to keep your mouth shut and appear stupid than to open it and remove all doubt.” Mark Twain

Below is an opinion on the same issue.

Censorship in bad faith

NEW Many would have assumed that Barisan Nasional was serious in wanting to revamp itself to remain relevant in the aftermath of the pounding it had received in the 2008 general election. In the days which followed the ruling coalition's heaviest defeat, many leaders said that it was time to do things differently -- discard the old mindset, rebrand the component parties and take up the challenge thrown at them by the rakyat to change.

Najib Tun Razak, who assumed the premiership soon after the polls debacle, then came up with various innovative policies to stamp his mark as the new-breed leader who was willing to listen to the rakyat. In came the walkabouts in your neighbourhoods, the various measures of how the government would conduct its business and his brainchild, the 1Malaysia concept, introduced with the intention of making us, the rakyat, feel that we belong to this nation and that we are one and united.

However two years on, and after numerous self-reminders that BN needs to change for the better, things seem to be the same in this country, if not for the worst. The same old BN mindset of “I-know-the-best-for-you” is still prevalent. The same Umno-lording over BN component parties is still visible. Corruption, transparency, open-tender processes, merit-based university entrances and scholarships and even general cleanliness of our localities are all issues of great concern for the rakyat.

And more worryingly, the same attitude of wanting to remain in power at all costs is gaining speed. Just look at the manner the Home Ministry is handling the publishing permits of the opposition newspapers. All three party organs, starting with PKR's Suara Keadilan, and then Harakah's PAS and now DAP's The Rocket, share the risk of not knowing their future, for allegedly violating their permits.

If the BN government is truly honest about introducing changes to reflect its new mindset in governance, it should not be worried about letting the opposition parties print their organs. After all, these newspapers are there to carry out the agenda of the opposition, and naturally to criticise the BN government. What's wrong with that? Continue reading..

Absolute Power Corrupts Absolutely

Hantu Laut

The Parliamentary Select Committee on corruption must be out of their minds to suggest that more powers must be given to the MACC, particularly the power to prosecute.

There have been many complaints of MACC's Gestapo style interrogations against accused persons.A "carte blanche" could become extremely dangerous and could open doors to abuses and corruptions.

The MPs should not in their over zealousness of wanting to be seen to spring clean corruptions unconsciously create another monster that can go out of control.There have been one or two cases reported so far of MACC officers demanding bribes to close the file on an accused person.We may close one evil's box and open another.

In a civil society there must be check and balance, no one should be given absolute power, not MACC, not the Police and not the AG.There must be separation of responsibility to ensure justice prevails at all level.The Police and MACC investigate, the AG prosecutes and the Judiciary purveys justice.

We inherited a good system from the British and there is absolutely no reason to change what is not broken.The MACC should stay as an investigative body and the power to prosecute stays with the AG.Such arrangement stifle abuses of power and corruptions.

We should not be too enthusiastic to copy the ICAC of Hong Kong without looking at the history of its formation.

The ICAC was an offspring of the very corrupt Hong Kong police force which used to have an Anti-Corruption Branch within the force.Due to it ineffectiveness and suspected collusion with corrupt officers the then British Colonial government of Hong Kong disbanded the department and created the independent ICAC, reporting directly to the Governor, now the Chief Executive.

The ICAC was created primarily to clamp down on corruptions within government departments and the Hong Kong police force.

With the economic boom after World War II Hong Kong was awashed with money but the civil servants were poorly paid, thereby, resorting to corruptions to supplement their incomes.The ICAC, in its earlier days swoop down on entire police station and taking everyone in for questioning.

The MACC should employ the same shock tactic used by the ICAC against police officers suspected of corruption.

The Hong Kong ICAC has fair share of corruptions involving some of its officers but has since evolved to become one of the most effective anti-corruption agencies.

As Lord Acton said " absolute power corrupts absolutely." it would be negligent of Parliament to give absolute power to anyone.

Let the "status quo" stays.

Can The Malays Lose Political Power ?

Hantu Laut

How accurate is opinion poll? The recent Merdeka Centre poll result shows that majority of Malays want to continue keeping the crutches.

According to the survey 60 percent of Malays are in favour of keeping the NEP while 40 percent rejected the idea.

In every opinion poll there is what they termed as "response bias", simply put it means the respondents do not reflect their true beliefs.Some, are under social pressure not to accede to unpopular answers hence giving false returns.

While 60 percent say they want to maintain the NEP which I believe has higher degree of accuracy than the 40 percent who were not in the affirmative and where I believe lies most of the "response bias."

Hypothetically, the result should have been higher than 60 percent if the respondents had been in all honesty stayed true to their hearts.

The Malays in the street responses would depend on how the questions or the wordings of such questions are presented to them and most would hardly understand how the NEP can benefit them.The "response bias" would not have come from this strata of the Malay society it would have come from those in the higher strata, the Malay elites, where false sense of self-worth is greater than it would have existed in the lower level.So, the higher you go the less accurate the feedback.

Therefore, those wanting to keep the crutches should be more than 60 percent.

I believe majority of the 40 percent would have come from "constitutional Malays."

In his article the 'Trust Deficit' Jema Khan, a constitutional Malay himself, expanded his opinion on the impossible loss of Malay political power. The relevant paragraph appears below.

"It seems illogical to many that the Malays can lose power in Malaysia. Yes, Umno can lose but the Malay power is nonetheless firmly entrenched. Not only are the Malays 60 per cent of the electorate but the civil service, police, military, monarchy and judiciary are overwhelmingly Malay dominated".

While I agree with him UMNO is not synonymous with Malay power and should not be viewed as such, nonetheless, the erosion of Malay power is possible. The realities, in our midst, are Penang and Perak.If the Federal Territory of Kuala Lumpur was still in Selangor than it would have joined Penang as a state not under Malay majority control.

Although, total loss of Malay power may not occur in the very near future the diminution at federal level is and should not be a figment of one's imagination, the rare possibility is not all that remote and is even possible at the next general elections.

The loss of most of non-Malay parliamentary seats in Sabah and Sarawak combine with the loss of most non-Malay parliamentary seats in Peninsula Malaysia would weaken the Malay ruling power irrespective of whether it is UMNO, PAS or PKR.The Malays could become a minority in the coalition as was the case in Penang.

Sabah and Sarawak would become very crucial states in the next GE.Losing most of the non-Malay seats would put the BN in a grave situation.It is as good as total loss for the BN if the support for the opposition stays intact or improved further in Peninsula Malaysia and Sabah and Sarawak supplementing additional seats to the oppositions.

Below is a very possible scenario if Malays are still divided in the voting pattern.

Non-Malay seats
------------------
DAP 28
Sabah(non-UMNO) 11
Sarawak(non-PBB) 16
PKR(non-Malay) 11
MCA/MIC/Gerakan 20 (assuming they lost all seats to PR)
--------------------------------
Total 86

Malay seats
------------------

PKR 20
PAS 23
----------------------------------
Total 43 (assuming both PAS and PKR maintained the present seats)

The Pakatan coalition could garner 129 seats or more forming a weak coalition and a government without Malay majority for the first time. If majority of Malay votes shifted to PAS or PKR than Malay dominance would stay.

The prime mover of the oppositions is no more Anwar Ibrahim and PKR, it is Lim Kit Siang and DAP, including helping to garner non-Muslim votes for PAS.Unlike PKR, riddled with problems of infighting and defections, DAP and PAS are very focus and emboldened to fight to the end.DAP is actively pushing its agenda in Sabah and Sarawak.Anwar Ibrahim is done. He self-immolated his political career by his political doublespeak.

UMNO can only win and continue with its autocratic power over the nation if the Malays are united.The 'bangkit Melayu' movement and the birth of Perkasa was brought about in furtherance of Malay dominance.

Rewinding the clock back to 26 years ago it reminds me how wrong one could get with political prediction, an uncle, a businessman and part politician once told me that the Kadazans in Sabah, because of their minority status, would never be able to rule Sabah.He was proven wrong, less than two years later PBS and Joseph Pairin took over the rein of the Sabah state government and ruled the state for two terms and would have been there longer if not for UMNO political manoeuvring and gerrymandering of the electoral boundaries. The Chinese was the kingmaker then and chose to side with the Kadazans.

Berjaya, a multi-racial party and component of the BN led by Harris Salleh was blown to smithereens, winning only 6 seats in the 48-seat state assembly.

In Sabah and Sarawak there are concerted effort by the oppositions and those within the BN/UMNO to remove both Musa Aman and Taib Mahmud from helming the next government by exposing acts of corruptions.

Taib has been exposed in numerous blogs to own expensive real estate in a number of foreign countries and Musa Aman has had his cronies hauled up by MACC for interrogations as reported in numerous blogs. Both Chief Ministers delivered almost all BN seats that saved the BN from becoming history in the March 2008 General Elections.Across the South China Sea in the Peninsula the BN lost 5 states to the much disorganised oppositions at that time.

There is now talks in blogs and coffee shops of selective prosecution by Najib's administration and the imminent replacement of Musa by Shafie Apdal, a Sabahan of Suluk extract and the ousting of Taib in the next GE.

How true is the story is hard to tell but doing away with Taib and Musa at this juncture would have its dire effect on winning the states in the next GE.

It is common knowledge that in Sabah and Sarawak's politics money speaks louder than words and the last GE was testimony of this fact why the two states can deliver almost 100 percent of the seats.The sad result in Peninsula Malaysia and lost of 5 states was attributed to that much of the money never reached the ground.

Former Prime Minister Mahathir has, time and again, says that the Malays could lose political power without elaborating.Some Malays think he is talking cock.The non-Malays think he is racist.I think he is being frank and called a spade a spade while the fashionable Malays want to swallow their pride and believe in the invincibility of Malay powers.

MP Kota Belud Call For Greater Autonomy Should Be Lauded

Hantu Laut

This article was published in the South China Morning Post in February 2002.

To day, the scenario has changed.Sabah, is facing acute labour shortage in its oil palm plantations.The Indonesians have returned home voluntarily to work in their own country's plantations that is paying them the same or better wages.

Since the fall of Suharto's autocratic rule and the beginning of the 1999 decentralization and wider autonomy of the provinces given by the central government things have changed drastically at the provincial level.This otonomi daerah (regional autonomy) have given the local government better leverage to manage their own affairs and transformed the provinces and achieved far greater economic development than under Suharto.His stranglehold on the nation exerting political and economic control over the nation and its people to feed his insatiable appetite for corruption and abuse of power slowed Indonesia's economic progress in the provinces.

Indonesia hasn't looked back ever since.

The key to Indonesia's success in decentralization are the key features in Law 22/1999, the devolution of wide range of public service delivery functions to the regions and the strengthening of the elected regional councils (Dewan Perwakilan Rakyat Daerah -DPRD) which received wide-ranging powers to supervise and control regional administration.

Kalimantan, our neighbour is divided into four provinces,East,West,Central and South. East Kalimantan is the most prosperous among the four provinces with total GDP of US28 billion mainly for its gas and oil.

In his Ceritalah, Karim Raslan, a notable writer suggested that Sabah should open it doors to visitors and business from East Kalimantan.While I agree to most of his suggestions, I believe that isn't exactly Sabah woes.

The per capita income of Kalimantan is still lower compared to Sabah.The transient population placed heavy strain on the economic well-being of the state.Without their heavy presence Sabahans would have fared much better.It is more than obvious that the Federal government is not interested to resolve this needling issue.It is an open secret that some of these illegal immigrants have obtained Malaysian identity cards, dubious or otherwise.

Sabah and Sarawak should be given greater autonomy to manage their own affairs. Decentralisation has proven to have worked in some parts of Indonesia and Kalimantan is a model of the success story of doing away with autocracy which the Malaysia government is still deeply embroiled in due to its sense of insecurity.

The call by Kota Belud MP Abdul Rahman Dahlan for decentralization and wider autonomy for Sabah should be lauded. Sabah MPs should join hands with their Sarawak counterparts to seek better treatment and direct state supervision of state affairs including planning and supervision of federal funded projects.

Sabah has seen many federal funded projects like building of hospitals,schools and other public amenities either over or under specified, placed in the wrong locality, poorly designed and badly built. Some eventually ends up as white elephants.

Many of the problems were the result of poor planning by people who sit either in Kuala Lumpur or Putrajaya who know nuts about the actual conditions on the ground.Schools and hospitals have been known to not having enough teachers and doctors after being commissioned.Sub-standard construction of buildings and highways have rendered some of the structures to be unsafe or of wrong design.The one way flyover near the city centre of Kota Kinabalu is glaring example of such damning practice and waste of taxpayers money.

Kota Kinabalu has now joined other dysfunctional cities in Peninsula Malaysia.Such planning and construction should be left to Sabahans who probably can do better job.

I was in Kuala Lumpur 3 days ago and have to take one and a half hour agonising journey from my hotel in Raja Chulan to Bangsar at peak hours.Give KL another five years and it would be a nightmare to live in that city.Jalan Bukit Bintang is perpetually jammed and the cab drivers still haven't changed their cheating habits.So much for progress and a city of cultured people.

My apology for the diversion.

The central power should loosen its stranglehold on wanting to control the states by controlling the flow of the tap.It should concentrate what most central governments are doing... should be responsible only for foreign affairs,defence, security,justice, monetary and fiscal affairs, religion and not forgetting the collection of all federal taxes.All other affairs should be left to the states.

It's about time Prime Minister Najib gives it a serious thought if he wants to keep his "fixed deposit"