Anwar Called For Restoration Of State Rights Under True Federalism

True definition of a federation:

A federation (Latin: foedus, foederis, 'covenant'), also known as afederal state, is a type of sovereign state characterized by a union of partially self-governing states or regions united by a central (federal) government. In a federation, the self-governing status of the component states is typically constitutionally entrenched and may not be altered by a unilateral decision of the central government.Read more.

KUALA LUMPUR, Sept 16 — Datuk Seri Anwar Ibrahim sounded out a rallying cry today to restore the spirit of federalism, which he says has been abused by the ruling elite to remain in power to the detriment of the nation’s global progress.

“There is no longer any restraint on the centralisation of power to the federal government. The understanding of federalism, the rule of law and the spirit of federalism is being set aside for the sake of keeping the elite in power,” the opposition leader said in his Malaysia Day statement today.

He noted that the spirit of federalism — the system of sharing power between member states and a central administration — was one of the mainstays when Malaysia was formed in 1963 and was once upheld in the Federal Constitution, but stressed it was being eroded daily.

The Permatang Pauh MP pointed out that power had been channelled unchecked towards the federal government over the years, leading to discrimination in the development of the states, with some states remaining backward while others enjoy the fruits of their natural resources.

“It’s no wonder we see states like Kelantan, Sarawak and Sabah denied their rights even despite being endowed with natural resources,” the economist said.

“Sweet promises are being scattered throughout Sabah and Sarawak, for example, where they are regarded as a ‘deposit’ for victory in the elections,” the PKR advisor added in a thinly-veiled reference to the ruling Barisan Nasional (BN) alliance.

Anwar’s concern over the matter was likely triggered by widespread speculation that the Najib administration will call for snap polls in the next six months.

The next general election is due only in 2013, but Prime Minister Datuk Seri Najib Razak and his political colleagues have been stepping up their interaction with the grassroots in a nationwide tour to drum up greater support for the BN, which lost its traditional two-thirds control in the Dewan Rakyat for the first time in 53 years during Election 2008.

Anwar noted the citizens of those “oppressed” states had become “indifferent and pessimistic to the desire to strengthen the federation” as a result of suffering unfair treatment over the years.

“Clearly we cannot blame them and should work harder to generate energy, thinking and aspire to eradicate discrimination.

“It would be unfortunate for the nation if its government acts to exclude and deny the rights of its own people because of differences in politics, race and culture,” said the 63-year-old whose ambitions to become the next prime minister are well known.

He vowed that his party and the opposition Pakatan Rakyat (PR) will work hard to ensure justice to all the states in the federation, in bid to swing support, especially in the two East Malaysia states, to his side.

“On this day, September 16, 2010 let us together make a commitment to continue to aspire and fight to restore the spirit of federalism… to achieve the status of a sovereign and independent nation on a level position with other nations in the world,” he said.

Malaysian Insider

The Spirit Of Independence 47 Years Too Late

Declaration of independence 16th Sept 1963

by Donald Stephens (Tun Fuad Stephens)

witnessed by Tun Mustapha Harun and Tun Abdul Razak

Hantu Laut

I was only 14 years old when I had to go to the town padang to witness what I was told the making of a new nation which I haven't got a clue about. Why would we need a new nation?

As student I am still blur about the going ons, the celebration and the festive mood everybody seemed to be in.

That unforgettable day was 16th Sept 1963.

Why in the first place we have to count Malaysia come to being a nation from 31st August 1957 instead of from 16th Sept 1963? There was no Malaysia prior to 1963 so how could we have existed for 53 years?

Remember George Santayana's "Those who cannot remember the past are condemned to repeat it" and I say those who twiddle history should be condemned and ridiculed.

We can learn from our mistake but it seems we had no wish to.We still celebrate 31st August as independence day when we should have completely scrapped that for 16th Sept which is the true day in history Malaysia was formed.

Would the people or the nation lose anything by rectifying mistake made by over-zealous leaders of the past who manufactured history to satisfy their whims and fancies.

I hope Prime Minister Najib would be taking the first step before the giant leap to correct the history book and not fool our younger and future generations that Malaysia is 6 years older than it actually is.

Today, for the first time in 47 years the people of Sabah and Sarawak can relate to a true independence day. The day the Union Jack came down to mark the end of colonialism and the hoisting of a new flag and the dawn of a new nation...Malaysia.

The last governor Sir William Goode bidding farewell to Harris Salleh

Lest, those federationists forget, we are a state in a federation, not a colony nor a province.Lest, they do not know the meaning of the word "federation" read the definition below:

A federation (Latin: foedus, foederis, 'covenant'), also known as a federal state, is a type of sovereign state characterized by a union of partially self-governing states or regions united by a central (federal) government. In a federation, the self-governing status of the component states is typically constitutionally entrenched and may not be altered by a unilateral decision of the central government.Read more.

Today, for the first time, is a national holiday, and a big celebration to be held at Kota Kinabalu.

Big Fish In A Small Pond ?

Hantu Laut

This is the man that took a tiny crime-stricken tropical backwater island to become the most successful modern nation and an economic miracle no less in less than four decades of his regime.

Despite lack of natural resources Singapore became a financial and industrial powerhouse.A success story, a feat, that many world leaders could only dream about.

I have read almost every book written on Lee Kuan Yew, from the obscured James Minchin's "No Man Is An Island" to his two-volume memoirs and the latest book written on him by American columnist Tom Plate.

"One of the asymmetries of history" wrote Henry Kissinger of him. Kissinger's one time boss Richard Nixon was even more flattering and said had Lee lived in another time and another place, he might had attained the stature of a Churchill,Disraeli or a Gladstone.

Profoundly true but water under the bridge now.Few leaders could have attained what Lee had with a tiny nation that had no natural resources except the richness and diversity of its human capital.

In 1965 Singapore ranked the same economically with Chile, Argentina and Mexico, today its per capita GDP is 6 times more than those countries.Even more amazing the per capita GDP is higher than its former colonial master and richer than the purportedly richest nation on earth.The per capita is higher than Britain and the United States.

Talk about the success story of Singapore many Malaysians would not wonder in amazement . "Oh! It's a small country, easier to manage" some would say.True in a way but untrue in many ways.

Smallness will not guarantee success if you have rotten leadership, bad governance and run-away corruptions.That's where Singapore succeed and where other more resourceful countries failed.It persisted in zero tolerance for anomalies.

Obviously, Lee is a big fish in a small pond and he is not letting go of his lost opportunity to govern a bigger land mass......being kicked out of Malaysia as reflected in his regret and disappointment here.

Lee, no doubt is an accomplished leader, a great statesman, an intellectual with achievements unequalled in this modern era.All those do not necessary help smarten his views of hindsight.

His lamentation that Malaysia, if had been kept intact, would have benefited from what Singapore had achieved today in term of racial harmony and equality is just his pipe dream.

As Mahathir said in sarcasm of him as being "A big frog in a small pond" in Tom Plate's "Conversation With Lee Kuan Yew" comments by world leaders.

Keeping Singapore and hard-nosed Lee in Malaysia would have been genocidal and ended in unimaginable disaster. It would be Singapore wanting to leave Malaysia then when the Malays refused to concede political powers to the Chinese whom would have been same in numbers or in the majority. It's a sure recipe for disaster and Tungku Abdul Rahman was wise when he took the decision to expel Singapore to save the nation from ending up in violence and bloodshed. There would not be any Malaysia.There would not be a bigger pond for Lee to swim in. Sabah and Sarawak would have joined Singapore in breaking up the nation.

That's what the most probable scenario would have been.

Of course, I do not expect everyone to agree with my hypothesis.

Where No Man Is An Island

Days of Reflection for Man Who Defined Singapore

New York Times

By SETH MYDANS

Published: September 10, 2010

“SO, when is the last leaf falling?” asked Lee Kuan Yew, the man who made Singapore in his own stern and unsentimental image, nearing his 87th birthday and contemplating age, infirmity and loss.

“I can feel the gradual decline of energy and vitality,” said Mr. Lee, whose “Singapore model” of economic growth and tight social control made him one of the most influential political figures of Asia. “And I mean generally, every year, when you know you are not on the same level as last year. But that’s life.”

In a long, unusually reflective interview last week, he talked about the aches and pains of age and the solace of meditation, about his struggle to build a thriving nation on this resource-poor island, and his concern that the next generation might take his achievements for granted and let them slip away.

He was dressed informally in a windbreaker and running shoes in his big, bright office, still sharp of mind but visibly older and a little stooped, no longer in day-to-day control but, for as long as he lives, the dominant figure of the nation he created.

But in these final years, he said, his life has been darkened by the illness of his wife and companion of 61 years, bedridden and mute after a series of strokes.

“I try to busy myself,” he said, “but from time to time in idle moments, my mind goes back to the happy days we were up and about together.” Agnostic and pragmatic in his approach to life, he spoke with something like envy of people who find strength and solace in religion. “How do I comfort myself?” he asked. “Well, I say, ‘Life is just like that.’ ”

“What is next, I do not know,” he said. “Nobody has ever come back.”

The prime minister of Singapore from its founding in 1965 until he stepped aside in 1990, Mr. Lee built what he called “a first-world oasis in a third-world region” — praised for the efficiency and incorruptibility of his rule but accused by human rights groups of limiting political freedoms and intimidating opponents through libel suits.

His title now is minister mentor, a powerful presence within the current government led by his son, Prime Minister Lee Hsien Loong. The question that hovers over Singapore today is how long and in what form his model may endure once he is gone.

Always physically vigorous, Mr. Lee combats the decline of age with a regimen of swimming, cycling and massage and, perhaps more important, an hour-by-hour daily schedule of meetings, speeches and conferences both in Singapore and overseas. “I know if I rest, I’ll slide downhill fast,” he said. When, after an hour, talk shifted from introspection to geopolitics, the years seemed to slip away and he grew vigorous and forceful, his worldview still wide ranging, detailed and commanding.

And yet, he said, he sometimes takes an oblique look at these struggles against age and sees what he calls “the absurdity of it.”

“I’m reaching 87, trying to keep fit, presenting a vigorous figure, and it’s an effort, and is it worth the effort?” he said. “I laugh at myself trying to keep a bold front. It’s become my habit. I just carry on.”

HIS most difficult moments come at the end of each day, he said, as he sits by the bedside of his wife, Kwa Geok Choo, 89, who has been unable to move or speak for more than two years. She had been by his side, a confidante and counselor, since they were law students in London.

“She understands when I talk to her, which I do every night,” he said. “She keeps awake for me; I tell her about my day’s work, read her favorite poems.” He opened a big spreadsheet to show his reading list, books by Jane Austen, Rudyard Kipling and Lewis Carroll as well as the sonnets of Shakespeare.

Lately, he said, he had been looking at Christian marriage vows and was drawn to the words: “To love, to hold and to cherish, in sickness and in health, for better or for worse till death do us part.”

“I told her, ‘I would try and keep you company for as long as I can.’ That’s life. She understood.” But he also said: “I’m not sure who’s going first, whether she or me.”

At night, hearing the sounds of his wife’s discomfort in the next room, he said, he calms himself with 20 minutes of meditation, reciting a mantra he was taught by a Christian friend: “Ma-Ra-Na-Tha.”

The phrase, which is Aramaic, comes at the end of St. Paul’s First Epistle to the Corinthians, and can be translated in several ways. Mr. Lee said that he was told it means “Come to me, O Lord Jesus,” and that although he is not a believer, he finds the sounds soothing.

“The problem is to keep the monkey mind from running off into all kinds of thoughts,” he said. “A certain tranquillity settles over you. The day’s pressures and worries are pushed out. Then there’s less problem sleeping.”

He brushed aside the words of a prominent Singaporean writer and social critic, Catherine Lim, who described him as having “an authoritarian, no-nonsense manner that has little use for sentiment.”

“She’s a novelist!” he cried. “Therefore, she simplifies a person’s character,” making what he called a “graphic caricature of me.” “But is anybody that simple or simplistic?”

The stress of his wife’s illness is constant, he said, harder on him than stresses he faced for years in the political arena. But repeatedly, in looking back over his life, he returns to his moment of greatest anguish, the expulsion of Singapore from Malaysia in 1965, when he wept in public.

That trauma presented him with the challenge that has defined his life, the creation and development of a stable and prosperous nation, always on guard against conflict within its mixed population of Chinese, Malays and Indians. Read more.

This article has been revised to reflect the following correction:

Correction: September 11, 2010

An earlier version of this article contained a picture caption that misspelled Mr. Lee's name. He is Lee Kuan Yew, not Lee Kuan Kew.