Shaffie Salleh was the Higher Education Minister of Malaysia. I’m not sure if he still is. Hopefully not but fat chance.
Late in December 2004, he vowed to keep University ITM ethnically pure – ie all Malays – and generally keep Malay population in Malaysian universities not less than 55%. Those were racist things to say, surely? Anyone made any noise? Not really, except Kit Siang. When he did, HE was accused of raising sensitive racial issues. That works only in Malaysia, where Malays can and do say anything they wish but if a Chinese or Indian say or do anything either in response or to point this out, he/she would be accused of carrying out a racially motivated act.
Why are Malay leaders so racist and non-tolerant? I’m really confident that it has everything to do with being a spoilt child. For too long now, the Malay has been told he is special, that he deserves more wealth, more opportunity and more good things in life generally. He has been told that these are his birthright in Malaysia, that he doesn’t need to work for them.
How does one straighten out a spoilt child? I know the cane works. So what is the equivalent of this cane? It has to hurt. It has to remind that spoilt child that every time behaviours resembling a spoilt child are acted out, the pain from the cane would invariably follow. Sort of like a Pavlov effect.
For now, I can think of nothing that resembles the cane more than a straight talking media. I know the baggage that publications like Star and Sun carry, but what is the worst case scenario? Is it that these companies risk losing money by risking their licence if they point out a racist act every time one of those UMNO buffoons commits one? But surely government investment agencies now hold significant shares in these companies so that they too hurt? I recall the Sun recently took steps to privatise its shareholding. So maybe it has more to lose. But is the future of Malaysia too insignificant a benefit to risk such loss?
What other means are available to deal with this spoilt rotten child, if not the media? There must be something out there? Something to inflict pain, so that the lesson is learned. Something to tell buffoons like Shaffie Salleh and others in his herd that they and their behaviours are “unasseptable”…

I was up much earlier than usual for a Sunday morning, no thanks to the continuing warm weather. Taking advantage of the extra hours I had as a result, I surfed for news.

USD100 a barrel. I remember while working in an investment bank in Malaysia, the weekly analyst briefings I attended suggested various companies would remain viable as long as oil stayed at what – USD40 a barrel? How do these companies cope now?

With that level of oil prices, surely the reduced consumer spending capacity would hurt the economy? Apparently not. At least that’s what the Malaysian Finance Minister thinks. Ah well, he is the Malaysian Finance Minister, past central bank credentials notwithstanding (actually he screwed that one up as well). While everyone else in the world thinks USD100 barrel is a problem, Malaysia thinks otherwise…

Perhaps he was thinking, not of the economy, but of the politicians who stand to benefit from Petronas’ windfall. It may be good for Petronas, but does it benefit the economy? Many Malaysians would smile and give you a knowing look.

It must be the Malaysian still ambering away somewhere within my relatively new legal status as an Australian citizen. I continue to be deeply annoyed with the stupidity which defines the dominant ruling party of Malaysian politics.

Strictly speaking, the government is a coalition of parties. In behaviour however, it isn’t. The dominant party is an unruly mob of buffoons and oafs who demand its coalition partners do as they say. 

A clichéd response would be to attribute this behaviour to the feudal mentality of the Malays. I no longer believe this explains the totally unacceptable behaviour. The Chinese and Indian are also feudal communities, if you choose to look at it that way. They don’t however misbehave that way, in general. In any event, feudalism works as an explanation only in terms of behaviour towards their  own not inter-racial relations.

I often think there is a much simpler and more down-to-earth explanation. It is that they are a spoilt bunch. Their behaviour is consistent with that of a very spoilt child. A spoilt child demands its own ways at all times. It is prone to irresponsible behaviour (telling lies or making wrong statements and thereafter flatly deny ever saying such things). When it doesn’t get its own ways or when someone demonstrates just how unreliable or what a liar it has been, it lashes out recklessly, akin to throwing a tantrum.

Such behaviour would have been laughable had the stakes been anything less than the future of a once prosperous and respected country.

It will be a long and painful process before the spoilt child that is UMNO attains maturity and start learning how to behave and be responsible. If at all, that is. It would be very nice if one thinks someone like Hishamuddin Tun Hussein or Khairy Jamaluddin can grow up, step out of the privileged cocoon which they have been sleeping in all their lives and see that the real world does not owe them a living, that the real world gives and demands in equal measures. There is nothing now to suggest these idiotic louts are capable of breaking out to do the right thing.

Last night a mate was in our house with his family. While chatting we mentioned the councillor in Klang, my hometown, who was widely believed to have been absolutely corrupt. Zakaria was known as the guy who lapped everything in sight (“Chia Kar Liao” – hokkien for “ate everything”, or 100% corrupt). His palatial mansion in Klang was a testament not just of his bribe taking, but also of his total contempt for the law. While the council he runs goes around tearing down illegal buildings, he built this obscene monstrosity without a building permit. He also has 2 family members sitting as councillors, so effectively he runs the local council like his private mahjong club.

Klang is a town of stark contrasts, as many towns in Malaysia probably are. In our chat last night, my mate’s wife told us living in “gated communities” is now a common thing. An occupant in one of these communities pay up to 200 bucks a month just for security services. So while unsafe, it is a town with many rich people.  At the same time however, there are great numbers who struggle to make ends meet.

I remember tutoring a schoolmate. Unfortunately I only remember him as Paul. I forget his last name. He was an Indian boy. It may have been Nathan. I used to give him some help with his English after school hours. Sometimes I’d grab a quick lunch before starting. That’s when I realised Paul hadn’t had anything to eat all day. I asked him about it and he said he ate when he got home. His one meal a day was going to be some rice, onion curry and kangkong. His father was a labourer with the local council. He had a sister and 2 brothers in school and they simply couldn’t afford 3 meals a day.

With the likes of Paul in the community, it is outrageous that we have councillors like Zakaria. Yet the ruling party refused to act against him. He has remained untouched by the bad presses he was receiving at the end of 2006 and continues to run the roost in Klang. People like Zakaria completely ignore the poor and the law, and thinks only with his wallet.

Malaysians in general, particularly those living in those gated communities, don’t care. I’m sorry if I offend some of those who pay me the honour of reading this site every now and then. These are people who live in these gated communities, or better.

I’m sorry if I generalise and say people like you don’t care, but you don’t. You may feel it, but you don’t care. Not really. Not as long as you don’t speak up, consistently if need be, against such wrongs. If you sound like a broken record and no one seems to be listening anymore, you should still speak up. Why? Everyone should speak up every time he or she sees something wrong, that’s why. The saying “all it takes for evil to prevail is for good people to do nothing” strikes a chord with many because it is true.

I’m afraid I’m one of those who’d put journalists like Nadeswaran from The Sun on a pedestal for his persistent attitude. We need to put away people like Zakaria. Zakaria must be removed from office, charged for his sins and go to jail because if you don’t, you will breed more like him. If you don’t, you are telling your children it is okay to break the law as long as you reap the benefits and get away from it by being “in the right camp”.

Nothing may happen to the likes of Zakaria when you talk about it, write about it or go to a street rally to protest about it. But something will happen to you and those around you. You and those around you would be less inclined to accept what is not acceptable. You and especially your children will remain sensitive to wrongdoings.

Some have written to me in the past to say it is easy for me to say what I like because the threat of ISA doesn’t affect me anymore. I don’t care what you think of me. The danger is staring at you in the face. Your government is using fear to shut you up. If you shut up, you have reacted exactly the way your corrupt and imbecile government wanted you to react. Maybe they are not so stupid after all, if they succeeded in making you behave in the way they want you to.

How many people can the government throw in Kamunting before the tide turns completely against them? The Hindraf leadership has copped it under the ISA. If the movement continues notwithstanding this, they would have succeeded where the supposedly more sophisticated section of the community has failed. It failed because it didn’t really care. If it did it would have given Nadeswaran a bigger platform and promoted the likes of him. If it did it would have acted more than it did and be prepared to change this totally unacceptable UMNO mob that seeks to run the country into the ground while enriching themselves.

A few nights ago, Tress and I stayed up to watch a number of video clips on various websites showing the arrests of various Malaysian opposition figures as well as a writer who sang the Negaraku and held up the Federal Constitution before being led away by the police.

After watching these, we telephoned a relative in the Klang Valley. It didn’t come as a big surprise that the ugly incidents of the past two days have gone largely unnoticed by this relative. I believe that apart from the relatively small number of those interested in such matters, most Malaysians would have been oblivious of this development.

Where are the journalists?

Malaysia has, for a long time now, slid in many ways. The recent events serve only as reminders that the decline has become critical and untenable. As a lawyer, I have been disillusioned with the Malaysian legal administration system of the past 20 years. I thought the 1988 Salleh Abas episode was as low as the Malaysian judiciary can go. Yet now we have the Lingam-Fairuz scandal.

The government has not demonstrated any serious intentions to fix this. It feels as though the steps have been taken reluctantly with the objective of getting critics off its back instead of attempting to restore judicial integrity and quality. This is a serious and fundamental flaw yet most ordinary Malaysians are oblivious to this problem.Where are the journalists?

The electoral system has been fraught with problems for as long as I have participated in elections. I lived in an established area of the Klang Valley and had not moved for a long period of time. And yet I found myself “voting” in a different constituency after an election. With gerrymandering, postal vote manipulations, party workers conduct on polling day, media bias and various other horrendous practices, the Election Commission requires a serious overhaul.

The man at the helm of the commission who has been responsible for allowing these malpractice to persist continues to hold on to that role. Abdul Rashid Abdul Rahman should have been gone a long time ago but his tenure has been extended. Objections to this have been met with high-handed responses from the authorities. The lack of objectivity on the part of the police, the Attorney-General’s Chambers and the judiciary persists but man on the street is oblivious to this serious flaw.

Where are the journalists?

For a long time, the Indians have been receiving a very raw deal. Many of them are labourers with paltry incomes that are no match to the escalating costs of living in Malaysia’s badly-managed economy. If they try to seek alternative or additional incomes by setting up hawker stalls, for example, they face problems with the local council. Petty traders are met with racist and religious bigots who give minority races a tough time. Bribery, unfair treatment and unreasonable terms all conspire to make it next to impossible for these disadvantaged groups.

Religion, their sole comfort in life, is given a literal bashing when their temples or shrines are demolished with little or no compassion. Can one expect a community to undergo incessant oppression and not react? Do they not deserve a more compassionate review of their situation? Few speak up or represent them. Those who do are thrown into jails without trial (eulogised as detention centers, call it what you will, Kamunting is a jail). Surely this is a matter of serious public concern requiring objective dissecting of all relevant issues.

Where are the journalists?

There are other equally serious issues in Malaysia including equitable distribution of wealth and opportunities, transparent economic management and review of civil and religious issues facing all sections of the communities. The media must play a central role in all of these. There should be a special role played by journalists in the current situation.

The editors, in particular, should stand up and be counted. If they persist in playing the pliant servant of the ruling party, how can they be the people’s conscience? If they write and report only in the manner approved by the government, they are mere instruments of propaganda not honorable journalists.

I suppose to a large extent, Malaysian media is more about making money than anything else. They are business enterprises. They have to turn a profit for their shareholders. I suppose in a country like Malaysia, where credibility isn’t a differentiating factor, there is no incentive to do the right thing and damn the profits.

In more mature societies, a sycophantic media soon loses its credibility and its audience. Very quickly soon after, it loses its advertisers. There is a business case for credibility in these societies. In Malaysia the reverse is true. There is a business case to be sycophantic. A sycophantic media serves very little purpose in terms of its original raison d’être.

It may have a business case for being sycophantic but it is no longer the media as it is traditionally known. I do not think those of us who call it an instrument for propaganda are being unfair or unkind. Freedom should be qualified only in terms of public standards of mores. When the media does not have such unqualified freedom, it is anything but a press.

Tress and I were viewing some video clips last night. After viewing them for a while, we telephoned a relative in Malaysia. Just as we expected, that relative knew nothing about what had happened. This is the single most despicable thing the Badawi government has done since assuming control in what – 2003? – And yet save for those closely or directly linked with politics, barely anyone in Malaysia knew what was going on. This is why we should never go easy on the media in Malaysia. Whenever we pick up anything that even remotely sounds like rubbish, we should write to the person responsible, including the editor, and let them know exactly what we think. Don’t mince your words and don’t go easy – just go in hard. Be unforgiving.  I don’t mean to be heartless and uncompassionate. I am deliberately adopting this stance because of the special place occupied and special roles played by journalists in the current situation. The editors in particular, should stand up and be counted. If they persist in playing the pliant servant of the ruling party how can they be the conscience of the people? If they write and report only in the manner approved by the government they are mere instruments of propaganda, not honorable journalists. I suppose to a large extent, Malaysia is more about making money than anything else. This holds true for newspapers which are also business enterprises. They have to turn a profit for their shareholder. And I suppose in a country like Malaysia, where credibility isn’t a differentiating factor, there is no incentive to do the right thing and damn profits. In more mature societies, a sycophantic media soon loses its credibility and therefore its audience. Very quickly after that it loses its advertisers. There is a business case for credibility in these societies. In Malaysia the reverse is true. There is a business case to be sycophantic.  A sycophantic media serves very little useful purpose in terms of its original raison d’être. It may have a business case for being sycophantic but it no longer is the media as it is traditional known. I do not think those of us who call it an instrument for propaganda are being unfair or unkind. Freedom should be qualified only in terms of public standards of mores. When the press does not have such unqualified freedom, it is anything but a press.

I was thinking about what happened in KL on Sunday – a lot. I can’t get over how bloody minded the government and public service in Malaysia are. So last night, I telephoned and spoke to CMS, an ex-boss, who is the senior partner of the firm I was in. I wanted to reach out and extend the camaraderie and express my disbelief over the behaviour of the government.They tried to oppose bail for Edmund. This is outrageous and clearly demonstrates how the AG or DPP continues to be anything but independent of the ruling party. Where is the objectivity? On the one hand, bail was granted for a murder accused. Razak Baginda was charged with murder in a very high profile case and they allowed him to roam free on bail. On the other hand, Edmund Bon has to contest the might of the AG or DPP to get bail, in what is at best a misdemeanour. It enraged me. I went home last night, seething. I complained to Theresa and kiddo, a lot. They are thankful I’m not in KL now. I would have been easily inclined to jump in. The fact that my legal work has been almost entirely within the banking/corporate (and now insurance) areas does not mean I have no inclination to react to issues of human rights and administration of criminal justice. All lawyers should react to this in the strongest possible manner.Justice and fairness must be the bedrock of any effective legal administration system. You can be the flashest corporate lawyer and be a whizz kid in terms of the intricacies of structuring complex corporate finance deals, appreciating every aspect of the legal risks associated with every feature of the deal. If you have a Mickey Mouse judiciary such as the one bedevilling Malaysia, you might as well write an “i. o. u” on a napkin of a coffee shop and a handshake. No whizz-bang-you-beauty suite of contracts is going to save you from a corrupt and clueless bench.The demonstrations against the administration are therefore well justified. For far too long, the executive branch of the government in Malaysia has been playing fast and loose with the judiciary, twirling the sad little judges around the fingers of the Prime Minister, business leaders and even lawyers. What sort of integrity does can this sort of judiciary have? The lawyers’ march was wrong only in terms of timing – they should have done this years ago.

Edmund Bon was a colleague back when I was in KL. I had made an entry about him earlier, (see here) about his role as a human rights lawyer.
 
Yesterday, he was arrested by the Malaysian police. 4 other lawyers were arrested together with him. They were all in the office building of the Malaysian Bar Council. Apparently, they were having a meeting in that building and had put up some posters at the lobby of the building which advertised that meeting. The meeting was originally planned to be march (latest in a series of marches) in a section of KL. The police refused to issue a permit for this march-cum-meeting so the meeting was moved indoor.
 
The government has been unhappy with recent public meetings which showed up how ridiculously stupid and wrong the government has been. I guess they are pretty sore with lawyers, who have spearheaded these public meetings. The recent Indian demonstrations were also organized by lawyers.
 
So when the meetings progressed indoor and the government was either late in responding or lacked imagination so all they could do was send a few city council enforcement officers along to remove “illegally placed” posters. These posters were apparently in the lobby of the building so the city council workers couldn’t have brought this allegation. I don’t think these posters contained explicit or illegal contents so I suppose the police have no basis to ask for its removal either.
 
But absence of either a legitimate basis or coherent reasoning didn’t stop the Malaysian government from behaving stupidly in the past so I suppose it didn’t come as a complete surprise, outrageous though such behaviour may have been.
 
It isn’t clear what happened. The Malaysian Bar website suggested that all Edmund did was to persuade them to stop removing the posters and when this failed and as the city council workers were leaving, he stood on the steps of the building and said out loud that these workers had violated the rights of the Bar. A police officer was there with the workers and Edmund even invited this officer to go into the building to participate in the meeting, saying there was food in the building and they were welcomed to have some. So it didn’t sound like he was obstructing any law enforcement officers from carrying out their work so I wonder what was the act or behaviour which provided the basis for any alleged breach or infringement. The only thing which appeared to be infringed was the ego of the officers, I think.
 
In Malaysia however that is enough to land one in trouble. This time, Edmund is at the receiving end. The day would come however when these perpetrators and participators of such bloody mindedness would wake up and regret their action. When that day comes, I hope the circumstances are still ripe for a painless turnaround.

It’s open season again for Malaysian Government bashing…

I have said this before – the dills in Malaysian government surely must realise they cant keep trampling on everyone and expect the streets to still be calm and peaceful. This entry was in June this year but really the signs have been there for much longer.