Tag: Malay

Sang Kancil Forum


There was a forum in Malaysia, back in the nascent days of internet comms, which the late MGG Pillai used to contribute to. Someone mailed me a link which said this, almost 12 years ago!:

 

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Re: [sangkancil] Malaysian Dilemma

Thanks Mr Teh and very well said.

>From: Bala Pillai 
>To: sangkancil@malaysia.net
>Subject: [sangkancil] Malaysian Dilemma
>Date: Sat, 11 Mar 2000 13:46:46 +1100
>
>--forwarded message--
>Date: Sat, 11 Mar 00 10:30:00 +0800
>From: TEH THIAN HWA 
>To: adnan98@pd.jaring.my (Adnan_xyz)
>Cc: bala@malaysia.net (Bala Pillai)
>Subject: Malaysian Dillema
>:
>:
>:
>
>Dear xyz,
>
>I refer to your email to sangkanchilers dated 10 March 2000. I am a
>Chinese and can therefore safely condemn the Chinese race's shortcomings.
>
>I make the following observations:
>
>1. The primary school teacher incident.
>
>i. I am inclined to believe one can find a vernacular school where when
>the race factor is eliminated, one finds a similar pattern of car
>ownership or qualification for an assistance scheme, between wage earners
>and entrepreneurs.
>
>ii. Perhaps the families which did not own cars had better furnished
>homes or were better clothed. My personal visit to homes of my malay
>friends and chinese friends tell me that malays in general place more
>importance on home furnishing than chinese. Down my street there are a
>couple of beemer owners, but their single-storey terrace units are in
>absolute shambles. My double-storey terrace unit looks like a palace in
>comparison, but my Iswara parked in front is somewhat of a giveaway
>
>iii. More pertinent may be why malay parents were more likely to be wage
>earners than chinese parents. Can one not turn it around to suggest
>employment opportunities unfairly favour malays? I know many small
>business owners who would not have chosen to start those businesses had
>they had better employment opportunities. Is there unfair treatment here
>and by whom?
>
>2. Special class during Friday Prayers
>
>Assuming the students who were praying did not know about the classes and
>would have attended those classes had they known, or assuming those
>classes were not specifically requested by those students not praying,
>the teacher was wrong
>
>3. Students Abroad
>
>I studied abroad. When I left home my father gave me enough money for
>three months. I started looking for part-time work on the third month.
> >From the fourth month on, I worked part-time and continued doing it until
>I left for home 6 years later. At the worst of times (during semester) I
>had one weekend job, working 10-11 hours starting at 5am on both
>Saturdays and Sundays - manual labour in fish markets. At the best of
>times during summer breaks I had four jobs simultaneously. Paper runs on
>weekdays at 5am-7am. "Regular" work as a cleaner/porter in a hospital
>from 8am-4pm weekdays. Ad-hoc work at university faculty in the printshop
>and moving furnitures, after 4pm. Fish markets weekends. Often I did
>paper runs and fishmarkets during semester. All this while, a family of
>malays live one floor above me. A married couple, both sponsored. Neither
>worked. They had children while I was working. Two of them, one after
>another. They had a good 10 years head start in raising a family.
>Assisted. I wasnt abroad because I was rich. I'm no Einstein but neither
>am I an intellectual slouch. I was in a top university in a top faculty.
>It now requires a near 99% percentile for admission. The family man was
>in a university a few suburbs away. In a faculty my cousin whose mother
>wished she had me for a son instead, would have gained admission if he
>tried harder. Merit? Deserving? Sigh ...
>
>I have another cousin whose father was schizophrenic. Left home when my
>cousin was only 2. My auntie became a seamstress to bring him up. There
>wasnt a year through primary and secondary school when he wasnt the top
>student. Guess who fished him out of the poverty cycle? The Singapore
>government.
>
>Of course, apart from my family man neighbour, I knew of another rich
>malaysian kid in my faculty, who was of the indian race. He drove a big
>Japanese car. Spent weekends on some waterfront hangout with local kids,
>sipping beers. Goes skiing during winter break, and out deep-sea fishing
>(read : sailing in some classy yacht, no doubt champagne laden) during
>summer breaks. He chatted now and then with me. I envied him whenever I
>do. I wished somebody had fished me out of my fishmarket routines. I know
>the malaysian government didnt. It plonked instead for that family man.
>And his wife.
>
>Also, the rich kids that malay student you mentioned spoke to? Maybe they
>had money because they worked. Not in fishmarkets may be, but maybe they
>worked. Certainly their parents did. Perhaps their parents were given a
>break from the vicious cycle by someone, huh?
>
>4, 5 & 6. Business cheats
>
>A pure, unadulterated truth - businessmen consider it a job well-done
>when they can squeeze maximum profits out of a deal. All businessmen do
>that. The fair ones try to give the party squeezed, some benefits so that
>they feel they have been fair. They squeeze some harder than they do
>others. Bases for differentiation? Anything. Race is certainly one way. I
>have been taken for a ride by a chinese, just because I speak a different
>dialect. Racist? Almost certainly to a large extent. Many chinese are
>racist. But that su
>
>
>Thanks,
>Teh
>
>
>--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
>To unsubscribe, send a blank message to 
>
>or go to <http://www.malaysia.net/lists/sangkancil>
>
>

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Stupid is as BN-UMNO Does


I confess to not having kept up with Malaysian news for a long time now. I thought I should have a peek, seeing my current subscription to Malaysiakini still has a few months to run. I’m contemplating using the money to subscribe to something like the Sydney Institute instead, so it was refreshing to read in Malaysiakini, that more and more people are standing up to the idiotic mob pretending to be the government of Malaysia.

Khaled Nordin is apparently the Malaysian Education Minister. An academic has basically just called him stupid. Maybe it’d take a while before Khaled realises that. Abdul Aziz Bari is the academic and good on him for saying what so many have known for so long – that ministers in the BN-UMNO led sorry bunch that makes up the government, are there only for 1 or 2 reasons. There’re Ministers either because they’re Malays or they know the right Malays, or very likely both. No grey matter or industry required.

But enough of space given to an age old issue which hasn’t changed in over 30 years – Najib Razak and his bunch of intellectually challenged mob are just living up to expectations.

See offending story here:

Aziz Bari slams minister over quit call
S Pathmawathy
12:55PM Nov 7, 2011

Pointing out the law and the constitution to members of the public is not politicking, says law professor Abdul Aziz Bari, lashing out at criticism that he should quit the academia and become a politician.

“I was just talking about the law and the constitution, which is somehow difficult to be disentangled from politics.

“Furthermore, I was talking to the ordinary people, not to an academic audience. I believe they have every right to know about the constitution and how to make it able to deliver,” the Universiti Islam Antarabangsa (UIA) lecturer added.

Aziz was responding to the call by Higher Education Minister Mohamed Khaled Nordin that Aziz resigns as an academician if he insisted on “taking part in politics”.

Khaled’s statement, widely reported by the Malay language newspapers, came after Aziz took part in ceramah organised by the opposition PKR in the minister’s Pasir Gudang parliamentary constituency over the weekend.

Aziz said Khaled’s comments were in stark contrast to the position taken by Deputy Higher Education Minister Saifuddin Abdullah, who constantly encourages tertiary students to be involved in politics, in spite of laws that prohibit them from doing so.

“For one thing, his deputy, Saifuddin, has been saying that it is fine for students to take part in politics. I think academicians have an even greater right, or perhaps duties, to be in politics,” Aziz said.

Noting the Court of Appeal’s declaration last Monday that Section 15 of the Universities and University Colleges Act 1971 (UUCA) was unconstitutional, he added: “He (Khaled) also should be aware that university regulations are not laws, strictly speaking.

“As such, these are subject to the laws of the land, particularly to the constitution as the supreme law of the land.

‘Treat academicians as public intellectuals’

“If that (the talk) is seen as politics, then perhaps we should throw away the constitution and make this country a one-party or an authoritarian one.”

The Court of Appeal in a 2-1 landmark decision declared Section 15(5) (a) of the UUCA, which bars university students from being involved in politics, unconstitutional and as such, null and void.

Article 4 of the constitution states that the constitution is the supreme law of the federation and any law passed after Merdeka Day that is inconsistent with the constitution shall, to the extent of inconsistency, be void.

Rebuking Khaled (right) for his criticism, Aziz said if he had given the speech on an Umno platform, there would not be a problem.

The minister, he added, should explain the government’s stand on cases where academicians have been involved in party politics.

“Some academicians went around – as part of their lobbying for senior posts in the universities – saying publicly that (Opposition Leader) Anwar Ibrahim was guilty of sodomy. This is obviously a crime as the case is still on going in court. It is subjudice.

“What about those senior professors who took part in preparing the draft of the Umno president’s keynote address?

“What about those academicians and professors who have been regular speakers in Biro Tata Negara programmes or Islam Hadhari workshops (this is obviously political, as it is the policy of Umno),” Aziz asked.

Khaled, he added, should be mindful that universities “are not factories or nurseries” and that academicians should be treated as “public intellectuals”.

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