By Jee Wan
Malaysiakini
When we won the Asian Football Federation Suzuki Cup, our PM declared 31st December a public holiday, claiming to support the 1Malaysia concept of “People First, Performance Now”. Hurrah, hurrah.
But when our PM attended a Christmas celebration at the Catholic Church Archbishop residence, the PMO directive ordered the church officials to remove crucifixes and prohibit them from singing hymns and praying, saying it’s to protect the prime minister’s Islamic credentials.
Here we are shouting 1Malaysia this and 1Malaysia that, but know not how to respect the tradition, culture and beliefs of another religion? What message are we sending out to the public and the world at large? That we are still immature even after 53 years of independence?
That even our own leaders can’t walk the talk?
That’s just the tip of the tip of the iceberg. And our opinion would probably sound very biased to those who only read the mainstream media or who have been constantly reminded and instilled with fear of change.
But seriously; if we want to see improvement and real progress, we need to change. Change the way we think. Change the way we perceive things. Change for the better.
A wise man once said, “He who rejects change is the architect of decay.” So, let this book, ‘March 8: Time for Real Change’, open your mind. Read it and then, tell me and those whom I share my stand with, if we’re biased.
‘March 8: Time for Real Change’, is an upgraded and revised edition of the 2008 original, titled ‘March 8 The Day Malaysia Woke Up’, put together by Kee Thuan Chye.
This edition is divided into 3 sections – Where We Are Now, Back to the Beginning and Where Do We Go from Here, and contains 42 essays altogether.
The ones in Where We Are Now discuss major issues that have happened since March 8, 2008 and reflect on whether the country is better or worse off.
Back to the Beginning consists of essays and interviews selected from the original book, which bring us back to the beginning of March 8, helping us to reflect and learn from our mistakes before moving forward. Lastly, in Where Do We Go from Here, we look forward and reignite hopes for a better future.
Hoping for real change
Spread sporadically throughout the book are comments and opinions shared by Malaysians from all walks of life, young and old, expressing their hopes for real change – each very moving, especially the ones written by determined, hopeful youths.
The essay that brought tugged at our hearts was the one written by Kee (right), titled Merdeka on March 8, which reminded us of what happened three years ago – the joy that spread like wild fire and camaraderie that had the right ingredients for the now 1Malaysia.
Everyone did their part to make a difference. There were those who came back from afar just to cast their votes, those who volunteered to help out at the polls and those who attended the numerous ceramahs during the campaign period, to see change. And change is what we got.
If this can’t convince people that we can make a difference, then I don’t know what can.
There are also brilliant interviews in this compilation. We enjoyed the ones with Raja Petra Kamaruddin (RPK) that had a rather suggestive title, How Big Are Your Balls? and Steven Gan in We Stand with the Underdogs.
It goes without saying that the interview with RPK is not without some bluntness, wisecracks and Malaysian slang slipping in every now and then. Not only did it tickle us to the core, but it made us ponder on a few things.
We liked what he said about fear. “Once you keep fearing and fearing, everything takut, gangster-lah, takut ini-lah, takut itu, I tell you we will never move forward.” And how can one learn not to be scared? “…set an example, and you get people to join you.”
And we found the last comment he gave in regard to Umno ruling by sheer intimidation, so true. Don’t blame the musang for eating the ayam, because that is its basic instinct. If you want to blame, blame the one who opened the door to let the musang in, i.e. people who gave the power to the parties to do so.
We Stand with the Underdogs, is an interview with Steven Gan, the editor of Malaysiakini, who’s also a dedicated, rare Malaysian journalist. In this interview, Steven shares with us about his experience and challenges working with an independent media.
The second half of this interview focuses on being an underdog and supporting those in the same position. “I think if BN happened to be out of power, we would be standing with them. It is part and parcel of the fact that there has to be some check and balance, and we need to play that role.”
Sweet success
Like many other Malaysians, he too, shared the sweet success of March 8. He said, “I think the most meaningful thing that came out of it is that there can be a change in government without riot”, further proving that we need not fear change, because we can handle change.
This book reminded us that change is possible; that there is hope for a better Malaysia. It helped us recollect what has happened and reignited that fire in us again, to want to make a difference.
Youths and those interested in knowing a little more about politics besides the ones you have read in the mainstream media would appreciate this book, as it gives a clear picture of what we have achieved thus far and what our future holds if we don’t do something about it today.
Please do not to turn a deaf ear and blind eye to politics; it’s not dirty if you’re fighting for peace and justice.
If you’ve never really cared about the future of Malaysia, then ‘March 8: Time for Real Change’ might just make you want to care about it now.
Monday, January 10, 2011
Saturday, January 8, 2011
Malay Contractors Association of Malaysia Apologises To CM Lim Guan Eng
Ketua Menteri Pulau Pinang mengadakan dialog bersama ahli-ahli dari Persatuan Kontraktor Melayu Malaysia Neger Pulau Pinang. Di dialog itu, YB Abdul Malik dan YBhg Dato' Farizan bin Darus Pegawai Kewangan Negeri Pulau Pinang dan pihak media juga turut bersama.
Yang Di Pertua Persatuan Kontraktor Melayu, YBhg Dato'... Haji Mohamed Fadzill Bin Hassan juga mengambil kesempatan memohon maaf berikutan laporan sesetengah pihak media yang menyiarkan berita yang negeri Pulau Pinang 'blacklist' 46 kontraktor Melayu.
Kontraktor Melayu tarik balik kenyataan terhadap Lim Guan Eng
By Himanshu Bhatt
The Sun
The Malay Contractors Association of Malaysia, which has in the past accused Penang Chief Minister Lim Guan Eng’s administration of marginalising Malay businesses, apologised to him today through a delegation to his office here.
The association’s deputy president Datuk Mohammed Fadzill Hassan, who headed the delegation of about a dozen members, personally tendered his apology to the state government.
He said they wished to cooperate and work along with the administration. Lim responded by describing the new outcome as a “positive turn of events”.
“I hope we can start a new relationship based on facts and not emotion,” he said.
Lim stressed that accusations that Malay contractors were sidelined under the current Pakatan Rakyat government were untrue.
“Malay contractors are able to perform very well, as most of those who have won contracts under the state’s open tender policy are Malays,” he said.
He said that previously, companies won contracts with the state government because of political connection, but now under the Pakatan Rakyat administration, contracts were issued on merit, with considerations given to quality and best pricing.
It is understood that the delegation had also spoken to Lim about retracting the names of 49 contractor members listed in a circular by Lim’s office to all department heads in the state government.
Lim said the state had not blacklisted the any company.
“We only want to ensure that all government contractors are competent and qualified, and not cronies of anyone,” he said at a press conference before the closed-door meeting with the delegation.
In one of his last attacks on Lim in December last year, Mohammed Fadzill, who is also the association’s Penang branch chairman, had alleged that Malay contractors were awarded only state projects of insignificant value.
Lim had responded by showing records that Malay contractors had been given 94% of the state’s Public Works Department (PWD) contracts and all the state’s Drainage and Irrigation Department (DID) projects.
Friday, January 7, 2011
Malay Problem Root Of Nation’s Problem
Sorry, I know I am suppose to come out with my next article "Pakatan Rakyat Cause The Premature Birth Of MCLM?" but is being delayed. My mind is not thinking right for the moment due to the daily shit that the ruling government is throwing at us. After 20 months the PM has not done much except for all his expensive slogans and talk.
Read the article below by a Malaysian Malay and you can reason out why umno/bn is so afraid to provide the right education and allowing the Malays to think out of the box.
AB Sulaiman
Malaysiakini
COMMENT
About a year and a bit ago, the Old Boys’ Association of the Royal Military College otherwise known as ‘Old Putras’ organised an evening of discourse.
The forum noted that the Malaysian people were fragmented, the economy at a virtual standstill, and democracy eroded by dictatorship, returning feudalism, and theocracy. Those present wanted to analyse the degeneration and like good citizens we were to come up with some solutions.
It was then that one speaker, Mohd Dahan if I remember correctly, who stood up to say, “Solve the Malay problem, and you solve the country’s problem.” Now we are in the first month of the second decade of the 21st century, the ring of truth in his statement still prevails.
But at this time, 53 years after independence and 10 years to becoming a high-income country, it appears we are still embedded deep in a long list of unsolved national problems, with many getting worse than before.
Here are but some of them: A restive and fragmented population, high migration rate, poor rate of growth, broken public institutions like education and the judiciary, high crime rate, degenerating personal and public morality, price increases, inflation, and a generally authoritative, intimidating and arrogant government. Our comparative indices with other countries like in areas of transparency, human rights, education, are all on the downward swing.
And corruption, the perennial social cancer, taking place at the highest possible level, involving amounts that would make Carlos Slim (currently the richest man in the world according to Forbes) and Bill Gates almost poor by comparison.
Hope lies eternal, so let’s see whether we can try to solve at least some of the national problems, by first solving some Malay problems, for this coming year.
But first, what exactly is the ‘Malay problem’?
Unable to break the inertia
My observation of this matter stemmed from the collective Malay lack of knowledge and of modern technical skills and thereby negatively reflected in the country’s wealth distribution scenario.
In 1957 the record books indicated that Malay economic involvement was no more than at a paltry 2 percent. This is not good at all as viewed and agreed on by the founding fathers and every meaningful citizen of whatever ethnic background.
Since then the Malays have been given all opportunities to be more fruitfully involved in the country’s economic activities. In 1970, a name was given to this ground-breaking exercise known as social engineering under the New Economic Policy.
Lavishly-funded government policies and programmes were introduced to even the playing field for Malay incursion into the national economy.
But try as they might, the Malays could not manage to break the inertia and achieve any planning targets. (Please spare me the need to repeat even some of the details for they have been pretty well and regularly documented by proponents, supporters and critics alike.)
This was to me the first time the Malay problem surfaced. It’s that the perception that Malay economic backwardness (and ‘problem’) is solely economic in its cause and could largely be solved under the NEP.
In fact its architect, Abdul Razak Hussein (right), asked for 20 years for the project implementation; surely thinking that this period was enough to see the Malay through.
Sadly, history has indicated there has been a fundamental flaw in this presumption. In reality, his economic ineptitude being one, but far more is his psychological or mental deficiency.
Psychological or mental? Yes. He has this innate inability to realise that upon independence the country was morphing progressively into a new era: From old to new, rural to urban, agrarian to manufacturing, ancient to modern. From a life aligned with nature and the natural featured by myth, magic, miracle and mystery, to one surrounded and led by technical principles and science. It was an era of change.
Change requires a few mental subtleties. First there must be awareness or consciousness of the advent of change, and second, it requires a willingness to adapt to it. Without these two, any change is but a natural progression. The mind must therefore be equipped to be conscious and be aware of change. This is what the Malay did not have.
Ketuanan Melayu
History tells us that the Malay has not been able to produce the thinking faculty to recognise the coming of change to begin with. Hardly surprising therefore for him to show an inability to adapt at the appropriate time. He has no ability to accept and adapt to change.
So this is to me the root of the ‘Malay problem’.
This inability to change again to me reflects the inner features and characteristics of Malay thinking:
i) It is ethnocentric: it believes in the superiority of its own type over all other types.
ii) It is non-scientific: it believes in not yet ascertained truth and in non-provable ones.
iii) It is quick in denial.
iv) It is not aware of its mistakes.
They would produce the following end-product or behaviour patterns:
v) The Malay is a superior race.
vi) Islam is the one and only religion that gets approval from God Almighty.
vii) These are irrefutable truths.
viii) Anyone denying the above is a traitor to the race and an apostate to religion.
Items (i) to (iv) indicate that the Malay is racially conscious and highly religion bound. Items (v) to (viii) reveal his racism and religious tendencies. They in turn at least partially explain the favourite Malay ideology ‘untuk agama, bangsa dan negara’.
They have also been personified by the ketuanan Melayu entity, and giving rise to the Perkasa movement.
Doubters to this contention might wish to counter check: Are ketuanan Melayu and Perkasa not ethnocentric? They are for championing ‘Malay rights’ when the constitution says it’s only Malay ‘special privileges’.
They are also non-scientific for championing Islam, or at least the government-approved version of Islam: Sunni sect, Imam Shafie line, and until recently, Islam Hadhari variety.
Who then are ketuanan Melayu members? To me, the ketuanan Melayu entity comprises those who generally harbour the eight features just mentioned above. As individuals they are:
i) The ruling party members, especially Umno leaders;
ii) The civil servants running the government machinery;
iii) The officers and personnel running government agencies like the police, military, customs, immigration, etc.;
iv) The ulama whose job is to protect and propagate Islam;
v) Political chiefs aspiring to get to the top of the party ladder.
It’s eerie to think the obvious – that this list would net almost the entire educated, urban, middle class, Malay population. And they are the embodiment of the Malay problem!
In other words, the root, core, essence of the Malay problem is the Malay collective culture!
Shameful performance
How has this collective culture been performing as the top leaders and managers of the country? Well, unless I am grossly wrong, you can’t create something good out of something rotten. Ketuanan Melayu (i.e. racism and religious fundamentalism) to me is something definitely rotten. So Malay supremacy has been able to create in the last decade or so the following:
a) Bending the laws to suit Malay interests. In this case the constitution has been amended a record 40 times (with 650 individual amendments) since 1957. Compare this with the US that has amended its constitution about 27 times since its founding. Or, Singapore, four times. Racism is institutionalised in this country!
b) Breaking the thin line between Syariah and civil laws. The supremacy of the constitution has been eroded.
c. Breaking down of institutions like the check and balance features of democratic governance. Democracy is all but dead. Have the periodic general elections, and that’s it, democracy is observed. Whatever happens in between is another matter altogether.
d) The flagrant use of lies, deceit, hooliganism on the part of the ruling elite against its own people. There is this massive breaking down of individual and public morality.
There are countless thousands of others.
We come back to Dahan’s wisdom. Now that we have re-acquainted ourselves with the Malay problem, how do we go about solving it?
This is no easy task for the obstacles are enormous. On the one side we have a people under the ketuanan Melayu ambit digging deep into the fortress of race and religion and not at all ashamed to use the political power available at its disposal. To the Malay, the saying that the ends justify the means is enshrined in gold.
The government and ketuanan Melayu are not about to let go easily. They are deep in the quagmire of lies, deceit, corruption, even sin and criminality. Only by them staying in power will they be able to prevent the law from taking its course.
On the other side we have the 21st century world demanding a 21st century open and flexible mind. Some of them are: Technical ability, professionalism, openness, honesty, fairness, justice, morality, transparency, responsibility, accountability and integrity.
Solutions
Whatever programme we have to solve the Malay problem, two elements must be present: The secularisation of the Malay mind and the restoration of basic human rights to the peoples of Malaysia.
It has to be repeated that it won’t be easy.
But hope against hope, the government must restore power to the people; the ulama must come to terms with universal realities. Civil servants too should reorient their thinking to serve the people rather than the politicians.
And the people, the average Malay down the road, must come to realise that the world is not an oyster, that individualism is the key to any personal or national development.
How can all these be achieved? Thinking influences behaviour – the ketuanan Melayu Malay mind must change from its ethnocentricity and non-scientific features to one of openness, fairness, rationality and respect for other men.
Develop the sense of the individual in him. Secularise Malay thinking. Open his closed mind. Go for secular education. Teach philosophy in schools. Do not teach children about religion until they are able to think for themselves.
Do anything to make the Malay more receptive for change. Then perhaps we can begin to solve the Malay problem, in 2011 and onwards.
AB SULAIMAN is an observer of human traits and foibles, especially within the context of religion and culture. As a liberal, he marvels at the way orthodoxy fights to maintain its credibility in a devilishly fast-changing world. He hopes to provide some understanding to the issues at hand and wherever possible, suggest some solutions. He holds a Bachelor in Social Sciences (Leicester, UK) and a Diploma in Public Administration, Universiti Malaya.
Read the article below by a Malaysian Malay and you can reason out why umno/bn is so afraid to provide the right education and allowing the Malays to think out of the box.
AB Sulaiman
Malaysiakini
COMMENT
About a year and a bit ago, the Old Boys’ Association of the Royal Military College otherwise known as ‘Old Putras’ organised an evening of discourse.
The forum noted that the Malaysian people were fragmented, the economy at a virtual standstill, and democracy eroded by dictatorship, returning feudalism, and theocracy. Those present wanted to analyse the degeneration and like good citizens we were to come up with some solutions.
It was then that one speaker, Mohd Dahan if I remember correctly, who stood up to say, “Solve the Malay problem, and you solve the country’s problem.” Now we are in the first month of the second decade of the 21st century, the ring of truth in his statement still prevails.
But at this time, 53 years after independence and 10 years to becoming a high-income country, it appears we are still embedded deep in a long list of unsolved national problems, with many getting worse than before.
Here are but some of them: A restive and fragmented population, high migration rate, poor rate of growth, broken public institutions like education and the judiciary, high crime rate, degenerating personal and public morality, price increases, inflation, and a generally authoritative, intimidating and arrogant government. Our comparative indices with other countries like in areas of transparency, human rights, education, are all on the downward swing.
And corruption, the perennial social cancer, taking place at the highest possible level, involving amounts that would make Carlos Slim (currently the richest man in the world according to Forbes) and Bill Gates almost poor by comparison.
Hope lies eternal, so let’s see whether we can try to solve at least some of the national problems, by first solving some Malay problems, for this coming year.
But first, what exactly is the ‘Malay problem’?
Unable to break the inertia
My observation of this matter stemmed from the collective Malay lack of knowledge and of modern technical skills and thereby negatively reflected in the country’s wealth distribution scenario.
In 1957 the record books indicated that Malay economic involvement was no more than at a paltry 2 percent. This is not good at all as viewed and agreed on by the founding fathers and every meaningful citizen of whatever ethnic background.
Since then the Malays have been given all opportunities to be more fruitfully involved in the country’s economic activities. In 1970, a name was given to this ground-breaking exercise known as social engineering under the New Economic Policy.
Lavishly-funded government policies and programmes were introduced to even the playing field for Malay incursion into the national economy.
But try as they might, the Malays could not manage to break the inertia and achieve any planning targets. (Please spare me the need to repeat even some of the details for they have been pretty well and regularly documented by proponents, supporters and critics alike.)
This was to me the first time the Malay problem surfaced. It’s that the perception that Malay economic backwardness (and ‘problem’) is solely economic in its cause and could largely be solved under the NEP.
In fact its architect, Abdul Razak Hussein (right), asked for 20 years for the project implementation; surely thinking that this period was enough to see the Malay through.
Sadly, history has indicated there has been a fundamental flaw in this presumption. In reality, his economic ineptitude being one, but far more is his psychological or mental deficiency.
Psychological or mental? Yes. He has this innate inability to realise that upon independence the country was morphing progressively into a new era: From old to new, rural to urban, agrarian to manufacturing, ancient to modern. From a life aligned with nature and the natural featured by myth, magic, miracle and mystery, to one surrounded and led by technical principles and science. It was an era of change.
Change requires a few mental subtleties. First there must be awareness or consciousness of the advent of change, and second, it requires a willingness to adapt to it. Without these two, any change is but a natural progression. The mind must therefore be equipped to be conscious and be aware of change. This is what the Malay did not have.
Ketuanan Melayu
History tells us that the Malay has not been able to produce the thinking faculty to recognise the coming of change to begin with. Hardly surprising therefore for him to show an inability to adapt at the appropriate time. He has no ability to accept and adapt to change.
So this is to me the root of the ‘Malay problem’.
This inability to change again to me reflects the inner features and characteristics of Malay thinking:
i) It is ethnocentric: it believes in the superiority of its own type over all other types.
ii) It is non-scientific: it believes in not yet ascertained truth and in non-provable ones.
iii) It is quick in denial.
iv) It is not aware of its mistakes.
They would produce the following end-product or behaviour patterns:
v) The Malay is a superior race.
vi) Islam is the one and only religion that gets approval from God Almighty.
vii) These are irrefutable truths.
viii) Anyone denying the above is a traitor to the race and an apostate to religion.
Items (i) to (iv) indicate that the Malay is racially conscious and highly religion bound. Items (v) to (viii) reveal his racism and religious tendencies. They in turn at least partially explain the favourite Malay ideology ‘untuk agama, bangsa dan negara’.
They have also been personified by the ketuanan Melayu entity, and giving rise to the Perkasa movement.
Doubters to this contention might wish to counter check: Are ketuanan Melayu and Perkasa not ethnocentric? They are for championing ‘Malay rights’ when the constitution says it’s only Malay ‘special privileges’.
They are also non-scientific for championing Islam, or at least the government-approved version of Islam: Sunni sect, Imam Shafie line, and until recently, Islam Hadhari variety.
Who then are ketuanan Melayu members? To me, the ketuanan Melayu entity comprises those who generally harbour the eight features just mentioned above. As individuals they are:
i) The ruling party members, especially Umno leaders;
ii) The civil servants running the government machinery;
iii) The officers and personnel running government agencies like the police, military, customs, immigration, etc.;
iv) The ulama whose job is to protect and propagate Islam;
v) Political chiefs aspiring to get to the top of the party ladder.
It’s eerie to think the obvious – that this list would net almost the entire educated, urban, middle class, Malay population. And they are the embodiment of the Malay problem!
In other words, the root, core, essence of the Malay problem is the Malay collective culture!
Shameful performance
How has this collective culture been performing as the top leaders and managers of the country? Well, unless I am grossly wrong, you can’t create something good out of something rotten. Ketuanan Melayu (i.e. racism and religious fundamentalism) to me is something definitely rotten. So Malay supremacy has been able to create in the last decade or so the following:
a) Bending the laws to suit Malay interests. In this case the constitution has been amended a record 40 times (with 650 individual amendments) since 1957. Compare this with the US that has amended its constitution about 27 times since its founding. Or, Singapore, four times. Racism is institutionalised in this country!
b) Breaking the thin line between Syariah and civil laws. The supremacy of the constitution has been eroded.
c. Breaking down of institutions like the check and balance features of democratic governance. Democracy is all but dead. Have the periodic general elections, and that’s it, democracy is observed. Whatever happens in between is another matter altogether.
d) The flagrant use of lies, deceit, hooliganism on the part of the ruling elite against its own people. There is this massive breaking down of individual and public morality.
There are countless thousands of others.
We come back to Dahan’s wisdom. Now that we have re-acquainted ourselves with the Malay problem, how do we go about solving it?
This is no easy task for the obstacles are enormous. On the one side we have a people under the ketuanan Melayu ambit digging deep into the fortress of race and religion and not at all ashamed to use the political power available at its disposal. To the Malay, the saying that the ends justify the means is enshrined in gold.
The government and ketuanan Melayu are not about to let go easily. They are deep in the quagmire of lies, deceit, corruption, even sin and criminality. Only by them staying in power will they be able to prevent the law from taking its course.
On the other side we have the 21st century world demanding a 21st century open and flexible mind. Some of them are: Technical ability, professionalism, openness, honesty, fairness, justice, morality, transparency, responsibility, accountability and integrity.
Solutions
Whatever programme we have to solve the Malay problem, two elements must be present: The secularisation of the Malay mind and the restoration of basic human rights to the peoples of Malaysia.
It has to be repeated that it won’t be easy.
But hope against hope, the government must restore power to the people; the ulama must come to terms with universal realities. Civil servants too should reorient their thinking to serve the people rather than the politicians.
And the people, the average Malay down the road, must come to realise that the world is not an oyster, that individualism is the key to any personal or national development.
How can all these be achieved? Thinking influences behaviour – the ketuanan Melayu Malay mind must change from its ethnocentricity and non-scientific features to one of openness, fairness, rationality and respect for other men.
Develop the sense of the individual in him. Secularise Malay thinking. Open his closed mind. Go for secular education. Teach philosophy in schools. Do not teach children about religion until they are able to think for themselves.
Do anything to make the Malay more receptive for change. Then perhaps we can begin to solve the Malay problem, in 2011 and onwards.
AB SULAIMAN is an observer of human traits and foibles, especially within the context of religion and culture. As a liberal, he marvels at the way orthodoxy fights to maintain its credibility in a devilishly fast-changing world. He hopes to provide some understanding to the issues at hand and wherever possible, suggest some solutions. He holds a Bachelor in Social Sciences (Leicester, UK) and a Diploma in Public Administration, Universiti Malaya.
Wednesday, January 5, 2011
Teoh Beng Hock Inquest: What A Frivolous Verdict
Death Not By Suicide
Death Not By Homicide
Its An Open Verdict
So, after spending so much time and money we are back to square one. The question remains:
I will not reproduce the coroner's long frivolous judgement in this blog because it's not worth reading them.
Saturday, January 1, 2011
2011 - The Rise Of Pakatan Rakyat, The Imminent Fall Of Umno/BN
Let us Malaysians start the New Year with a Big Bang. May our New Year resolutions not be for self but for the country. We should resolve to be fully committed to voting in a new Federal Government at the next GE, one that will bring about the changes Malaysians have desired for so long.It would appear that 2010 was a very good year for Najib, even though all he did was to plaster the whole country with slogans and rhetoric that benefitted no one but his wife, foreign agents and cronies. Just imagine the millions or even billions wasted to promote them. And it is the rakyat's money!
What comes out of Najib's mouth sounds so hollow. You must have read in the Mainstream Media his various speeches in front of different communities. He paints a rosy picture to arouse the rakyat into believing that what he is 'trying' to do is for the 'good' of the country.
He talks about unity, equality, religious tolerance, Bangsa Malaysia but his actions contradict his preaching. He can still tolerate the racists Utusan, Perkasa and civil servants spreading racial hatred and religious intolerance. All these are living proof that Umno/BN have failed in their 54 years of administration and governing.
The alternative media and bloggers too have countered all these insincere promises and pointed out that talk and slogans alone will not unite the country and bring prosperity to the rakyat.
We must reject Umno’s/BN’s call to return them to power again. There is totally no hope that they will change. BN’s continuing rule of this country will only bring more hardship to the rakyat and will bankrupt the country.
After March 2008, we expected Umno/BN to realise that there are so many faults in their ways of governing. However, instead of making amends, they have continued to use strong-arm tactics, undemocratic processes and a divide-and-rule system to stay on top. It is in name only that Umno/BN upholds democracy. In reality, it is leaning towards becoming a totalitarian regime.
Can you still tolerate Umno/BN, given their undemocratic actions, corruption and racism? While taking a break from writing this article, I read the news that Najib & Co are on their way to power-grabbing Selangor – just like what they did to Perak. And it was reported too that no cross was to be visible and no sermon allowed when Najib attended a Christmas function recently. This is a clear sign that 1Malaysia is not accepted even within Najib's own administration.
Najib & Co do not care about the rakyat. They are busy planning and plotting how to take back the States that they lost in order to regain a two-thirds majority. They will not hesitate to resort to underhanded methods and undemocratic processes and yes, they will get the help of the EC in the coming GE to ensure a win.
The 2008 tsunami shook up Umno/BN but it did not destroy their corrupt, arrogant, racist and undemocratic nature. To date, they have still not felt any shame in using their power to betray the rakyat and choke the States under PR of development funds. This country cannot afford to continue to allow such incompetent and undemocratic leaders to govern any further.
Malaysians must learn to accept the truth – that this country and its citizens can survive without this regime. We need not be afraid of their threats. We must recognise that it is we who decide the government of the day, not Umno/BN. We need to punish Umno/BN for not listening to us and we must put them into cold storage for 2 or 3 terms.
We must believe our hands are not tied. We have choices in everything. If you don't like a Proton Saga, you can go for a Persona. And there are many other choices of car models and makes. If you don't like Versace, you can have Christian Dior, Amani and many other brands of clothing, perfume and make-up. The choice is yours to make. But make a wise choice, for otherwise the consequences can be disastrous.
Umno/BN have been the ruling government for 54 years and we have grown tired of their undemocratic actions, their censoring of our freedom, their corruption, racism, unequal distribution of the nation’s wealth, poor education system plus their downright incompetence.
We now have a choice, an opportunity to rid our country of the cancer inflicted by Umno/BN and to start afresh with Pakatan Rakyat. Yes, there are weaknesses and flaws in PR. They may not be 100% perfect (which government is?) but I am very sure they are well over 100% better than Umno/BN.
So, join me in spreading this call:
My next posting : Pakatan Rakyat Cause The Premature Birth Of MCLM?
MCLM looks complicated and confusing only to those who want it to look that way.
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