elected to serve, not to own

Prime Minister Datuk Seri Najib Tun Razak was quoted as saying that Hulu Selangor had traditionally been a Barisan stronghold but was "on loan to PKR for a while". He was quoted as saying: "The time has come for the loan to lapse and the seat to be returned to Barisan".

Pardon me, Mr. Prime Minister. Neither Barisan Nasional nor Pakatan Rakyat "own" Hulu Selangor or Malaysia for that matter. The voters elect a representative to Parliament to carry out their manifest will, not for someone to be a vehicle for his party to do as the party bosses please. You are elected as a servant to listen to the voices on the ground and to serve them. You do not "own" anything. A Parliamentary or a state seat or any elected position is not a property nor a commodity for you to own or to run as your own personal fiefdom and to barter, trade and buy or sell as you will. Get that straight.

Holiday in sleepy hollow

Writer and sasterawan Salleh Ben Joned who was born in rural Malacca pretty much sums it all up about Malacca when he wrote about his "poor beloved Melaka", "sad Old Melaka", "Sleepy Hollow" - all fitting epithets to describe old Malacca in much the same way that it is known today as it has been known since years of yore and lore. Property prices in Malacca uncommonly gain/appreciate in value and when they do it is usually at sleepy hollow pace, businesses here typically move at a very "as i please" pace and its people are kind but generally frown upon outside attempts to hurry and punctualise Malaccans. I'm writing this on a hot and bright afternoon in sleepy hollow, the air so thick and humid, the heat so radiant from outside that i bask in its baking glow even from within a construct of bricks concrete and mortar. Malacca Malacca what can i say about you that hasn't already been said and written? Today the 7th anniversary of our "historical city day" will no doubt pass with little fanfare outside of officialdom. People going about their business as they please, as they like. And i actually like it. This grows on you. I don't mean that if you stay in malacca you will be condemned to a culture of laziness and complacency (some undoubtedly believe that) but the pace of life here is slow enough to render a certain healthful contentment to me. I'm a rusher alright, don't get me wrong but sometimes i admire folks of the more relaxed type. They're unhurried, they do what they do as and when they like and they finish it when they jolly well feel like it. Before you roll over belly-up laughing and fat ass all over the floor, consider this - in a state with a total population of about three-quarters of a million, a mere town over 7 years ago and inducted into cityhood by grace of political patronage, people generally agree that Malacca is a nice place to bring up your kids, it is a safe place. So if i can take safety as a plus and not get totally sucked into the lazy-and-complacent mindset, life here can be good.
I don't expect to make megabucks in old sleepy hollow, i don't expect corporate types to make a big imprint on anything in poor old melaka. i expect life to go on here as it always has with me right smack in the middle of it. And happily too, i hope. i pray even ;-)

nigga4life

i went out for lunch yesterday and again someone brought up the issue of the 5% government tax at fastfood outlets such as McDonald's, Pizza Hut and Kentucky Fried Chicken restaurants. Rumors have been circulating that Malays are exempted from paying the tax after a meal while non-Malays are charged. Anyway, one of my lunchtime associates asked a man-about-town to confirm whether the rumors were true. man-about-town confirmed that the rumors were true - he personally went out to pizza hut for a meal and asked a Malay buddy to get the bill. And Lo and behold, the bill was indeed cheaper when paid by a Malay. Immediately i asked but isn't this practice illegal? My lunchtime associates laughed. I also queried how they could ascertain whether the customer was malay or non-Malay since some Malays looked like non-Malays and vice-versa? No one could answer me on that point. I surmised that if indeed there was this practice, it can't be company policy or the law (as far as i know the sales and service tax applies uniformly acorss the board regardless of race) but rather some miscreant employees sympathising with poor malays and not charging them 5% govt tax. But wouldn't they be caught by the fastfood outlet Manager when they balance the cashier's till at the end of each day? Hmmmm

the importance of being earnest

Going out on a field project today with my office co-worker we got to talking as he drove me in his proton waja to the project site which is just a little out of town. We talked about everything and anything - politics, the government in Malaysia, the MCA, the government's affirmative action programmes, kids, you name it, we probably talked about it. He is a Straits-born baba-nyonya and he is very experienced when it comes to field work so he led me along and i mostly listened. Work apart, i found his views interesting and yet somewhat unsettling. He felt that all government projects, especially projects in Malacca, were a means to an end. the means was the project, the ends was kick-backs and bribes returned for securing the projects, into the pockets of our state politicians. While at the project itself that we visited we heard of a request from a JKK (Jawatan Kuasa Kemajuan dan Keselamatan Kampung - Village Development & Safety Committee) member that the non-bumi lots facing his house lying just outside the project boundary be moved so that his house would face the bumi lots. The allocation of bumi lots in any project in Melaka is usually about 60% of all lots and the blueprint is drawn up by the state government solely without the developer's influence or input. So this request from the JKK member came as a surprise. Coming back to my co-worker, he felt that projects such as the airport expansion plan in malacca was done to grease state politicians' pockets. "Why do they do it there and not somewhere else where there is empty land? You see, when they acquire land where there is housing already they get kick-backs too". On the journey home we spoke awhile about other things such as the government's allocations for vernacular schools. His take: "Well, they take nice photos with a big mock cheque but later when they cash the cheque it always bounces one". He even thought that fast food outlets such as KFC and McDonald's charged non-bumis service tax of 5% but exempted Malays from paying service tax. He was positive that his sources were true. When we were at the project i was approached by a man whose wife was a Sarawakian bumi. He wanted to know if his wife, being a bumi, was entitled to the bumi discount and could buy a bumi lot. We told him that under existing Malacca State land regulations they could not qualify for bumi lots as the bumi lots are reserved for Malays only. The man said:" Well, then they should say in the poster only for Malays instead of for Bumis which is misleading". Another non-bumi visitor openly voiced his dissatisfaction with the status quo and wondered if his children would rebel against this system. "We can take it, but how do we explain this to them?" was his take. On the road home later my co-worker told me that corrupt officials loved to resort to court action because all the judges were on their (the corrupt politicians') side.

I've heard about enough and this comes up all the time. Jaundiced views or close approximations to the truth, your guess is as good as mine. I am surprised that people believe half the things they believe, some of which are true and others a wildly exaggerated version of somebody's experience heard via hearsay. The bottom line is that the Malaysian government's credibility is very low and this makes it all the harder for the government to do its job. How do you perform when people are so willing to believe the worst things about you? As i write this i believe that the government has just come up with the broad brush strokes of the New Economic Model. I hope that they get it right at the implementation level especially and make sure that state governments conform to the liberalised regime and not merely carry on with business as usual. By golly, one gets tired of hearing the same old hash over and over and over again.

a tale of 2 cities

i'm driving up to kuala lumpur today after having gone down to singapore a few days ago. i don't make it a habit to go to singapore as often as when i was younger mainly because the exchange rate makes buying more expensive in the island republic, but when i do go i always observe what has changed about singapore. and what i saw this time took my breath away. we didn't have to drive around, we took the MRT tubes to where-ever we wanted to go and the MRTs were fast and on time and they had MRT stations conveniently located in almost every conceivable place. The escalators in orchard road were fast. HDB housing areas were clean and well-maintained. In all the public toilets i used the flush was strong and the toilets clean. Road signs were clear and helpful, you could actually trust in their road signs to get you to where you wanted to go. Singaporeans, particularly the younger generation, were polite and civic-minded. i have had doors opened for me, sorrys and excuse mes when i was bumped into, no queue jumpers at eateries, polite drivers on the road. in short, they reminded me of when i am visiting a developed country. Of course, Singaporeans themselves would beg to differ: they are unhappy with the high cost of living, ERP road tolls, foreigners taking away their jobs housing school places etc all the normal grouses that you'd expect locals to bear against their government just as we in Malaysia do. But while Singaporeans grumble about social realities, they grudgingly concur when i pointed out all the good things their government had laid on the table for their convenience. Sadly, we Malaysians do not enjoy such amenities.
It is true that many foreigners make their way to singapore to eke out a living. One of my friends who is a lawyer told me how he interviewed over 300 job applicants for the position of secretary and almost ALL were foreigners, be it malaysians, myanmareans, indonesians, etc. i spoke to my sister's filipino maid and she told me in equally gushing terms of how living in singapore was good compared to the corruption and backwardness back home. "oh we do have the shopping places too but here you get all the latest IT gadgets". Another friend told me of his long walks across parks linked together by park connectors or bridges linking certain big parks in singapore together so that walkers could have uninterrupted nature rambles at their leisure. This isn't possible in kuala lumpur. the more i look at things the more i felt a tinge of sadness and remorse. one feels like a hungry child staring at all the cake goodies through the shop window. Why can't we make the same great strides towards developed nation status as singapore? Back in the 50s, 60s even right up to the mid-70s the Malaysian Ringgit was on parity level with the Singapore dollar. the current exchange rate is about S$1 to RM2.39. In Kuala Lumpur we have ugly massive concrete pillars supporting our monorails which aren't quite as fast and on time as we'd like them to be. There is little greenery in Kuala Lumpur. But i admit that the road system in Kuala Lumpur has improved much over the years. However, the lack of public transport is something which only the government has the resources to develop and this is sorely lacking in Kuala Lumpur. This isn't something new, my story. People say the grass is greener on the other side. Well, i have actually been to the other side and it is a manicured lawn. I just hope that someday we will reach developed nation status and not have to encounter too many hiccups along the way. Our politicians bicker and fight over scraps while others zoom by us. The people who run singapore focus on the job at hand and get it done, no nonsense and no excuses accepted. We have progressed haphazardly while they have made giant leaps over the same time frame. Will our politicians quit fucking around and please wake the fuck up?

Timely Rain

A few days ago the first blessed showers to break the recent dry spell fell, much to everyone's relief. We take a lot of things for granted in our little corner of the globe. Fresh water supply for one. If the El Nino-induced drought dragged on for longer our water dams would very soon run dry and we'd be rationing water. Like during that very severe drought in the early 90s when everyone bought buckets and waited for the water truck or took showers at relatives' houses which had wells.
It rained again today. I'm keeping my fingers crossed for more rain. And for God's blessings. We have much to be grateful for. Lest we forget how fragile we are.

Sign of the Times

The Lunar New Year has come and gone. Earthquakes in Haiti, Chile, Taiwan, Japan and now Turkey. The hot and dry season beats down with unrelenting dullness - I'm challenged enough to NOT be dulled and so far i'm ok. In Europe, floods and wet weather. The local economy seems to be on an uptrend, the local stock market post-Lunar New Year is rallying once again. Interest rates are "normalising" (a tick up). I'm changing jobs. The governing party is trying to buy over enough MPs to form a two-thirds majority in Parliament so that it can re-draw electoral constituencies in its favour. Some MPs take the money. Some take promotions. Our oil is going to run out in about 20 years.

Ahhh March, life goes on.