Thinking Allowed Heyday of the Patriarch As the days go by, this writer is getting more pessimistic about a post- Che Det era. Nothing in the offing promises optimism. Take the latest development in UMNO � �No Fixed Term for the President� screamed the headlines. Now, isn�t that familiar? Not too long past, an infamous leader of a neighbouring country gradually got the people�s assembly to declare himself �president for life�. Cut the crap UMNO and declare the man President for Life! Shall we say we can at the latest expect such an announcement in the next five years, say, after the 2004 general election. It is a well-know axiom that the heyday of a dictatorship is also, ironically, its point of imminent decay � or so the historians say. Accordingly, the patriarch always amasses inordinate power, controls and manipulates every conceivable aspect of political life, eliminates all manner of dissidence and opposition, and gathers around him sycophants and hangers-on by the score, ready to satiate his every whim. When he�s really lost his grip on politics in the true sense, he continues to debilitate and destroy all that�s good in society in order to stay in power. He becomes the enemy of the people but the people shrouded by blinkers don�t see the stark truth till it�s usually too late. Are we really in such a situation? I beg to disagree. Yes, I hate to sound morbid but in my humble opinion our patriarch is still on the ascendancy. He still has yet to eliminate remnants of the Reformasi opposition, scores of troublesome social activists, several wanabee PM aspirants, a few more recalcitrant judges, etc, etc. A lot more work on the desk, I�m afraid. Autumn of the patriarch? Hell, no! He�s hardly reached his heyday! Annexation By Any Name Smells As Sweet! � First Mahathir denies the Kelantan people their water. Then Mahathir takes away the Terengganu people�s oil royalty. Now Mahathir annexes Putra Jaya and declares it Federal Territory. � (Raja Petra Kamaruddin, Information Chief of Barisan Alternative). The quotation from Raja Petra should give one pause for thought. The patriarch is indeed going about his business relentlessly and, what�s more there�s probably more of the same to come. Let�s take a look at the Putra Jaya �annexation� first. On November 7, an agreement will be signed to hand over Putra Jaya to the Federal Government. Putra Jaya would be �sold� for RM800 million plus an annual payment of RM7.5 million. Not too different from Francis Light paying the Sultan of Kedah an annuity of six thousand Spanish dollars for the island of Penang in 1786 - what? To be sure, Light got away with it pretty cheap but what�s 800 million and 7.5 million p.a. of the Malaysian taxpayers� money to Dr. M?
UMNO Selangor subsequently submitted a list of 11 potential successors to the PM. However, he chose none of the named but rather a rookie politician who, needless to say, would be more than willing to do his master�s bidding. Again reliable sources point out that His Majesty the King summoned the Regent, acting as Sultan of Selangor, to convene a meeting of the Royal Council. It was apparent during this meeting the Putra Jaya decision was to be endorsed, signed and sealed. Only the small matter of what quantum of money will be due to the state was debatable. Now, wouldn�t all of this serve as a nice precedent for the next federal �annexation� in Selangor � Cyber Jaya? In the light of the Putra Jaya affair, the quotation below by Dr. Mahathir seems wickedly appropriate:
�We cannot remove the Sultans. We still need them to give out awards on birthdays. If there were no Sultans who would give out the awards?�
Early To School, Early To Rise So, the Education Ministry has got wind of the idea that toddlers at the kindergartens, if given the right push, may qualify for a quick promotion to Standard Two. The underlying principle here, one would assume, is that the earlier you get them into the pressure cooker, the better the results. Never mind if the kids enjoy learning at their own pace. Nope. Just put them through the grind as early as we can and, hey presto, they�ll hop, step skip and jump out of school with the right tempo, yes, to the strains of the new upbeat and jazzed-up Negaraku! This weird notion of education that has infected many an educational official and Minister too, is that children are completely malleable and you can turn them overnight into what ever one wants. All they need to do is just follow what the teachers and the authorities tell them to do and say. Inquisitive, thinking minds? Nah, none of that�s required. Engendered Politics That�s why when some students, especially those in the universities, started to show some sign of thinking and curiosity, the powers that be can become rather upset and disturbed. From the prime minister downwards, government officials are continually haranguing students that their function is to read books and pass their exams, nothing else. Only after graduation should they think of the larger society and, become politicians if politics catch their fancy. Their minds must be focused on their studies. They should not waste the opportunity to improve their intellectual selves. In fact, those found to disobey this �golden rule��will be subject to disciplinary action or given marching orders. But recently, it looks like the ruling coalition, in particular UMNO, has had second thoughts about all of this. Malay, teenage women have now been given every encouragement to participate in politics via UMNO�s new Puteri wing. The party must have been reminded of the pivotal role played by Kaum Ibu of yore. But the question is will the new Puteri wing be able to do anything substantial or will this be yet another cosmetic embellishment to an aging party? Fairest In The Land Tighten your belts for a new round of price hikes � from bus, LRT and airfares, to telephone and electricity tariffs, to highway tolls. Already the cost of cooking gas and food items like fish and vegetables have escalated because of �increased transportation costs or charges�. What else does one expect after the 10-sen per litre rise in petrol approved by the government last month? Not to worry though. The government has promised that the increases will be fair and closely monitored. Consider, even with the recent hike, the prices of petrol and diesel is still �among the cheapest� in the region. And as though on cue, quite suddenly there have been several news reports, (�investigative� ones, mind you!) in the mainstream media about diesel smuggling by boats, people from a neighbouring country queueing around our petrol stations to fill up before returning home, etc. A MAS spokesperson has also announced that its airfares for individuals would go up by between 10-30 per cent, and for group travel by about 30%. But again, we are reminded that �airfares in Malaysia are still among the cheapest in the region�. To ensure such fairness, proposed hikes are first of all studied carefully. A multi-ministry committee, for instance, has been set up �to study the toll rise and its implications on highway users and the concessionaires of four major highways�. Asked how long the study would take, Works Minister Samy replied: �Surveys have to be done and studies have to be carried out. It will take some time�. To save time, and definitely expenditure, independent regulators on essential commodities and services could be appointed, as is the practice in many democratic countries. When price hikes are proposed, the regulator conducts hearings that the public has access to, via consumer groups, that are allowed to bring their accountants to the hearings, like the concessionaires. It can then be determined whether the price hikes are justifiable or not. For very often, the concessionaire does not make the desired net profit, and demand for new hikes, because of high operating costs. And these could be a result of mismanagement and/or ridiculous remunerations for top executives. Who knows if this is the situation vis-�-vis our Malaysian concession-aires and utilities providers? At present regulation is conducted by the government behind closed doors. And all details are unavailable to the public. � And More Studies Remember the Works Minister also prided himself on being an expert on gangsteerism some months back ? Well, he�s now persuaded the �Cabinet Committee on Social Ills� to provide the MIC with a RM20 million grant to tackle social problems confronting the Indian community. A new approach will be adopted: it will be �total and holistic, non ad-hoc, proactive, professional and monitored in a systematic way�. By his own admission, the current approach is �ad hoc, non-professional, reactive in nature, very emotional and with hidden and not proper agenda�. Who�s Samy referring to ? The MIC ? The government ? Foot-in-the-mouth disease ? So how is the new approach to be realised ? Through �smart partnership� of course, between the MIC�s Yayasan Strategik Sosial and a certain Pintas Negara � apparently a government-appointed consultancy charged with formulating a master plan for dealing with social ills. There will be national, state and local level projects targetting the entire Indian community over the next five years: 40,000 in 2000, 100,000 in 2001, 200,000 in 2002, 300,000 in 2003, and 200,000 in 2004. RM2m will be spent this year, RM5m each in 2001, 2002 and 2003, and RM3m in 2004. Hmm, smart arithmetic so far. And the projects themselves? All we�ve heard are the distribution of thousands of anti-crime posters, leaflets and car stickers, and organising workshops and �discourses�. The MIC Youths themselves will become �big brother� to problem schoolchildren. Samy says that �the youth leaders will go down to the ground and identify schools with a large number of Indian students in all divisions, and compile a list of their backgrounds and academic performances so that we can monitor them�. Samy expects monthly reports from all divisions. From our vantage point it looks like the MIC will be utilising public funds to reach down to the very people it claims it�s already fighting for. Very smart indeed! It�s certainly a more total, holistic, professional, proactive and non ad-hoc manner to promote the MIC. Whether gangsteerism and other social ills get resolved is quite another matter. By the way Samy, whatever�s happened to the study on monthly wages for plantation workers conducted by the MIC earlier in the year, an issue which many researchers had long studied, and from very early days already recommended monthy wages as a fundamental requirement if rural Indians were to escape from the vicious cycle of poverty ? Perhaps there�s something to learn from simple wisdoms like this one from the Dakota Indians (read on�) Riding A Dead Horse The tribal wisdom of the Dakota Indians, passed on from one generation to the next, says that when you discover that you are riding a dead horse, the best strategy is to dismount. But in modern business (and education and government) because heavy investment factors are taken into consideration, other strategies are often tried with dead horses, including the following:
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We have it from unimpeachable sources, that the move to �annex� Putra Jaya started during the tenure of the previous MB Abu Hassan. Not in favour of the Putra Jaya takeover, Abu Hassan was hardly in a position to stop the PM and that�s as good a reason to resign the MB position as any. Was the much publicized �sex scandal� only a smokescreen then, one wonders?