Single, Married & Divorced ............

The "Line-Up" Has To Go

http://zaiduntukrakyat.com/

Barisan has to go

Nov 29, 2012

ZAID UNTUK RAKYAT

 by Zaid Ibrahim

There is no doubt in anyone’s mind that the country’s entire system of administration has to change.

The former Inspector-General of Police’s revelation that Ministers and other higher-ups sometimes directed him not to arrest or investigate certain individuals for alleged criminal acts is a clear case of obstruction of justice, one that has been going on for many years.

For as long as UMNO remains in power, this practice will continue because UMNO leaders believe that they are the law. Did you hear anyone at the UMNO General Assembly express their concerns about these matters? Of course not – they would rather focus on threatening Malaysians with incidents like May 13, which they said would recur if the Barisan Nasional loses power in the next General Election. They also warned that an Opposition win will bankrupt the country.

Businessman Deepak Jaikishan’s disclosure about the alleged role of a member of the Prime Minister’s family in getting private investigator P. Balasubramaniam to retract his first statutory declaration on the murder Altantuya Shaariibuu also bodes ill for the country. Bala told me that he left the country with his wife and child in the middle of the night because they were told to leave for their own safety. It looks like the use of force, intimidation and money will not end if the BN retains power in the coming elections.

Malaysians have a clear choice: we must remove those who flout the law from their political perch or endure more of such blatant abuse of power. We must not regard this obstruction of justice as a small matter. The PM claims that the BN is holistic whilst the Pakatan Rakyat is chaotic. But the PR has been administering its states well and there has been no chaos.

Even if what the PM says is true, I for one would rather have a PR that is chaotic than live under a BN rule where bodyguards kill without motive, or where witnesses are forced to leave the country to save themselves. No democratic government anywhere in the world could have survived the kind of scandals we have witnessed under Najib’s rule. There is no greater ill than the obstruction of justice, especially when it is perpetrated by those in the higher echelons of power.

The PR is only chaotic about articulating some of their policies, and they will have their disagreements on matters like concerts and hair salons. Maybe they will also fight about issues involving gays and lesbians. But I do not believe that they would go so far as to call on the IGP to do their bidding, including the willful obstruction of justice the way UMNO does. They are, in fact, much more decent than the BN.

You can be impressed by the fiery rhetoric at the UMNO General Assembly but these are actually empty words, bereft of meaning.  Theirs are desperate voices full of fear, because they know that their days are numbered. We all have to make sure they will not rule again.

Just Who Is Burt Bacharach

Burt Bacharach makes my top 3 list of all time best songwriters. I do not want to do a tribute when he passes on, why not do it when he is still a living legend. The other two being Paul Simon and Lennon & McCartney.



He is 84 this year, still performing, you could have caught him at Tokyo Jazz Festival a few months back. I see no more tour dates of late, maybe he is not feeling that well now to perform anymore. Burt F. Bacharach is an American pianist, composer and music producer. He is known for his popular hit songs and compositions from the mid-1950s through the 1980s, with lyrics written by Hal David, as part of the duo Bacharach and David.

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This will be my longest post, and with good reason. I can tell you I am only posting a smidgen of his compositions through the years. A singer is just a singer. Great singers are a dime a dozen, without the good songs, they are just another great singer that people will forget easily. But somehow we don't give enough credit to the songwriters. You think David Foster is good, Burt is 10x better and more prolific. Burt is a champ.


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Oh ... Richard Parker

All adults should go and see Life of Pi, if they haven't read the book already. I am not a fan of fiction but this was great story telling. You want it so much to be non fiction, and finally we get Ang Lee who treated the book with respect. The fantastic images which was in the book came to life on the screen and were some of the most magnificent scenes ever.



Life of Pi is an adult fairytale. You can make as many associations of the meaning behind the characters and story line as you like. In the end its a search for God. Its a wondrous story, believable even, although if you hear of a boy spending 277 days adrift with a wild Bengal tiger, you'd think its pure fiction. Yann Martel made it very believable.

The name Richard Parker probably was taken by Martel as he has come across a few shipwreck incidents where persons by the name of Richard Parker was the victim, and in one case a victim of cannibalism.

Can you imagine, Martel's book was rejected by the first 5 publishers he showed to. It eventually won the Booker Prize as well. This book would be excellent material for English classes for "O Levels" and maybe "A Levels".



Parents will take their kids to see the movie, but kids will not get half of the beauty and deeper meanings to the story. Still, you can allow the story to move you and you can make deeper associations and meanings, or you can walk out of the theatre thinking its just a cute story .... I know which type of person I would like to be good friends with though.

In the end, Life of Pi means this to me:
- will a person give up on God
- what does it take for a person to give up on God
- if there is no God, maybe we would need to invent one
- should we interfere in the natural order of animal kingdom, we can infer that to the "order of the human specie as well", be eaten by the stronger or can you reason your way out
- are there things in life that will happen no matter what we do
- what are we surviving for
- optimism, inner strength, resoluteness ... from God or from oneself or both
- would an atheist behave differently in such situations
- how much of us is Richard Parker, the orangutan, the zebra, the hyena

But the most poignant moment for me was the question by Pi, about why Richard Parker did not say goodbye properly ... I think Richard Parker (or certain fellow human beings) did not know how to say goodbye, or in my view, sometimes its better this way .... and so it is with God.

News You Won'T Read In Mainstream Media

Criminal elements present in police, politics’

Teoh El Sen

 | November 29, 2012

(FMT)  Criminal elements have infiltrated the police force and even politics, the former Inspector-General of Police Musa Hassan suggested when he kick-started a new anti-crime NGO, MyWatch.

“Looking at the present situation, where there is a lot of illegal activities, do you think there is no links? You can answer yourself,” he told a press conference where he was named patron and advisor to MyWatch yesterday.

He revealed that there are cases where the links are too high up and “nobody dares talk about it”. He cited a case of a high-ranking police officer he did not name who was brought overseas for golfing by a “shady businessman”.

“Sometimes I feel they can even dictate officers, sometimes even spend [money] on police officers,” he said.

Musa advised the current police leadership to be careful with the people they mingle with or face dire consequences.

“Of course as a police officer, you cannot have links with dubious people. The people now have eyes, every phone has a camera. You are living in a glass house. If you don’t take care of yourself, if you allow to be friendly then your organisation will be destroyed,” he said, adding that politicians should not have underground links.

“It is very bad now. Later on the Mafia will be ruling this country, we don’t want that to happen, it took 30 years to clean up the Mafia in America,” he said.

Musa himself has been accused of such links, especially in the case of Johor kingpin Goh Cheng Poh aka Tengku Goh but has repeatedly dismissed the claims as attempts to bring him down.

“During my time, there was a professional way of doing things if we needed to get close to underworld characters. That is undercover work. When I was in narcotics, my relationship would be to purely gather evidence. There must be a line drawn,” he explained.

The press conference was chaired by MyWatch chief R Sri Sanjeevan and advisor S Gobi Krishnan, both PKR leaders.

Sri Sanjeevan said that the main objective of this new NGO, called the Malaysian Crime Watch Task Force, was to fight crime and not merely criticise the government.

However, he warned that if he did not get the cooperation of the current police, under IGP Ismail Omar, he would “go public with evidence”.

Gobi Krishnan said that the NGO would be challenging “every official statistic”, and promised to reveal “real” numbers.

Political interference

During the press meet, which lasted close to three hours, Musa also spoke about political interference and implied that his successor Ismail was losing command and control of the force.

Musa named Home Minister Hishammuddin Hussein and his deputy as the people who would usually try to give instructions to the force, and that this bad trend was still occurring.

“During my time whenever I arrested some crooks, there will be phone calls from top people. They even ask us to release. I will ask for an instruction in black and white,” he said, adding that the politicians would usually back off after being asked for a written order.

“You read the papers, sometimes you hear ‘I have directed the police to do this and that’. That’s wrong,” he said. He cited Section 4 of the Police Act which says that control and command of the force should come under the sole power of the IGP.

He also said that aside from ministers and deputy ministers, there were also “others” who attempt to give orders to the police, including opposition politicians.

Musa chastised the current police leadership under Ismail.

“The current IGP must make his own decisions on how to run the police force, not taking orders and all that from anyone.

“Even before I retired, I said, ‘please don’t interfere with the police administration’. Let the police do their job, do not interfere with the police… there are dissatisfaction on the ground among officers who said that they received instructions not from (their police superiors) but from the Home Ministry.

“He [Ismail] is a good man, but being a good man alone is not a criteria to be an IGP. You have to be tough also. Sometimes you have to be vocal towards your superiors. When it is not right,” he said.

“Dont just say “Yes”. I use to say, if the IGP is a ‘yes man’ he will be the best IGP in the world, if he is vocal then he will have alot of allegations against him. If you are a ‘yes man’ then you are the best IGP in the world, because in Malaysia it works that way,” he added.

Musa, however, expressed confidence in Ismail from his past record under him: “He was good before, strict. I feel that he is clean, that’s why I groomed him to be the IGP, but now he has to perform. I use to tell him he must be better than me!”

He also spoke about the time when he was speculated to have a fall out with Hishammuddin, saying their relationship was “so far so good”.

“When I found out that instructions were given [by Hishammuddin] to junior officers and OCPDs (Officer in Charge of Police District) without my knowledge, then something is wrong.

“So, I highlighted to him Section 4(1) of the Police Act … command and control of the police force is by the IGP, not a minister. I talked to him nicely, he didn’t like it… that’s why I [my tenure] was not extended,” said Musa, who retired as IGP in September 2010.

Musa also lamented that “nobody seems to respect the police now” and asked the “top police generals to look at themselves whether they can improve further on their service.”

“If you want to improve things, you need to introspect and see the weaknesses in your organisation, you identify that weakness then you change and improve,” he said.

Excerpts from Musa’s press conference:

Crime statistics
I said that you need an independent body to research the police’s statistics. When I was IGP, I got a grant to ask USM to do research on statistics. I was very open, I asked professors to check us. If the classification is right then I believe. During my time, if any district says crime is low, I wanted proof. I would get my officers to check the station, check all the reports, whether the classification is right or not. If the classification is not right. NFA reports on crime, If you don’t investigate there would obviously be no crime. Once, I did that in Sentul, because I didn’t believe the crime was down. I asked my disciplinary officers to check classification of reports. That was in 2007 if I am not mistaken. I was very angry.There was a difference between 20% and 30% increase from what was reported. If you don’t check, it could be happening now.

On policemen accused of gang rape
Any policeman who betrays the trust of the public must get double punishment.

On the Independent Police Complaints and Misconduct Commission (IPCMC)
The IPCMC is good but I didn’t like certain clauses. The ability to investigate any officer, take disciplinary action and no right of appeal. Even criminals have right to appeal in court. That is wrong. Why can’t the police have a clause to appeal? So I suggested a new commission and even drafted a Police Integrity Commission. In the PIC, they can investigate any police officer but they have to refer it to the Police Commission. That is the commission that has two ex-judges, three retired officers that can take action such as dismissal, demotion and so on. If it is a criminal offence then it can recommend for the AG to charge the policeman in court. That means there is a balanced law. We must be fair. The EAIC [Enforcement Agency Integrity Commission] has been implemented. What action has it taken? Has it been used? So that is no good.

On political interference regarding the Altantuya Shaariibuu case and related SDs
So far there was no [political] interference, that’s why I arrested my own officers and Razak Baginda. Sometimes people lie in SDs also, when a person makes an SD do you think it’s the truth? So we have to investigate further then. If you lie in a SD, sometimes these commissioners just sign it, you pay RM5. You cannot be saying that is the whole truth, because that can be manipulated.


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Musa Hassan's motive

• Opinion
 

 2012-12-01 16:05

By LIM SUE GOAN
Translated by DOMINIC LOH
Sin Chew Daily

The policy speech by the Umno president at the annual general assembly is often a kind of political show the entire nation is closely watching. Unfortunately, this year's show has been hijacked by former IGP Tan Sri Musa Hassan.

Even as Najib hits out hard at Pakatan and tabulates the accomplishments of the BN government, Musa Hassan's shocking revelation has nevertheless exposed the administrative weaknesses of our government agencies.

Musa Hassan is no ordinary retired civil servant, and as such the government should seriously consider setting up an independent panel to probe his accusations which must not be downplayed as immaterial or be trifled with.

If Musa Hassan's accusation that politicians have intervened in police affairs is true, the operation of the police force will be adversely affected and its integrity eroded.

The police force is tasked with the responsibility of keeping the social order intact and it therefore must exercise its professionalism to achieve this in the absence of political intervention.

Musa said when the police were about to arrest some heavyweight suspects, they would often receive calls from those in power.

If the country's laws cannot be justly upheld, how do we expect the public to have faith in our law enforcement?

The Malaysian police force should be an unbiased enforcement institution. If it fails to operate independently, it would be very difficult for it to carry out its duties during the upcoming general election.

Musa Hassan also exposed links between senior police officers and illegal gangs, an accusation that would jeopardise the integrity of the police force.

When police discipline is involved, things will suddenly become very sensitive.

Because of Musa Hassan's previous objection to the setting up of the Independent Police Complaints and Misconduct Commission (IPCMC), the issue of police misconduct remains unresolved to this day.

The MACC investigations and subsequent charges against Musa Hassan and former CID chief Ramli Yusof are nothing we can be proud of. The police force must strive to improve its image instead of persistently rejecting supervision.

If a split takes place at the top ranks of the police force, how do we expect them to set a good example for their subordinates?

Thirdly, Musa Hassan also queried the reliability of the police's crime data, and this has begun to arouse public suspicion.

Well familiar with the modus operandi of the police force, Musa Hassan highlighted the fact that some police officers have resorted to converting unresolved cases to "no further action" cases in a bid to achieve the government's crime reduction targets.

Without true and genuine figures, the minister will be kept in the dark and thus wrongly assess the actual crime situation in the country.

This August, the Centre for Policy Initiatives (CPI) received a letter said to be from an anonymous police officer making the same accusations. As such, it is imperative that the police's crime figures be appraised by an independent third party institution with the hope the root cause of the problem could be identified.

Fourthly, why do some senior civil servants continue to slam the government after their retirement?

Some notable retired senior officers have joined PAS, including former Bukit Aman CID chief Fauzi Shaari, former chief secretary for the ministry of land and cooperative development Nik Zain Nik Yusof, former solicitor-general Mohd Yusof Zainal Abiden, and former TUDM officer Mohd Nazari Mokhtar.

The BN government has been taking very good care of our civil servants; the defection by any of them could deal a serious blow on Umno.

Really Cool Songs

Really cool songs are usually not big commercial successes or chart toppers. There has to be something with the melody and/or lyrics that makes it special.

First on my list has to be Lou Reed, his drug laced, brash lyrics and mind numbing bass line and melody make this in a class of its own.



Just to prove that punk bands also can come up with gems, The Stranglers shine here.



How to be sexy, breathy and lyrics that are suggestive but goes nowhere with soaring vocals. Chris Isaak at his best. 



Listen first and see how compact and loud this band is, and there are only 3 of them The highly under rated Rush from Canada with their biggest hit.



The brilliant, enigmatic, in your face performer Annie Lennox ... in all her glory and talent, powerful lyrics to boot.



For all of Pink Floyd's brilliance, this song somehow stays with us for the longest time. Its the title I guess. So cool.




If The Beatles never existed, we'd be talking about The Beach Boys. Not many of us appreciate the musical genius of the band, in particular with Brian Wilson. This song can be broken up into 3 songs, thats how good their composition can be and what about their harmonies.




Roy Orbison, under rated, this song revived in a duet with kd lang only accentuated his musical brilliance and unique voice.




Santana at his best, this song makes love to you at the start, caresses you then brings you to musical orgasm with his riveting solo.

The Pink Elephant In The Room

You are in a room in a social setting with a few people and there is a pink elephant in the room as well. How long can you carry on before you start talking about the pink elephant? In local financial markets, the pink elephant is the results of the upcoming elections. What if? 

My opinion, for what it is worth, the ruling party mightl win only one state in the Peninsula, I find it very hard to see where the second state is coming from. What about phantom voters and rigged votes? That can only be used in close seats, its pointless to use rigged votes in all seats, and I think there are not enough of such votes to go around town.

Whether its Anwar or the leader from PAS as PM, I don't think thats an issue anymore. PKR may lose some votes on that but miniscule.

Will there be a hung parliament? I think that is the best the ruling party can hope for, a hung parliament. Then its a jockeying of candidates to move to one side or another. Not a good situation. However, I do think in a hung parliament situation, the momentum will favour people moving to PKR rather than the other way around. Because a hung parliament already means, the tide has shifted significantly, and shifting still, ... for politicians with a bit of brains, a sinking ship or a new ship - no contest. 

If the opposition wins convincingly, what will happen to the stock market? I read in the front page of The Star, of all places, the front page!!! Talk about media propaganda. Scare tactics started already. 

First of all, there are three components, one is foreign funds, two local funds, three retail funds. As the election draws closer (say two weeks to elections), retail funds would exit already. Local funds being local funds will stay put, anyway, the big local funds already controlled the indexed stocks.

The key scare tactic is to instil into the public that foreign funds will exit and cause a plunge. Let's look at the size of foreign funds. They make up around 20% of volume. Look at the stock they hold: Public Bank, IOI Corp, KLK, BAT, Guinness, DIGI, IHH .... there are very few that are holding big local indexed GLCs. Ask any genuine head of sales or head of research NOW, they will tell you most of their clients are soooo underweight Malaysia, even though the controlled mainstream media would want you to believe otherwise.

Look at the stocks above, will the fundamentals change significantly for these stocks should there be a change in government???? Thailand changes government every couple of years, see what happened to their civil service and listed companies .... same-same!!! Just because this is going to be our first time, its easier to put up scare tactics cause we have not travelled this path before.

I believe the level of foreign shareholdings in local stocks are low, and they are in "safe counters" anyway. So, the sell down will be minimal. A probable fact that not many realise is that a substantial amount of the so called foreign funds now who are long Malaysian stocks,.... are probably Malaysian owned funds rerouted, no need for me to go into possible details.

A recent report in The Star, UOB KayHian's Vincent Khoo was unconvinced on the local market stating in a report that foreign institutional funds that it had met were mostly underweight on Malaysia and continued to be “wary” of Malaysia's index components' high valuations.

Top Ten Issues That Divide Malaysians according to a survey by Merdeka Centre for Opinion Research


I am not trying to put up a rosy picture should there be a change in government. I am trying to put up a realistic picture. Yes, markets will go down and stay there for a couple of months until there is stability, a proper manifesto and proper execution that things are different. I see index could go to 1,400-1,450 temporarily. But consider this:

- there will be more "real tenders of government projects"
- there will be better utilisation and accountability of our "big revenue items"
- there will still be corruption but hopefully a bit less, but let's give them 5 years la ... we gave 50 to someone, we cannot give them 5???

We so badly need a two party system in our country for the democratisation process to make any headway.