Tun Dr Mahathir for routine medical checkup

There were romours flying about that the ex PM Tun Dr Mahathir was critcally ill and was admitted to hospital. Tun Dr Mahathir immediately issued a statement that he was only going for a routine checkup. Wow, a retired politician still can stir up so much news!

Big business with only 1 Euro

Malaysia national car builder Proton has sold its subsidiary,Agusta for 1 miserable Euro. Agusta was acquired by Proton for 7000 Euro with much fanfare on 7 July 2004 . Subsequently Proton pumbed in another RM 1.7 billions to cover losses incurred. It lasted barely a year and all we saved is 1 Euro. No profit and no technology transfer. After the MAS fisco,this is another big money sucker. Work harder you Inland Revenue guys out there,we need you to feed these big money suckers!

Kedah Tenaga transformer stolen

Three stand-by feed transfomers of Kedah Tenaga was stolen.The capacity of these transformers are enough to power half of Kedah.Two large lorries are used to carry them away. What do these thieves take the police for,they think the police are blind or what? The police should pay regular visits to the second hand goods and scrap iron traders,so that these people will not be so bold as to carry out a stunt like this. Maybe the junk yards are too dirty for our policemen to set foot on?

Who own these construction companies?

The authority and dignity of 2 state government are put to the test recently,coincidentally both by developers (construction companies). The fisrt incidence is in Tawau of Sabah.4 lots of state lands ear-marked for recreations purposes and car parks are given to private developers under dubious conditions. The irregularity was exposed when construction works were started on these lots. The town council called an emergency meeting and declared that works on these lands should stop with immediate effect.However,the town council's order was ignored and works continued. Petitions and protests from the public occupied the front pages of local news papers daily,which caused the cabinet to issue an order to the said developer to stop work on the project. Yet works on the said site continued,and the news reported (complete with photos) that the protesters and the developer's employees are getting physical. The Chief Minister himself had to stand out and gave stern warning to the developer.The dispute is not over yet. Who is behind this developer who can ignore the weight of the town council/state cabinet/CM? Even if they go ahead and complete the project,who will buy their shop lots knowing very well that they will not be able to get OC,trade licences and other permits if the relationships between the developer and the authority are strained? To top it all the self-proclaimed "champion of the people",the Consumers Association Of Sabah (CASH) ,is on the site of the developer! The developers are robbing the people of recreations and parking facilities,and CASH stood by them and urged the state government not to stop them! The second incidence takes place in Penang. It involves public interests too,this time the victim is a school,Sin Chung Chinese Primary School (the name is translated by me,might not be accurate,because I read only Chinese papers). A developer managed to get a court injunction to evacuate the school and a factory nearby which are situated on state lands.How they gained control of the state lands with school on it is everybody's guess. Anyway,the villagers/parents formed a human wall against the developer's bull dozers and the fierce workers to protect the school. This makes good content for the news papers,especially the Chinese news. This stirred the Chief Minister himself.He ordered the developer to stop threatening the school.Meanwhile refurbishment works were going on in the school. When the works on the school was completed,the Chief Minister and many of the local dignitaries went to witness the open ceremony.What welcome him was a new solid fence of wood and zinc surrouding the school,only a small "dog-hole" was left open to let the CM and and his group of YBs to pass. The ceremony was called off to save the CM from the humiliation of going through a "dog-hole". The fence was susequently pulled down by city council workers. But it sprang up again later in the day! The fence was pulled down the second time,police men are posted there this time to prevent the fence to be put up for the third time. Unfortunately,the developer had dug a huge hole in the middle of the access road to the school.It is believed that the road is government property,the law is broken then! Take them to court and see the reaction of the court! Again,who is this developer who is more powerful than the CM,making the whole state government so helpless ?

Merry Christmas

Merry Christmas!

Foreigners as tourist guides

Deputy Prime Minister Datuk Seri Najib announced that foreign individuals will be allowed to work as tourist guides to serve visitors from their home countries. This move will certainly boost the tourism industry. Earlier this month 9 Mandarin speaking personnels from the Immigration dept are stationed at airports of the major cities to facilatate smooth operation at the check points in order to attract visitors from China,Taiwan and Hong Kong. The government is doing the right things,if you want people to come here you must make them feel at home and stay longer (and spend more).Remember Malaysia is not the only country that has bright sunshine and beautiful beaches!

Floods at 4 northen states in Penisular Malaysia

The yearly north-east moosoons (winds) is demostrating its powress again. It brings a 3-day non stop down pours.As a result,the northern states--Perlis,Kedah,Kelatan and Trengganu are under 5 feet flood water. All land transport between the north and south are cut off,rubber-dinghy are deployed to reach areas where aids are urgently needed.In extremely urgent cases,helicopters are used. Losses are yet to be assessed as a result of power cut,and road inaccessibility and crop destruction. One thing for sure the yield from Kedah,the ricebowl of Malaysia will drop dramatically. The Kedah state government blames Thailand for the disaster,because the southern Thailand state city Changloon was under 8 feet of flood water,and they opened the flood-gates and let the surplus of water to flow into Malaysia. What a kind neighbour we have here!

Radio Hosts' Pronunciation And Accent

The authority concerned has released a new set of guidelines for Bahasa Malaysia announcers of Radio TV Malaysia,as there are a lot of confusions over how to pronounce certain words among the announcers. This is definitely a positive step,but the authority can go one step further by correcting the annoucers' accent as well. The spoken Malay words differ from their written forms when the last syllable ends in the vowel "a",the spoken words will be read with the last syllables ending with the vowel "e" instead of "a",to make the last accent less heavy.Example : "mereka" will be read as "mereke" instead. The fomer deputy Prime Minister Anwar Ibrahim wanted to change this way of accenting over the air.He introduced the Bahasa Baku where "mereka" will be read as "mereka" not "mereke". Unfortunately the Bahasa Baku sounds very much similar to the way Indonesians speak,so the annoucers thought that by aping the Indonesians they will be speaking perfect Bahasa Baku,which is not true. The Bahasa Baku requires that the last syllable of words not to be light-accented,whereas the Indonesians put heavy accent on every single syllable of their words! So let's speak BahasaBaku,not Bahasa Indonesia!

Malysia's own squash Queen,Nicole David.

What Nicole has accomplished is some thing which I never believe a Malaysian can achive....I confess. You make us proud,Nicole!!!

National Service Camp for the Police

Design a "NATIONAL SERVICE CAMP" specially for the police force! Since everyone agrees that the "National Service" camps are good for instilling desirable values in our kids,why not set up the same trainings for those police personnels who are already in the service for over 10 years? The recent stream of disgraceful publicities created by the police is,in my opinion,stemmed from pure boredoom. The police personnels involved have nothing better to do. When the public report minor cases like handbags-snatching to them,they will just reocrd the incidence and advise the victims,"small matter lah,forget it lah..." Then they do nothing. On the other hand,when met with serious crimes like murder cases,they will push them to higher authority or special unit. They will say,"oh...so big case,we can't handle lah...". Then what is left for them to do? Everyone knows the answer now after reading the many bad reports about them from the media. An alternative to the "KHIDMAT NEGARA KHAS" for the police personnels to help them while off their idle time is to get them involved in community/social works. Moreover,it will help them get rid of their bulging bellies!!!