The slapping incident. Some preliminary thoughts. Tales by an unknown blogger. No. 76

1. When writing "jungle book", Rudyard Kipling said strange things happened in the jungles of India. In our country, stranger things happened in the legal jungle.

2. In the slapping case , the judge ruled that the 65 years old Malay man, fasting, a Muslim wearing a robe be given a DNAA.

3. Then it was reported that the AGC countermanded this ruling by saying ,after a few glitches, the DNAA is rescinded.

4. Boleh itu maciam kah?

5. Pardon my ignorance, but I thought as many do, that the judge is the final arbiter in cases brought before him or her.

6. If what is reported is true , then the conduct of the AGC tantamount to usurping the authority of the court. This maybe grounds for contempt of court or any other charges lawyers can creatively come out with.

7. So which is which? That's why I say stranger things can happen in the legal jungle.

8. If it's true the AGC said that, it reflects badly on the quality of people in the AGC.

9. This is what happens if you have numbskulls in the AGC. We must demand now that the AG must be a 1st class holder and the lawyers in the AGC must be at least of 2nd upper material.

10. Otherwise statements like that issued by the AGC, which are usurpive and contempt of court in nature, will be the norm of an imbecilic AGC.

11. What the AGC said maybe grounds for contempt of court or maybe not. The case is over and not ongoing. But its certainly usurpive in nature.

12. I would have thought, going through the process, if the AGC is not happy with the decision of the court of 1st instance, it can appeal to the Appeal Court. If still not happy, it can go the Federal Court

13. Or was the response by the AGC, a knee jerk response of the AGC to the PM's condemnation of the slapping incident?

14. Note that the PM did not dispute the decision of the court( that's the business of the AGC or the DA) but condemned the slapping incident.

15. That proves my point . The legislature and especially the executive are the custodians of public policy, the greater good, public interests and keeper of the People's conscience. At times he must interfere in judicial decisions when they are patently wrong and go against public interest.

16. I am not going off tangent to discuss the issue of judicial activism vs judicial restraint. Let lawyers argue about that

17. The judge in this particular case may have directed his mind to considering of extraneous factors that have got nothing to do with a case of assault and causing bodily harm.

18. Or the charges were badly written, that the judge had no choice but to give a DNAA.

19. If no. 18 is the case, then we come back to the points in para 9. I think this point was also raised by lee kuan yew , when he cited an example of a lawyer with 4 O- levels with a lawyer with 10 0-levels.

20. With the four O-levels lawyer, you've got to explain things to him several times. Similarly to make sense of what he wrote, one has to read his material over and over again

21. If that were the case, reflected in the charges he wrote, he should be given the sack. And never to practise.

22. Whatever it is, the assailant as of now, got a DNAA. We are not certain if he has been recharged. Again that's a whammy for the DA and the AGC.

23. If he got a DNAA it's disgusting. Raises repugnance, shock, distrust in the judiciary and our law deserves public opprobrium.

24. Imagine a person who hears voices in his head giving him a religious license to do as he pleases, a self appointed vigilante and a robed crusader going around roughing up people. Such a chap should be locked up in a mental institution.

25. I think it was Sukarno, who understood the psychology of the average Indonesian. Give the average Indonesian, a uniform and he transforms into a beast!

26. Here, a 65 year young man, a Malay, Muslim , fasting wearing a robe, the defacto uniform of the seemingly religious, slapping a Chinese, non Muslim and therefore not fasting. As sir Thomas Moore asked, on whose authority?

27. He takes the law into his own hands. Push it to the extremes. Women with tight clothing or arousing him can be molested, men with no moustache and bard can be hurt and so on

28. Public policy demands he be punished accordingly and not given a suspended sentence on account of some technical glitches.

29. I read somewhere on FB, some joker asked why the fuss about the slapping. Move on.

30. That's typical of the yak yak yay crowd. Treat everything lightly and have fun.

31. Stealing is fun, lying is, mocking the judiciary is fun, slapping other people causing them bodily harm is fun.

32. We don't move on mappilay, the man must be taught accountability. Every action must be met with equal reaction. Having made the bed, he must now lay on it!

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Old vs new comfort zone. Tales by an unknown blogger no 75

1. Friends asked for my opinion about the outcome of the recent dap elections. I told them I am reluctant to do so . I don't want to because of reasons only I know. But when I heard some people say the Lim dynasty is despatched unceremoniously and the DAP is no longer in a comfort zone, I have to say something after all.

2. All these opinions coming from armchair analysts are simply wrong. Admittedly these opinions unconsciously reflect their UMNO dna.

3. In an earlier article,I wrote Lim guan eng must accept the desire for a change of guards. He mustn't see his demotion as it were, as a rejection of his legacy or of Lim kit siang's.

4. The DAP will always be known as the party that LKS built.

5. Hence , the smug and gleeful view of opinions of seeing what happened at the DAP congress as an ungrateful despatch of the lims legacy, is wrong

6. It's political darwinism in action. It's adapt or be irrelevant.

7. On the other hand, parties that refuse to adapt, like UMNO, pas, bersatu will be extinct.

8. The new adaptation I am talking about, is moving away from confrontational and pugilistic politics to one that is willing and reason out with various stakeholders in the country.

9. What comfort zone are we talking about? It's old vs new comfort zone.

10. Parties like UMNO , pas , bersatu and other Malay supremacists, are snug, commodious and reposeful in the old comfort zone.

11. The old comfort zone where racial strife, hostilities and differences are accentuated. The old comfort zone that sees life as a zero sum game.

12. These parties see their relevancy beng affirmed only by way of hostile narratives, by championing xenophobic utterances. 13. In a zero sum world, the Chinese prosper, the Malay suffer. The Chinese get richer, the Malays get poorer. Seems the area in which malays excel is corruption.

14. The old comfort zone is compatible with parties that refuse to adapt. Well, adapt or perish. This old comfort zone is also embellished by UMNO DNAied social media operatives.

15. DAP is moving to the new comfort zone. Where things like ethnic unity matters, good governance matters, law and order matters, shared prosperity matters, education for all matters, eradication of corruption does, political stability is a premium etc

16. The DAP defines the new comfort zone and will not let unadaptive political parties define it.

17. The instrument by which the new comfort zone will be achieved is the newly elected DAP leadership.

18. The changing of the guards shouldn't cause any consternation among grass roots DAP people. Trust the leadership of Anthony loke and the new praetorian guards.

19. Some UMNO people must be daydreaming or have ingested copious amounts of daun ketum. They say DAP will suffer the same fate of MCA. Huh, UMNO finally admits that MCA is but a footnote in it's playbook.

20. Its like kettle calling the pot black or like the Malay says, the tray(dulang) says the nail is chipped, saying about other people, you overdoes it.

21. It's UMNO, which refuses to adapt that will become increasingly irrelevant. And that will not be understood too by the UMNO DNA -ied social media operatives.

22. You know what the DAP changing of guards means and symbolizes? It means the DAP acknowledges the increasing maturity of Malaysian society.

23. It acknowledges that society has matured. Willing to be engaged and listen to rational reasons. It's ready to eschew xenophobic nationalism and xenophobic religiosity.

24. The DAP is ready for it and this is reflected in the new leadership . Willing to engage and reason with Malaysian stakeholders. Get behind the leadership of the sec-gen.

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DAPs pledge of loyalty to Anwar. Tales by an unknown blogger. No 74

1. A few big name political parties were noticeably absent from the DAPs 18th congress. We can assume they were not invited.

2. BN, GPS and GRS were not invited. UMNO is considered BN as mic and mca are considered UMNOs minions only .

3. The fact, they were not invited can suggest they were not considered as core parties of PH.

4. They were just mentionables. They were mentioned by the pm in his speech as a matter of politess .

5. So, the parties that remained were the OG, the originator of the PH group. the lower case g refers refers more to umno-the thieves, morbid racists, the real exploiters of race, religion and King. Avoid it like the plague.

6. However, we do want to discuss who were invited and who were not . Of particular interest to us, was the promise made by DAP that it would be loyal to Anwar.

7. To cut to the chaste, it means don't trust UMNO. UMNO is only a fair weathered friend. While it's leaders in the cabinet may pretend to be loyal to pak sheikh, its people are constantly destabilizing Anwar.

8. There, I say it! Never trust UMNO. Zahid the diffident and vacillating UMNO leader can't control the loose canons in UMNO . always covering it by saying that democracy in UMNO Is alive . The truth is, UMNO is hunting with the hounds and running with the hare .

9. Have we ever heard or seen UMNO declaring undying loyalty to Anwar? No! yes,? It can't as a matter of conscience. It's always plotting to oust Anwar.

10. The fatal mistake, is to invite a mortal enemy to share power with you. Please remember that?

11. Don't listen to a few desperados describing the relationship between UMNO and DAP as umdap. What is that? There is no love lost between the 2. They are strange bedfellows learning to tolerate each other as is allowed. They learn to coexist peacefully for the time being

12..listening to DAP is listening to excellence. Listening to UMNO is listening to mediocrity.

13. Now, let's explore the symbolism of DAP pledging undying support for Anwar.

14. Anwar can only trust DAP and by extension AMANAH. These are the OG which have swum and sank with PKR. They are proven material.

15. By reverse reasoning, never trust UMNO.its a fair weathered friend. It clings on to PH in order to retain power and remain relevant to malays.

16. More importantly, trust in DAP and AMANAH , in the sense of a fukuyama trust involves reciprocity .

17. By pledging loyalty to Anwar, the PM must reciprocate with an instantaneous goodwill gesture. No, not by kowtowing to DAP - that would only please Malay supremacists, that Anwar tunduk kepada DAP.

18. The reciprocity asked is by being always circumspect of UMNO.

19. Itu saja!

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Unscrambling the PM's speech at the DAP 18th national Congress. Tales by an unknown blogger. No 73

1. The PM's speech at the 18th DAP congress was interesting. Of particular interest to me was his admission that it's extremely difficult to rule a country with different races, religions, demands etc .

2. Unfortunately, the ramifications and import of the opening remarks were easily lost on many in the audience.

3. That is, as soon as the PM gets into his constipation mode, punctuating and exerting verbally the rest of his narrative.

4. The message he wants to impart will be lost on the crowd as they become mesmerized by his oratorical skills.

5. Those are the perils of being a demagogue orator. That's why plain and as a matter of fact narrative is preferred .

6. But we can't change the way the pm speaks. He is gifted in that. No one in Malaysia has that skills. When I was studying at UM long ago, girls would swoon when he talked. Some, already older now still have the young girls excitement.

7. So, allow not so bright me, break down what the PM says to you. Ok people?

8. It will become extremely difficult to rule a country with diverse people with different cultures, religions and so on. If you try to be all things to all people and try to please everyone.

9. Tablay itu maciam, dei thamby.

10. Don't be a political hydra, that creature with many heads. You use head A to talk to malays, head B to Chinese, head C to indians, heads D, E ,F to other races. Always saying things each community wants to hear

11. Be a man of all seasons, consistent to a set of principles rarely changing them in response to situational pressures.

12. Luckily for all of us, the PM has affirmed that he will remain consistent. Despite the competing and often conflicting demands of the various races, he will give effect to the heartbeat and pulse impulses of the Malaysian people as a whole. His unchanging principle is that no one race will be marginalized. That's comforting for us. We must support such a man .

13. Just look at the terrifying alternative..if the PM were to listen and pander to the demands of the racial supremacists, Malay for example, what do we do? Drown all non malays in the ocean?

14. It's not just a smarmy call to support him. It's in the interest of the greater good

15. I have told you, when the PM gets into constipation mode or push the baby during childbirth mode, we stand no chance. We will be swept away and mesmerized by his oratorical skills.

16. Listening to the PM's speech per se, wasn't it, inadvertently a death knell for guan eng?

17. From guan eng we get grouses, whining and veiled threats. From loke, we get hala tuju, policies and the way forward.

18. Between the 2, which one do we choose? Even jinjang joe knows which to choose.

19. I am not siding with either one. I know both personally but loke was the one who persuaded me to join the DAP. He was the national organizing secretary then.

20. Looking at the outcome of the dap elections, guan eng has to accept the desire for the changing of guards. Accept it gracefully, 'bloder'.

21. Next, listen to the views of the PM on the speed of revolutions, reforms and changes. If rushed will end in failures. Look at Poland , France and chezchoslovakia.

22. But it shouldn't be done leisurely either. The point is not fast or slow, but to it with great care and meticulously.

23. And forget about politeness, niceties and sentimentalism. Revolutions, reformasi must be violent in nature. 24. A revolution, ' reformasi' are not like doing embroidery, doing a painting or eating pasembor and drinking teh tarik. It's the violent overthrow of the old and decrepit regime .

25. There was 1 particular aspect which the PM mentioned in his speech. We now move on to a hallowed ground subject matter, the independence of the judiciary.

26. I will confine myself only to what the PM understood it to be in that speech although I have my own opinion on this trias politica concept coined by Montesquieu. That will be the subject of a separate article I hope.

27. To the pm,in that speech, independence of the judiciary means absolutely no interference by the executive into the business by the judiciary in the dispensing of justice. Ok la, I accept this admission for the time being, although I had wished the pm would have added the proviso, ' provided the judiciary does it's functions without fear or favour and most importantly with HONESTY.

28. Provided the judicial fraternity does its job without fear or favour and most importantly with HONESTY, then there ought to be absolutely no reason for the executive to grope it like Clinton did..we are comforted by the PM's empathetic and assertive assurance on this matter. Hurrah, belts off pants down dicks out

29. If the pm says, under his rule, there was and will be non interference in the judiciary,then the many disagreeable things to emanate from the judicial fraternity, siapa bikin pak sheikh?

30. The lhdn lawyers must have acted with bias and unfairness, when Najibs daughter who owed 10m back taxes was forgiven. What about the millions owed by the sons? I am saying this to be unfair when so many salary earners like my own daughter , are called by the lhdn to undergo forensic accounting. Did Najibs children be made to undergo the same ordeal?

31. The prosecutorial team must be incompetent and 3rd grade MCE graders for dropping charges against Reza Aziz and giving DNAAs to people like Zahid and Najib Ali babavum.

32. Judges must be corrupt to easily give in to these unjusticiable infractions. Tiu Nia seng!

33. I am not making up this last accusation ya..last 2 years, a friend an ex MB sent me a document on corruption. I was horrified to learn from the data, that the incidence of corruption was highest among the judiciary. Higher than lawmakers!

34. So pak shekh, the notion of non inference of the judiciary may be right in Montesquieus ideal world but not in the world of realpolitik.

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Najib type of bailout v Anwar type of bailout. Tales by an unknown blogger no 72

1. Try as he may or carry out verbal acrobatics and semantics, the 1.1b extended to Sapura to pay off a phalanx of vendors, it's regarded as a bail out anyway.

2. Let's call it Anwarbailout, a particular product of anwarnomics. this is to differentiate it from najibbailout ,a product of najibnomics.

3. So , it's Anwarbailout v najibbailout.

4. The differentiation is necessary because the mad cow diseased UMNO youth chief, thanked Anwar for adopting Najibs proposal to bail out Sapura.

5. Wait a minute you landlubbers, there are differences between the Najibbailout and Anwarbailout, as we shall see later.

6. Anyway, no shame UMNO , ever the opportunist, will stake a claim for doing something of which it has no part at all .

7. As the Malay saying says, the milk is produced by the cow, the cattle gets the name .

8. The Najibbailout is a carte blanche for Sapura. Just give money and let Sapura does with the money any how it likes. Owners and management can even stuff the money in mattresses, pillow and bathtubs. Just don't forget to donate some to UMNO and some politicians individuals.

9. For Dr Mahathir, the man who can walk on water, bail out is an opportunity. An opportunity to put in his cronies in the target company and channel funds to it.

10. That's how UMNO and Malay supremacists understand what a bailout means. It's just a glorified income transfer. Not paying back pun tak apa. Malay owned companies are entitled to government largesse.

11. The Najib or Mahathir bailouts would have the same effect. It's business as usual as money comes easy.

12. The same enabling structure allowing rapaciousness, greed, reckless investments, profligate spending etc will still b there . What do you think will be the results?

13. The Najib type of bailouts will perpetuate business doomsday.

14. So anyone thanking Najib for pointing the way to his type of bailouts, deserved to be ostracized and deserve public opprobrium.

15. Knowing the measure of the man, the Anwar type of bailouts, would entail the following. At least, I hope they do .

16. The main difference is that under the Anwar type of bailout, the enabling structure that allowed the mess to happen to Sapura is dismantled.

17. I am not 100% sure the things I am about to say have taken place, but I sure hope they will happen.

18 . Carry out changes in the ownership of Sapura. Let new shareholders come in. Do away with the astronomical remuneration packages enjoyed now

19. The BOD must consists of people with excellent technical and business knowledge. They must be Malaysians not necessarily must be malays. We don't want a case an LCE graduate is a bod member so long as he is Malay.

20. Learning from the case of Sapura, there must be an oversight committee separate from the bod. It's to evaluate every big investments.

21. Certainly, the CEO must be removed and most of the management team be cashiered.

22. I am in favour of breaking up Sapura into 3 or 4 separate profit centres. Let them compete on the parameters, I mentioned in an earlier article.

23. Forget about sentimentalism when dealing with Sapura. The PM must adopt the attitude, I am not interested in preserving the status quo but am interested in overthrowing it.

24. You see, the Najib type of bailout preserves the enabling structure creating the mess Sapura is in while the Anwar type of bailout removes it. Big difference, towkay.

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Cleaning the Sapura Shit. Tales by an unknown blogger. No 71

1. These are the economic reasons why I think ,bailing out Sapura is wrong as a matter of principle .Nevermind, if it's camouflaged under the pretext of paying vendors. Almost all are bumis .

2. I am not going to wail about the PM pandering about bumi vendors or about helping Sapura vendors but what about Malay farmers?

3. These are not economics reasons but political score points. Only politicians do that. As one prominent person said, I am not interested in being politically correct, only correct.

4. These people are just mouthing Democratic party empathy , sentimentalism, cafeteria socialism, smoked salmon socialism etc.

5. We are tired of these self appointed social justice warriors behaving sanctimoniously, regarding themselves as the only ones who can speak about bumiputera. If other than them, the PM for example,he is just being opportunistic.

6. Our economy is a private enterprise economy. It's based on profit and loss principles. The loss part is more important. It's the principle that weeds out the incompetent, poorly managed and badly operated companies .

7. Government bail out prevents the self correcting principle of a market economy .

8. Have the bozo mcs officers at MOF and other departments actually think about the costs of bail outs?

9.sapura is a company probably founded on UMNO values. Get an exclusive license, monopoly, privileges and make as much profit as possible. Confound careful investment decisions. If fail, ajib gor or wak jahid can help ( when they were in power). Just spend, baby spend!

10. Being a creature created by private enterprise means, if it gets into a mess, use private enterprise solutions. Not public enterprise solutions. This is the incompatibility issue.

11. This is wrong number one . Sapura is a car running on petroleum products. Now it wants to switch using fresh or salt water.

12. If u mix water with petrol ,your engine will produce knocking sound and your engine will eventually koyak

13. If water is mixed with jet A1 fuel or aviation fuel, the water will freeze over a certain altitude. The plane crashes.

14. Later , the government bail out will crash down bringing with it, taxpayers money, sapura, the vendors and the government. They will never get repaid .

15. If I see the goons who advised the PM, I will circumcise them a 2nd time.

16. Long ago, when Anwar then was debating the issue and quite badly at that, I wrote articles opposing any form of bailouts.

17. I mentioned about profligate spending , reckless investments. Perhaps, there were some corruption elements in the joyful spending. Maybe the authorities need to investigate on the joli katak spendings no?

18. As fish rots in the head first, change sapura s ownership and replace most of its management team. They are the ones who caused the mess in sapura in the first place..

19. Now , we come to the thorny issue of the vendors. We must remember they made a conscious, deliberate and voluntary decision to do business with sapura. They knew of the risks and gains .

20. Having made the bed, they must now lay on it .

21. Sure our democratic party empathy, pompous caring for others, our LV and caviar socialist leanings make us pity them .

22. But the bugger who owes them is sapura. By helping to pay them, we are in effect bailing out sapura.

23. Now that pak sheikh has already decided to help them because of his kindness and sentimentalism, there's nothing we can do. Except I hope he will be mindful of what I have said.

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The Sapura bailout. Tales by an unknown blogger. No 70.

1. As details about the 1b bailout of Sapura comes slowly, I will come up with the appropriate response.

2. A bailout by any other name is a bailout . Saying it's for paying vendors, insults our intelligence.

3. Now, call me a neo classical dude, a Friedmanite, Austrian school Hayek stooge or just a pain in the ass confused economist, be my guest. Stepping in to save Sapura on account of saving vendors, is the government -saved jobs fallacy.

4. What it does is to prevent the efficient allocation of resources by rewarding poorly and badly managed company and punishing the good ones .

5. When the US government bailed out Chrysler, it didn't do it for lee iacoca ( cola,). No siree, it says that because it wants to save jobs and vendors.

6. The American consumers don't use or consume the parts supplied to Chrysler, the steering wheels, gears, door knobs, glass screens etc. in other words, consumers are asked to pay for things they don't need, on their own. If they can afford it, they buy completed cars assembled by Chrysler.

7. What happened to Sapura , happened to Chrysler in the 1970s. The government thought it's saving Chrysler by bailing it out. To cut the long story short, the US government didn't.

8. Similarly the Malaysian government is using the save jobs fallacy to bail out Sapura. It's doing it the wrong way.

9. The government should allow Sapura to fail because its poorly and badly run. Let new owners take over and run it well. Vendors can choose to do business with new owners. As to old owners take a class action against them.

10. Hey, our economy has been described as a free enterprise system, market economics.

11. The lynchpin of that system, is profit and loss. Not profit alone. Sometimes the loss part is more important as it endures poorly and badly run companies are weeded out. Like Sapura.

12. Success can be a bitch..if intervention in Sapura is successful, it might embolden policy makers intervening in other industries even when it's not warranted. Then night as well have businesses run by government officers

13. Bailouts would distort the market. By propping up an inefficient company, would encourage other companies to also behave irresponsibly knowing uncle non would be there to help.

14. By allowing unviable companies to fail, would be good for the market. It allows capital to flow to more productive uses.

15. Not holding that against Sapura, it's just business. Then, there is the moral hazards argument. Companies would take unnecessary risks knowing if they fail, some do gooders and special interest groups in the government will come helping .

16. I am not faulting Anwar for citing bumi matters. That's for politicians to do. I am just presenting cogent economic reasons. Although I am a politician, I am also interested in economic reasoning.

17. Playing the race game, is the favorite pastime of UMNO politicians and Malay supremacists. Hidup melayu!

18. We cannot reward the inefficient and punish the competent .

19. One final stupid question.. pardon my ignorance. If the 1b is for the vendors, register them. Pay them directly. Don't pay sapura.

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