Government teh tarik blunders?

My favourite Hokkien mee costs RM 4.50 per plate nowadays. It was RM3.80 before June 08 and was just RM3.50 a year ago. A difference of RM1.00. My regular mamak corner also increases my usual teh tarik and tosei.

My neighbourhood chicken rice was just RM3.3o per plate a year ago and now I am paying RM4.00 for it. Serving still the same. No extras.

Consumers has been complaining why the prices of food is still the hike up price since the petrol price already dropped drastically. Price of petrol per litre was increased from RM1.92 to RM2.70 by the government in June 08 with the reason being the impact of global price increase of crude oil per barrel. So the manufacturers, transporters, supplier, retaurants, hawkers and whatsoever merrily took the opportunity to increase their prices citing sky rocketing costs.

Now crude oil per barrel already dropped to below USD70, why the food and consumers goods is still the hike up price? The law of the market is that, whenever the costs goes up, the selling price will go up; whenever the costs goes down, the price will remained the same. No use reasoning with the hawkers. I already done that umpteen times since last week. They will always blamed the suppliers or just put on a wide smile. If we asked the suppliers, they will blamed it to the farmers, transporters and whatever they can think of. The finger pointing need to stop somewhere isn't it?

Well, I think the buck should stop with the government! Why did they increase the petrol price with such a huge different? Now when the oil prices dropped, the government just reduce the petrol price bit by bit, sen by sen. Do they expect the Hokkien mee and chicken rice seller to reduce their price by 5 sen or 10 sen each time? No way man! They will tell you the petrol price reduction is so small that it makes no difference to their costs!

So, did the government make the following blunders.

1. Increase the petrol price drastically by 40% margin in June 08, which ultimately provides a good reason for everyone in the market to increase prices for their goods.

2. Reduce the petrol price in stages and in small percentage each time at about 5% only, which does not make much difference to the costs and conveniently no changes to the food selling price.

With just a little price slashing campaign side-show from the hypermarkets, do we expect all businesses to follow suit? Maybe the politician are too busy campaigning themselves to really take note on the peoples well-being. - Loka

Najib's Fishing outing

Is Najib Razak fishing for opportunities to shake up the Umno/Malay populace to support the party? If he did, it looks like someone already taken the bait. Najib mere suggestion to liberalise the NEP received quick response from other BN component parties including MCA and MIC. Recently elected MCA vice president Liow Tiong Lai took the bait by suggesting the Malay equity quota to be abolished. After Liow's statement was made known, a flurry of Malay politicians and pseudo-politicians in various guises and clothings starts to criticised the suggestion to do away with the equity quota. It's been made to look like it's the MCA that demand for the NEP to be liberalised, not Najib's proposal! Now Najib will just sit down and watch as the drama unfolds based on his script since he is also the director!

While there are many non-Malays BN politician whom has been suggesting the same, it was usually discussed privately amongst their comrades. What makes these politicians think that just because the person that suggested it is the PM designated the statement can be accepted as the gospel truth and with sincerity. How naive some people can be! Have they forgotten to check the person's political background to ensure the suggestion was given with sincerity, without ill-will and hidden agenda. If he is serious about it, it is not necessary to hand out the bait but just do it full heartedly. - Loka

Youth organisations used by Umno aspirants

Barring any behind the scene horse trading, three corners fight for the Umno Youth chief is confirmed between nominations leader Mukhriz Mahathir, vice chief Khairy Jamaluddin and former Selangor MB Khir Toyo.

The first two candidates are supported by a former PM and an out-going PM respectively. Does it means Khir Toyo is on his own without any back-up? It is not necessary so.

Khir will be counting on Ali Rustam's 4B Youth Movement to provide him the necessary support and campaigning manpower. It it estimated that one third of Umno' delegates are linked to the 4B. Most of the 4B national and state leaders are also leaders of Umno even though most of them are no more in the youth age category.

The movement has been fully utilised to drummed up support for Ali Rustam and Khir Toyo in last Umno's election in 2004. Even though Ali is from the small state of Malacca he managed to win second placing for the vice president position and Khir was elected with the most votes for a supreme council seat.

The recent surged of the number of nominations for Khir proves his strong networking on the ground. He may not get more nominations than Mukhriz or Khairy but when it comes to voting, the patterns expected to sway to Khir. While Ali is still trailing, with his networking he is also expected to gain enough nominations to challenged Muhyiddin Yassin for the deputy presidency.

Both Khir and Ali will be looking forward to a good harvest from delegates with youth organisations background. They were former presidents of the Malaysian Youth Council. Khir is also the current Asian Youth Council head and Ali the president of the World Assembly of Youth.

The others expected to linked up with youth organisations for support includes Entrepreneur and Cooperative Nor Omar who is 4B deputy president and Reezal Merican who is the Gabungan Pelajar Melayu Semenanjung president. Nor Omar is going for the supreme council seat while Reezal is trying for the Youth vice head.

Interestingly, Reezal will missed the opportunity to contest for the MYC presidency because this year's AGM was postponed to next year by the MYC currently led by another Umno youth exco Shamsul Anuar Nasarah. By next year Reezal will be over 40 and under the Youth Act disqualified from contesting for the MYC presidency . Is this an deliberate attempt to denied Reezal the opportunity to make use of MYC as a vehicle for his Umno political networking?

Umno dan Menteri Zina

Adakah Umno/BN bersedia menerima seorang yang telah melakukan zina untuk dilantik sebagai menteri kabinet?

Ini mungkin menjadikan Perdana Menteri, sama ada yang sekarang ataupun yang akan datang amat serba salah. Walaupun parti etnik berkenaan yang akan mencalonkan politikus tersebut mengikut senioriti dalam parti, ia mungkin membawa padah kepada BN sekiranya pihak lawan terutamanya PAS menjadikan ia sebagai bahan politik mencabar kewibawaan Islam Hadhari yang diuar-uarkan oleh pihak kerajaan persekutuan BN.

Persoalannya ialah bukankah Anwar Ibrahim dipecat sebagai timbalan perdana menteri sepuluh tahun lepas atas dasar ia tidak sesuai menjadi pemimpin negara kerana melakukan perbuatan sumbang meliwat? Mampukah pihak BN dijadikan bahan jenaka seluruh negara jika melantik seseorang yang telah mengaku berzina dengan wanita yang bukan isteri sahnya. Lebih-lebih lagi perlakuan intim tersebut telah dirakam dan diedarkan dalam bentuk DVD untuk tatapan orang ramai.

Sememangnya mungkin bukan dia seorang sahaja pemimpin politik yang mempunyai kebiasaan berzina dengan wanita bukan isterinya tetapi masalahnya ialah dia telah mengaku melakukannya. Yalah, yang lain mungkin juga melakukannya tetapi mereka tidak ditangkap ataupun dirakam semasa melakukannya. Dia bolehlah dikira sebagai seorang yang "gentleman" kerana berani mengaku di depan kaca kamera dan pihak akhbar.

Yang menarik ialah terdapat golongan tertentu (seperti perwakilan yang mengundi beliau dalam pemilihan parti) menyokong beliau atas dasar kemampuan politik dan kepemimpinan beliau, perlakuan peribadi kekal sebagai urusan peribadinya. Tetapi untuk mereka yang tidak mengenali politik kepartian ataupun mengikuti perkembangan politik negara, kemungkinan akan timbul fahaman bahawa parti itu sebenarnya memperakui perbuatan zina ataupun pada hakikatnya perwakilan-perwakilan yang mengundi beliau juga melakukan perkara yang sama! Maka itu ia dibolehkan kerana pemimpin besar telah melakukannya dan akan memimpin kita ke arah itu!

Kesian mereka yang tidak mengundi beliau kerana walaupun tidak menyokong ahli politik itu, mereka juga akan menghadapi cemuhan yang sama dari orang ramai. Lembu-lembu sekandang juga terpalit dengan lumpur dan najis kerana semua dalam kandang yang sama.

Will Umno accepts sex tainted as minister?

Will BN or more specifically Umno, accepts a sex scandal tainted politician back into the Cabinet?

It is interesting to note the re-entry of a sex scandal tainted politician into a high level position in his party. The choice of the party delegates to elect a politician who openly admits being adulterous and quits his government and political positions in a huff invites comments on the wisdom and mentality of the delegates.

Even though the politician was elected with less than 50% of the votes, the support he got had vindicated him in one way or another. It shows that about half of the delegates had put the difference between personal and public affairs and judge the person based on his capability in the party and the government. His sexual waywardness which ends up in a sex DVD distributed for public consumption was not an issue to them. The delegates that voted for him prefers to acknowledge his public service rather than his personal service!

That’s what delegates from this school of thoughts wants to believe.

On the other side of the coin it can also be deduced that the delegates way of thinking are also based on their personal beliefs and also practice. Will it be too preposterous to derive that the delegates that voted for him also had the tendency to be sexually wayward as the elected one. Are these delegates choice reflects their own personal intention too? The message the delegates want to put across is that it is alright to commit adultery and bring disrepute to their family and party. Just don’t get caught doing it and if you do, all one’s need to do is admit it in front of the press and TV cameras. Then in an instance it turns from zero to hero.

Indirectly it also reflects the party’s stand – go ahead and commits adultery; you are most welcome to lead us doing it after that!

The contribution of this sex scandal tainted politician will now moves a step higher – the Cabinet. Based on convention he is expected be appointed a full minister by the PM of the BN government upon recommendation by his party president. But there will be some criteria or even obstacles that needed to be sort out before he can become a minister.

First, whether he himself prepared to accepts the nomination. With his tainted background, will he be able to perform his duties as before? Will his re-entry into the cabinet brings good tidings to his party or will it dragged the party to worse and lower ebb? As an old man he ought to be able wiser in his judgment.

Secondly, he is neither an MP nor Senator which means he can’t be appointed as Minister unless he becomes either one. The easier one will be via the back door i.e. to make him a Senator. The other choice is for him to contest a by-election and wins it. That means someone needs to vacate a seat for him. The choice of seat will be obvious, which is his former seat that was handed over to his son in the recent general election. It sounds very much a family affair which he openly criticized during the party election campaign. That’s OK! He just requires admitting it openly that he practices nepotism and his party people are expected to accept it. The difficult part will be to convince the constituency voters especially during this political climate when Umno may be too busy and reluctant to campaign for a sex tainted candidate to fish for the Malay-Muslim votes in the constituency.

Thirdly, even if he is appointed as Senator or elected as an MP in a by-election he will face the final hurdle to walk into the Cabinet. With his tainted background, which Umno PM will want to take the risk to bring in a person whom committed “zina” (adultery) into an “Islamic” country Cabinet? It is not that the other ministers are as holy as a saint or all are ulamaks (as mentioned by the politician previously) or without any hint of sexual misconduct. The problem is no ministers ever admitted berzina (adultery) with other women who are not their legally married wife.

PAS will have a field day attacking Umno on the un-Islamic nature of the Cabinet. Will Umno and the PM take the risks for the sake of one politician and party which Umno considers non-consequential in the running of the country? - Loka