Dogs aren’t illegal, you know

LAST month, a Muslim friend of mine received some extreme backlash in her Instagram feed for uploading a video of herself petting and feeding a stray dog. Her act of empathising with the dog was seen as immoral and in opposition to the rules of Islam.

LETTERS

Tue 25 Dec, 2018

I have to ask: Do the majority of Malaysian Muslims really think dogs are harmful?

Earlier this year, the Chinese community in Malaysia, in celebrating their New Year and the Year of the Dog, had to compromise in their festivities by not using any dog-related decorations in public in case it disrespected Muslims.

Selfish and intolerant. That is what I say to people who don’t respect the cultures and rights of other races.

I don’t mean to be racist, but there is always room for tolerance in areas that don’t affect any religion. So I am writing this letter for those who are sceptical about dogs.

Traditionally, Islam warns Muslims not to have contact with dogs. Unfortunately, many Muslims use this view to justify the abuse and neglect of dogs, even though animal cruelty is contradicting the Quran, which says all animal forms are communities like us humans.

Let me clarify one famed myth among Muslims regarding dogs: It is not wrong to own a dog. Mus-lims can actually touch dogs, too. If the saliva of a dog or any of its wet parts touches you or any part of your clothing, then you have to wash with sertu, an Islamic cleansing procedure. After that, you are considered clean.

Dogs have never actually been illegal. They are used globally to help humans in many ways. Pro-tecting homes, sniffing out drugs and bombs, and relieving stress are just some of the many reasons why dogs should be taken care of and should never suffer neglect or abuse.

Furthermore, it is incumbent upon all Muslims who own animals, including dogs, whether for farming or work purposes, to provide adequate shelter, food, water and veterinary care for their animals. Animal abuse is forbidden in Islam.

Each year, some animals are considered too “sensitive” to be used in public decor in Malaysia, supposedly to respect Muslim sensitivities.

Yet, while Muslims are banning dogs and pigs in public decorations, Hindus have to struggle during the season of Eid when Muslims slaughter cows – which they consider holy – in public.

Any religion’s beliefs should be respected but should never be used as license to assume and misjudge for the sake of our own priorities.

Remember when Auntie Anne’s pretzel dog had to be renamed pretzel sausage because some claimed the name would spark confusion among Malaysian Muslims? I believe we are actually better than such abnormal controversies.

Malaysia is a multiracial country. While Muslims are defending Islamic beliefs and rules, there are much bigger issues that need to be taken care of rather than focusing on making other religions, cultures and traditions taboo.

With more consideration and mutual understanding, we can live better, together.

SAIFUL AZWAN MOHD RAZIS

Sungai Petani, Kedah

https://www.thestar.com.my/opinion/letters/2018/12/25/dogs-arent-illegal-you-know/

The perils of China’s “debt-trap diplomacy”

Malaysia’s rethink of Chinese belt-and-road projects has lessons for other countries



Sep 6th 2018

IN AUGUST, three months after his opposition coalition trounced the Malaysian party that had ruled since independence, Mahathir Mohamad, the country’s 93-year-old new prime minister, travelled to Beijing. His aim was to tell President Xi Jinping that his country was now the Malaysia that can say no.

Dr Mahathir’s predecessor, Najib Razak, had hewed close to China. His loss at the polls resulted more than anything from the stench of corruption within his ruling United Malays National Organisation (UMNO). But his chumminess with China was also a factor. The two issues were entwined.

To read more, see:
https://www.economist.com/asia/2018/09/06/the-perils-of-chinas-debt-trap-diplomacy

China’s “debt-trap diplomacy”

May 21, 2018 -- China is funding dual-use infrastructure projects from the Pacific to the Horn of Africa, fuelling “debt traps” that will give Beijing leverage to gain strategic and military power.

05/21/2018
Graphic News

It is all part of Beijing’s “Belt and Road” initiative -- also known as “One Belt, One Road” (OBOR) -- a US$8 trillion plan to create a new Silk Road with sea and land links across Asia and Africa to Europe. OBOR will encompass some 64 nations and an estimated 7,000 infrastructure projects. And this real estate will need to be defended.

Projects costing around $900 billion are currently underway or in the planning stage, paid for with billion-dollar loans from Beijing. Loans that cannot be serviced leave governments in the debt trap. China is leveraging economic debt for strategic advantage, tilting the balance of power from the U.S and its allies towards Asia, according to a report by Harvard Kennedy School scholars for the U.S. State Department.

Co-authors, Sam Parker and Gabrielle Chefitz, point out that Beijing has used infrastructure incentives in the contested South China Sea to help break opposition to Beijing’s territorial ambitions. Now, Sri Lanka, Djibouti, Pakistan and Vanuatu are deemed to be vulnerable.

In 2017, struggling to pay its $8bn debt to Chinese state-controlled companies, Sri Lanka leased its strategic port of Hambantota to China for 99 years, raising fears it could become a military base.

In Djibouti, where the U.S., France and China already have military bases, Beijing’s state-owned enterprises have taken over Doraleh Container Terminal in exchange for debt.

Pakistan, where China is constructing major port facilities at Gwadar, is adding $62bn of Chinese loans on top of external debt standing at $82bn

Vanuatu, just 2,000 kilometres (1,240 miles) off Australia’s coast, has taken at least $270 million in Chinese loans in the past decade. Fairfax Media reported in April that China had held discussions with Vanuatu about building a People’s Liberation Army naval base -- a charge vehemently denied by Beijing.

In an interview with the Australian Financial Review, Parker said, “China is giving hundreds of billions to countries that can not afford to repay it, and it’s going to want something in return for that money. ”

• The Fishing Port That May Become a $10 Billion Chinese Debt Bomb (Bloomberg)
• Safeguarding Australia’s security interests (Lowy Institute)
• Defend the First Island Chain (U.S. Naval Institute)

https://www.graphicnews.com/pages/en/37978/MILITARY-Chinas-debt-trap-diplomacy/

Religion cannot be the legal basis

LET me get to the point. I don’t care what your religion says - wrong is wrong.

A widow should not have to die in a fire with the dead husband. And under no circumstances whatsoever shall a child be married off to a man. 

Siti Kasim

Sunday 8 July 2018

Cruel practice: Imagine the lost childhood and potential life opportunities snatched from that child with child marriage to grow as full human beings.

Malaysians need to demand that our Government put a stop to child marriage. We need to demand that our politicians, Ministers, Deputy Prime Ministers, their offices and officials uphold basic human rights.

Their allegiance must be towards the protection of children without any ifs and buts. There must be no negotiation or consideration when it comes to protecting our children. Child marriage is abuse of the worst kind. 

Torture was once an acceptable punishment. Slavery too was once acceptable. But neither is today.

We are no longer living in the middle ages where a child, especially a female one, is deemed a property, a chattel to be traded for money, influence or favours. Something that may be the norm of ages past or even years past does not justify its continuation in any way, shape or form when human civilisation has progressed and we are informed by knowledge and values that say such practices are an abomination of human rights. 

Malaysia is the perfect case study where religion is allowed to dictate the laws of the land and in so doing has failed its people miserably. Malaysia’s civil law dictates that the legal minimum age of marriage is 18 for male and 16 for female. And yet in the period between 2010 and 2015, approximately an average of 1,045 child marriage applications were recorded per year to Muslim children (Hansard May 19, 2016).

Let that number sink in. 

Imagine the lost childhood and potential life opportunities snatched from that child, and possibly for his or her progenies, to grow as full human beings. Imagine the horrors a young girl goes through at the hands of a sick paedophile. All this in the modern world of 21st century Malaysia! 

Why? 

Because in Malaysia, in spite of our civil laws, the state Islamic laws allow 16 as the marriageable age for girls and the Shariah courts can provide consent for any age below that. That endorsement provided the implicit authority for paedophiles and perverts, weak parents, authority figures, even police and political leaders with a certain religious conservative-bent to be not just apologists but also enablers of child marriages in this country. 

And thus we hear the office of the Deputy Prime Minister suggesting a standard operating procedure for child marriages? Really? For child marriages? This can only happen when religion trumps reason. 

In the midst of a contentious American presidential campaign in 1960, John F Kennedy famously said “I am not the Catholic candidate for president. I am the Democratic party’s candidate for president, who happens also to be a Catholic. I do not speak for my church on public matters, and the church does not speak for me”. 

That is how our elected representatives and political leaders need to be if our nation is to be united and to progress, and our citizens irrespective of beliefs, and non-belief, is to be treated equal and with full dignity and human rights. 

And here we are with child marriage, and the only defence for it has been by religion. That is precisely why religion and its influence cannot have a place in governance. Any right-thinking human being educated in this century will never agree to even a hint of allowing child marriages. But religion and the religious do not care for right-thinking.

It only cares that you follow its edict, despite many scholars casting doubt on the veracity of the saying, or hadith, used to assert Aisha’s young age. Reason and humanity be damned. 

Taking all known accounts and records of Aisha’s age at marriage, estimates of her age range from nine to 19. Because of this, it is impossible to know with any certainty how old Aisha was.

What we do know is what the Quran says about marriage: that it is valid only between consenting adults, and that a woman has the right to choose her own spouse.

As the living embodiment of Islam, Prophet Muhammad’s actions reflect the Quran’s teachings on marriage, even if the actions of some Muslim regimes and individuals do not.

A stateswoman, scholar, mufti, and judge, Aisha combined spirituality, activism and knowledge and remains a role model for many Muslim women today. The gulf between her true legacy and her depiction in Islamophobic materials is not merely historically inaccurate; it is also an insult to the memory of a pioneering woman.

Those who manipulate her story to justify the abuse of young girls, and those who manipulate it in order to depict Islam as a religion that legitimises such abuse have more in common than they think.

Both demonstrate a disregard for what we know about the times in which the Prophet lived, and for the affirmation of female autonomy which her story illustrates.

When we invoke religion, faith or belief in public policy, worse still in law, how do we determine truth? Faith and belief by its very definition has no anchor in reason. Who will be the judge of it? As it is we already have a Chief Justice of the Shariah Court in Selangor proposing an SOP for evaluating the mystical and witchcraft (sihir) in adjudicating cases.

Once unreason takes hold of authority, who will stop it? They cannot be reasoned with. 

The unreasonable have God in their corner – so they say. The apologists caught between unreasoned belief and humanity does not have the courage to act on their humanitarian conscience because they believe their God dictate it so. And society and the citizenry suffer. Who shall rescue the poor children? 

Religion must be banished from government and governance. Humanitarian empathy and reason must be the primary driver of law and order.

Our children cannot be bargained or compromised for any God or faith.

There is no excuse that justifies the destruction of a child’s life in return for pleasing a supposed religious allowance. 

It is time our elected government and representatives put a stop to this travesty of human misery and child abuse.

Raise the minimum age for marriage to 18 irrespective of religion and/or custom without exception. No SOP required.

Read more at https://www.thestar.com.my/opinion/columnists/siti-kasim-thots/2018/07/08/religion-cannot-be-the-legal-basis-humanitarian-empathy-and-reason-must-be-the-primary-driver-of-law

The real Malay dilemma

The issue is whether any of the Malay leadership would be willing to change its society from a religious-centric one to one that is progressive and modern in character.

Siti Thots
Sunday 26 August 2018

Old politics: If the leadership keeps to the racialist, feudalist and religious-centric tactics and policies of the past, thinking this is what they need to do to keep the votes, it will just be the repeat of past mistakes of the Umno era.

A HIGH-level panel has been announced to review the administration of Islamic Institutions at the Federal level. Commendably, all views from the general public is welcomed. The Keeper of the Rulers’ Seal is also quoted as saying, in the announcement of this Panel, that it was appropriate that the related institutions undergo improvement so as to protect the religion of Islam, as well as promote its universal values in the country.

So here is a short opinion - Islam does not need protection, nor does it need to be institutionalised.

As a Muslim, I believe in God Almighty. His religion does not need anyone’s help, least of all from fallible human beings. Islam and God has no need for anything, but human beings do. No one represents Islam. Everyone represents their version of Islam that suits their wants and needs. These include those in political parties that say it represents Islam but simply do not. They merely represent their personal human interest for power and authority.

We need our Government to protect us from people who want to wield powers upon others by using religion as their weapon. That is what we Malaysians, Muslims and non-Muslims need. I want to ask the political leaders of Malaysia, elected and unelected: What do you intend to do to protect us from those in power whose interest is to wield their religion over others?

In Malaysia today, we are obsessed with religion. Politicians and Ministers talk about religion and upholding religion. We have dedicated channels and programmes on religion on mainstream TV. Teachers force their religion and religious interpretations on children. Even the technical department, JKR (Public Works Department) for example, has set up sign boards espousing religious thoughts. Ever go to civil service offices? Observe just how many religious seminar banners and thoughts are plastered all over these places. Sometimes I wonder whether these are public services departments or religious propaganda functionaries.

Why this parade of religion in the public sphere? Is it because our people obsess on religion, as they personally have got nothing else of substance to promote that would enhance their work and the lives of the people they serve? Or that they have to cling to religion as that is their one and only part of their lives that provide them any sense of self-worth?

this parade of religion in the public sphere? Is it because our people obsess on religion, as they personally have got nothing else of substance to promote that would enhance their work and the lives of the people they serve? Or that they have to cling to religion as that is their one and only part of their lives that provide them any sense of self-worth?

Today, our Malay society has become a society so religiously judgemental that the sight of a woman without head-cover is practically blasphemous.

Think about this, after all the hue and cry of the 41 year old with 2 wives, from Kelantan who groomed his third, 11 year old child bride from the poor family in Thailand, the state religious authority penalised him for an unregistered marriage and then, instead of voiding it, basically approves the marriage. A significant portion of our Malay- Muslim society rejoiced!

Can a Malay society, more insular and superstitious in thought, that is now funding thousands of religious schools and Tahfiz centres/boarding houses than ever before in its history, create a population that is competitive to succeed in the 21st century?

Can it even compete on a fair footing with the rest of the Malaysian non-Muslim population? Malays have been given preferential places in universities, GLCs and the civil service for more than 40 years now, what have we got to show for it? Uncompetitive universities, a significant pool of unemployable Malay graduates and with most being employed by the civil service and the failed GLCs, and such corrupt administrations that a 93- year-old man has to come back to be the Prime Minister, that’s what. Would more religion help? Or would it make the population less competitive? Let us all be honest.

This has been the unintended consequence of the assimilation of Islamic values in governance (“penerapan nilai-nilai Islam”) instituted in 1985. The road to hell, they say, is always paved with good intentions.  If nothing is done this nightmare is just beginning for the Malay society and Malaysian in general will suffer for it.

If we want to see where our nation is headed with this type of ideology and cultural religious mind-set besetting 60% of our population, we don’t have to look far to Saudi Arabia or Iran or even Aceh, we just need to see the state of governance and life in Kelantan. Democracy is only as good as an informed and intellectually challenging population. The Nazis in Germany and the Mullahs in Iran were all elected by the majority. Today, the Iranians are rebelling against their repressive theocratic Government but the Mullahs are not going to let go of power that easily. Thousands are in jail. But our Malays don’t seem to see or learn the lesson. Erdogan is taking Turkey on that road to already disastrous consequences and many of our Malays applaud.

The only reason the majority of the Malays today are satisfied with their lives to carry on being religiously obsessed, thinking non-stop of the afterlife and judging others, while the non-Malays are focused on bettering themselves in this life, is that the Malays, by and large, has been able to live off the teats of the Government in one way or another. It has been a fulfilled entitlement that will end sooner rather than later.

This gravy train has stopped. Mahathir and Robert Kuok, two 90-year-old plus statesmen, had to go to China almost in tribute with offerings, to extricate us from the mess our Malay leaders have created.

Unfortunately, Malays are oblivious to this fact. In fact, even most non-Malays are oblivious to the fact that if we do nothing, 30 to 40% of the population cannot sustain 100% of us. You need the remaining, at least, majority of that 60% to be able to truly contribute economically and not be consumers of tax from the minorities. And religion is not an economic contributor. It is an unproductive consumer of epic proportions with no returns.

Mahathir came to lead the Government in 1981 and transform an agricultural hamlet into an industrial one with liberal economic policies powered by an industrious non-Malay population and the liberal segment of the Malay society.

This was the population that made the country progress. Mahathir was not popular as a result of Islamisation. Mahathir was and is popular because he brought progress, prosperity and in-turn unity and pride in the country to everyone as Malaysians. He brought revolutionary change to real life. For all intents and purposes, he was a liberal progressive leader.

A progressive leadership will only be elected by a progressive society. The only reason the Pakatan Harapan government was elected was because the progressive societies of the non-Malays and the liberal Malay voted for it. We saved the nation, again. Unfortunately, that liberal segment is now forgotten and vilified. Malay liberals who are capable and focused on a productive life are labelled blasphemous and extremists, and shunned by the leadership in power, no matter who are in power.

The religious conservatives, on the other hand, are courted and coddled as if they will be the ever-lasting vote bank that must be assuaged.  Think again on this paradigm. Malay swing votes are persuadable but only if the leadership shows the way.

If the leadership keeps to the racialist, feudalist, and religious-centric policies of the past, thinking this is what they need to do to keep the votes, they will just be repeating past mistakes of the Umno era. More of the Malay population will move to the right of centre towards the Mullahs. It is an inevitable outcome of such a policy. Islamisation was a counter to PAS, it only made Umno the old PAS, and PAS the new Taliban and a stronger party every year from that time onwards.

Religion by its very nature will always veer towards conservatism and fundamentalism, no matter how one wants to spin those words. Because institutionalised religion is about following. The attractiveness of institutionalised religion is the abdication of thinking to religious leaders with easy answers one shall not question. More so, when the population is uncompetitive against the outside world. In Malaysia, we have one of the most sophisticated array of institutionalised Islam in the world today.

So, without a change from the religious-centric environment the Malay society is currently in, and an education system that indoctrinates rather than enhance critical thinking, Malay society will continually drift towards the insularity of religious conservatism and away from progressive capabilities to succeed in the modern world. And population demographic will ensure that a progressive Government will eventually lose out.

Therein lies the real Malay dilemma.

Would any of the Malay leadership be willing to change its society from a religious centric one to one that is progressive and modern in character?

Do you want our Malay society to continue to regress and be uncompetitive? Do you want it to drag the rest of us down the road of conservatism and economic ruin?

As Malay leaders, do you placate or do you lead for change?

How do you lead that change? 

Read more at https://www.thestar.com.my/opinion/columnists/siti-kasim-thots/2018/08/26/the-real-malay-dilemma-the-issue-is-whether-any-of-the-malay-leadership-would-be-willing-to-change

Nazri shocked to discover revelations about Najib and Rosmah

Former minister Datuk Seri Nazri Aziz said he was shocked to discover the revelations about Datuk Seri Najib Tun Razak and his wife, Rosmah Mansor.

14 August 2018

He said there were all sorts of exposes being made, which he was not aware of when he was in government. 

"I did not know about Rosmah's jewellery, I did not know about SRC International.

“I didn't know when I was a minister that there was money and Jho Low (fugitive businessman Low Taek Jho), it was not disclosed," he told reporters at the Parliament lobby on Tuesday (Aug 14).

Nazri, who is Padang Rengas MP, also expressed his support for investigations into 1Malaysia Development Berhad (1MDB).

A series of police raids on properties-linked to Najib in June resulted in a haul of RM686.37mil, including RM116.7mil cash in 26 currencies.

Also part of the haul from the raids were 567 luxury handbags, 423 watches, 234 sunglasses and more than 10,000 pieces of jewellery, all with an estimated market value of between RM910mil and RM1.1bil. 

Najib has so far been slapped with seven criminal charges related to criminal breach of trust, bribery and money laundering related to SRC International Sdn Berhad, a subsidiary of 1MDB placed under the jurisdiction of the Finance Ministry in 2012.

Nazri said as a fellow Umno member, he had previously always taken Najib at face value.

"I was shocked. I was shocked because as a party member, even when Tun Dr Mahathir Mohamad was the Umno president, we did not dig into what they said," said Nazri.

He said that Umno members stuck with what was said when Dr Mahathir accused Datuk Seri Anwar Ibrahim of sodomy.

"Only now we know, which is why I have remained silent because I want to see what more will be exposed,” he added.

Once a fierce Dr Mahathir critic, Nazri now claims he has no issues with the second-time Prime Minister.

"I never left Umno, it is he who left. But now that he is the Prime Minister, we have to support him. I don't have a record of fighting the PM,” he said.

Read more at https://www.thestar.com.my/news/nation/2018/08/14/nazri-shocked-to-discover-revelations-about-najib-and-rosmah/

Denmark's Controversial 'Burqa Ban' Takes Effect, Proving Immediately Divisive

Supporters and opponents of a ban on garments covering the face, including Islamic veils such as the niqab or burqa, clashed verbally Wednesday as the law takes effect.

By JAN M. OLSEN / AP 

01 Aug 2018  5:10 AM EDT

Women wearing niqab walk in front of the Danish Parliament in Copenhagen, Denmark,
on May 31, 2018.

 

Mads Claus Rasmussen—AFP/Getty Images

Marcus Knuth of the ruling liberal party Venstre, says the dress worn by some conservative Muslim women is “strongly oppressive.”

Sasha Andersen of the “Party Rebels” activist group, is planning a demonstration later in the day against what they called Wednesday a “discriminatory” measure against a minority group. Groups that back the ban also plan to rally.

Danish lawmakers approved the law in May, which was presented by the center-right governing coalition that is known for tightening asylum and immigration rules in recent years. In 2016, Denmark also adopted a law requiring newly arrived asylum-seekers to hand over valuables such jewelry and gold to help pay for their stays in the country.

Other European countries have similar bans, claiming they are not aimed at any religion in particular, and don’t ban headscarves, turbans or the traditional Jewish skull cap.

Popularly known as the “Burqa Ban,” it is mostly seen as being directed at the niqab and burqa. Few Muslim women in Denmark wear such full-face veils.

The law allows people to cover their face when there is a “recognizable purpose” like cold weather or complying with other legal requirements, such as using motorcycle helmets required under Danish traffic rules.

First-time offenders risk a fine of 1,000 kroner ($157). Repeat offenses could trigger fines of up to 10,000 kroner or a jail sentence of up to six months.

Anyone forcing a person to wear garments covering the face by using force or threats can be fined or face up to two years in prison.

Austria, France and Belgium have similar laws.

http://time.com/5354855/denmarks-burqa-face-veil-ban/com

Spare us the righteous anger

I sometimes wonder what it is that these Umno fellows eat and drink. I would not have thought that such self-delusion could be possible unless one was scoffing “special” mushrooms on a regular basis.

BRAVE NEW WORLD

Wednesday, 1 Aug 2018

Umno youth chief Datuk Dr Asyraf Wajdi Dusuki (seated 2nd right).

For example, Umno Youth chief Datuk Dr Asyraf Wajdi Dusuki took offence with some comments made by Human Resources Minister M. Kulasegaran.

He must resign, the youthful fellow yells. His comments are divisive and seditious and will cause disharmony amongst the people. And if he doesn’t resign, he must be sacked, he screams.

What did the minister say? It depends how you want to interpret it. The question is, who is the “they” he was referring to? The minister said he was referring to those who would call Malaysian ethnic Indians “pendatang”.

People like the Umno Youth chief would say Kulasegaran was referring to all Malays. If such is the case, then it is super offensive and the minister’s head must roll.

Wow. Such hypocrisy. How many times have Umno ministers been unapologetically racist, telling non-Malays to leave the country and “go back to where they belong”? Have these people been fired or forced to resign? Of course not.

(Incidentally, the Human Resources Minister has apologised if he caused offence.)

And even now, the Umno machine (with their best pals from PAS) go on about how it is better to vote for someone Malay and Muslim regardless of his capability or indeed his integrity.

If anyone plays the race card, it is Umno and those of their ilk (which now seems to include PAS).

So please, Umno Youth leader, do us a favour and spare us your righteous anger.

I know that race and religion is all these sort go on and on about because it is all they know.

They scream about Malay rights and Muslim rights being under threat without defining those terms and without offering any evidence such a threat even exists.

This is what they do. This is the only thing they know how to do.

But Malaysians can rise above that. We can, all of us, regardless of ethnicity, see that when those who are intellectually bankrupt go on and on about some imaginary problem based on race and faith, it is because they have nothing to say of any actual intellectual value.

We changed our government in a peaceful manner. We showed to the world that democracy can work. Even when the odds are stacked against you. Even when the system is designed to ensure the victory of one side over the other.

We showed the world that if enough of us come out and vote and if enough of us take the trouble to do the hard work of PACAs (polling agents and counting agents), we can make a difference.

I am now somewhere in Yorkshire – in the West, where democracy is taken for granted and where people are so complacent that their laziness to even go out and vote has put Britain in the madness of Brexit and the Americans in the madness of Trump.

We have already shown how we can change things, despite the odds, by sheer effort of enough people.

Now we need to show that sustainable change can occur and we can move away from the vile and regressive with patience and reason.

We have to make small-minded voices redundant by firmly and surely working in a manner to benefit all Malaysians and not use the poisonous and toxic narrative of race and faith that only serves the few.

• Azmi Sharom (azmi.sharom@gmail.com) is a law teacher. The views expressed here are entirely the writer’s own.

https://www.thestar.com.my/opinion/columnists/brave-new-world/2018/08/01/spare-us-the-righteous-anger-the-change-that-malaysians-voted-for-will-not-last-if-we-dont-push-back

New Malaysia springs from within us

I AM writing this column at the birthplace of Harry Potter, exactly 21 years and one day since the publication of Harry Potter and the Philosopher’s Stone, the very first book in the series. I am on a “Potter Pilgrimage” in Edinburgh, a much-needed respite following nine months in an intensive masters’ course on public policy.

   

Lyana Khairuddin 

Sunday 30 June 2018

Time flies by these days. Next week, the 2017/18 batch of Chevening Scholarship recipients will have our farewell event. There are 44 Malaysians in this group, around 3% of the total.

With my time in Britain coming to an end, I am getting a feeling of déjà vu. Eight years ago, I was in this exact same position – leaving a country where I gained not only quality education but also lifelong friendships and enriching life lessons, to go home.

My return in 2010 was filled with anxiety and I must admit, forced me into a bout of depression that lasted three years. I felt that back in Malaysia, my wings would be clipped professionally.

Despite coming home then to an assured position with a public university, I felt I would have benefited more from working as a post-doctoral fellow in laboratories overseas rather than fighting for bench space and teaching students a curriculum that had not changed from the time I was myself a student there.

Worse, I did not realise how much Malaysia had changed in the four years I was away. Suddenly, the fact that I returned with a PhD from a laboratory that founded the cervical cancer vaccine did not matter as much as my hair, the way I dress, my weight and my marital status.

Petty things, but these are the issues I had to deal with. The Malaysia I returned to in 2010 was adamant in making me “the other”, and it was resolute in dividing and pitting Malaysians against each other.

Such rhetoric would make anyone sick. It took me three years, several professional counselling sessions and countless marathons to overcome my depressive state.

My new year’s resolution for 2013, the year I turned 30, was to instead contribute towards the Malaysian society that I want. I started volunteering my time and portions of my meagre salary to soup kitchens and social enterprises, started to meet more like-minded Malaysians and participated in gatherings that promote an inclusive multi-ethnic, interfaith society.

This time around, I will be returning to Malaysia with a lighter heart. The lingering post-GE14 euphoria notwithstanding, the lessons I have learnt after my first return will arm me with the necessary resilience to face old rhetoric and new challenges.

This past month, and even in my few days here in Edinburgh, I met Malaysians who have studied and worked overseas claiming that they are now ready and willing to return home.

I applaud them, but I hope that my journey as documented here will serve as a reminder to all of us that change doesn’t come overnight. Nor does it come without us, ourselves, making the necessary changes within.

Despite a new government, there is still discrimination, xenophobia and injustice.

Cases in point: the recent “suggestion” by the Human Resources Minister to only allow local cooks in restaurants; the early morning arrest of Siti Kasim for allegedly “kidnapping” an adult woman, although she was acting as a lawyer for the woman when providing her with lodging; and the backlash against ministerial press statements in languages other than Bahasa Malaysia.

Despite a new government and more women in Cabinet, as state representatives and in politics than ever before, women are still objectified and vilified for our choices.

Strangers will still police what we wear. Colleagues will still question why Malay women do not wear the tudung, are not married, have not had children or are not having more children, and speak predominantly in English. And Internet trolls still call out our weight and body shapes.

Despite a new government formed by a coalition with two multiracial parties, there are still those who question a multi-ethnic open house held recently at the Prime Minister’s residence, calling it a Chinese New Year celebration rather than a Hari Raya open house.

There are still those who continue to divide, incite racial tensions and spread animosity.

Yet, I have learnt that regardless of who is in power, Malaysians can always be counted upon to surprise even the most cynical of us and come together, especially for a good cause.

Any call for help will be respon­ded to with enthusiasm, showing that indeed, our strength lies in our ability to come together while maintaining our diversity.

Rome was not built in a day. It is the same with Malaysia; it is still a work in progress. To those of us returning home, learn to contribute as well as embrace the eccentricities known only to us.

Let this New Malaysia be what we all hope for.

Lyana Khairuddin is a Chevening-Khazanah Scholar who pursued a Master of Public Policy at the Blavatnik School of Government, University of Oxford. The views expressed here are entirely her own.

Read more at https://www.thestar.com.my/opinion/columnists/naturally/2018/06/30/new-malaysia-springs-from-within-us-regardless-of-who-wins-elections-the-nation-is-at-its-best-when/

Nazri Aziz: BN 'as good as gone', time for it to dissolve

It is time for Barisan Nasional to dissolve, now that its Sarawak component parties have left the coalition, said Datuk Seri Nazri Abdul Aziz (pic).

The Padang Rengas MP told The Sun Daily that Barisan was "as good as gone" and said bold changes were needed.

13 June 2018

"It might be a good thing to dissolve BN now and have Umno go it alone in peninsular Malaysia," Nazri said.

He said there is no coming back for Barisan, especially after MCA, MIC and Gerakan were defeated on May 9.

"BN is no longer strong like it used to be, and in times like this, we must bravely make changes or take drastic steps, similar to what the late former premier Tun Abdul Razak Hussein did after the 1969 general election," Nazri said.

He said that when the Alliance Party lost the popular vote, Abdul Razak was spurred into action and formed Barisan by joining forces with Gerakan and the People's Progressive Party.

On Tuesday (June 12), Parti Pesaka Bumiputera Bersatu (PBB), Sarawak United People's Party (SUPP), Parti Rakyat Sarawak (PRS) and the Sarawak Progressive Democratic Party (SPDP) announced that they were pulling out from the former ruling coalition to form a new state-based pact.

BN entered the fray for the last general elections with 13 parties, but is now left with only four (and a half) parties. 

The remaining BN members are Umno, MCA, MIC and Gerakan, while MyPPP seems to be half-in, half-out.

BN was founded in 1973, after the 1969 general elections saw the then Alliance (of Umno, MCA and MIC) suffering many defeats to the Opposition, which then included DAP, Gerakan, (then) PPP and PAS. Shortly after those elections, the May 13 racial riots occurred.

The then prime minister Tun Abdul Razak Hussein had the idea to bring national unity and stability by having Opposition parties such as Gerakan, PAS and PPP (now called MyPPP) join a grand coalition - Barisan Nasional.

But 45 years later, BN led by Razak's son, Datuk Seri Najib Tun Razak, suffered its worst defeat ever.

Within a week after the elections, four parties in Sabah - Upko, LDP, PBS and PBRS - announced they were leaving BN.

The BN brand had become so unpopular that at one point, it was announced that Sabah Umno leaders such as Tan Sri Musa Aman were expected to leave and join PBS. Tan Sri Joseph Pairin Kitingan announced that PBS and Sabah STAR would form a new Sabah coalition, Gagasan Bersatu, to hold on to the Sabah state government.

As for MyPPP, a power struggle has been ongoing with its president M Kayveas announcing on May 19 that the party was exiting BN. However, the other supreme council members have disputed this, leaving MyPPP's status within BN in doubt.

Related stories:

Sarawak abandons Barisan Nasional ship

Sarawak BN parties had to rebrand themselves, fearing wipe-out at next state elections, says analyst

PBS leaves BN, Musa Aman to leave Umno and join PBS

Read more at https://www.thestar.com.my/news/nation/2018/06/13/nazri-aziz-bn-as-good-as-gone-time-for-it-to-dissolve/

China's debt-trap diplomacy: Inquirer columnist

In the commentary, the writer cautions about the inflow of aid from China.

Alito L. Malinao

MANILA (PHILIPPINE DAILY INQUIRER/ASIA NEWS NETWORK) - This is not the kind of invasion that Supreme Court Senior Associate Justice Antonio Carpio warns about, but a subtle and insidious mode of conquest that could undermine Philippine sovereignty in the long term.

A Chinese national flag hangs from a barrier in a car park in Beijing on Jan 18, 2018.PHOTO: AFP

In fact, with the way Foreign Secretary Alan Peter Cayetano is defending China whenever questions are raised on its blatant interference in Philippine affairs, we are now fast becoming a vassal state of China, like Laos and Cambodia.

To reports on the presence of Chinese naval vessels in our sovereign waters off Kalayaan Island, Cayetano was quick to react that the presence of such vessels, if true, "would not mean anything." He made the remark even before Beijing could deny the report.

Cayetano has also defended the government's action in allowing a research vessel operated by the Institute of Oceanology of the Chinese Academy of Sciences to conduct research in Philippine Rise, formerly Benham Rise, which is recognised by the United Nations as part of the Philippines' continental shelf.

According to Cayetano, a law allows foreign research in Philippine territory so long as a Filipino scientist is aboard the research vessel and the findings of the study are shared internationally. But Carpio said there is no local statute that specifically covers such an arrangement.

Cayetano's stance could be the Duterte administration's way of expressing gratitude to Beijing for its financial assistance to the Philippines.

Consider what happened in Cambodia. At the close of the Asean Summit in 2014, Cambodian strongman Hun Sen refused to issue a joint communiqué that would have called for a stop to China's militarisation of the South China Sea.

Two years later, in October 2016, Cambodia was rewarded with China's commitment of economic aid worth more than US$600 million and some 31 cooperation agreements.

China is the largest source of development assistance and investment in both Cambodia and Laos. As of 2016, its foreign investments in Cambodia totaled nearly US$12 billion (S$15,688 billion), or close to 35 per cent of foreign direct investments in that country. In 2014, China's investments in Laos exceeded US$6 billion and its grants amounted to US$187 million.

In the Philippines, China has pledged to finance 12 projects worth a total of US$4.4 billion, including the US$3.01-billion south line of the North-South Railway and the US$374.03-million New Centennial Water Source-Kaliwa Dam project in Quezon province.

It has also provided a P3.6-billion (S$92 million) grant for the construction of two Pasig River bridges and drug rehabilitation centers in Mindanao.

But here's the caveat: Like Laos and Cambodia, the Philippines could become beholden to Beijing, preventing the exercise of a truly independent foreign policy.

This is what Indian analyst Brahma Chellaney has described as China's "debt-trap diplomacy."

Chellaney, a professor of strategic studies at the Center for Policy Research in New Delhi, said that through its US$ one trillion "One Belt, One Road" initiative, China is supporting infrastructure projects in strategically located developing countries, often by extending huge loans to their governments.

"As a result, some of these countries are becoming saddled with debt, leaving them even more firmly under China's thumb," he said, adding that what China is doing is "commercial and strategic penetration" in countries in need of loans for their development.

Chellaney said a country is ensnared in a debt trap when it is caught in a cycle of interest capitalisation or taking on new loans to pay off interest or principal repayments.

"When default occurs, the Chinese move in to gain control of the resources, corporations or installations," he said.

China's financial hold on Cambodia, Laos, Myanmar, Thailand and the Philippines ensures a disunited Asean when it comes to China's aggression in the South China Sea, according to Chellaney.

He said countries that are well-managed reap the economic rewards from their projects. But rogue countries or leaders that take from China could become subservient to it.

This appears to be happening now in our country, with the Duterte administration having no qualms in defending China's incursions into our territorial islands and waters.

The writer is a former news editor of the Manila Standard, who teaches journalism at the Pamantasan ng Lungsod ng Maynila. The Philippine Daily Inquirer is a member of The Straits Times media partner Asia News Network, an alliance of 23 news media.

https://www.straitstimes.com/asia/se-asia/chinas-debt-trap-diplomacy-inquirer-columnist