Poh Ah Pak

20 Sep 08, 14:55

Blog posts from Dr. Mahathir Mohamad.

Poh Ah Pak

20 Sep 08, 14:57

LOSS OF CONFIDENCE

1. I was reading the comments on my blog on 'Mengingati Pejuang-Pejuang', when I came across a comment which respectfully disagreed with me that the defeat of BN in the General Election was not due to support for the opposition but disaffection with BN.

2. He said if that was the case they could have voted for the third candidate who actually lost his deposit.

3. I had lost in the Election of 1969 in a constituency with 35,000 voters of whom 30,000 were Malays. I had won in this constituency in 1964 with more than 4,000 votes majority. I figured that in 1969 that even if the non-Malay voters did not vote for me I would still win because support for me amongst the Malays had increased by almost 3,000.

4. But what happened shocked me because Chinese voters not only refused to vote for me, which meant a loss of 3,000 votes but they voted for PAS. I needed 6,000 more votes to replace 3,000 voters who did not vote for me and another 3,000 because they voted for PAS.

5. I lost by 900 votes. If the voters who were dissatisfied with UMNO and BN voted for a third party or refuse to vote, the BN would lose these votes but may still win if the margin previously was big and the opposition did not get additional votes. But when votes were taken away from BN there would be a decrease in BN votes. Then when the votes are given to the opposition there would be an increase in votes for the opposition and so the gap is widened and the opposition would win.

6. Experience has shown that independent third parties hardly ever win. Supporting them would reduce BN votes but that would not be enough to ensure the opposition wins.

7. The rakyat are right in being fed-up with corruption by UMNO "plutocrats". But that had not always been so. It is the corrupt practises of UMNO leaders of today, especially the topmost leader, which has caused deep anger against the party.

8. Actually the present leader's involvement with graft, his support for his son's business, the power he gives to his son-in-law, his well-known sleeping habits, indecision, lack of ability to handle problems, sudden withdrawal of oil subsidy, cancellation of the bridge to Singapore, wasting money on the unused RM800 million (Johor Baru) Customs, Immigration and Quarantine building, cancellation of the railway double tracking and electrification project, the monsoon cup and lots more are what turned the voters against BN.

9. The kampung folks and the ordinary Chinese by and large are not too concerned about human rights or more liberal Government. Even the ISA did not bother them as shown by their strong backing for the Government party, before.

10. The talks in the kampungs and the ordinary Chinese and Indians were about the increase in cost of living, few business opportunities and of course the behaviour of the PM's family.

11. In 2004 they gave wholehearted support for the BN so that the party won 90% of the seats in parliament and recaptured Terengganu. Could it be possible that the voters who were so greatly enchanted with the BN in 2004 but in a space of just four years have changed their collective minds so radically?

12. As for rejection of race based politics, why did the voters vote for PAS, a 100 percent Malay party and DAP, a predominantly Chinese party.

13. I know many who admire the West tend to support their values. They would like to interpret the disastrous performance of the BN based on Western thinking. But we are Asians and in Malaysia our basic racial differences are extreme. All we can do to avoid confrontation between the races is to allow them to form race based parties and to have them cooperate with each other. This was the BN policy and practise. And it worked for almost half a century.

14. We cannot fault the BN concept and governance. We have to look elsewhere for the loss of confidence in the party.

http://test.chedet.com/che_det/2008/09/sn

Poh Ah Pak

22 Sep 08, 16:45

THE BARISAN NASIONAL II

1. When the Barisan Nasional did very badly in the March 2008 general elections, all the component parties except those in Sabah and Sarawak experienced losses as they had never done before.

2. In the aftermath of the elections, the component parties pointed accusing fingers at each other. Very quickly they were at each other's throats.

3. There were talks about leaving the BN. And now we are seeing the first party to do so and to become an independent party.

4. Where before all parties avoided raising sensitive issues in public, now in the name of democracy and liberalism sensitive issues are brought up in which the component parties of the BN make known the differences in their view. The result is to widen the divide separating the BN component parties.

5. When Ahmad Ismail made unpalatable remarks about the Chinese, it was made out that it was the view of UMNO itself. Far from denying it, the UMNO leadership accepted the blame and apologised. This solved nothing as the Chinese parties refused to accept the apology but demanded the culprit himself should apologise.

6. He refused and UMNO whose president heads the Government suspended Ahmad for three years. This may satisfy some Chinese but almost immediately the Government arrested a Chinese MP under ISA. The effects of Ahmad's suspension have been nullified.

7. Now the Malays are angry with the Chinese and the Chinese are angry with the Malays. Party-wise UMNO is angry with Gerakan and MCA and Gerakan/MCA are angry with UMNO.

8. Threats to leave the BN are made by the Chinese parties, not just because of Ahmad's refusal to apologise but also because of the impression that they are subservient to UMNO. They believe that the failure of Chinese voters to vote for them was due to this junior position they hold in BN. To correct this impression they found it necessary to take pot shots at UMNO and defy the BN leadership.

9. Privately UMNO, MCA Gerakan and MIC express their dislike of Dato Seri Abdullah and his Premiership. But none seem willing to acknowledge that it was dislike for Abdullah which caused the BN to lose the support of the people. Instead they picked on the parties and blame each other.

10. At the rate things are going the BN might split asunder. If each party go their separate ways, none would become a force in Malaysian politics and certainly none, not even UMNO, can aspire to form the Government of Malaysia. Of course they can all join the Opposition under Anwar, but they would still play a subservient role in the Opposition. In any case the Opposition withi its ideological incompatibility would not make a good Government, capable of handling Malaysia's multi-racial population. It is difficult to think that the hodge-podge collection of incompatible parties can handle oncoming economic and financial problems that are inevitable.

11. The stability of this country has been undermined by the weakness and incompetence of the current Government and the harsh bickering between the Government parties. A Government by the Opposition is not going to be any better and probably would be worse.

12. Currently we are seeing the loss of confidence in the ability of the Government to deal with economic problems. Foreign investors are not coming and together with locals are pulling out their investments in the stock market. From a high of almost 1500 the index is now below 1000. God knows how much market capital has been wiped out.

13. The Ringgit is depreciating and may shrink further. The cost of living has shot up. Businesses are having a hard time already. The recent decision to tax excess profits of the Independent Power Producers has caused foreign investors and locals too to lose confidence. The tax has now been withdrawn but not for the first year. This alone would put the IPPs in trouble with their banks.

14. In at least one case a foreign investor has been given back his deposit of almost 100 million Ringgit because allegedly there was some technical error.

15. I once said Malaysia as a multi-racial country needs a strong government. Multi-racial countries have to face race relation problems. With the need to handle racial problems, the managment of the economy becomes extremely difficult.

16. I cannot see the Opposition with its loose organisation being able to handle Malaysia's racial and economic problems.

17. In the past, the BN Government had managed to keep Malaysia stable and to develop the country as well. If it seems not to be able to do so now it is not because the BN as a party is no longer suitable for this country. It is simply due to very poor and incompetent leadership.

18. The component parties of the BN should not think that their best hope is to see the demise of the BN. Rather they should all come together to resuscitate it. If it is necessary to dump the leader than they should do so. But destroying the BN will neither be good for the component parties nor for the nation.

19. I am not an UMNO member even but I would like to suggest the component parties should stop blaming each other, stop taking pot-shots at each other. Instead they should all come together and review the structure of BN. They should try for a win-win or lose-lose solution in dealing with inter-party relations. They should listen to the people and to their own members and find ways to satisfy their needs; to overcome their dissatisfaction.

20. There must be some new thinking on the BN concept. But the basic premises about close collaboration between the parties, about the need to help each other, to accommodate and deal with grouses together should be maintained.

21. I believe that for this multi-racial, multi-lingual, multi-religious and multi-cultural country with extreme economic disparities, the BN is still the best political solution provider. It is still the best way for the different races to cooperate to govern this country.

22. As the Malays say "Because of one drop of indigo, a whole pot of milk is spoilt."

23. We must not throw out the baby with the bath water.

24. The BN is still relevant. It is still the ideal coalition for Malaysia's multi-racial population.

http://test.chedet.com/che_det/2008/09/the

Poh Ah Pak

26 Sep 08, 12:58

Pegging

1. I am not in the business of advising the Government. When I mentioned the advisability of pegging the Ringgit, it was in answer to a question posed by a reporter. If the Government noticed the report I would feel flattered.

2. Pegging currencies is not as easy as it sounds. The whole thing must be studied very carefully. Even getting agreement by a select panel is not easy. A decision made on the spur of the moment that pegging is not possible cannot really reflect the assessment made together with experts in consultation.

3. Pegging need not be always with the US Dollar. But the fact that the US Dollar is currently not stable is no reason why the idea should be summarily dismissed.

4. There can be other options. Other more stable currencies can be used or a basket of currencies may be used to reduce extreme volatility.

5. The US Dollar is backed by nothing, not even reserves in foreign currencies and gold which other countries hold in order to back their own currencies. The US is a bankrupt nation which means it is not in a position to provide foreign currency backing for its money.

6. The gold in Fort Knox has been depleted long ago and the pegging to gold of a certain amount as agreed to at the Bretton Woods has been done away with by President Nixon. No more gold standards. Yet the US Dollar still commands a certain value in the market. It is still being used for trade payments. This in fact gives the US Dollar a certain value even though the value, in exchange rate terms may change.

7. If the US Dollar is not used in international trading, it will have no value at all. This will of course hurt a lot of countries including Malaysia which carry substantial sums of US Dollar as reserves. Countries like China, Saudi Arabia and tiny Singapore would want to support trade payments made in US Dollar. They do not want their huge reserves of US Dollar to become worthless.

8. What we see here is the importance of international trade payments in sustaining the value of a currency.

9. Long, long ago I suggested the use of a special currency for trade. The currency should be equal in value to a fixed amount of gold. It should not be used domestically as each country would have its own currency pegged to the special trading currency.

10. The price of gold may go up and down but we know that the price of gold today is more than, say, 30 years ago. If we keep gold long enough we will eventually see it appreciating. It is not as volatile as currency notes.

11. So gold is an ideal standard for a trade currency. Effectively we would be going back to the Gold Standard, both for the trading currency and the domestic currency. For the domestic currency the rate against gold can change in keeping with inflation.

12. It was suggested that we call this trading currency the "dinar". Transactions would of course not be in solid gold dinars but with equivalent papers. It is not practical to carry around so much gold dinars but this will not be necessary if a country's export to another country and its import from that country is fairly balanced and only the difference need to be paid.

13. I am not an expert in this area but we can get experts to study whether pegging or the gold dinar are feasible. I would not dismiss the eficacy of these so easily.

14. Perhaps I can make a ridiculous suggestion. Why not make all Malaysian trade payments in Malaysian Ringgit?

15. We are a big trading nation. We export more than 200 billion Ringgit worth of raw material and manufactured goods and we import slightly less than that. Traders cannot just ignore us or boycott us. They need our exports and they need to sell their products to us.

16. All we need to do is to demand payment in Malaysian Ringgit for our exports. We can require payment for our imports in Ringgit according to the current value in an international trading currency or gold.

17. If we do this there will be a constant demand for Ringgit and this will keep the value of the Ringgit at a certain level which we can fix, taking into consideration factors which influence its value.

18. This may sound like a ridiculous suggestion. But not being a trained economist or financier I can allow myself the privilege of unorthodox thinking.

http://test.chedet.com/che_det/2008/09/

angel7030

26 Sep 08, 14:28

Uncle, under the Asian constitutions, we are not allow to interfere with our neighblouring country polictical problem.

Poh Ah Pak

27 Sep 08, 18:09

THE UNITED STATES

1. I wonder what is happening to the United States of America. It used to lay down the laws and rules which the whole world must abide. If any country refuses then blacklisting, sanctions and even invasions by the US forces might ensue.

2. It set the forms and standards for everything; systems of Government, human rights, economic transparency etc etc. Now it seems to be breaking or ignoring its own rules, regulations and laws.

3. It had condemned the Internal Security Act as unjust and a violation of human rights. Following the shock and awe invasion of Iraq, it has detained alleged terrorists without trial and without rights and habeas corpus proceeings. Some detainees have been there for five years.

4. Then in Abu Ghraib detention camp detainees have been tortured and humiliated. They were treated like animals. If it had happened in some weak Asian country, the US would demand for all kinds of punishment which the US is ever ready to inflict. But no one can drag Americans to court and punish them. If at all American courts would try these miscreants and the punishment would be very light.

5. Because of the extraordinary greed of American financiers and businessmen, they invent all kinds of ways to make huge sums of money. We cannot forget how in 1997-98 American hedge funds destroyed the economies of poor countries by manipulating their national currencies.

6. When as a result of the so-called trade in currencies the companies in the poor countries faced bankruptcy, the Governments were told not to bail out any company or bank which was in deep trouble. The Americans claimed that these companies or banks were inefficient and they should be allowed to go bankrupt and perish. Better still they should be sold at fire-sale price to American investors.

7. Yet today we see the US Government readying US700 billion to brazenly bail out banks, mortgage companies and insurance companies.

8. Where does the money come from? From thin air as no real money in cash or bullion or anything tangible are moved into the bankrupt banks. The money is just in the form of loan papers and entries in the books of the banks or companies.

9. The US 700 billion has no backing whatsoever. No gold reserves, no foreign currency reserves as required for other countries. Without such backing the US Dollar is actually useless. Only the military power of the US is forcing the world to give value to the US Dollar.

10. Desperate to avoid a serious recession the US has abandoned all its principles. It has now banned short selling, limited currency trading and insist that the accounts of hedge funds and currency traders to be open for inspection and be published.

11. In the final spasm of fear, the Government has given itself the right to resolve the problem of bankrupt banks and companies by the Government taking over i.e. the great capitalist country has accepted what is nothing more than nationalisation which it had condemned so much before.

12. The US now owes the world US 14 trillion. There is no way it can ever settle this debt. If other countries fail to repay or service their debts, the US would demand that they be made bankrupt. Now the US is literally bankrupt but it still insists that the pieces of paper, the famous or infamous greenbacks have some value. It actually has no value. Certainly it cannot be used to finance wars of aggression against Iraq and Afghanistan, to finance the CIA (Central Intelligence Agency) activities in undermining Governments and countries. But still the US' ability to threaten countries is undiminished.

13. An attempt is being made even in Malaysia to achieve a regime change. Money has been funnelled to certain individuals and parties to ensure that a well-known candidate with extensive connection to the US Jewish lobby would somehow become the Prime Minister of Malaysia.

14. US intervention in the politics of Malaysia is clear. I may not agree with the leadership of the present Government but I resent and object to US manipulations to make a satellite of this nation.

http://test.chedet.com/che_det/2008/09/

Poh Ah Pak

14 Oct 08, 16:30

DO WE NEED A STRONG GOVERNMENT?

1. In a previous article I said that a multiracial country needs a strong Government.

2. A weak Government would not be able to deal with the quarrelling between the races, which is the natural tendency of most multiracial societies. Indeed in some multiracial countries violence and fighting are common. Witness the countries around us.

3. For the slightest reason the races would be at each other's throats. One incident was the reaction in some countries because of the currency crisis.

4. Even religious differences can lead to conflict and violence. We see this in Northern Ireland, Lebanon, India, Indonesia and elsewhere. It is important to remember that in Malaysia racial differences are associated with religious differences. We are already seeing incidents involving religious differences.

5. We now have a weak Government and clearly it is incapable of dealing with the tendency towards conflicts because of race and religion. Because of its weakness it commands little respect and even the weakest parties would thumb its collective noses at the Government. The Government apparently has no idea how to handle these problems. We see it apologising only to have it's apologies rejected.

6. The worst part is to find its apologies causing anger among the race for whom it is apologising. It has managed to displease everyone; to please no one.

7. Admittedly even a powerful Government, if it is incompetent and badly led would not manage to govern a multiracial country well. We see this happening with the present Government. In 2004 the people gave it almost unlimited power. But it was not able to use the power well and the people decided to reduce drastically its power. Now we see it floundering about, unable to deal with the sensitivities of a multiracial country.

8. The BN was a 14-party coalition of big and small parties. Because it was powerful the component parties did not challenge it. They know if they left the coalition they would be unable to exert any pressure on anyone.

9. Even if they join the opposition they would not be able to reduce the coalition's two-third majority enough to bring it down. For that reason none of the component parties would want to leave the coalition.

10. On the other hand a coalition of two parties would be very weak. This is because the bigger party need the smaller partner in order to achieve majority to form the Government.

11. Such a Government would be unstable as the smaller party could always threaten to leave and thus bring down the Government. On the other hand the smaller party can join the opposition giving it the majority to form a new Government.

12. The reason the BN was able to create political stability before was because it could not be threatened by any one of its component parties. If any one left the Coalition would not collapse. The party quitting would be out in the wilderness.

13. Presently because the Government coalition is weak every little party can thumb its nose at the Government. The Coalition Government could not afford to lose any component party's support. It is also not in a position to discipline its component parties.

14. The weak Government lives in fear of being toppled by its components switching side to support the opposition. That is why we see such silly things as sending members of Parliament to a foreign country ostensibly to study agriculture.

15. What does it mean to a multiracial country to have weak Government? The Government would not be able to concentrate on governing because it has to deal with continuous threats by its components of different races.

16. The stability of the country would be undermined. This would be bad for the economy. We are seeing today investors pulling out their money by the billions from the stock market; we are seeing little investment either by locals or foreign investors.

17. The trade balance is in our favour not because of anything smart done by this weak Government, but because the prices of oil, palm oil and rubber on the world market are very high (although now the prices are declining).

18. Generally the economy is bad, as bad as the race politics that we are seeing. The people are the ones to pay the price. They are suffering from high prices with no compensating increase in income.

19. We have had strong Governments for almost 50 years. When we gained independence few gave us any chance. They foresaw racial clashes and political instability.

20. But they are wrong. With strong Governments in place, the bickering between races was reduced. The country was stabilised and with that the economy grew. The objective of becoming a developed country by 2020 seems possible.

21. Now with this weak Government, with incompetent leadership the country is not developing as fast as it used to.

22. In a single ethnic country it does not matter if the Government is weak because it will not have to deal with the heavy pressure of racial conflicts even if the Government is less competent.

23. My observation of Malaysian politics over the last 50 years has convinced that a powerful Government lead by competent leaders is necessary for multi-racial Malaysia.

http://test.chedet.com/che_det/2008/10

Poh Ah Pak

21 Oct 08, 13:35

THE FINANCIAL TURMOIL AND MALAYSIA

1. I am glad to hear that Malaysia will be spared from the fallout of the systemic collapse of the whole world's financial system. This ability to isolate Malaysia and Malaysian banks from the effect of the bankruptcies of all the biggest banks in the world must be regarded as a miracle. Our ability to manage our financial system better than others must earn us the admiration of the world.

2. I hope we are right in forecasting the effect on us of the collapse of the world's financial system. But I have a sneaking feeling that all is not well.

3. We are a trading nation which trades with all countries of the world. The United States and Europe are among the biggest of our trading partners. Roughly 40 per cent of our total trade is with them. I may be wrong but I believe that if our buyers cannot pay for what they import from us, we would not make the profit we had expected. In fact we would lose a lot of money as we will not recover the cost of the goods we sell even.

4. Now the common practise is for importers to open Letters of Credit (LCs) with banks to ensure that when they receive the goods the corresponding banks will release the money. However, if the importers' banks go bankrupt they would not be able to transmit the payment.

5. They may be bailed out by the US Government. But they may not consider paying Malaysian exporters as a priority. In which case we will not be paid. Worse still we can no longer entertain orders coming from this market. Our trade must shrink.

6. We are not talking about one company. We are talking about hundreds of companies trading with America and Europe and other countries not getting paid for their exports. We are talking about tens of millions, even hundreds of millions of Ringgit worth of goods not being paid for.

7. These companies all borrow from banks to finance their operations. They hope to pay the banks from the proceeds of their export. When they cannot pay the banks, the banks in turn would have a lot of non-performing loans.

8. The banks would be wary of lending money to not only the exporting companies but to others as well. There will be a credit squeeze which would hurt other businesses. There will be margin calls. When the borrowers cannot meet this there may be foreclosures.

9. We see a lot of construction in Kuala Lumpur, all dependent on borrowed money. If these buildings are not sold or rented, payment by the developer to the banks would not be forthcoming. Again there will be a lot of non-performing loans.

10. When the Government withdrew the subsidy for oil the pump price increased by 40 per cent. The immediate result was to increase the prices of a wide range of food, goods and services commonly needed by the people. In other words the purchasing power of the people had been reduced.

11. Since then the price of oil had been reduced three times. But the prices of food, goods and services have stayed up.

12. Some cranks estimated that every citizen had lost purchasing power by RM300 a year. Since we have a population of 27million, the country's loss of purchasing power amounts to RM8.1 billion. That is a lot money which is lost by food suppliers, cooked and uncooked, goods and service providers at various levels. A lot of small businesses would just fold up.

13. The Government has given back some money but not enough to reduce the losses sustained by the economy.

14. Now the corridors cannot be fully implemented. But this is fine because nothing had been implemented anyway. Unfortunately the anticipated earnings by contractors, sub-contractors, suppliers, workers, teh tarik and nasi lemak sellers would not materialise.

15. Maybe we will not need several hundred billions to bail out our banks. But the banks will also face the problem of unpaid loans incurred by their credit card users. They have been rather lax in providing credit card facilities to their customers, many of whom have no accounts with them. It is believed that unpaid credit card loans is in excess of RM20 billion.

16. Will the Government guarantee depositors will not lose their deposits when the banks which had in the past made huge profits now go bankrupt because of their mismanagement?

17. This is what the peoples of America and Europe are asking. Their money is used to bail out the banks whose profits had enriched their Chief Executive Officers and their share holders so much in the past. The people did not get a share of the profit, but they must pay for the losses.

18. We are told that six billion Ringgit in Foreign Direct Investment would flow into the country. But what about the RM30 billion outflow as foreign investors pulled out of the stock market?

19. I pray that I am wrong. I pray that the Government is right in declaring that the whole world may collapse but we would be the only country which won't. We will sail calmly through the seas of shattered economies.

20. What is happening in the world today is the total collapse of the international financial system. This has been brought about by greedy people abusing the system. Instead of doing business in goods and services they now do business in money, in fictitious money.

21. We had experienced the effects of the trade in our currency in 1997-98. For no very good reason, our Ringgit was devalued so that its purchasing power was halved. And we became poor.

22. Fortunately for us we succeeded in stopping the trade in Ringgit and restoring its value. But the system is still in place. And now it is the US Dollar which is devalued.

23. But trading in currencies is only one of the abuses. The banks are lending more money than they have. They actually go to the people to persuade them to borrow.

24. Their clients can borrow 100 per cent of the money to buy a house for example.

25. They need not worry about paying or servicing the loan. The price of the house would appreciate. You may even have a second mortgage. You may even sell at a profit.

26. In the meantime the bank would register the loan and add the projected earnings from interest maybe over 20 years. That done the bank can put all the loans together and sell it to the hedge funds at a discount after adding potential interest.

27. The more risky the loan the higher would be the interest and the higher would be the profit. The hedge funds which buy the loans can basically sell the mortgages to investors in the fund or to the huge Government financed Federal National Mortgage Association, nicknamed Fannie Mae, and the Federal Home Mortgage Corporation, nicknamed Freddie Mac.

28. Now the hedge funds and the banks would feel safe and enjoy the huge profits that they have made.

29. But when hundreds of thousands of house buyers find themselves unable to pay simply because they have no money, and could not sell the houses and could not borrow from banks, Freddie Mac and Fannie Mae would not be able to pay the hedge funds. Then the hedge funds would collapse and drag down the banks with them.

30. This simply is what happened. The same applies to credit cards. People with little or no money would be given credit cards. They would spend more than they can afford and the banks would be faced with huge amounts of non-performing loans. The banks cannot pay the bills submitted by the sellers of goods or suppliers of services. The banks would collapse and there would be a run on the banks and on other banks which had lent the money to the affected banks. And so we see one after another of the giant banks of America and Europe going bankrupt.

31. The Government may try to bail them out. But the confidence does not last long. Soon the bailout would be seen to fail.

32. Actually I am giving a very simplified version of what is happening. All these shuffling of papers and figures cannot but encourage cheating. The bigger the amount of money involved the bigger would be the returns. The tendency is therefore to play with very large sums of money.

33. But where does the money come from? From nowhere. The Government and the banks, including the Federal Reserve Bank conjured up the money from nothing. If you ask yourself where do the US700 billion Dollars come from when you know the United States' Government has to borrow US1.5 billion every day, you will find no answer. Is the US Government holding US700 billion Dollars in its treasury just in case it has to bail out the banks? Not likely when it cannot even make ends meet, when it has twin deficits.

34. So money can be conjured up out of thin air. And this must be the money the banks lent, the money the hedge funds and currency traders play with, the payments for expensive wars etc.

35. Basically the international financial system and the market economy has failed. Unless and until a new system is introduced and Governments regulate with the running and operation of national and international finance and the so-called free market we are going to see the financial turmoil and collapse repeated over and over again.

http://test.chedet.com/che_det/2008/10/the

Poh Ah Pak

28 Oct 08, 21:55

LITIGATION

1. Malaysian politicians seem to be resorting to litigation in order to gag their critics and detractors.

2. When I was PM and Anwar Ibrahim was being tried, he sued me for 100 million Ringgit for some statements that I made. I had to find lawyers to take up my case. Fortunately I won. Otherwise I would have been bankrupted.

3. When the press asked me about Anwar's acquittal I pointed out that though the two judges in the Appeals Court cleared Anwar on the basis that the complainant was not a reliable witness and that the "event" did not take place on the date as reported in the charge, but they still said they believed that Anwar did indulge in sodomy.

4. Of course the third judge concluded that Anwar was indeed guilty of sodomy.

5. The press reported my answer. Following that Anwar sued me again for 100 million Ringgit and again I had to employ lawyers to defend me.

6. It is now three years since the suit and I don't know whether it is sub-judice or not but I am scared to talk about it. Effectively the suit has gagged me. It is no different from being censored by the Government.

7. If eventually the court decides that I am not guilty I suppose I am entitled to be compensated for the cost incurred. But I don't think I would be paid.

8. On the other hand if I lose I would be made a bankrupt.

9. The amount that the litigants sue for is usually extremely big, running into one hundred million even. The litigant knows the person he sues would not be able to pay. But that doesn't matter. It would deter him and others too from exposing his (litigant's) misdeeds in the future.

10. I get a feeling that the court is being made use of by these politicians to hide their misdeeds and to prevent them from being made political issues.

11. I feel sure we will be seeing more suits by politicians in the future.

Viva Malaysian politics!!

http://test.chedet.com/che_det/2008/10/

the Bear

28 Oct 08, 21:57

Mr 10% speaks!

ahahahahahaha

wheelcamp

29 Oct 08, 00:52

Read the part on the financial crisis. Dr M is able to present his views clearly. Poh Ah Pak, continue to post more articles. Really enjoy reading them.

Poh Ah Pak

1 Nov 08, 14:51

INTERVIEW

1. I was interviewed by the BBC on the current financial turmoil and over management of the currency crisis in 1997 - 98.

2. I was amused when he attributed the pegging and the elimination of CLOB (Central Limit Order Book) to Dato Seri Anwar Ibrahim. I asked him whether he was given this information by Anwar. He did not answer.

3. Of course I did not do everything by myself. I had a lot of help from others. But Anwar was not one of them. He, many will remember, was the Minister of Finance who implemented the IMF strategy without the IMF with disastrous results.

COMMENTS

1. When I started my blog I expected many criticisms to be levelled at me when I wrote articles against the Government.

2. I am disappointed that those who made critical comments never argued their cases against me. All they could say is that I was worse when I was Prime Minister or that all the problems began during my time. No supporting evidence at all. And obviously not even true.

3. Clearly the quality of these carping commentors leaves much to be desired.

RUBBISH

1. We are great producers of rubbish - not the verbal kind, although that also - but real solid waste. But we are not keen on their disposal.

2. Rubbish dumps, legal and illegal are everywhere. Land fills which seem to be the preferred method are really hazardous to health. When rain falls and leaches the waste, the water would seep into the ground and pollute ground water. This water flows into the land around and may get into the water supply. At least New Water in Singapore is thoroughly filtered and rendered safe though not aesthetically acceptable. But our ground water is not filtered and can poison the soil and ourstreams and rivers.

3. The Government had wanted to build a modern incinerator like the ones in Japan. These Japanese incinerators are located in the residential area. They produce hardly any smoke from their very tall chimneys. The incinerator is so clean that the locals use them as their recreation area. I have never heard of the Japanese complaining against incinerators being located in their residential areas.

4. But we in Malaysia have higher standards of cleanliness. We do not want even the cleanest incinerators to be located anywhere near where we live. We prefer to dump the rubbish untreated on land. Soon we will be having rubbish mountains like in a neighbouring country where scavengers can recover discarded items which can be washed and sold to the not so rich.

5. Incidentally I am told that in the United Kingdom every household has to have three rubbish bins; one each for plastics, glass and perishables. If the rubbish inspectors finds that there is nothing in the bins the householder will be fined for throwing his rubbish elsewhere. Will we accept sorting our rubbish and dumping them into the correct bin! I think not. That is for the Government to do, as we pay taxes precisely for sorting our rubbish.

http://test.chedet.com/che_det/2008/11/

Poh Ah Pak

9 Nov 08, 12:22

CONGRATULATIONS OBAMA

1. I would like to add my congratulations to the millions that Barack Obama must have received for his great victory for the Presidency of the United States of America.

2. Only a few years ago I thought it was impossible for a black man to become President of white United States, the country where the blacks used to be the slaves of the whites.

3. But attitudes have certainly changed radically among the white people. Their support for Obama is overwhelming.

4. There are many reasons why Obama managed to break through white prejudice. But President Bush has contributed much towards the acceptance of black Obama.

5. The Presidency of George Bush Junior must go down in American history as the worse ever. Arrogant, narrow-minded, autocratic, inconsiderate and totally uncaring for the views of others and even of his own countrymen, Bush created a demand for change as no other US President had ever created.

6. There was a lot about wanting to have Obama come in but there was more about wanting to have Bush and his ilk out. And McCain as the Republican candidate simply increased the desire of the Americans to have nothing to do with anyone even remotely identified with Bush.

7. Obama made such a contrast from Bush that the voters must have felt they were voting against Bush as much as for Obama.

8. But Obama is also unfortunate. To be different from Bush in attitude and foreign policy is not going to be too difficult. But Obama is coming in at a time when the US and the World are experiencing the worst of economic and financial crises. While he might succeed in changing foreign policy he is not likely to be able to solve the economic and financial crises, not in the near future certainly.

9. Bail-outs are not going to work. We have seen that already. Even partial or complete nationalization of banks and other financial institutions will not really help in turning things around.

10. Obama will be hard put to find a solution. He has five years. If he fails it is not going to be good for the new President. Certainly it will not be good for the first black President.

11. The world will be watching. It is easier to say change than to actually change.

12. I wish him the best of luck.

http://test.chedet.com/che_det/2008/11

Poh Ah Pak

9 Nov 08, 12:24

Former Secretary General Acquitted & Economic Headlines

FORMER SECRETARY-GENERAL ACQUITTED

1. Can I say how glad I am that Datuk Dr Abdul Aziz Muhammad has been acquitted of the charge of abetment in committing criminal breach of trust (CBT) and of cheating involving RM9 million.

2. I remember how shocked I was that this senior civil servant whom I know very well should have been found guilty of CBT etc. I knew him as a good officer who was conscientous when doing his work. I also remember the Minister involved telling me how profitable was the "koi" breeding and orchid ventures. But suddenly there was this accusation against Aziz. Apparently the ventures were not profitable at all. I wonder why!

3. I am sorry for the sufferings Aziz went through. Miscarriages of justice do happen and we must not blame anyone. I hope and pray that there will not be too many miscarriages. The talks of unseen political hands are not to be taken seriously.

ECONOMIC HEADLINES

I wonder whether Government leaders see anything significant in these headlines in today's (Nov 7th) The Star;

1) "Malaysians bearish on Economy"

2) "Tough road ahead for man in the street"

3) "Economic downturn to cause drop in passenger volume"

4) "Third quarter may be mixed"

5) "Moody's gives negative rating on gaming"

6) "F&N quarterly profit declines on property"

7) "Britain makes record interest rate cut"

8) "Fund to prop up South Korea stocks"

9) "Iceland's swap loss set to fall"

10) "Bonuses of top Wall St execs to be slashed"

11) "Toyota forecasts huge drop in profit"

12) "US vehicle sector faces 'critical' period"

13) "Snoring judges' verdicts overturned"

http://test.chedet.com/che_det/2008/11/snippets

Poh Ah Pak

9 Nov 08, 12:25

PAYOUT FOR JUDGES

1. Now we know how much has been paid out to the judges.

2. It is not bad at all. The Government must have plenty of money to give away for something that the Government says is not an admission of guilt and does not merit an apology. This generous act is unprecedented but must now be taken as a precedence. We should see more money being doled out every time a Minister feels a need to be popular with the Opposition. I wonder whether the amount of ex-gratia is based on how much the ex-de facto Minister of Justice considers would please the Bar Council.

3. The Minister informs us that the judges had been drawing full pension for the last 20 years. The highest pension is RM6,548.59 per month. Roughly this adds up to RM1,600,000 for 20 years.

4. Judges in Malaysia are paid two pensions - one at 55 years and one at 65 years. As I pointed out before one judge actually draws three pensions. Is the sum mentioned the total or just one?

5. Assuming that the highest pension is paid to the most senior of the judges, then he would have done extremely well to get RM5,000,000.00 (Five million Ringgit). He would have to draw pension for another 60 years to get RM5 million. Truly the Government is generous.

6. Were the judges sacked or suspended? I think they were sacked. The records say so. Now the Minister says "No", the judges were not sacked or suspended.

7. Why pay them compensation if they are not sacked or suspended and they did not even lose their pension rights?

8. Were they allowed to continue being judges, to preside over cases brought before them? I cannot remember them doing this.

9. Really the Salleh saga gets curiouser and curiouser.

http://test.chedet.com/che_det/2008/11/snippets

Poh Ah Pak

29 Nov 08, 14:31

RACISM AND 2008 ELECTIONS

1. When the Barisan Nasional did badly in the March 2008 General Election, foreign observers and many in this country were jubilant because they claim that it marked the demise of racial politics and racial parties in Malaysia.

2. I did not agree with this simplistic view and I had put my thoughts on this blog. I believed that it was rather protest against the failures of the Abdullah Government that caused many Barisan Nasional members and supporters to vote for the opposition. But many still insist that race based politics is no longer relevant in Malaysia. Is it?

3. If it is because the Malaysian electorate had rejected racial politics, why did they vote for such parties as PAS, a very Malay Muslim party, and DAP, a Chinese dominated party. Even the Keadilan is made up of violently racist Hindraf Indians, Chinese dissatisfied with the MCA's representation of the Chinese in BN and self-serving Malays who could not find a place in the other Malay parties.

4. These three parties did not campaign for human rights or open Governments or even against the Internal Security Act. PAS had made no secret of their Islamic State pretensions. DAP talked of Malaysian Malaysia which was the battle cry of its very Chinese PAP antecedents of Singapore (no non-Chinese PM) and Keadilan talked about reforms etc., but the stress was on Hindu Rights and anti-Malay racism.

5. Their accredited supporters who may really subscribe to their creeds had never been big enough to make them strong opposition parties in the past. They were never able to deny the BN a 2/3rd majority. It should be remembered that Keadilan won only one seat in the 2004 elections. The other two, DAP and PAS did not do much better either.

6. It was the defection by the BN party members which resulted in the opposition parties, regardless of the quality of their candidate getting the large number of votes to win so many more seats than they or anybody else expected.

7. Apart from the voters supporting the essentially race based opposition parties, the claim that it was the rejection of racial politics which led to the poor results by the BN has also not been borne out by the attitudes and debates by Malaysians post 2008 elections.

8. What we are witnessing today is an explosion of racial politics that is more bitter and blatant than ever before. Even the least observant cannot fail to notice how Malaysian politics now is more about racial inequities than about liberalism, human rights, openness etc.

9. True there has been quite a lot of discussion on the ISA. But most of the angry and bitter discussion is about Malay "privileges", about the Social Contract, about the Deputy Prime Minister and Prime Minister being Malays, about UMNO bullying, about being or not being immigrants, about Malay dominance. Even the criticisms regarding the way judges are appointed or promoted have elements of race that is hardly disguised.

10. Truly Malaysian politics have not been decoupled from racial sentiments and loyalties. And it is going to remain so for as long as the different races prefer to be separated and divided, prefer to strongly uphold their languages, cultures and their historical origins and links. All that is said about reforms and liberalism is mere lip service.

http://test.chedet.com/che_det/2008/11/racism

Poh Ah Pak

5 Dec 08, 12:16

Zaid Ibrahim and UMNO

1. UMNO has now sacked Zaid Ibrahim from the party.

2. This is the man who was held in high esteem by UMNO President Dato Seri Abdullah Ahmad Badawi so that from among hundreds of UMNO leaders of sorts, he chose Zaid Ibrahim, a dubious character who could not be accepted even by his own Kota Bahru division and was not made a candidate in the 2008 Election. It is known that Zaid was in Perth, Australia during the elections.

3. Seeing Zaid's behaviour toward UMNO lately, the rumours that he was supporting the opposition against the UMNO/Barisan Nasional candidate in the March 2008 Elections must have been true.

4. Now Zaid has left his benefactor with controversial issues which can only undermine the support for UMNO / Barisan Nasional whatever his benefactor may try to do. And Najib will inherit these headaches when he takes over.

5. Seems that I am not the only one to make wrong choices.

http://test.chedet.com/che_det/2008/12/

ABDULLAH'S MARCH

1. When Dato Seri Abdullah Ahmad Badawi announced that he would be stepping down in March 2009 he said he needed the extra three months to complete certain missions he had set out to do.

2. These initiatives, he said, are needed "to regain the country's competitiveness, to face the challenges that the world has in store for us".

3. Among the initiatives are the reform of the judiciary, the setting up of an Anti-Corruption Commission, Special Complaints Commission, equitable distribution of the fruits of growth, strengthening and enlarging the social safety net, development of corridor initiatives etc etc.

4. It is now December 2008. So far we have seen no progress at all in any of these glorious initiatives. Instead the Prime Minister is busy visiting foreign countries with his family in the beatiful, big and new Airbus A320.

5. After announcing that there is no money to build the second Penang Bridge, the contract was signed during the PM's China visit to build the bridge after all. There is a lot of money involved here.

6. In Uzbekistan, Petronas is to invest a few hundred million Ringgit. Trips are also scheduled for Iran and Turkmenistan. No doubt more contracts and more money would be involved. Some contractors will benefit.

7. After failing to implement any of the promises made in the 2004 or 2008 elections, it looks like nothing is being done either with regards to the promise to carry out a variety of so-called reforms as mentioned in the press statement on why the PM would step down in March 2009 - three months after the scheduled UMNO General Assembly.

8. But the visits to foreign countries to sign contracts which were not mentioned in the statement are being assiduously carried out.

9. I wonder why.

10. On the political front Abdullah has been busy campaigning for his chosen candidates for the posts of Deputy President, Wanita chief and Pemuda chief and other posts which will lead to appointments as Ministers.

11. Najib is going to be surrounded by Abdullah's people and through these people Abdullah will control the Government of Najib.

12. Najib has already abandoned Muhyiddin, the fierce critic of Abdullah. He does not want to incur the displeasure of his boss. Would he refuse to appoint Abdullah's nominees? Would he dare go against them?

http://test.chedet.com/che_det/2008/

Musings of Che Det

DO WE NEED A STRONG GOVERNMENT?