Malaysians Living Abroad Want a Say in Next Election

From the New York Times: Malaysians Living Abroad Want a Say in Next Election

KUALA LUMPUR — Nurul Syaheedah Jes Izman, 27, a graduate of New York University, lives in New Jersey and works on Wall Street as a financial analyst. Though she has spent her college years and all of her working life in the United States, she closely follows political developments in her native Malaysia, reading Malaysian news Web sites every day and talking with friends and family back home about the issues.

But under current law, Ms. Nurul Syaheedah will not be able to express her political preferences at the ballot box in the next Malaysian election, widely expected this year, unless she makes the 23-hour trip home. The only Malaysians living overseas who are allowed to vote by absentee ballot are government workers, military personnel and full-time students and their spouses.

“The right to vote is a basic right of all citizens,” Ms. Nurul Syaheedah said in an e-mail. “No one should be disenfranchised in this time and age, even from a different location overseas. We are all rightful stakeholders in our nation.”

With an estimated 700,000 of Malaysia’s 28 million citizens residing abroad, the Malaysian diaspora is spread far and wide, from neighboring Singapore to New Zealand and the United States, and their calls for a greater say in how their country is run are growing louder.

These appeals are being heard against the backdrop of a larger popular movement to make the process of choosing Malaysia’s leaders more fair and transparent. Last summer, thousands of people demonstrated in Kuala Lumpur for electoral changes that they argue would level the playing field for the political opposition to compete against the governing National Front coalition, dominated by the United Malays National Organization, which has been in power since independence in 1957.

In January, the High Court in Kuala Lumpur rejected an application by six Malaysians living in Britain for a review of the election laws. But the authorities have begun taking steps toward extending the vote to more overseas Malaysians. A parliamentary committee, set up after the protests last year to consider changes to the election process, has recommended that overseas voting be expanded and has been discussing options with the Election Commission. The panel is expected to present a report in early April.

But some expatriates are concerned that any changes will not come in time for the next election and that Malaysia will continue to bar some of its overseas citizens from voting — based, perhaps, on how long they have lived abroad, as some other countries do.

Some analysts believe that the Malaysian governing coalition — which in 2008 suffered one of the greatest electoral setbacks in its history, with the opposition taking more than a third of the seats in Parliament — is unlikely, for political reasons, to extend the franchise to more overseas Malaysians in time for the next election.

Expatriates, these analysts say, could be seen as likely to support the opposition, since many are ethnic Chinese and Indians who went abroad, at least in part, out of exasperation with the government’s longstanding policies favoring Malays.

“The strong suspicion is that the vast majority of overseas Malaysians, who are ethnic Indians and ethnic Chinese, are somewhat frustrated with the affirmative action policies and have left Malaysia to seek better opportunities,” said John Lee, adjunct associate professor at the Center for International Security Studies at the University of Sydney. “This includes better opportunities for their children’s education, and also due to the fact that the best jobs in the public service and other selective sectors of the economy have affirmative action quotas in place.”

Wan Saiful Wan Jan, chief executive of the Institute for Democracy and Economic Affairs in Kuala Lumpur, said that, based on his observations, Malaysians living overseas were “overwhelmingly critical of the governing coalition.”

“The government has a lot to lose,” he said. “Overseas voters can make a big difference if they have that opportunity to vote.”

Wan Ahmad Wan Omar, deputy chairman of the Election Commission, said the commission had recommended to the parliamentary panel that Malaysians living overseas be required to return at least once every five years to maintain their eligibility to vote. He said it would not be fair to extend the vote to citizens who return less frequently and do not follow developments in their constituencies.

Some expatriates are riled by the implication that if they stay away for long periods, they do not care about their country’s affairs. They say they want the chance to vote for leaders who will address the issues that prompted them to leave in the first place.

“Just because you are overseas doesn’t mean you don’t care and don’t know,” said Ong Suan Ee, a Malaysian who works as a senior research analyst at Nanyang Technological University in Singapore.

See-See Leong, a software designer who has lived in London for 17 years and was one of the six Malaysians involved in the case the High Court ruled on in January, said there was “no logic” to why only certain overseas Malaysians are allowed to vote.

“The Constitution gives you the right to vote, and therefore, so long as you are a Malaysian citizen, you should have the right to vote,” said Ms. Leong, 44, who is on the board of trustees of My Overseas Vote , an advocacy group established in London in 2010.

Among other changes, My Overseas Vote wants votes to be counted at Malaysian embassies, rather than mailed back to the country from overseas — a process that the election commission has recommended stay in place. The group said in a statement this week that voting by mail in Malaysia had “become synonymous with fraud and unfair balloting.”

The group also said that in the past, some overseas military personnel had had to fill out their ballots in front of their superiors.

Mr. Wan Ahmad of the Election Commission said he was aware that such allegations had been reported in the news media but said the commission had received no formal complaints and urged anyone with evidence of misconduct to come forward.

Some expatriates, including Hwa Shi-Hsia, 28, a biologist who lives in Singapore, are determined to vote even if the rules are not changed before the next election. Ms. Hwa, 28, plans to book a flight home as soon as the election is called. But she says this is a cost she should not be required to bear.

“The Philippines managed to arrange overseas voting for its citizens in Singapore,” she said. “I don’t see why we can’t.”

The Virtual Press Called Internet

Some of you may know that we have very little freedom of press but we have no idea to what extent.

Reporters Without Borders ranked Malaysia a low 141 out of 178 on its 2010 Press Freedom Index.

We probably rank higher than Burma and maybe Zimbabwe. I hate to break this to you, but that is no cause for celebration.

From NYT:

==================================

When thousands of protesters calling for electoral reform took to the streets here July 9, Malaysiakini, one of Malaysia's most popular news
Web sites, received 5.2 million hits, making the day one of the site's busiest since it was established in 1999.

An increasing tendency to seek news online is hardly unique to Malaysia. But here, it is not just technology driving readers to news Web sites.
It is also that - by design, and in contrast to countries like China, with its infamous Great Firewall - in Malaysia the Internet operates
outside the stringent laws that regulate the traditional media.

==================================

Read more here:

In Malaysia, Freedom of the (Virtual) Press

We've Hit The New York Times

From the NYT:

http://www.nytimes.com/2011/07/08/world/asia/08iht-malaysia08.html

Excerpts:

Analysts say the Bersih campaign could help the political opposition.

"The opposition parties have jumped on this bandwagon because they would be direct beneficiaries of electoral reform," said Ibrahim Suffian, director of the Merdeka Center, an independent polling firm in Kuala Lumpur.

Describing Bersih's demands as "perfectly normal in terms of what's expected in a functional democracy," Mr. Ibrahim said that if large numbers of protesters turned out Saturday, it could slow the government's momentum after a recent series of by-election victories.

"I think that is the deeper concern: that a show of protest, a show of force by the opposition and NGOs demanding reforms from the government, could sway undecided people to feel that the government is not doing enough," he said.

Ong Kian Ming, a political analyst at UCSI University, said that the rally came at an "opportune time" for the opposition and that a violent crackdown on the protesters could be "a game changer" in the coming elections.

Construction Flaws In Lynas Refinery

I don't want to sidetrack from the main issue in these past few weeks, but I thought there may be some of you out there (especially those in Kuantan) who might be interested in this article from the New York Times.

Of main concern is this: The Fear of a Toxic Rerun

But the construction and design may have serious flaws, according to the engineers, who also provided memos, e-mail messages and photos from Lynas and its contractors. The engineers said they felt a professional duty to voice their safety concerns, but insisted on anonymity to avoid the risk of becoming industry outcasts.

The problems they detail include structural cracks, air pockets and leaks in many of the concrete shells for 70 containment tanks, some of which are larger than double-decker buses. Ore mined deep in the Australian desert and shipped to Malaysia would be mixed with powerful acids to make a slightly radioactive slurry that would be pumped through the tanks, with operating temperatures of about 200 degrees Fahrenheit.

The engineers also say that almost all of the steel piping ordered for the plant is made from standard steel, which they describe as not suited for the corrosive, abrasive slurry. Rare earth refineries in other countries make heavy use of costlier stainless steel or steel piping with ceramic or rubber liners.

This sounds like a serious hazard.

Another Religious Custody Battle

We have made it on the NYT for all the wrong reasons - yet again.

Malaysian Custody Dispute Lost Between Courts

KUALA LUMPUR — Through most of their 17-year marriage, M. Indira Gandhi says she and her husband observed rituals that she considered integral to their Hindu faith. Each morning they would pray before a shrine and on Fridays they would fast. During festivals they donned brightly colored, traditional outfits to attend their local temple.

Those were traditions Ms. Gandhi assumed they would be passing on to their three young children.

But nearly a year ago Ms. Gandhi was stunned to discover that her husband had converted to Islam. Her surprise turned to anger when she discovered that, without consulting her, he had also converted their children.

Read the article in its entirety on the website.

NYT On Affirmative Action

Malaysia Dilutes Its System of Ethnic Preferences

BANGKOK — Najib Razak, Malaysia’s prime minister, announced Tuesday a major rollback in the system of ethnic preferences that has defined the country’s political system for almost four decades.

The new policy would severely weaken a requirement that companies reserve 30 percent of their shares for ethnic Malays, the country’s dominant ethnic group.

The 30-percent rule was once considered politically untouchable, and Mr. Najib described the change in policy as a “tricky balancing act.”

Malaysia has long given ethnic Malays and members of other indigenous ethnic groups — known as bumiputra, or sons of the soil — political and economic privileges. But that system has come under strain amid growing resentment by minority groups and poorer Malays.

The government offers bumiputra discounts on houses, scholarships and other perks. But some benefits, like government contracts and stock-market allocations, have been beyond the reach of working-class Malays.

Anger among Chinese and Indians, the country’s main minority groups, over the ethnic preferences was perhaps the main reason that the opposition made large gains in elections last year that nearly dismantled the governing coalition led by Mr. Najib’s party, the United Malays National Organization.

“We want to be fair to all communities,” Mr. Najib said in a speech in Kuala Lumpur, the Malaysian capital. “No one must feel marginalized.”

Mr. Najib’s success in rolling back the ethnic preferences will depend in large part on his ability to hold together his coalition and fend off a resurgent opposition led by Anwar Ibrahim, a former finance minister.

Mr. Anwar, who leads a diverse group of opposition parties, has promised to undo the system of ethnic preferences.

By positioning himself as a reformer, Mr. Najib, who came to power in April, appears to be calculating that he can stave off opposition advances and be seen as an agent of change.

“The world is changing quickly, and we must be ready to change with it or risk being left behind,” he said Tuesday.

The change would leave some ethnic preferences intact and come with caveats. But it would dilute one of the most important components of what is known as the New Economic Policy, introduced in 1971: the requirement that companies listing on the stock exchange sell 30 percent of their shares to ethnic Malays.

That requirement was scrapped for companies already listed on the stock exchange and reduced to 12.5 percent for initial public offerings. The requirement will remain in place for “strategic industries” like telecommunications, water, ports and energy.

Mr. Najib also said he would lower barriers for foreign investors. The government would eliminate a special vetting process for foreign companies wanting to invest in, merge or take over a Malaysian company, he said.

“The global economic crisis is amplifying the need to be a preferred investment destination,” he added.

Malaysia’s trade-dependent economy is expected to contract by 5 percent this year.

Losing Popularity

I'm always impressed when Malaysian news hits the New York Times as it has, regarding the power struggle in Perak.

I'm also pleased to note that there are judges who have not been bought over by the ruling coalition, better known to Malaysians as UMNO.

Malaysian Court Orders Reinstatement of Opposition Minister

Rightfully, there should be new elections.

But as even the NYT concedes, UMNO does not want to suffer yet another sobering defeat at the hands of the public:

Mohammad Nizar Jamaluddin, the chief minister reinstated by the court, hailed Monday’s decision as “a historic day for all who love democracy.” He said he would ask the Sultan of Perak for new elections, which the coalition has resisted. Over the past year, they have lost four out of the last five parliamentary and state by-elections.

UMNO is so unpopular that even a racial riot won't work.

So defections are their last option at staying in power. And desperately, they clutch at straws.

After Our Holier-Than-Thou Image

Political Sex Scandals Rock Modest Malaysia

By THOMAS FULLER
Published: August 4, 2008

KUALA LUMPUR, Malaysia — Government censors in this majority Muslim nation have upheld an ethos of modesty by snipping sex scenes from films and banning entertainers from wearing outfits that reveal too much on Malaysian stages; bare belly buttons and figure-hugging outfits are off limits.

But these days Malaysians looking to avoid R-rated content might be advised to steer clear of news reports about their own leaders. Two top politicians are embroiled in scandal, one accused of sodomy and the other of romantic links to a Mongolian woman gruesomely killed in 2006.

Prime Minister Abdullah Ahmad Badawi of Malaysia, right, with his deputy, Najib Razak. Mr. Najib’s name has surfaced in connection with the case of a woman who was killed in 2006.

Reports on the finer points of a rectal examination and revelations about the sexual preferences of the dead woman make other sex scandals that once shocked people here — including Monica Lewinsky and her blue dress — seem almost Victorian.

This is not the first time that sex and politics have collided in Malaysia. In the 1990s, the sodomy trial of Anwar Ibrahim, a former deputy prime minister, featured, among other highlights, a bloodstained mattress being hauled into the courtroom.

This time, wider use of the Internet has helped disseminate documents, facts and rumors that would otherwise have been filtered out of the mainstream news media that are tightly controlled by the government.

The scandals encompass much more than sex; each is a potential career-ender for a man vying to become Malaysia’s next prime minister, with control over a political patronage system that dominates the economy.

Mr. Anwar is now facing new accusations of sodomy — a crime punishable here by up to 20 years in prison — at a time when he is making strides toward unseating the governing coalition, which has run Malaysia since its independence from Britain 51 years ago. His principal political rival, Najib Razak, the deputy prime minister and anointed heir to the current prime minister, has been persistently linked to the slain Mongolian woman, despite his insistence that he never even met her. She was shot and her body obliterated with explosives in the jungle outside Kuala Lumpur.

The defendants in that case are a former political adviser to Mr. Najib and two commandos who were bodyguards for Malaysia’s top leaders.

Tampering is suspected in both cases. Testimony revealed that immigration records of the slain woman had been deleted. Witnesses have dropped from sight, including a private investigator, Balasubramaniam Perumal, who said in a sworn statement in early July that the Mongolian woman was Mr. Najib’s mistress. He retracted his allegations the next day in a hastily convened news conference, and then disappeared, along with his wife and three children. The family’s two Rottweilers were left behind in their cages.

“It’s obvious what has happened here,” said Americk Sidhu, the investigator’s lawyer. “You don’t need to be a rocket scientist. Somebody needed him to shut up.”

Mr. Balasubramaniam, who worked for the Najib adviser now on trial, Abdul Razak Baginda, spent two months writing and revising a 16-page declaration about the case, based on conversations he had with Mr. Abdul Razak and, before her death, with the woman, Altantuya Shaariibuu.

Many of the most salacious facts and rumors about both cases have been funneled into the public realm by one prolific blogger, Raja Petra Kamarudin, formerly a political associate of Mr. Anwar’s wife.

Citing sources in military intelligence, he issued a sworn declaration in June alleging that Mr. Najib’s wife was present at Ms. Altantuya’s killing. Mr. Najib called it “total lies, fabrication and total garbage” and a “desperate and pathetic attempt to discredit and taint my political image.”

Mr. Raja Petra was also responsible for leaking a medical report relating to the sodomy case against Mr. Anwar. The accuser, a 23-year-old former campaign volunteer, went to a private hospital in Kuala Lumpur hours before lodging a police report charging that Mr. Anwar had sodomized him. The medical report said he complained of a piece of plastic being inserted into his anus. The doctor who wrote the report, Mohamed Osman, said he found no active bleeding, no pus, tear or scar.

Since then, Dr. Osman also has disappeared. The hospital says he will be back on Monday.

The government has charged Mr. Raja Petra with criminal libel, invoking a law that lawyers say has not been used in recent memory in Malaysia and that, unlike civil defamation, can carry a two-year prison term. He has also been charged with sedition, and his house has been raided several times.

Mr. Anwar, who announced Thursday that he would run for Parliament in his quest to become prime minister, said in an interview that he expected to be arrested soon.

He said he had refused to give a DNA sample because he believed that it would be used against him. “There’s nothing stopping them from fabricating evidence again,” Mr. Anwar said.

Although Malaysians enthusiastically share the latest developments in both cases, some have grown tired of the graphic details.

“A good word is disgust — whether it’s sodomy or blowing up the Mongolian lady,” said the Rev. Wong Kim Kong, executive adviser of the National Evangelical Christian Fellowship, a group of Protestant churches. A narrow majority of Malaysians are Muslim, but the country has sizable Christian, Hindu, Buddhist and Sikh minorities.

Mr. Wong said the constant barrage of accusations made by bloggers, paired with the government’s steady denials, had left Malaysians pining for clarity.

“People just cannot trust the word of any of these people,” Mr. Wong said. “They cannot distinguish who is telling the truth.”

The scandals come at a time of great political uncertainty in Malaysia. The governing coalition, and the ethnic-based system of politics that it represents, is in disarray. There is simmering resentment among the majority Malays and the minority Chinese and Indians, and corruption within the government is rampant, despite promises by Prime Minister Abdullah Ahmad Badawi to clean up the system.

Mr. Anwar has vowed to remake the country’s politics and revoke the authoritarian laws that, among other things, ban students from protesting, keep the media controlled and allow the government to lock up dissidents without trial. But he remains a polarizing figure who is not trusted by many in the elite.

“I think there will at some point be a crisis of legitimacy,” said Ibrahim Suffian, the director of the Merdeka Center, a polling agency. “The leaders seem to feel that they can get away with a lot of things so long as the masses are satisfied with the economic opportunities given to them.

“But the economy is so bad that people are losing faith. There is a feeling that maybe it’s time for major changes.”

UMNO - Paedophile Central?

WTF?

Make a comeback?


Who invited this pervert back?

LOL. UMNO is bloody suicidal if they field this guy.

Check out what Aisehman has to say about this fool.

Get lost, Tamby!

Though you gotta laugh at this:

“During my term as Malacca chief minister for 12 years, I did my part to transform a poor state into a vibrant one and I would like to do the same for national politics,” he said.

I have not seen any visible development in Malacca for the past 25 years. Maintenance of our historical sites is poor. There is insufficient explanation of the history behind the buildings and artefacts.

Tourists, especially foreign ones complain after a visit. I know, because I unfortunately bear the brunt of it.

But don't mind me. Back to Rahim Tamby Chik.

His only claim to fame is his paedophilia back in 1998 which few of us want to forget and his less memorable (but still significant) bouts of racism in 2007.

Yep. Bear in mind the government decided not to press statutory rape charges against him - instead choosing to detain his victim, the 15-year-old girl involved for three years in "protective custody".

Guess who gets jailed for speaking out against it?

It's time to bring back justice - through your votes.

Reluctant To Use ISA!

We finally got our mention in the New York Times.


And we have completely lost the "stable and racially harmonious" image. It was about time, too. I was getting sick of trying to live up to such a fake image.

Truly Asia, my foot!

It hasn't been too good on the economic side though. According to Forbes, Malaysian shares have closed lower - and very possibly because of our political turmoil. Investors are obviously jittered.

I'm not overly worried. Even if we completely crash, I'm confident we Malaysians have what it takes to build up again from scratch.

What is important is that we remove the cancer within us - the scourge of racism that is the backbone of Barisan Nasional policies.

In one of the numerous interviews (in which he predictably made himself look stupid, I suppose), Syed Hamid Albar said the government was "very reluctant to use the ISA". Reluctant?

Ya gotta be kidding me.

They couldn't wait for it to be implemented - allowing these guys to walk about free men is equivalent to displaying the all the nasty skeletons in the closet. Damage control - vapourise them.

Only problem being, the cops may have run out of C4 explosives from the previous operation. No fear, send the annoying HINDRAF boys to Kamunting, and firmly out of the public eye.

Sound easy to you?

The same fool who represents Malaysia as its foreign minister said the ISA was only implemented when the government felt the security and safety of the country was at stake.

Yes, our security and safety ARE at stake. But only because the Barisan Nasional government is allowed loose to spread its racist propaganda, which makes Uthayakumar sound like a mild lamb.

The foreign minister wedges his foot more firmly in his mouth. "So I think ultimately this is the best thing to do, to allay the fear of the public."

Even the foreign journalists can't be so stupid to fall for that. The ISA is poised to set fear in the hearts of protestors, to scare them into silence for fear of falling under the same act themselves.

His sleeping boss makes an accurate observation, albeit in the wrong context. "The people don't want to see this country in chaos."

We certainly don't want chaos. But it's too late. We have been in chaos for too long now.

It's time to change.