Still able to recall the bloody Sunday?

Malaysiakini reported that the Human Rights Commission (Suhakam) will hold a public inquiry to investigate allegations of police violence against a group of demonstrators.

"In the last monthly meeting, we decided that we will investigate the alleged police violence in the demonstration," said rights commissioner SK Choo.

Apart from Choo, other members of the inquiry panel are commissioners Zaitun Othman, KC Vohra and Michael Yeoh.

However, Suhakam has yet to set a date for the inquiry, which will be open to the public. It is expected that a number of eye-witnesses and police officers will be called to testify.

Last Monday, gangsterism reared its ugly head in Univerisiti Putra Malaysia (UPM) when about 50 "pro-establishment" students took the law into their own hands and manhandled seven students who are members of the UPM student Student Progressive Front (SPF) in the campus canteen.

Click here (http://www.merdekareview.com/movie_show.php?sid=2) to view the video captured by a student and hosted on merdekareview website.

SPF’s coordinator and student Ooi Tze Min, 22, described how some 50 members of the ruling student body allegedly humiliated him and six others in one of the canteens.

"All we wanted to do was to help new students in financial difficulties, and getting the used to their new surroundings and bus routes," Ooi said.  

"We did not do anything wrong, yet we were shouted at and bullied."

"The students could have acted professionally and just told us nicely that we should leave, and not turn it into an ugly situation by surrounding us, behaving like gangsters and shouting at us."

MCA Youth Chief Liow Tiong Lai took the episode seriously and has called for urgent action to be taken by Higher Education Ministry and UPM to conduct an inquiry into the incident.

Students should learn to accept differences of opinion and be participative in healthy discourses, rather than jeer and boo. It is intimidating.

With regarding to the matter, Minister of Higher Education Mustapa Mohamed said he has received two reports detailing the incident and has asked UPM vice-chancellor Nik Mustapha R. Abdullah to take action.

We have a VC who is responsible to ensure the university affairs run smoothly. So, I leave it to the university (to handle it). I view it seriously and I have asked for immediate action to be taken.

In return, the VC said he viewed the July 17 incident seriously and would ensure that its campus was safe for students.

"We have advised the students involved to be more careful about ethnic relations and to think rationally before taking any action, to ensure that harmony is maintained on campus," he said.

UPM has emphasised to student leaders the importance of abiding by the university’s rules.

On top of all, there is this one public statement by UPM’s academic and international affairs deputy vice-chancellor Radin Umar Radin Soladi which is ridiculous by not taking into consideration the severity of the said incident.

"All the students should stay cool." […]

"I was made to understand that a number of boys involved had just finished a rugby game and were probably pumped up because of this."

Meanwhile, Subang Jaya police chief ACP Mohd Fuad Talib said police have received five reports from the students, but merely revealed that the incident arose as a result of a misunderstanding over an event organised by the students.

I seriously urge the UPM to look at this case as soon as possible, then take all the required action against those 50 rude students or so, lead by the student council president. As for SPF, the society should be allowed to register and allowed to organise their events within the rules and regulations.

The bottomeline is that, UPM just can’t let this go by without any stern action, otherwise it will set a precedent and it will be free for all.

Talk about World Class Universities with barbarian kind of inhabitants?

Think hard.

Singapore’s largest company by market value, Singapore Telecommunications (SingTel) CEO Lee Hsien Yang announced his resignation. No successor was named and he will remain in the position until one is found. 

Given that my commitment to the board is to see through the transition to an end-point which we are not entirely clear about right now, I have not thought about what I might undertake. I suppose I would think about it carefully. To some extent, I suppose people have assumed that I would stay in SingTel almost forever and it’s not as if I think about it everyday.

However, one thing’s for sure, he will not follow the footsteps of his father and elder brother into politics.

Under the helm of Lee, from a telco with nearly all of its earnings in Singapore back in 1994, the former local monopoly has spent about S$20 billion (US$12.6 billion) building a presence in regional mobile-phone markets, and now boasts assets in Australia, India, Thailand, Indonesia, the Philippines and Bangladesh.

SingTel will start a "formal and rigorous internal and external global search process to identify the best possible candidate for the position"’ of CEO, it said in a statement.

On Friday, SingTel’s shares closed the session at $2.47, down 0.4 percent.

All this while, as a multi racial and multi cultural country, Malaysians exist in perfect harmony as the mutual tolerance, acceptance and celebration of the multi-ethnic communities and cultures in Malaysia are traits that have been successfully inculcated throughout Malaysia’s history. These multiple facets of Malaysia are what make Malaysia so colourful and fascinating to others.

Despite diverse cultural and traditional backgrounds, the people of Malaysia have been able to coexist peacefully in unity and harmony.

However lately, the "Ethnic Relations" course that was introduced into the curriculum at University Putra Malaysia (UPM), has caused uneasiness among the public and a heat debate in the parliament. The course is said to contain inaccuracies in its course material relating to the May 13th racial riots, where the unfortunate incident has always been considered a taboo subject.

Famous Malaysia historian Prof. Dr. Khoo Kay Kim commented that ethnic relations is a sensitive subject that needs to be handled with care, and universities should not rush to get their teaching materials and content out.

Why do we always fall into the typical Malaysian pitfall of rushing into something, only to discover that the results are not up to expectations? Historical facts, for instance, need to be easily verifiable.

Writers dealing with historical facts must be able to give the precise source of where they get their facts. If the source is vague, then their facts will be highly questionable.

It is a rash statement because there is no evidence of who started the riots. It is a complex issue that needs to be studied from all aspects. It is important for historians not to pass judgment and be able to deal with hard facts coldly.

While blogger Ktemoc called it a half-past six book, blogger Penthesilea questioned the need of a text book for a class of ethnic relations. A simple Malaysian is wondering when will Malaysians learn to pick the goods from the bads. Blogger Siva hopes Prime Minister will send correct message over the ethnic issue to the Cabinet and at the same time instruct his ministry to send circulars to all the universities, schools and government departments regarding this matter, in order to help the small minds to see the bigger issues.

As for Malaysia Opposition Leader and blogger Lim Kit Siang, he condemned the textbook and the Higher Education Minister Mustapha Mohamad for defending the indefensible and what Lim perceives as half-truths, untruths and the generally biased, tendentious and divisive accounts in the textbook as "historic facts" when they are in fact "historic lies". He too called upon Prime Minister to review all varsity courses and school history textbooks.

After a heated debate in Parliament over the Ethnic Relations course at Universiti Putra Malaysia, Prime Minister Abdullah Badawi’s decided to withdraw the book. Following the withdrawal, a new module for ethnic relations subject will be drafted soon, by a newly set up special committee.

Is That So would like to remind every Malaysians that while ethnic integration is never easy, however when taking our own path, let us not forget that the world is here for all to share. Minncandy believes that Malaysians need to own higher degree of maturity, putting ownself in other people point of view and discuss sociopolitical matters rationally without hurting the other party.

And perhaps the most important for Malaysians, is that we must treasure the peace and the stability that we now enjoy as it’s easy to take for granted what we have now. We must never again descend into conflict.

Peace, it is!

[Repost of my entry at Global Voices Online]

[UPDATED VERSION] The Star SMS alert at 1:01pm.

PM says he makes all his decisions on his own and that Khairy Jamaluddin, his son-in-law, is not his adviser.

For your information, this had been the second statement from Prime Minister Abdullah Ahmad Badawi ever since the elegant silent had been broken.

It was only yesterday that Pak Lah admitted is him who wanted to meet up with his predecessor Tun Mahathir while both of them were in Japan recently, thus broken the old myth.

We hope Pak Lah will continue to speak out, simultaneously, we don’t hope Tun will slow down too. Both, as the former CEO and current CEO of Malaysia, can provide the kind of transparency that we Malaysians have been waiting long enough.

Meanwhile, blogger Aisehman have one, just one unsolicited advice to the son-in-law: Stick to making money and gave up his political ambitions.

Kinda hard.

Next time, if you want to spin a dongeng, make sure you’re playing the same script as your boss, else shame it is!

Last month, in a desperate attempt to salvage the reputation of Prime Minister Abdullah Ahmad Badawi, plus to seek revenge over former Prime Minister Tun Mahathir’s "Hindu god and Muslim priest" remark, NST’s deputy chairman and editorial adviser Kalimullah Hassan put Mahathir into a very bad limelight.

The Prime Minister was in Japan shortly after the Malaysiakini article appeared and was told that Dr Mahathir wanted to come and see him.

Abdullah, in the midst of breakfast with aides and officials, immediately put on his tie and told the ambassador that he would go and see his ex-boss rather than let Dr Mahathir come down and see him.

However today, speaking to reporters at his office, Pak Lah said he would usually greet Tun, shake hands with him and engage in a conversation when he met the former prime minister on occasions.

When he was in Tokyo recently, Abdullah said, he was the one who made the effort to meet Dr Mahathir in the latter’s room after knowing that Dr Mahathir also stayed at the same hotel.

Abdullah said he contacted an officer of Dr Mahathir to enquire whether the former prime minister had the time for them to meet.

"I did not ask him to come and see me. I went to meet him. As a gesture of friendship, just to exchange greetings," he said.

So, what Kali is going to say on what Pak Lah has said?

Let me repeat: Next time, if you want to spin a dongeng, make sure you’re playing the same script as your boss, else shame it is!

Read the minister’s lips well.

A husband who causes his wife to undergo mental injury, including stress, in his bid to have sex with her can be prosecuted and sentenced to a jail term of up to five years under the amended Penal Code, the Dewan Rakyat was told Tuesday.

Home Affairs Minister Mohd. Radzi Sheikh Ahmad said the provision was unique in that no other country had it and it did not contravene the principle of any religion, culture and belief of the people in the country.

One of the offence included is on having sex without consent by inserting an object into the vagina or anus, with a maximum jail term of 20 years and whipping.

But my question is, what criteria would be used to determine the severity? CCTV like the Singapore’s Bak Chor Mee style?

Uniquely Malaysia: Do first, think later.

What can Malaysia do to qualify for the World Cup finals?

Answer: To import players, by offering citizenship to talented foreign players.

Next question: Who the hell is tempted to take up the offer?

Oil prices hit a new high above $76 a barrel Thursday in a market agitated by three factors:

1. Escalating violence in the Middle East
2. News of explosions on Nigerian pipelines
3. Iran nuclear row headed back to the U.N. Security Council

A few years ago, only a handful of geologists and academics were considering the "Peak Oil" theory, but now it appears even governments are taking a serious look into the subject.

The question is occupying more and more minds around the world. It could happen soon, but the question is, when? As early as 2013.

Back to square and we’re back to parliament.

The rape subject was at the centre of the debate on the proposed amendments to the Penal Code relating to sexual offences and the call to include marital rape as an offence.

The usual suspect, which is the Jerai MP Badruddin Amiruldin rose to the occasion. Via Malaysiakini:

In our laws, rape refers to a man raping a woman. However, if my wife wants to rape me, I am willing.

It’s not the first time and definitely NOT going to be the last time for this unparlimentary act to take place.

It’s also true enough that in this democratic country, it’s the people of Jerai who voted him into the parliament. Thus, it’s natural or a sin for me to perceive and assume that, Jerai-an are tasteless too?

Talk about world class parliament and middle fingers are everywhere.