I bet you won't read about this in the Star!!!

Penang MCA Youth chief, 439 others quit party

In a surprise move last night, Penang MCA Youth chief Eng Hiap Boon resigned from all his party posts, citing disappointment with the MCA leadership.

Eng (right) said 439 members have also resigned together with him, resulting in two MCA branches in the state being shut down.

"My comrades and I are very disappointed with the party's leaders, who are currently facing immoral and unethical issues in their leadership," Eng told a press conference in George Town last night.

Infighting within the party, he added, continued to grow and the leaders have refused to engage with the grassroots or serve the people genuinely.

Eng is known to be a "hardcore supporter" of former MCA president Ong Tee Keat, but he said his departure from the party was his own decision.

He also said that he understood some 500 party members from Johor may also have resigned from the MCA about the same time (last night), causing the dissolution of five branches in the process.

"I don't know when this tide will stop, but the MCA leadership should really conduct a self-examination," Eng said.

A member of the leading Chinese Malaysian party for 18 years, Eng criticised the MCA leadership for being "disloyal, lacking in integrity, being immoral and having no righteousness".

‘Those who work are run down'

He added: "The leadership is facing some moral issues and appears ignorant about the problems faced by the Chinese community.

"The worse thing is when members committed to serving the people and initiate welfare work, but their ‘reward' is a cut on their faces."

Eng was referring to incidents where certain members have had their banners promoting their party work torn down by certain quarters, but he would not reveal those behind the vandalism.

He has held seven positions in the party, including as Berapit state constituency coordinator.

He said among the 439 members who joined him in quitting the party were five branch Youth chiefs, seven elected state Youth executive committee members and 12 Youth divisional council members.

"We are still collecting more signatures and member cards from those who have decided to quit," Eng said.

He also claimed that after the March 2008 general election, Penang MCA hired "gunners or cybertroopers" to take charge of the party's statements, but none of them were paid a single sen for their worjk.

"MCA leaders only know how to cheat and do not keep their pledges.

"The party members are ageing and incapable of fighting with the new government after the 2008 loss, especially in the area of publicity," he complained.

"Hence, they hire people to write for them. These are who we call ‘gunners', but they are not paid at all," he added.

Chua accused of vote buying

Eng also accused party president Dr Chua Soi Lek of vote buying before the last MCA election by handing out money to all veteran members, instead of spending the funds to help the public.

Although MCA is the second largest Chinese-based political party in the world, Eng said, he felt ashamed to be seen as a party member as "this is a rotten party, led by a dirty president".

He denied being disloyal to the party, explaining that he could not accept what has been done to it by the leadership.

"For many years, I can still remember all the infighting within the party. Although it is easy to avoid an open attack, it is difficult to prevent the dirty tactics.

"Sometimes, my supporters were threatened by gangsters and have been targets of malicious allegations. I experienced these as well. Is this MCA's culture?" he asked.

"It is better to leave now and explore new platforms to do some welfare activities," Eng said, adding that he was currently committed to NGO work and would not join any other political party.

On a related matter, Eng criticised Penang state MCA chairperson Dr Ng Yen Yen for her "incompetence" in not calling for a state party meeting in the last three to four months.

He said such incompetent leaders would make it difficult for the MCA to regain Penang in the coming general election, which could even be called in the first quarter of next year.

Najib should be made responsible for this!

From Malaysiakini

Shares of the company behind the MyEmail email project plummeted today, after the company revealed yesterday that it suffered heavier losses than initially reported due to a typo.

The Edge reported that Tricubes Bhd shares fell by 2.5 sen to 18.5 sen today as of 12.30pm, after it told Bursa Malaysia that its accumulated losses stand at RM17.24 million for the financial year ending on March 31, 2011, not RM7.3 million as reported in its 2011 Annual Report.

This followed the company’s submission of the audit of its annual report to Bursa on Sept 7.

The financial daily cited the report as saying that there may be “material uncertainties” that cast doubt on the the company’s ability to continue.

Its survival is dependent on securing more contracts to survive, as well as the support of bankers, creditors and shareholders, it said.

“Currently, the group has secured several contracts and is planning to secure additional contracts with various government agencies and commercial banks for its existing and newly developed products,” the report was quoted saying.

Tricubes is best known for its appointment by the federal government for the email project - then known as the 1Malaysia Email project - to provide Malaysians with a secure email account for correspondences and monetary transactions with the government.

However, the project would cost 50 sen per correspondence, drawing brickbats because critics argued that there are already freealternatives. Despite that, its shares shot up from 5.5 sen to 32.5 sen over a week, after Prime Minister Najib Abdul Razak announced the appointment on April 19.

The company was thrown into the spotlight again when it was awarded a contract to collect traffic summonses for the Royal Malaysian Police on Nov 16, prompting another share spike.

Read More Here!

Christmas Carolling affected because of the Peaceful Assembly Bill!

Catholic Bishop Dr Paul Tan Chee Ing described the new conditions imposed before a police permit is granted for Christmas carolling groups to visit households as making the country "very nearly a police state".

"The Peaceful Assembly Bill 2011 is vexing if things have come down to this," opined the head of the Catholic Church for the Malacca-Johor diocese, who is also president of the Catholic Bishops' Conference of Malaysia.

Up to now, priests of churches that send carolling groups to visit Christian homes in the prelude to Christmas are merely required to apply for a police permit for the visits. Approvals were never a problem.

However, provisions of the recently passed and highly controversial Peaceful Assembly Bill require priests to furnish the names of the main occupants of homes the carollers intend to visit.

"If parish priests have to furnish the names of the main tenants, then we have become very nearly a police state," said Tan.

"This is a bureaucratic requirement that is so vexing," added the Jesuit-trained prelate.

Buffer zone between citizens and the state

"We are a church that periodically conducts a census of our members, but we do not go around asking our members details of where exactly they stay and if they own their residences or are merely tenants," he said.

"We generally know where they stay but we don't keep a ledger of their addresses.

"We don't snoop and we respect the privacy of individual members of our congregation. We don't believe we should be Big Brother or Nanny to them," Tan said.

The prelate said a valued insight of Catholic social teaching was the necessity of a mediating space between the state and ordinary citizens.

"That space is the area in which bodies such as the church and others play a role. It's a kind of buffer zone between the citizen and the intrusions of state. The width of that space is taken to be a barometer of the heath of a society.

"With this Peaceful Assembly Bill, the government is intruding into an area that is not theirs, unduly burdening the people in the process. This is worse than the ISA that can put suspects into detention without trial," asserted the bishop.

NFC caps a long string of scandals

COMMENT For weeks, just in time for Umno's annual general assembly which opened yesterday, the party has been embroiled in an embarrassing scandal involving a 2007 government decision to spend RM300 million to establish a national feedlot corporation to slaughter as many as 60,000 cattle annually under Islamic halal dietary requirements.

The scandal seems emblematic of a long series of such situations that imperil Prime Minister Najib Razak's vow in April 2010 that the government "can no longer tolerate practices that support the behaviour of rent-seeking and patronage, which have long tarnished the altruistic aims of the New Economic Policy."

The National Feedlot Corporation (NFC), as it is known, has never slaughtered 10 percent of the projected total and has since scaled back its target to 8,000 head but hasn't been able to meet that target either.

Worse, the company has been losing millions of dollars every year - while pouring funds into two RM10 million condominiums in Kuala Lumpur, among other things, and spending RM800,000 for overseas travel and entertainment.

The scandal is doubly embarrassing because the agreement to establish the NFC, made when Abdullah Ahmad Badawi was prime minister, went to the family of Shahrizat Abdul Jalil (right), the
minister of women, welfare and community development and head of the women's wing of Umno.

Her husband, Mohamad Salleh Ismail, is the chairman. Her three children are respectively the chief executive officer and executive directors of the company. None had any experience in cattle production or beef supply prior to the establishment of the company.

The report of the NFC's operations was contained in the 2010 report of the auditor-general, which was delayed for weeks before it was finally released. The scandal has generated tensions inside Umno, with some reformers demanding that Shahrizat be forced out of her job as minister.

However, the leadership has circled the wagons to protect her. In particular, Muhyiddin Yassin, the deputy prime minister, has said there was no case to be brought against her. Muhyiddin was the agriculture minister in 2006 when the project was approved. Others who have come to her defence are Abdullah Badawi and his son-in-law, Khairy Jamaluddin, the head of the Umno Youth Wing.

The NFC scandal is said to have the potential reformers worried because party operatives thought they had the Selangor electorate turned around and that they could take the state back from the opposition Pakatan Rakyat in national elections expected to be called early next year.

However, Asia Sentinel has been told, the refusal to hold anybody to account in the feedlot scandal could well turn the tide back against them, especially as other patronage scandals continue to bubble up.

Mahathir's cadre of 100 super-rich bumis

The depth and breadth of the scandals also calls into question moves earlier this year with Najib launching a series of programmes to develop bumiputera, including allocating an RM2 billion fund for development.

In the 2012 budget, Najib also announced the government would allocate RM200 million to guide 1,100 high-performing bumi companies with the potential for listing on the Kuala Lumpur Stock Exchange. Critics are concerned that the patronage system will continue unabated.

The current Umno general assembly was hoped to provide a dramatic backdrop for Najib to win back disaffected Malay voters.

For decades, this patronage has involved highway construction and defence contracts and a variety of other government arrangements with Umno cronies in a plan formulated by former Prime Minister Mahathir Mohamad.

His ambition was to create a cadre of 100 super-rich bumis who in turn would help rural Malays into prosperity under a ‘konsep payung', or umbrella concept routed through Umno, much the way he envisioned driving the country into industrialisation through massive
projects.

However, many of the companies eventually collapsed and are being supported by government institutions such as Kazanah Nasional, the country's sovereign investment fund, or the Employee Provident Fund.

Contained in the same 2010 auditor general's report, for instance, is a passage on the decision to privatise a 77-km stretch of highway from Senai to Desaru in Johor.

The land acquisition turned out to have doubled - from RM385 million to RM740.6 million - with the road surface described as "undulating." The project completion "was not in accordance with specifications, causing damage to the road surface and endangering road users."

The company failed to complete construction within the stipulated period of the contract. However, the construction agreement didn't specify damages in the event it wasn't completed. Required maintenance is described as "unsatisfactory."

The company that won the RM1.7 billion contract is Ranhill Corp Sdn Bhd, which has long been described as Umno-linked. It is partly owned by Lambang Optimia Sdn Bhd. Both are headed by Hamdan Mohamad, described as Malaysia's ‘water baron', who operates several utilities and power companies.

He was one of several ethnic Malay businessmen who followed former PM Mahathir's vow to take Malaysian companies overseas. Another shareholder is YPJ Corp Sdn Bhd, an arm of the Johor state government, and yet another appears to be Umno itself, which owns a minority share through an account at Public Bank Bhd, according to records.

Ranhill has had a lackluster two to three years, capped by disaster earlier in 2011 when its Libyan operations were caught between the Muammar Qaddafi forces and those of the Libyan rebels aided by Nato air strikes.

Overpriced defence hardware

Also, earlier this year, Deftech, a wholly-owned subsidiary of DRB-Hicom, won a contract without an open tender to produce and deliver 237 eight-wheeled armoured personnel carriers to the Defence Ministry.

DRB-Hicom is 55 percent owned by Etika Strategi Sdn Bhd, which is wholly owned by billionaire Syed Mokhtar Al Bukhary, one of Mahathir's targeted bumiputeras and a man who is extremely tight with Umno.

Opposition member Tony Pua (left) complained on the floor of Parliament that the average price of RM29.4 million for each unit compared unfavourably with a Portuguese Army purchase of 363 similar vehicles for the equivalent of RM4.4 million each from the Swiss MOWAG CmBH Corp, Malaysia is paying a 6.6-fold increase over the Portguese purchase.

Saudi Arabia, he said, bought 724 such vehicles for the equivalent of RM9.9 million from General Dynamics Land Systems-Canada, with Malaysia paying almost three times as much government officials said the contracts don't compare with each other and that the government is getting more equipment, maintenance, etc. for its money.

"Further research has revealed that DRB-Hicom will be acquiring the AWC technology from a Turkish company - FNSS Defence Systems Inc which manufactures the Pars 8x8 AWV models," Pua said.

"With this deal, Malaysia will be its first foreign customer for this vehicle. What is perhaps of greater alarm is the fact that FNSS has announced that they have sold 257 units of Pars 8x8 AWVs to Malaysia for approximately US$600 million or RM1.83 billion or only RM7.1 million per unit," Pua said in a prepared statement - considerably different from what the Malaysians said they bought the vehicles for.

Pua also complained about the cost of six offshore patrol vessels from Boustead Naval Shipyard Sdn Bhd at RM1 billion each in the aftermath of another total fiasco.

The auditor-general, in a 2007 report tabled in Parliament, alleged that a contract to build naval vessels given to PSC-Naval Dockyard, a subsidiary of Penang Shipbuilding & Construction Sdn Bhd, which was owned by another Umno crony, Amin Shah Omar Shah(right).

PSC-Naval Dockyard, which was taken over by Boustead, contracted to deliver six patrol boats for the Malaysian Navy in 2004 and complete the delivery in 2007. Those were supposed to be the first of 27 offshore vessels ultimately to cost RM24 billion plus the right to maintain and repair all of the country's naval craft.

But only two of the barely operational patrol boats had been delivered by mid-2006. There were 298 recorded complaints about the two boats, which were also found to have 100 and 383 uncompleted items aboard them respectively.

The original RM5.35 billion contract ballooned to RM6.75 billion by January 2007. The auditor also reported that the ministry had paid out RM4.26 billion to PSC up to December 2006 although only RM2.87 billion of work had been done, an overpayment of RM1.39 billion, or 48 percent. In addition, the cabinet waived late penalties of RM214 million.

Between December 1999, according to the auditor-general, 14 "progress payments" amounting to RM943 million despite the fact that the auditor-general could find no payment vouchers or relevant documents dealing with the payments.

AG: Serious financial mismanagement

The auditor-general attributed the failure to serious financial mismanagement and technical incompetence stemming from the fact that PSC had never built anything but trawlers or police boats before being given the contract.

Once called ‘Malaysia's Onassis' by Daim Zainuddin, Amin Shah was in trouble almost from the start, according to a report in Singapore's Business Timesin 2005.

Eventually Boustead PSC was born out of the Royal Malaysian Navy's dockyard facilities which were to provide ship repairs and maintenance services. Under the corporatisation programme advocated by the Malaysian government, the dockyard was set up as Limbungan TLDM, a wholly-owned government company.

It has modern facilities to meet the maintenance requirements of the Royal Malaysian Navy fleet, from hull repairs to major overhauls and from radar refitting to weapon systems refurbishment.

The six patrol boats have now cost five times what the Royal New Zealand Navy paid for its patrol vessels, bought at only RM210 million each from BAE Systems, the second largest global defence company.

The irrepressible Raja Petra Kamarudin in early November found that the Philippines was buying Hamilton-class patrol ships from the US that would be deployed to the West Philippine Sea area to secure the country's natural resources.

The latest one is to be transferred by the first or second quarter of next year, to guard energy projects in Malampaya off Palawan.

"Malaysia is going to buy six patrol boats at a total cost of RM6 billion or RM1 billion per patrol boat. Of course, Malaysia's patrol boats are going to be far advanced and more sophisticated than those of the Philippines who paid only RM31.5 million for theirs," he wrote.

"The Philippines's patrol boats can only patrol the waters. Malaysia's patrol boats can...well...patrol the waters."

- Asia Sentinel

A simple explanation on why Malaysia's Elections are unfair

All Malaysian should read this article from Malaysiakini to understand why BERSIH 3.0 is crucial if the government does not reform the electoral process!

---------------------------------------------------------------------

A retiree arrested the attention of opposition members at the public hearing by the parliamentary select committee (PSC) on electoral reform, when he told them to forget about marching to Putrajaya under the current electoral system.

Armed with printouts of his presentation slides, Ng Chak Ngoon (right) who described himself as a retiree, presented the panel with a graph that showed 222 lines with every one being taller than the other as it progressed.

The graph, said Ng at the hearing in Kota Kinabalu yesterday, which saw several others testifying, was plotted against the population size of all the constituencies in ascending order for the 2008 general election.

"All on the left (in blue) are won by BN, on the right (in red) are all won by the opposition. The BN constituencies are very small and the opposition constituencies are very big. So what is happening here?

"It's not by chance that all the people in big constituencies like the opposition and all those people in the small constituencies like BN. I would think there is a design here for the Election Commission (EC) to sub-divide all the BN areas into smaller areas to increase their number of MPs," he said.

Ng added that the smallest constituency, BN-held Putrajaya only had 6,008 voters but Opposition-held Kapar had a staggering 112,224 voters, 17 times more than Putrajaya.

‘Kapar can have 17 MPs'

"If we break down Kapar to the size of Putrajaya, you would have 17 MPs from Kapar instead of just one."

If all the seats are made into equal size, Ng added, the last general election would yield a result where BN and Pakatan Rakyat would only have a difference of seven seats in Parliament as opposed to the actual results of 140 to 82 seats.

He further estimated that if a party relied on all the small seats to win power, it would only require 15.4 percent of the total votes to form a majority in Parliament.

"If the opposition thinks they can march to Putrajaya, forget about it."

At this point, PSC member Anthony Loke who is DAP's Rasah MP quipped: "Very demoralising."

Explaining further, Ng said the smallest constituency in Malaysia was 13 percent of the national average while the largest was 288 percent, in contrast to the UK's which smallest and largest constituency are 77 percent and 153 percent of the national average respectively.

"If the EC is sincere, it should redraw all the constituencies, this is not gerrymandering, this is outright cheating."

PSC member Dr Hatta Ramli later concurred, pointing out that the Baling parliamentary constituency, supposedly a rural seat, had an unusually large number of constituents at around 70,000.

"This was because PAS has won the seat before," said Hatta, who then asked if Ng thought this was ethical.

"Unethical is a mild word, Can I answer outside?" replied Ng in reference to parliamentary rules that require members in the hearing to abide by appropriate language.

State by state breakdown

Ng later proceeded to present similar graphs with a state by state breakdown at which PSC member Mohd Radzi Sheikh Ahmad said: "Can you rate Kangar?", in reference to his own constituency.

"If you have Negeri Sembilan's, I would like to see my chances of winning," added Loke.

At this, Ng quipped: "I'll have to charge you for consultancy."

When asked by PSC member Fong Chan Onn (right) on how the panel can accommodate the increase of seats for Sabah and Sarawak to meet the Malaysian Federation agreement of 34 percent into his recommendations, Eng replied: "What is your objective?

"To win the election or to have an equitable dispersion of votes? If these are conflicting desires, obviously we cannot come to a compromise. BN has to answer that question, not me, I'm a retired man."

Is Najib lying about reforms!?

Recent event has proven that Najib is an outright liar with regards to reforms (of the ISA and Police Act)

Recently the BN government use the ISA to catch 13 people in Sabah. Why use a law that is suppose to be done away with?? So much for your intention to abolish ISA.

Even worst is the new "Peaceful Assembly Bill 2011" the BN govt is proposing!

It is scary!! It will effective turn Malaysia into a Police State!

Among the main points of the proposed law are:

• 30 days' advance notice for assemblies, except for those in designated areas as defined by the home minister;

• after notification, the assemblies can proceed, unless there are objections from the police;

• no street protests are allowed;

• no protests in or anywhere in a 50-metre buffer zone around prohibited areas defined in a list, which includes hospitals, schools and places of worship;

• Section 8 allows a police officer 'to take such measures he/she deems necessary' to ensure compliance;

• Section 9(5) allows the police to fine organisers up to RM10,000 if no advance notice of a planned assembly is given to the police;

• Section 20(1)(c) allows police to arrest anyone who brings, allows to come or recruits children for an assembly;

• Section 21(3) allows the police to fine those arrested up to RM20,000;

• those under 21 years of age are not allowed to organise assemblies; and

• children under 15 are not allowed to take part in assemblies, except in cultural or religious events such as funeral corteges or events approved by the home minister.

See the full Assembly Bill here!

Example of this new law being worst then the old Police act includes:

1. “Under the new law, a person can be fined up to RM20,000 as compared to RM10,000 under the Police Act,”

2. 30-day notice that organisers must give the police before holding an assembly!

3.Section 15(2)(h) allows the district police chief to decide on:

1. Date, time and duration of assembly;
2. The venue;
3. Manner of the assembly;
4. Conduct of participants;
5. Clean-up costs arising from the assembly;
6. Any inherent environmental factor, cultural or religious sensitivity and historical significance of the place of assembly;
7. Concerns and objections of persons who have interests; or
8. Any other matter that he deems necessary or expedient in relation to the assembly.

Anyone violating the restrictions and conditions will be liable to a maximum fine of RM10,000.

“It is clear that the real intention of Najib and his government is to make it as difficult and as burdensome as possible for the people to peacefully assemble.”

The Bill demonstrates that we have rogue politicians ruling the country as the stifling provisions are a flagrant breach of the federal constitution, that allows for freedom of expression and does not stipulate any age barriers.

None of these provisions are in line with Najib's promise to enable a more vibrant democratic space.

Whatever the analysis, we the rakyat simply cannot take the Bill sitting down. If we do not act now, it would send a signal to the government which would clearly translate to mean it can bulldoze into our democratic space and civil liberties.

I therefore concur with law expert Abdul Aziz Bari that this Bill must be challenged in court, for it violates the federal constitution. This would send a strong message to the government that we will not allow the ruling elite to trample on our rights.

(partly taken from...)
CHARLES SANTIAGO is the DAP member of parliament for Klang.

Another MCA Idiot!

From Malaysiakini

The Health Ministry has today ordered a recall of Kedai Rakyat 1Malaysia’s (KR1M) oyster sauce, for violating food safety regulations.

"We have informed the Domestic Trade and Cooperatives and Consumerism Ministry, which has jurisdiction over the matter to remove the product from the market.

“The product must be recalled immediately," its minister Liow Tiong Lai told reporters at a press conference at Parliament House today.

He explained that the 1Malaysia branded oyster sauce sold at KR1M outlets nationwide, recorded a lower protein content than the requirement mandated by the Food Regulation 1985, in tests conducted by the ministry's Food Safety Department.

"Two samples of the sauce obtained by the ministry recorded protein content of 0.8% protein weight for weight (w/w) and 1.0% protein w/w compared to the standard for oyster sauce which is 2.5% protein w/w specified in Rule 166A of the Act."

The sauce is one of seven products tested by the Health Ministry following claims by Petaling Jaya Utara MP Tony Pua that thequality of the products were in question.

'Pua didn't send samples'

To a question, Liow said there had been a delay in conducting the tests because samples need to be procured.

"I asked Pua (left) to send the samples to me. But since he was not forthcoming, I had to send out my officers to obtain samples for testing by the department responsible," related the minister.

Liow however cleared other products of any infringement of food regulations, which was alleged by Pua.

"We have tested samples of the sweetened condensed creamer, evaporated creamer, pure Ceylon tea, meehoon and blackcurrant fruit cordial and found them to comply with the food safety regulations," assured the minister.

He also denied Pua's claim that the Vitamin A contents of the KR1M's growing up milk formula was way above permissible levels.

Another Stupid Minister! Is it Tony Pua's job to get you the sample is the first place? You should have done your job and check it out yourself!

How about charging the KR1M for violating the Food Regulation Act?!?! Do your job Health Minister!

We still have not forgotten about your stupid lies from the BERSIH rally!