What more do the Chinese want?

I wonder if BN can recapture Hulu Selangor parliamentary constituency if not because of the huge amount of money they pumped in just before the election. But whatever it is, a win is a win, perhaps it is also a wakeup call for Pakatan Rakyat that ‘the power of the people’ which was behind their unprecedented success in 328 has started to fade.

It is not difficult to tell that BN is aiming nothing but a win in Hulu Selangor. All the heavyweights from its component parties were there to campaign and that also included the ex-ex Prime Minister who labeled Zaid as a drunken frog who could not be trusted upon.

Undeniably, under the leadership of Prime Minister Najib, a lot of positive changes have started to shape up nicely. Generally speaking, many friends of mine are giving thump-ups to Najib and most of them are having high hopes that he can bring about positive changes that will benefit Malaysian as a whole. At the very least, he is deemed more capable than his predecessor. However, it is still too early to tell if NEM will bring about positive changes to the livelihoods of this multi-racial nation. One thing for sure, if race harmony cannot be preserved, then what happen in Thailand may also happen here.

After the Hulu Selangor by election, I guess UMNO is very happy, MIC is not disappointed but MCA is left puzzling again. In fact, the return of Malay and Indian votes to BN was not reciprocated for Chinese community in Hulu Selangor as there were even more votes for Pakatan Rakyat from the Chinese voters as compared to the last general election.

Many BN leaders especially those from UMNO will imply that Chinese are not grateful despite all the goodies promised by the government during the campaign. The big mouth of Pekasa has urged the government to stop all allocations it promised to Chinese and Indian communities as he viewed that Chinese and Indian are not supporting BN. But if Prime Minister Najib’s holistic approach of One Malaysia is to be a success, then some of the recalcitrant leaders must first drop the attitude of other races must be grateful to them. Otherwise, why waste time talking about One-Malaysia, if one race is superior to another?

Bias in interpretations

The ex-ex Prime Minister was campaigning at Hulu Selangor, urging the voters not to trust a “frog” which might get drunk to represent them. Funny isn’t it. Why the “frog” can get drunk when he crosses over to another party while this very same “frog” can stay very much not intoxicated when he was then the cabinet minister just a couple of years ago.

And apparently the ex-ex Prime Minister also rears horses, 30 of them altogether but he is not racing them, so it is alright for him to keep his horses. On the other hand, the “frog” was accused of racing his horses thus the gambling “frog” should not be accepted by the voters. The question is, why the ex-ex Prime Minister raise up all these so-called unethical or whatever now but not a few years ago when the “frog” was still not a “frog”? Well, that’s typical bias in interpretations, that’s what politicians are good in.

Horse racing in Hulu Salangor

Apparently Zaid owns horses and participates in horse racing frequently. Well if not because of the Hulu Selangor by election, most of us may not know that he was also drinking before. I guess for a big lawyer like Zaid, horse racing is just another hobby, just like our ex-ex Prime Minister likes to ride horses. Or just like any other MPs keeping luxurious cars and so on. And for a person getting western education, maybe social drinking is just a norm. Is there any different, horse riding and racing? Don’t forget we also have our very own Formula 1 Team Lotus which is also racing, animal and machine, any different?

I’m a frequent gambler buying 4D and I’m not ashamed of myself. My religion says that gambling is bad but never prohibiting it. If you go to 4D outlets, the gamblers are essentially One-Malaysian, you know what I mean, not only Chinese and Indian are gambling, many other races are also doing the same thing even though there are very clear signboards at the 4D outlets saying that gambling is prohibited by a particular religion, but so what, you mean to say that these people from the lower income groups do not stand a chance to become a lottery winners and become instant millionaires?

All religions teach people to be good. Gambling is not good we know. Then all these poor fellas can forget about getting rich one day by winning lottery. So everyone stick to the normal path, study hard, get a good education, get a good job and just like ordinary you and me, struggling in the rat race. You can work damn hard but no necessary can be successful like those guys sitting in high positions in private company or public services. Be realistic, how many like us can be like Tony Fernandez, or those guys sitting in high positions in all these GLCs? Dream big? Come on, be realistic.

Given that Malays make up approximately 53% of the voters in the Hulu Selangor parliamentary constituency, it is interesting to see what is the outcome of the by election on this coming 25^th April. But if the MCA party members can accept Tiger Chua as their president, hey, I don’t see why people in Hulu Selangor cannot accept Zaid, after all he has openly apologized for his alcohol drinking in the past and only horse racing as a sport but not gambling.

Teacher attacked by student in Kulim

Teaching profession used to be the well respected one during my childhood times. I think many of those growing up in the seventies will share my feeling, teachers were so influential that we often afraid of them than our own parents. There are bad students and also some not so good teachers regardless of the past or present, but generally speaking teachers were more respected then than now.

My wife is a lecturer in a private tertiary institution. She always complained that the students are so rude nowadays that they can even eat their lunch box in the class and talking loudly to each others. One of her student showed his fist to my wife as she refused to allow the student to sign the attendance for his friends. The youngsters are spoilt bunch of gung-ho people. They thought that they are smarter than their teacher. Some of them drive BMW or Mercedes to campus and you expect this bunch of spoilt youngsters respect their teachers driving cheap cars?

I was shock to read about a teacher in Kulim suffered head injury as a plastic table was thrown at him by his students. If the students are so violence, what are they going to be when they grown up? Gangsters, bank robbers, drug addicts, mat rempits? No wonder our crime rates can never come down even though the IGP and Home Minister always very pleased with their own KPIs.

The discipline issue of the student warrants attention from our parties. If the schools fail to guide the kids on the right path, and the parents are too busy to make end meets, our future generation is at risk.

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NEM

Poverty is the major deprivation of human life. As the country advances, more and more high-rise buildings and eye-catching mega malls are built in the cities and all other forms of modernization also taken place so rapidly, we often forget that some people are still suffering from poor household income and can never afford to enjoy the prosperity of the country. Even the middle class are suffering to make ends meet as everything is getting more and more expensive nowadays. Buying an apartment in big cities such as PJ, KL will cost a fortune, children education is escalating and for a dollar to a dollar, even cars are very expensive here as compared to developed countries like US, Europe or Japan.

Just two days ago while traveling back from KL after a meeting, I was chit-chatting with our plantation advisor in the car. He told me that he spent almost one million ringgit for his two children who study abroad. I asked him whether worth it to do so as I told him that I would rather prefer the kids to study locally which is much cheaper so that more money can be saved for their future needs such as buying a house or starting up a business. He said that would depend on the situation but somehow agreed that studying oversea may not necessarily get a desired outcome, as not all the oversea graduates can get a good employment.

I often talk to a lot of people very senior to me during my course of work. Most of the planters or those working in the plantation industry often revealed the same thing, the cost of education is getting more and more expensive and that is the major household expenditure especially for family with many kids. None of the parents want the kids to be the school drop-out and therefore most of people have to struggle to raise their children and provided them with more and more expensive education in the hope that their children will be able to compete in a more challenging future. To get into local university is so competitive and although there are more and more private universities in the country, they are damn expensive.

PM said that the prime objective of NEM is to increase the per capita income to USD15000 by 2020. For years the issue of minimum wages for plantation workers is still unresolved due to forever dispute on the collective agreements. Mr. Prime Minister will have to engage his persuasive skills to convince the industry to increase the wages of the workers at the same time ensuring that the industry are not transferring the higher wages into their products or services or otherwise it will be back to square one as cost of living will certainly be going up. Seriously speaking, it is timely for the government to uplift the livelihoods of lower income groups and not just keep on churning out one after other mega projects in the way creating more wealth for their cronies.