THE RAT RACE PART VI – MALAYSIA: HOW DID UMNO STAY IN POWER FOR SO LONG?

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[size=14pt][b]THE RAT RACE PART VI – MALAYSIA: HOW DID UMNO STAY IN POWER FOR SO LONG?

Ch 3: Operation of the UMNO War Machine.

In the previous chapter we touched on three strategies that UMNO uses to gain and hang on to power.

1. Topple Opposition State Governments
2. Win general elections
3. Psychological warfare against the Rats.

We will commence this chapter with a discussion of the second strategy used by UMNO

– Topple Opposition State Governments.

Such events are rare as they occur about once every 10 to 20 years, the last one in Sabah in 1994. The Perak event is current and fresh in everybody’s minds, so it will easy and interesting to follow. From this exercise, we can compare how having a mental model will help greatly in our understanding of events.[/size]

Analysis and predictions by Shuzheng. His analysis reaffirm our points about the existence of the UMNO War Machine.

Twenty-two years of Mahathir Mohamad and six under Abdullah Badawi, Malaysia has finally reached the precipice. The methods might be haphazard, but in twenty-eight years, especially in the last years of Mahathir’s rule, there had been a covert, single minded purpose to construct a system to replace the constitutional version. You wouldn’t have known this was happening, except that the signs of the new construction couldn’t be hidden and its results could be tested only publicly.

(a) In 1988 – Mahathir sacked Chief Justice Tun Salleh Abas and a number of other top judges, opening the way for a slew of new appointments so it wouldn’t be difficult to imagine who he might pick for the vacant slots.

(b) In 1993 – Mahathir removed legal immunities against the monarchy.

(c) In 1998 – Mahathir arrested Anwar and this bought him five more years in power to 2003. Anwar represented a pivotal Umno party link between grassroot politics and the elite institutions Mahathir headed.

(d) In 2002 – V.K. Lingam reported (without him knowing it) how he had been and was continuing to fix the judicial Bench, from top down, and this meant it had been going on for a year or two before the recorded phone conversation.

(e) In 2005 – Musa Hassan, the senior CID man leading the criminal arrest and interrogation of Anwar, was appointed deputy IGP, No. 2 in the police. A year later, he was made IGP.

(f) In 2008 – Badawi appoints Umno man Zaki Azmi as Chief Justice, finally rounding the circle and connecting the dots from the political party Umno to the executive government (specially the Prime Minister’s office) and the judiciary.

(g) In 2009, May 7 – The police invade the Perak legislature, seizing from Pakatan Rakyat its control and handing power over to Umno.

(h) In 2009, May 12 – Zambry Kadir of Umno is removed by the High Court as Perak chief minister and reinstalls Pakatan’s Nazir Jamaluddin. The next day the superior court judge Ramly Ali, the same name mentioned by Lingam, stops the High Court. On May 14, Nazir’s lawyers are told they won’t receive Ramly’s written judgement, which is also to say he need offer no rationale for his decision.

All this is to say:

(1) All matters of politics, including the legislature, will from this year be settled in the courtrooms so putting to test the new system Mahathir had initiated and Badawi had cemented and left behind.

(2) There is only one system, not two. The constitutional system that supposedly exist (suggested here) alongside the new one is to all intents and purposes dead, and replaced. Zambry’s removal by the High Court is a displacement of his appointment by the Perak sultan who is supposed to have the ultimate and constitutional prerogative on the matter, yet Umno is silent.

(3) The new system has been tested at multiple levels. At ground, consider the murder of A Kugan inside a police station. At a higher level, the police lent armed force to Umno to seize the Perak legislature. In both cases, the police and Umno lawmakers have become one, each serving the other. It is a test of the judiciary’s turn now.

(4) Once Umno succeeds and gets away with Perak, the seizure of constitutional rule and the coup against legislature would be complete. Power will reside solely on a clique, centred in the Prime Minister’s office from where orders flow. Two repercussions:

(4a) In the future event that Pakatan is anywhere near to taking federal power, it will face a circle of defense, the judicial Bench being the key. Conversely, it will face aggression by the police. How far and how deep this new system acquires muscles, while tying up the seams, now depends on the suggested meeting between Pakatan’s Anwar Ibrahim and prime minister Najib Razak. Any such meeting is a half-step to giving legitimacy to the new system. And anything other than immediate elections in Perak fully legitimises it and so give the clique of elites some space to properly tie the seams.

(4b) Commerce and trade remain as hostages to the political paralysis; people look for work that are non-existent; the children starve; and, the epidemic of crime continues, the police stand with arms folded raising them only to offer pious speeches and pointless remedies. (Understand that the crime epidemic did not begin for no reason; police incompetency is only one, and the police was in the thick of constructing the new system over the last decade.) The new system is too busy finding firm ground where, right now, there is effectively only minimal government. Meanwhile, the chattering class (bloggers in particular) throws another party, toast to each other, hail their chief Mahathir Mohamad, and bow at his feet.

In the New System, You’re On Your Own

[pywong]

Satire: Here is some advice from Sambal Petai to UMNO on how they can hang on to power - use divide-and-rule tactics through racism and religion.

How To Cause Racial Disharmony & Win Elections In Malaysia – A Step-By-Step Guide For Bloggers (With Examples!)
May 17, 2009

To all BN bloggers, More…

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Divide and rule, that's the modus operandi of the Ruling Class. The rank and file policemen who are instructed to do their dirty work are victims also. Look at their low pay and poor service conditions and we can understand that they are also manipulated by the system. Do not hate them. Empathise with them. The crooks are the police at the top who are offered directorships in companies upon their retirement.

The Tyranny Of The Rich And The Powerful

Posted by admin
Sunday, 24 May 2009 10:55

I just watched the video of the Teratai candlelight vigil. If I consider everything there is for real, then it makes my blood boil just as with what happened all the times that Hindraf expressed their feelings or when Bersih expressed theirs.

By Subramaniam Bharathi

The Chinese citizens of this country are trying to make a point like the Indians and the middle class and poor Malays, about their dissatisfaction with the way things are run in this country. But what do they get -other than having poor policemen (all Malays) who have no choice but to do their jobs for a living, following orders to harass and to arrest these Chinese people – dragged along by their collars like dogs, just as with the Indian compatriots during their expressions. This makes for a perception that it is the Malays who are under attack and the Chinese (or the Indians) who are attacking – funny isn’t it. Not at all … not at all. It makes my blood boil.

When you stand up against the tyranny of the rich and the powerful, do not think only Malays, clearly there are many Chinese and Indians as well, are behind this – the video clearly shows what you will get. The deprived Chinese people of our country express it in their own ways. The deprived Malay people in theirs and the deprived Indians in their way.

The policy of the rich and the powerful however is to keep us divided so they can continue to allocate the resources to themselves with impunity and in utter collusion. More…

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The political cost of civil service deceit — The Malaysian Insider

MAY 29 — Anyone surprised at the scale and level of incompetence in the Port Klang Free Zone fiasco? Anyone surprised with Datuk Mat Zain Ibrahim's statement of claim and attempts to clear his name with the anti-graft authorities?

Possibly not after the various scandals that have rocked this young nation of 52 years, most over the past three decades. Think BMf. Think Maminco, Bank Negara's forex losses, Perwaja, CCB.

How about the graft scandal that was linked to a Nuri crash in December 1989 that killed 16, including senior military officials in Sarawak.

And the 4.3ha land scam in Penang that is costing the state government RM29 million rather than RM40 million. Consider the fact that it could have been settled for RM1.8 million but the previous state government had appealed.

Or the fact that a royal commission found some people had a case to answer in the V.K. Lingam video clip. Nothing has happened except the accidental videographer in the case is now the accidental honourable parliamentarian for Kelana Jaya.

Let's not even go on about the police action these past few weeks in Kuala Lumpur and Ipoh over wearing black attire, holding candle-light vigils and going on a hunger strike. Or the fact that police can enter a state legislative assembly chamber and pull out a sitting speaker.

While the monetary cost of these scandals run into the billions, the Barisan Nasional government is now counting the political cost that has broken its customary two-thirds parliamentary majority and rule in four more states apart from Kelantan.

Do they wonder why people don't trust them?

Don't they know they have ruled the country since Merdeka, through predecessor Alliance, and should have had better control over a civil service that has either gone amok and crazed with power, making deceitful decisions that now carry a political cost.

Or is there a tenuous political link to the civil service decisions?

More…

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This is how UMNO uses brainwashing as part of their strategy to maintain their hold on power. Watch your children in the National Service program.

Instill patriotism among NS trainees says Zahid

Posted by admin
Thursday, 04 June 2009 11:47

(Bernama) KUALA LUMPUR: The Patriotism Drive Programme will be organised every three months after the completion of the National Service (NS) programme, said Defence Minister Datuk Seri Dr Ahmad Zahid Hamidi.

He said the programme could instill patriotic fervour and remind the younger generation on the struggle towards independence, and enhance the 1Malaysia concept.

There are lessons to be learned by the younger generation on the sacrifices of the security forces in thwarting the threats from the subversives, he told reporters after attending the NS Patriotism Drive Programme at Angkasapuri here Wednesday night.

"We should not take lightly attempts to destabilise the country through cyber war by supporting a call for Chin Peng (former communist leader) to be allowed to return to the country," he said.

On the programme which was telecast live by TV1, he said 641 trainees from the second group series 6/2009 took part in the show.
Present were Information, Communications and Culture Minister Datuk Seri Dr Rais Yatim and his wife, Datin Seri Maznah Rais.

http://mt.m2day.org/2008/content/view/22778/84/

[pywong]

Satire: Here is some advice from Sambal Petai to UMNO on how they can hang on to power - use divide-and-rule tactics through racism and religion.

How To Cause Racial Disharmony & Win Elections In Malaysia – A Step-By-Step Guide For Bloggers (With Examples!)
May 17, 2009

To all BN bloggers, More…

Racism is defined as:

1. a belief or doctrine that inherent differences among the various human races determine cultural or individual achievement, usually involving the idea that one's own race is superior and has the right to rule others.
2. a policy, system of government, etc., based upon or fostering such a doctrine; discrimination.
3. hatred or intolerance of another race or other races.


Sadly for Malaysia, some politicians, ex-politicians & media seem to believe that they will be more powerful by returning to the days before PRU-12 and even further back. Therefore they frame all issues in racial, religious or communal terms, and portray others as the enemies who seek to victimise & disposses.

While such actions and words are not necessarily racist, they constitute demagoguery, i.e. a strategy for gaining political power by appealing to the prejudices, emotions, fears and expectations of the public — typically via impassioned rhetoric and propaganda , and often using nationalist or populist themes. More…

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There is no cost analysis for the nation's defence

Is this for the nation's defence or UMNO's defence?

In any case, announcing the birth of a new addition to the UMNO War Machine. This goes under the Militias.

Tentera Wataniah costs tax payers RM50mil

17 Jun 09 : 8.16PM
By Zedeck Siew zedecksiew@thenutgraph.comzedecksiew at thenutgraph dot com

KUALA LUMPUR, 17 June 2009: There was no cost analysis for the formation of a Tentera Wataniah battalion in all 222 parliamentary constituencies.

"There is no cost analysis for the nation's defence," Deputy Defence Minister Datuk Dr Abdul Latif Ahmad told the Dewan Rakyat today.

"The cost (for the battalion) is not high, because we only pay them an allowance," Abdul Latif added.

The deputy minister revealed that allowances for the volunteer military force, numbering 45,000 persons nationwide, currently costs the government "only RM50 million".

However, Abdul Latif also told Parliament that the ministry had plans to increase the number of Tentera Wataniah forces by another 50,000.

"This is to achieve a two-to-one ratio of volunteers to career personnel," Abdul Latif said.

Abdul Latif also revealed that the current allowance scheme for Tentera Wataniah would be reviewed, to make volunteering "more attractive".

Abdul Latif was answering a question by Charles Santiago (Klang-DAP) about the formation of Tentera Wataniah battalion in all 222 parliamentary constituencies.

This move, announced on 12 April, quickly invited suspicions that such troops would add to the number of postal votes in such constituencies.
Abdul Latif has previously denied such allegations, pointing out that Tentera Wataniah personnel were volunteers, and therefore regular voters. Link here…

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[color=blue]Readers may be wondering what is this article doing here. If we refer to the Table on the Elements of the Rat Race, we can see Religion classified under the Liabilities Column. Religion in the hands of good teachers and leaders is a force for good but in the hands of evil people can generate great evil. The Rat Race articles is all about self-defence, protecting yourself from the manipulation and exploitation by the Ruling Class and Financial Class plus their collaborators. Inability to recognize evil puts us in the Boiled Frog category. If you are not financially literate, you get set up as suckers, irrespective of the level of your education. More…

The National Evangelical Christian Fellowship Malaysia

Selangor Bans Christian Song

Imposes fine of up to RM1,000

From banning Bibles to Christian publications, the authorities are now prohibiting songs.

The Selangor Islamic Religious Council (MAIS) has banned an Indonesian song which contains the word "Allah" to "prevent Muslims from being confused".

Anyone found playing or singing the song, "Allah Peduli" (God Cares), risk being fined up to RM1,000 under the Non-Muslim Religious Enactment 1988.

However, the ban is confined to Selangor as matters of religion come under state jursidiction.


MAIS chairman Datuk Mohamad Adzib Mohd Isa told the media on March 13 that the song by Indonesian singer Agnes Monica repeatedly used the word 'Allah' when referring to Jesus Christ and that the lyrics ended with words "Tak akan pernah dibiarkannya ku bergumul sendiri sebab Allah Yeses ku mengerti" (Will never be left alone to face my own anxiety because Allah Jesus understands).


Following the ruling, the Penang Islamic Religious Council (MAIPP) urged the Department of Islamic Development Malaysia (JAKIM) to extend the ban to the nation.

MAIPP chairman Shabudin Yahaya said he had not heard the song but he had received reports that the lyrics touched on the sensitivities of Islam.

NECF Malaysia maintains that it will continue to use the word "Allah" as languages and words are universal property and should not be monopolised by any one religion or ethnic group. Furthermore, the word has been used by Christians and other religions even before Islam existed.


NECF asserts that one of the ways to resolve the issue is to get the various religious groups who use "Allah" in their Scriptures and faith - Sikhs, Christians, Muslims and others - to educate their followers on their unique understanding of the word according to their religions.


Different religion views and understands "Allah" in different manner and no one religion should impose its understanding of the word on another religion.


You can catch the controversial song "Allah Peduli" on youtube.com

[pywong]

Did we not state that the police and the MACC (previously ACA) are part of the UMNO War Machine. Read RPK below.

THE CORRIDORS OF POWER

Raja Petra Kamarudin

Just before the recent Hari Raya holidays, a lawyer from one of Malaysia’s leading law firms was arrested and detained overnight in the ACA lockup in Putrajaya. What was this lawyer, Rosli Dahlan, guilty of? Did he bribe a government officer? Did he pay RM50 to a policeman to avoid getting fined RM300 for speeding? Did he solicit and receive a bribe from a supplier or contractor as an inducement for dishing out lucrative contracts? No, his ‘crime’ was acting as a solicitor for a senior police officer who was being accused of accumulating RM27 million in undeclared assets. More…

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Signs of increasing desperation of a failing regime.

The Rise of Militancy

Posted by admin
Thursday, 02 July 2009 10:51

“Militarism is the doctrine that military strength is the basic foundation of all security. It is not solitarily restricted to the armed forces of a nation but to the legal enforcement agencies inside the country as well. It is a sad day when a country resorts to militarism to enforce its views upon its denizens.”

By Hakim Joe

Militarism is not exclusive to dictatorships or authoritarian states as portrayed here in Bolehland. Not evident here? Well, there is the introduction and implementation of compulsory National Service as a first example. Do not mistake my statement here as I am not saying that it is not a good thing but neither did I state that it is all bad. All I am merely doing is stating the fact that this action by the federal government is a route towards militarism. There are many ways and methods to character building and perhaps this is one of them. My question remains why is it implemented now and what is the rationale behind it.

Secondly, the arming of senior RELA members. While not many people realize this, RELA used to be an unarmed outfit that is basically used as support to the local police force. Their normal duties are crowd control, whether during an official government function or during the elections or whatever the “real” officers tell them to do. With the onset of foreign workers, RELA was roped into the system as a quasi-enforcement agency and legislations enacted to legitimize their actions. The powers of arrest are now part and parcel of being a RELA member (trained or under-trained) when it should only remain within the trained police force. Firearms in the hands of amateurs are bound for disaster. More…