1970s, estate labourers of Indian origin began to migrate to the towns and urban areas of Peninsular Malaysia in search of their livelihood.
Thus began a pattern of their lives that saw them exchange the discreet poverty of their estate existence for the grinding poverty of their urban lives.
Their lack of education and the higher cost of living in urban areas meant that these rural-to-urban migrants were hard put to eke out a living. They began to languish in hopelessness, their poverty turning endemic because their children’s low educational attainment, in part due to gloomy home conditions, meant their further immersion in the poverty trap.
Within two decades of this migratory drift from estate sufficiency to urban depression, Indian Malaysians began to top the indices of social pathology. The unemployment rate, school dropout rate, crime rate, and high incidence of single parents, all testified to social malaise among Indian Malaysians.
Now, MIC new President Planivel has suggested the urban poor Indians who are earning a meager income to move back to the estates to earn a better and higher income as a temporary solution.
Palanvel is out of touch of the real problem of the Indians. A temporary solution cannot work. What is needed is a long term solution to the hard core problem of the Indian poor.
It is suggested that a Parliamentary select committee consisting of the government, opposition and eminent personalities to be established to ascertain the real cause of the hard core poverty among the Indians.
The select Committee can then make due recommendations for a permanent and long term solution for those Indians who are suffering in the urban poor net. Thus a safety net of a sort is needed like a "tongkat" for the community to progress from the slumber.
The Committee can and should visit and ascertain the real issues affecting the Indians in all areas where the Indians are residing.
I will raise this issue next week during my turn to speak during the Royal address in Parliament.
Will MIC,Gerakan, MCA and PPP support me? Or as usual they will pretent not to hear me for fear of UMNO their big brother?
The Parliamentary select committee could also encompass to look into:
1) poverty affecting Malaysians as a whole;
2) Gangstersim and High criminal activities among the poor;
3) Why many thousands do not possess birth certificates and identity cards;
4) Why many urban Indians are said to earn only RM500 per month;
5) The present per capita income is RM26, 000 per head per month which makes out to over RM2000 a month. Why in reality average Malaysians are earning less then this? Can the target per capita income of RM50,000 be reached by 2020 as vision by the Government;
6) Why in 1970 the civil service had 17% Indians now down to 4% and Chinese from 30% to presently 5%?
7) Why academically well qualified Malaysians students are denied scholarships and financial help from the Government:
8) Why the present workforce is relatively unskilled with 80% educated to Sijil Pelajaran Malaysia or it equivalent
9) Why is there a growing population of single mothers;
10)Social matters like alcoholics and drugs, unemployment, the over dependence on foreign workers and the need for a minimum wage.
There are definitely many other pressing matters which need urgent and concrete action. The select committee can delve in it if the necessity arises.
Finally, I urge the report to be made public and to follow up with concrete action.
Der House doctor: Blatant or political liar? (Part 1) — Sakmongkol AK47
March 13, 2011
MARCH 13 — “I have Indian blood but I am Malay.”
When Dr Mahathir Momahd said those lines, I nearly fell off the chair. Not because the Malay categorisation of such a fellow is a Mamak or an Indian-Muslim, but because of the admission of political chameleon-ness of the person.
Because of that, we can now reconcile such an admission with one particular categorisation of Dr Mahathir — that of a political liar. To re affirm his brand of politics, Dr Mahathir is willing to not tell the truth.
His memoirs contain not hard truths but fabricated deceits. All in furtherance of his politics. Musa Hitam wasn’t the political animal after all. It’s Mahathir. All the time.
Only Dr Mahathir has the absolute discretion to tell his version of things. He and his version is the ultimate measure. Many of us are just blinded by the fact that during 22 years he lorded over us, Malaysia was rushed into the 21st century, ignoring the immeasurable costs to this country and to Malays in particular.
If I were to accept another categorisation of Dr Mahathir as a blatant liar, that would induce a different feeling. At least describing Dr Mahathir as a political liar suggests that essentially Dr Mahathir may still be a good person, but he assumes a certain character when his Machiavellian instincts overwhelm him. Tengku Razaleigh Hamzah is ever so polite.
On the other hand, to describe Dr Mahathir as a blatant liar suggests a deeper natural characteristic of the man. In other words Dr Mahathir is a born liar. So you pick your choice — Dr Mahathir the political liar or Mahathir a natural liar.
How can we ever argue with this kind of man? Here is an example of a man who can contain two extremes and two opposites simultaneously. So how? Dr Mahathir is bi-ethnic? Others are hmm… bi-sexual?
Arguing or opposing such a man would only end in the annihilation of one party — namely us. Consider this. When Umno does not agree with him, he forms an Umno Baru! Umno: Under Mahathir Never Oppose.
Then, just look at the list of those vanquished by the hands of Dr Mahathir. Tengku Razaleigh Hamzah because of the man’s absolute sense of propriety and protocol when Dr Mahathir has none; Musa Hitam because of Musa’s insistence on stable principles when Dr Mahathir has only preferences for expedience; Ghafar Baba because of Ghafar’s trusting nature and old school innocence facing off with Dr Mahathir’s you-are-valued-as-long- as-you are useful to me and un-conventionalism; and Anwar Ibrahim because of the man’s dirty morals (?) when Dr Mahathir is artificially clinical.
Dr Mahathir runs a political clinic then. He is a house doctor dispensing Panadol and aspirin to relieve heart problems. Finally there was the bungling Tun Dol who immediately said yes I am ready to be your deputy when asked, when actually what Dr Mahathir was looking for was a pliant tool.
So the victor writes his own history.
I have described him as the only man in Malaysia who can walk on water. That is testament of his ability to do impossible things. But I think this description of him beats everything else.
Here is a person who can hold two opposites simultaneously. You can only term such a person as slippery.
Anwar calls him a blatant liar. Tengku Razaleigh calls him a political liar. Can you beat such a slippery person? Now a slippery person can pick and choose which part of his own story that he wishes to amplify. Dr Mahathir reminded me of Winston Churchill. We are all worms, but I am a glow worm. Everything else pales in comparison to him. This could be the mystery sentence of the decade. It’s spoken by the doctor in the house. He has just come out with his memoir after an eight year wait.
Unfortunately it appears to be extraordinary more in terms of the author’s vindictiveness towards his political rivals. As they say, history is written by the victor. Thus far, Dr Mahathir is the victor and he intends to tell the story as he sees it.
A memoir is what it is, a very personalised and heavily nuanced version of history. In the case of a self-written memoirs or autobiography, a personalised and heavily nuanced version of HIS legacy and a selective recollection of aspects of history.
It’s easy to rebut what Dr Mahathir says when — in diplomat-speak — what he says do not seem to tally with the records we have.
For example, during that crucial Friday prayer break, it was Dr Mahathir’s storm troopers who went on a spending spree paying delegates. He just couldn’t believe that his larger number of nominations couldn’t translate into votes.
But Dr Mahathir said it was done by Tengku Razaleigh’s people. So we say to Dr Mahathir, what you say does not seem to match the notes we have. That is the only form of counter argument one can adduce against a personalised and nuanced version of history.
He begun money politics but says it’s done by others. He begun the politics of internal discord yet says others started it.
The question is, can you trust a person who is congenitally intractable? He wants Malaysians to accept history as it is written by him. He is pig-headed in his version of history.
Can you hold on to anything he says if he doesn’t see anything wrong in “I have Indian blood but I am Malay”? My Indian Muslim friends were rolling on the floor laughing out loud.
Rather than use his memoir as an opportunity to set the record straight, the memoir is used to bolster his one track views on many things. Dr Mahathir is more eager to leave behind a cleaned-up operation. Mostly the trails he left behind.
He says he was disappointed that Daim Zainuddin did not defend himself against accusations of graft. How could Daim if his defence would have to reveal that Dr Mahathir, the one-time doctor who was not a wealthy person when he travelled frequently from Alor Star to KL, had become the subject of insidious whispers of now being a fabulously wealthy man?
So Daim has to keep mum or bring down the house of cards.
Dr Mahathir is eager to leave a sanitised legacy perhaps because he is actually scared some people may piss on his grave. So he must give the world a sterilised version of his-story. — sakmongkol.blogspot.com
* Sakmongkol AK47 is the nom de plume of Datuk Mohd Ariff Sabri Abdul Aziz. He was Pulau Manis assemblyman (2004-2008).
*
I have changed my name to Senthamizhlan. Don’t bother if you can’t pronounce that—even Barack Obama can’t. What matters is the meaning. And my new name means ‘the friend of classical Tamil.’
"Why the change," asked Raja, the autorickshaw driver. The good 20 minutes I spend with him as he zips Rajnikanth-like along the potholed roads from my suburban home in Adambakkam to my office on Chamiers Road, nay, Pasumpon Salai, we usually discuss such mundane things as fuel hike, school fees and vegetable prices. Today, I raised my bar.
"You are lucky, Raja," I told him as he shifted from top gear to third to overtake a Volkswagen, "yours is a truly king-size Indian name acceptable in almost all the regional languages; mine is not."
"But what is the need to change your name, sir?"
Raja insisted. In order to avoid uncomfortable questions and for the convenience of not breaking my quotes later in the day when I would be writing this blog, I told Raja to shut up and just listen. The rest is history you are about to read.
"Sorry for being rude, Raja,” I started, “but one has to be a bit rude to put things in perspective, especially when you are having a bumpy ride.” The driver nodded his approval, as I launched myself into a speech explaining the necessity for change of names:
"See, it may be just an event, you know, this world classical Tamil conference to be held in Coimbatore from June 23 to 27, but events are the cornerstones of history. This one is so big that it will not just create history, but will rewrite it. See how the Chennai Corporation top brass have started in right earnest their attempts at being more loyal than the king – it has decided to change the names of, to begin with, 50 roads and streets. Named after cruel, mean, oppressive Englishmen, these roads will now be renamed after nice, sweet, loveable, Tamil scholars and poets.”
Raja turned his head to say something, but I barked at him to focus on evading that water tanker which looked almost certain to run us over. As he revved up to ascend the Kathipara flyover, I cleared my throat for some more noble speech. “What’s the need for naming that road in T Nagar as Madley Road? It may be true that the road is named after JW Madley, the engineer who laid the first water pipes in the city in the early 1900s, but why should we glorify him? Though many of the water pipes in the city are of Madley’s vintage, hasn’t the water changed? I don’t know, Raja, if you follow me, but you should know that today’s piped water is a wholesome ecosystem with all kinds of flora and fauna that Madley cannot claim credit for.” Raja silently agreed.
"Look at that!” I yelled, pointing at a road sign, as we reached Saidapet. “Why on earth should it be called Jennis Road, Raja?” As the driver looked helplessly at my reflection on the broken rear-view mirror, I continued to educate him. “That’s the name of a ship that brought Christian missionaries to Chennapatnam in… God knows when.
Chennai port receives scores of ships every day. Will you, Raja, for heaven’s sake, name this road MV Mighty or USS Nimitz?” The driver shook his head.
“Can’t you see it is the same sick logic these anglophiles employ when they call that road near Perumbur Loco Works, Stephenson Road? McDonald Stephenson submitted the first proposals that helped the East India Company lay the foundation for the Indian Railways network, they claim. So what? Going by that logic, all roads near railway institutions should be named after the Germans who invented the wagon rails in the 1550s. History, Raja, history…” At this point, the driver smirked, which I quite didn’t like, but I decided to be civil.
"Not for nothing has our mayor asked all shops and establishments to have their names written in Tamil in the biggest font size and then in English and then only in a language of the trader’s choice. What will happen to the logos, they ask. Phew! Change the logos! Don’t they understand these are times of change? Don’t they realise that the Chinese have some of the best logos in the world? Can’t they respect local sentiments? Now, why are you silent, Raja? Talk!"
He stopped the vehicle in front of my office and refused to take money. As I stood overwhelmed by the impact I had on this common man with a universal name, Raja spoke: “If I ever happen to let you get into my vehicle again, I will change my name."
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