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| James Chin is a Malaysian academic. The views expressed here are his own and do not reflect the views of institutions he is associated with. |
MARCH 15 — I am a great supporter of Perkasa, the Malay nationalist group.
I support them not because I subscribe to their ideology but because I am a strong supporter of free speech.
(In Perkasa’s case, obviously they don’t believe in free speech since they keep making police reports against people who disagree with them but hypocrisy is a norm among these groups... but that’s another story.)
MARCH 8 —Today marks the second anniversary of the “Tsunami” election, or 308 as the Chinese likes to call it.
Has Malaysian politics changed? Are we seeing a deepening of the democratic process in Malaysia?
I have to say “no” to the first and “yes” to the second.
MARCH 4 — ... you have narrow-minded Fascists running the country. I don’t know about you but I am increasingly frustrated by the rise of fundamentalists, religious bigots and Fascists in this country.
While our neighbours — Indonesia, Singapore and Thailand — are becoming more progressive and moving forward, we seem to be stuck in Bolehland.
The cause is well-known, what we lack is political will to do something about it.
JAN 21 — This the story appeared in The Star:
Nanyang Siang Pau reported that the number of Chinese in the civil service has dropped tremendously despite the Government’s efforts to lure the community into the service. Although their recruitment had been the highest in recent years, the overall number was still smaller than five years ago, and even less compared to 10 years ago, Chief Secretary to the Government Tan Sri Sidek Hassan told the daily.
JAN 8 — This article is for Sarawak observers and Sarawakians in general. After the last state election in 2006, many think another state election would be due in 2010. Sarawak is BN’s “fixed deposit”, to quote Pak Lah, and Sarawak’s 31 seats are worth about 13 per cent of the seats in Parliament.
However, BN will probably lose up to three parliamentary seats in the next general election in Sarawak. A lot will depend on whether Sarawak will hold state and parliamentary elections simultaneously. Right now, Sarawak is the only state in Malaysia with a separate date for state elections.
