Najib's headache, Tee Keat's heartache

Updated, Sunday 10pm
Dnightcaller has an interesting analysis on the MCA presidential turmoil, here, which pits the Lone Ranger and Brutus.

Original Article:

Circus. Chess. Curse. That the BN chairman and Prime Minister Najib Razak hasn't uttered a word in public about the latest MCA drama suggests that he's tired with or deeply hurt by the antics of the jokers in this political circus. Like many, he'd probably thought that the party's AGM would heal the scars and bring the factions together. For a while, the political headaches and heartaches belonged to the Pakatan Rakyat as Anwar Ibrahim's PKR grappled with defections in recent weeks.

Then, suddenly, just days before the AGM, Chua Soi Lek decided to quit his deputy president post to check-mate the "unity" plan that had brought him and party president Ong Tee Keat together for the last few months.

Tee Keat may have felt like Caeser, betrayed by his own subordinates, but unlike Ceaser he's alive, unfortunately, and he's still the President of the party and, therefore, he has a job to do.

AGM and then fresh elections. Firstly, he needs to fulfill the leadership's earlier commitment to hold the AGM and prepares members for fresh elections (now scheduled for March 28). There are those who do not wish Tee Keat to hold the AGM for fear that it may provide him with a platform to address the delegates but then he is the President. NOT holding the AGM would be a dereliction of duty, and there's nothing worse than that.

In any case, the women's wing of the party has convened their AGM today (against a directive of it's chief Chew Mei Fun, it seems!) and there is no reason why Tee Keat should not hold the AGM as scheduled.
Curse of the PKFZ. Secondly (and more importantly at least for people like me), as Transport Minister and the man who said he would deliver justice in the Port Klang Free Zone fiasco, Tee Keat must remain focused. The turmoil within MCA must not distract or deter him. I know he's been under great pressure since his pledge to expose those responsible for the billions lost in PKFZ.

His days at MCA's helm may be numbered but as I see it Tee Keat may be President of MCA for the another 20 years but it would do him little good if he fails to help bring to book the culprits (including some MCA politicians from what I've heard) behind the PKFZ.

So, as I see it, Tee Keat can fight to stay on as president of the MCA or Liow Teong Lay can take him or Chua Soi Lek or both on 28th March. The important thing is will MCA emerge stronger after that and will Tee Keat be able to finish what he sets out to do at PKFZ?

Another one jumps the ship

Third PKR MP quits

Wednesday, March 3rd, 2010 12:58:00

BAGAN Serai Member of Parliament Mohsin Fadzli Samsuri has quit PKR, making the 65-year-old the third legislator to quit the party within one week.

He cited internal squabling and PKR’s stance on the ‘allah’ issue for his resignation. Mohsin has opted to become an independent MP.

Are they all bribeable? So, why are the elected representatives from PKR jumping ship? Money? RPK and Co say they are being bought by Umno, led by Jamaluddin Jarjis way out there in Washington, the U.S.A. If that was so - and I don't believe that is so - why were they so buy-able or bribeable? Remember, these aren't the only three who have jumped out of Pakatan Rakyat. The 3 state assemblymen who jumped in Perak, which caused so much problems till recently. What happened to them? Bought also, ah?

BN has also lost some, the biggest fish of them ex-Minister Zaid Ibrahim. Bought also, bribeable and buy-able?

If everyone in politics can be bought with money, what's with the ideals, cause and principles?

Let's be real, let's be frank. There's something seriously wrong over there. RPK and Co ought to do something constructive for once and for a change for their masters - analyze and find out what's wrong and advise them on how to put an end to the jumpers.

Read the rest of the Malay Mail on-line article h e r e.

Naked again, Down Under

Art or Obscene? Bujai's posting Will they strip for Anwar as well?, which features the picture above, reminds me of a long-running trouble I had with the Home Ministry in 2002/2003 for, among other things, publishing a story and picture of an Australian naked art in the Malay Mail.

The pic we published then was nowhere as graphic as this one but the KDN delayed renewing our printing permit for 3 months from Jan to March 2003.

Today, Bujai's digital media won't have to worry about the KDN at all!

Freedom or what?

It's just Nazri so why get so excited, right?

Ordinarily, I wouldn't give a damn what Nazri says. The pro-Umno bloggers think he scores own goals too often and my Barisan Rakyat blogger friends would only support him when he has something nasty to say about Dr Mahathir.

But when I was told that Anwar Ibrahim's top campaigner Raja Petra Kamaruddin himself was in Washington last week to sabotage a forum that Nazri was addressing, I got a wee bit interested.

It turned out that someone else from another pro-Anwar news portal (not Malaysia Today) was there reporting on behalf of RPK. The Malaysia Today editor never left London, his home since he escaped from a series of lawsuits in Malaysia, at all.

So why was it so important for Anwar, RPK & Gang that the forum was stopped or at least disrupted even though it's "only" Nazri Aziz who was talking to the Americans? Why was it important to make believe that RPK was there in Washington to report the forum?

In Cloak and Dagger, 3 Stooges in Washington, blogger Sakmongkol (who made it quite clear that he wasn't in Washington) provides some answers.

What impressed me is that Malaysia's news portals are beginning to send their reporters abroad to cover political assignments like this one. It's not cheap to send reporters to places like Washington DC.

Read also Sak's earlier postings:
On the circus that got to America
The circus that got to America - 2
Malaysian circus in DC - 3