A good country to go missing

Puchong, 21 July: If you want to get lost, Malaysia is probably the best place in the world to go missing. Why? Because nobody will really notice, not even the police, and people will forget that you’d gone missing as soon as their minds make them forget, which is very quickly. 

The case of the former tv personality Zalina Azman, who has gone missing since Nov last year - yes, it’s almost end-July 2022 now - has gotten sone Malaysians concerned. At least more concerned than they would be if a 10-year old girl of the average Mat goes missing. So concerend that the police had to explain why it took them so long to finally broadcast the news of the missing Zalina. [Not very reassuring, though: if that’s how lonnng it took the police to coordinate efforts with the other government departments, bad news for the missing and the lost. Read Kenapa lambat hebah kehilangan Zalina? Ini penjelasan polis.] 

But, hey, I’m not sitting on the cops, okay? We the media didn’t do much better, actually. I sent a phone message to an editor of a Melayu news portal on Dec 1 last year to tell him that I heard a police report had been lodged about Zalina going missing. He sounded genuinely concerned, this editor,  but nothing in the news every came out of it. If it had, the police would have to come out a lot sooner and tell us that another person - this time a media celebrity - had gone missing in Malaysia.

And we would have forgotten all about it much earlier, too.

p.s Reminds me of Nurin Jazlin, every time someone lodges a missing person report. And, what do you know: the hunt for the killer is still on, or so say our police as reported by our media.

One election, three winners - the joke about Ampang’s PKR election

Bangsar, 11 July: It was probably one of the most bizzarre party elections ever. In a keen fight to pick a divisional chief for Pandan at PKR elections on June 24, Daing Muhammad Reduan emerged the clear winner over six other candidates, including favourites Hans Isaac and Altimet. Daing was later disqualified (read here). In the re-election on June 29, 51-year old Hans, a former actor, beat rapper Altimet by two votes. Such a razor-thin margin shoud trigger an automatic recount but in this case the recount was only done a few days later when Altimet asked for it. On July 9, more than ten days after the re-election, Altimet was declared the new winner (read here).

You can try to explain the process or the principles behind the Ampang elections. Most people, however,  have made up their minds about one thing: that this still has no idea how to conduct a free and fair election. At the next general elections, nobody from PKR should be taken seriously if they were to complain of rigging, lack of transparency or vote-buying.

In any case, congrats Altimet. That is, if the election committee does not order another re-electiona week or two from now. Nine votes, after all, is still razor-thin by any standard.

Altimet-ly, hard work pays off for Hans Isaac the Ampang boy

Hans-ups Altimet by two votes in PKR Ampang re-election - The Vibes

The Kita Budak Ampang story (watch the You Tube) has a happy ending for Hans Isaac, after all, at least for now. After two years of walking and talkng the grounds of Ampang in the hope of convincing the PKR members there that he is their best candidate for branch chairman, the celebrity businessman made the cut yesteday by beating Altimet, another big name in the entertainment business, in a tight re-election (read PKR disqualifies Ampang chief Daing Muhammad, fresh polls June 29). 

Party insiders believe this hard-earned victory opens up a lot of possibilities for Hans: he could even be fielded as a PKR candidate at the next general elections.. If party big boss Anwar Ibrahim also believes that Hans has what it takes, that is. And if you ask me, it’s hard not to believe in Hans if you know what he’s had to go through to take on the bigwigs in Ampang and within his party. Especially how he’s set out, tirelessly and almost single-handedly, to help and motivate the Ampang constituents during the pandemic. 

It has only been two years since Hans set his sights to becone a politician in Anwar’s party and look at how far he’s come. Imagine what this 50-year old newbie can do in the years to come to help mend our broken politics - and dreams.

Malaysian journalists told once more they’re just NOT good enough!

The Hadiah Kajai is deemed as one of the highest awards that the long-suffering Malaysian journalist can expect to win locally. Last weekend at the Malam Wartawan Malaysia, however, there was no wiinner. According to the Malaysian Press Institute, which organised the MWM where dozens of “lesser” awards were given out, its esteemed panel of judges unanimously felt that nobody had met the criteria set for Kajai. In other words, no Malaysian journalist was good enough. 

Not good enough for the MPI (or its panel of judges, MPI would insist), that is. Many of my colleages and I would beg to differ, We are of the opinion that the best article submitted to the MPI for the awards, no matter how weak or pathetic the standards of the competition was, ought to be awarded the Kajai. “The best of the worst”, if you like. Becaues telling all those editors, sub-editors, writers and reporters that none of them and none of their articles met the MPI’s standards is a great insult. Unkind.

MPI’s standards (oh, sorry, the judges’ standards) must be so damn high.

Congrats to all the winners of those lesser awards. May our journalism standards improve for next year’s Malam Wartawan Malaysia and the years to come so that we can have a Kajai winner every year.