History all the way

A few of my readers complain that I am too history eccentric and they said it sometimes too mind-numbing for their reading.

A few asked me how old I was, when those happenings happened, and a few more asked me what have those histories have got to do with our current modern lives.

There are many ways of answering these questions, but I am too unknowledgeable to answer them in philosophical behavior as I am not a scholarly person. Remember I have never been to Oxford or Cambridge University like some had.

I am not at all able to put up nice and impressive definition to this big terminology but I know it is important constituent of modern and civilized being and nations.

If I am not wrong, oxford dictionary defines "history" as a study of past human events.

How one could decide of the future if there is no history to that? How do we go about charting the nation’s paths for the future without basing it on its history? Everything has be history attached tightly to it.

A large number of Malaysians are not welcoming Chin Peng to spend his residue of his life in this country because of his history.

But a lot of us forget history that Japan takes the US as her main partner in many areas and scope of bilateral relationship despite of deadly atomic bombs detonated by the Americans in the 2nd World War on Hiroshima that made Japan a bankrupt.

We are not happy that Singapore is changing her history by denying the existence of Sang Nila Utama in history. They taught their school children that Singapore was founded by Sir Stamford Raffles in 1819…and we can see what history meant to them.

A bit of knowledge in history, old and recent one would make one forms good or bad impressions on individuals and it all depends on one’s perception in that person and that again depends on what angle one looks at him.

It is history that makes me form a strong stand that the current environment is not sustainable if nothing is done towards improving it. Malaysians are praying hard that the leaders of today would do things in sanity for our good history of tomorrow.

And history again proves to us all that sacrifices from leaders of the past were consequential to our lives of today and the future. That is nothing more and nothing less history to us now.

The interpretation of history in place is again be taken differently by individuals who sees things from different angle.

History of Mahathir administration is very colorful and many people think that was a very good history to many, but to persons like me and a lot others take it differently as I believe his politics and going for speedy physical development have brought Malaysian to become materially eccentric.

That leads to massive corruption in the government as a rush in building physical development had contribute in parallel the fertility of corrupt practices both by politicians and the government servants.

That is weaknesses to many and equally many others think he did the right thing.

Tengku Razaleigh (TR) has his own weaknesses for being too gentleman in facing his political contemporaries who had strong political killer instinct with no element of gentleman ship.

Time Magazine used to write on TR and one of the magazine’s comment was, “had this prince was a little bit less gentleman he would have become the Prime Minister long time ago”…and that is again a writing of history.

However TR again can create another history if he can be the real person to make up all the distortion in the Malaysian administration and politics to a real peacefulness of life in this great but improperly managed country.

The world goes to war because of history. The Muslims in particular the Palestinians and her neighborhood feel disparaged with United Nation for forming an Israeli state in their homeland in 1948 after the Jews were ostracized in Europe.

19 years after Israel went to war with the surrounding neighbors and succeeded in expanding her territories and subsequently brings unending disputes over their territories until today.

Conversely the Jews recount ancient history to justify and legitimize their existence in the region as a sovereign state. They claim that the whole regions of the northern Africa and the Mediterranean were all theirs historically.

In fact to the Jews all prophets except for Muhammad s.a.w were from them and they feel they are superior to any other races in the world. In crude actuality the Jews unify among their small community because of history that they went through.

The US goes to war purely because of history. The Americans are the world super power and they know and history tells them that all Super Powers never last.

The Portuguese was a Super Power, followed by the French and the Dutch as well as the British which had colonies around the globe, and their existence as Super Power is only known to historians.

In short, what we do today will be history once we wake up the following morning.

Space and time do not permit me to write this article longer than this point, and I hope this short write-up of mine can answer the questions put to me by some readers of my blog.

Everybody! Let us enjoy our weekend with our family and friends to the fullest because what we enjoy today may become history tomorrow.

We must bear in mind that death is always peeping in. We may just close our eyes unpredictably if God wishes and it is all at his liberty.

Than our lives in this world would become history to the next world. Whether we go to heaven or hell then, it all depends again on our life historical conduct.

So it is history all the way.


Thanks………………………………………………………………..Aspan Alias

UMNO : Mandatory massive corrections OR ........

This country like many others which recent history can tell should now go for massive adjustment in order to remain salient and outstanding, as we proudly claim.

Nonetheless, we must submit to the fact that it would certainly takes time for the serenity and stillness to stand upright with tolerable degree of political decency.

Indonesia had gone through rough and uneven tribulations for more than 10 years after the downfall of Suharto, who had been loitering in the Presidential Palace for more than 30 years with iron-fist rule.

After India, Indonesia has turned into another great democracy in Asia, after the Indonesian has realized that ruling by flexing political muscle is not sustainable when the rakyat are cogently and lucidly crying for revolutionary changes in that great nation of more than 250 million population.

To the mind of concerned citizen, Malaysia is no exception from the rising call for an accurate and straightforward democracy as our politics of late are obviously in topsy-turvy, proving to everyone that the strong model of democracy that has been friendly to us now turn sour.

Our fore fathers had been repeatedly reminding us to take good care of the systems and values we adopted, by being honest and without a breath of personal glorious intention and put our hearts and soul forefront for the nation’s sake.

When our leaders of past decades tried to run the country with the intention to create personal legendary history, by fouling the system and values, the environment clearly changed.

The rakyat then slowly became divisive in perception of things, and the originally intended purposes were waywardly short-circuited and shift of directions became unambiguous.

By convention the President of UMNO becomes automatic Prime Minister, and a strong President would command strong and impeccable mandate from the people.

But that has become history. A strong and unanimously elected President has ceased to enjoy the support of the masses, as UMNO itself has been mutilated by its leaders for the past 2 decades through unprecedented intra-politics within the party.

UMNO is swiftly meandering towards massive defections of its own members in the ballot box in the next General Elections intended to be called in 2013.

The huge party membership means nothing anymore in electing their ruling line-up, and for now UMNO’s fate is very unpredictable, but the mood on the ground reflects that the party is at incurable stage.

A large number of its members have ceased to take pride being members of the party and subsequently lost the sense of ownership of their own struggle and it happens not without reasons.

The members have used up all reserved patients after seeing all the shenanigans and monkeyshines of their leaders, more so towards those in the government in particular the Cabinet line-up.

The critics within the party are not welcomed; in fact they take offence and brand the critics as insubordination to the party and government and quite a number were sent in prison under Internal Security Act (ISA).

As for now the people have already made decision in their mind and in order to circumvent the fall, UMNO in particular has to accept in humility of its irrelevance currently, and should strive on by adopting drastic changes in its approach to the adversities in place.

Everyone in UMNO, the top leader in particular should earnestly be prepared to sacrifice personal feelings, glory and advantages in place, for tranquil political state of affairs.

The old and the young, the veterans and the reigning ones and astute personalities should be sitting with clear minds minus prejudices towards individuals or groups and make the proposed conclave a success and consequential.

Rakyat on the street like me will just be waiting for positive outcome for permanent reconciliations and formula based on provisions and spirit of our Federal Constitutions.

If this endeavor is not set in motion, the prediction that BN/UMNO is approaching its terminal death in perpetuity, would become reality.

Pakatan Rakyat (PR) is just waiting as an alternative to us and we can’t blame the rakyat switching their allegiance from UMNO/BN as the parties within that coalition (PR) are legally registered political organs.

Voting for any other party other than UMNO in any election, is never a crime, as some of us in UMNO perceive.

Just can’t imagine when there will be scanty UMNO representatives then sitting on the opposition bench across the floor in Parliament, exactly the same row where DS Anwar Ibrahim currently sits.

For those who are still in deep love with UMNO would then be in despondency, and it will more hurting for them if the switch of seats are with DS Anwar Ibrahim and his party.

If that seriously happens, UMNO will cease to be a premier political organization of consequence, as it will be relegated to the same fate of HAMIM and BERJASA, or to the best it will be within the class and wavelength of current GERAKAN party.


Thanks……………………………………………………Aspan Alias

Thieves & the corrupt - Any diffrerence?

Is thieving already become a culture of today’s life? Before any further deliberation, let us ask ourselves who are the people within that category of thieves?

It is good to know as the thieves can be somebody close to us, or they can even be our leaders. Some can come from well-to-do family and adored by many and quite a number pretentiously talk about how to be a morally rounded person.

There are some common attributes of thieves; they are dishonest, light-fingers and having the apt to steal. Then we ask who the thieves are?

A person who steals a few chickens form his neighbour’s farm is a thief, and a person who quietly picks up one or two durians under its tree without the knowledge of the owner too is a thief.

What about robbers? Robbers are also thieves as they force on some one to hand over their money or valuables to them (robbers).

So, Botak Chin is a thief. The answer is YES. What about Batang Kali who was shot dead in Damansara Jaya few years ago? He was also a thief. Both were shot dead by the police as they had been in the wanted list of the police for a long while.

What about corruptors in the government and politicians who take benefits apart from what is due to them?

They are also thieves, but their differences than the ones we mentioned earlier are distinct.

The corruptors are the white collar thieves while the ones we mentioned earlier are the blue-collared ones.

Then we ask what the differences between the white-collared and the blue-collared thieves and what are the consequences they have to face if these two kinds of thieves are found guilty and convicted?

The consequence can be a lot different. The white collar thieves would face jail sentence while the other kind of thief might end up with gunshots and looses his cheap life.

The white-collared thieves get more loots than the blue-collared. The loots for the white collar thieves are sometimes called commission and let us now call them commissionaire.

Normally the white-collared ones secure their commissions more than allowable rates by hiking prices of product and services and the supplier would then send back a portion of what they earned to the purchasers.

The purchasers could be Government Departments like Ministries, or private and public companies and corruptions are rampant in these places.

This is a white collar corruption and if found guilty, the conviction may send one to prison and fined to the amount stipulated by law.

I have not heard of white collar thieves being shot dead when convicted. Even before the conviction it would cost years before the court could decide on their conviction, as one is still innocent until proven guilty.

By engaging good and renowned lawyers these white collar thieves may even not found guilty and can lead a normal life like others in the neighborhood and enjoy the loots with his family.

The white collar thieves sometimes can be a great leader to a nation as the court of Law are unable to find him guilty as the transfer of the corrupt monies are normally done in high manner and the wire transfer would not be easy to trace and leave no trail.

Over and above that these white collar thieves are having strong position that the authority dare not try to do investigation even though his criminal act is an open secret. Even if the police or any other related body are forced to investigate the answer is already predictable…insufficient proof.

The mafias are well and safe while the pariahs will have to serve their sentences.

The quantum for white collar thieves is normally very huge and may be in hundreds of million ringgit, and that is why we can see houses of those corruptors elegantly stand in places like Kensington in London, Perth, Melbourne, Adelaide and many other cities in the world.

White collar thieves normally are social and political climbers. The higher they climb the more they can pinch and steal.

Conversely, the blue-collared thieves are more risky as the nature of thieving is easily monitored by the authority. Botak Chin was shot dead and could not have the time to engage a lawyer. So did Batang Kali.

Once they are caught their wives and families suffer after their death for generations while the white collar thieves have the family guaranteed of easy lives after their death also for generations.

In short, the conviction on white collar thieves is just jail-term while the blue-collared ones would end up dead by bullet shots.

Other common traits for both categories of thieves; once a thief he remains a thief.

Looking through the angle of moral there is no difference between Botak Chin and corrupt leaders of a nation.

But let us come to term that both are thieves and they are a real pests to the community, and let us not disagree about it.


Thanks………………………………………………………Aspan Alias

Petronas : The next "rape" victim?

When can there be an ultimate serenity in Malaysian politics? Can we ever achieve it or just continue on listening to rhetoric and pranks of the deceiving politicians of the day?

Or is there any serious intention in the first place to arrive at a political tranquility by any of the ruling politicians, as many politicians of late survive through political tribulation and misfortune?

There are questionable actions taken by our top leader which outcries the people of late. The appointment of Omar Ong, the so-called young economic savvy in the 4th floor at JPM to the Board of PETRONAS is another issue under serious public watchfulness.

Now, there are rumors circulating that Syed Hamid Albar is going to chair the Board of PETRONAS and if the rumors turns real than there is another flaw that DS Najib commits…and it is an absolute crab.

PETRONAS has never been touched by politician and all the while that petroleum company has been growing up on its own independently under direct supervision of the reigning Prime Minister.

If there is any politician sitting on the Board, we are at risk of facing another round of political misadventure and would be a tough issue to mitigate.

I pray that the rumor is unsubstantiated. It abhors if it is the real finality that had been decided.

What does Tengku Razaleigh (TR), the architect of PETRONAS has to say about this?

If Mahathir interminably gives comments to leaders who succeeded him, TR should come up with opinion on this issue as he is the living founder of PETRONAS which he built for free of charge…no salary. No allowances…no car. No nothing.

TR should come up with his voice upright because he was the one who went through the pains sweat, tears and hell in getting PETRONAS in existence and subsequently becomes one of the giants of the world.

TR is duty bound to tell the people on the endurances that he had to go through in setting up PETRONAS with everyone in the world were going against the forms and the fundamental motives of setting up this National Petroleum Company.

It was purely for the sake of the needful Malaysian and the generation there after and if current leaders are all out to fulfill their personal advantages, the doors are wide ajar for them to leave us.

He (TR) must tell us why politicians were not welcomed to the Board and why the company was totally given to professionals to manage.

This is his inheritance for the people and he must help us to protect this astute organization from going through shambles and muddle.

Tun Razak’s Cabinet gave him (TR) the task to set up our own National Petroleum Company, and TR was given very wide parameter within which he decided on every little thing as to how PETRONAS should be organized.

Malaysian of younger generation do not know all the hind side stories as to why PETRONAS was set up the way we make out today.

The unpatriotic leaders of the day are not able to actualize all the reasoning behind much stuff surrounding PETRONAS existence.

It is obligatory on the part of TR to recount detailed history of PETRONAS; it is for the generation after to understand the significance of its existence that no element of personal greed creeps in it.

We are in defense of the few left for the people and we wish not to see any further sordid, distasteful and squalid decisions by current leaders as we don’t want to bear witness for our leader’s wrong doings any further. We have had enough of it.

I would advocate everyone who has the platform to express views over this matter, and be vigilant of what is there to come for PETRONAS.

Let us put up defense for PETRONAS till the end from encroachment of unreliable persons with mischievous intent.

I hope what we heard; as I have said in a line above is just an unfounded rumor. No one should be blaming us for being so protective of PETRONAS, as that is the only one of the few left for us to have pride and to rest our laurels on…the rest have gone to the backyard.

Lastly may I repeat, I hope it is just an unsubstantiated rumor. I am dreadful if it is real.


Thanks……………………………………………..Aspan Alias

Carelessness of today is suffering of tomorrow

I was with a few friends in Petaling Jaya enjoying supper at about midnight last few days, most of them are of my age (between 55 to 62 years) and when friends of this age group together one of the main topics of discussion would be about health.

“Aspan, how’s your heart, lever and all? Do you have any problem with all or any of those?” one of them asked me. “So far so good, what about you?” I answered him with a question. “I have loads of sugar!” he quipped.

Quite a number of my classmates in school and in campus are no more living due to various health taxing problems; cancer, stroke, heart attacks and many other kinds of diseases.

Coincidently 3 among the 5 whom I invited to meet that night, in some way or another are facing to some extent health problems.

They are encumbered from going out freely at night and have to observe tight dietary program, and the three poor friends just ended in sipping just warm or sterilized water and a small portion of tosay.

I was concerned, and felt so sorry for them and I could see their basic characters changed after contracting these terminal diseases. Apparently their lives are not like what they were before.

As for me I am thankful to our merciful Creator for extending my life with averagely in good state of health but may be a good candidate for diabetics.

“Aspan, make no mistake like us bro. We were not careful and did not really care to live in proper ways for the last 2 or 3 decades. We ate everything that my teeth could chew without bothering what the consequence to that bad habit,” says Ramli (not his real name) seriously.

Apparently he was referring to his ill-eating habits in the younger days. “Since childhood days I took in red meats, crabs, squids, and other foods in category of silent killers in huge amount,” he continued. “Now I am paying hefty bills for the past 6 years for what I have done to myself,” he emphasized. "I now realize that we are what we eat" he moved on.

“Bro, I didn’t take all those in my younger days. Vegetable was my main diet everyday until my age of 19. It was not that I was too disciplined with food, but purely because I couldn’t afford it. I had meat only on Hari Raya days and that were the way poor people in remote areas like us were fed,” I said truth about myself.

The other friend is a cancer patient and still in the early stage and is under radio therapy in one of the government hospitals and the third friend is quite secretive about the disease he has.

That short dialog tells us a lot. It clearly tells us that the disease only surface after a long misjudgment about health and while they were enjoying wealthy food they didn’t realize that terminal diseases are just peeping to hop in us.

Sooner or later they will succeed in invading our body system and consequentially brings hazards to our lives. Subsequently we may have to treat and manage the disease we suffer very expensively and it contributes misery to our lives.

That applies to every specs of life. The most evident is in politics. The carelessness of leaders 20 odd years ago has contributed desolation to current political circumstances.

I vividly remember one of my in-laws said, "All diseases originate from the stomach; your personal health and politics alike. The political situation becomes bad when all its leaders are busy taking care of their stomachs. Not many can be trusted. They actually walk on their stomach". he said.

While they were enjoying the power attested to them, they misused, and abused it to the utmost. Many decisions were made to serve the need of their time without taking into account that the ill consequences will surface in decades to come.

They make decisions on ad-hoc basis, which only served for the need of that material time for personal glory and all the bad consequences now are all in our account.

The weak leaders who succeeded them just care to address the pains but are not able to address the actual disease because they themselves are suffering of the same miserable infection.

As long as the actual disease is not diagnosed and subsequently solved them we are not going to smell happiness and solace anytime soon.

The mistakes of past leaders coupled with the inappropriate leaders of the day, would contribute to dreadful state of lives.

Many may detest and hate me intensely for saying this, but I can’t find nicer way of telling the truth. Maybe others can.

Note: Above is the universal blue symbol for diabetes


Thanks…………………………………………………Aspan Alias.

DS Najib - Hopes & Aspirations - If there's any Final Part

What we do today shapes up the future, and the consequence whether is for the good or for the bad, it will surface in 1 or 2 decades after.

That is why there are many living Malaysians are missing the kind of life which they experienced 25 years ago.

The politics of divide and rule by Mahathir ever since he ascended to the Premiership in 1981 resulted in what we see today.

His pleasure is our anguish, and there are still many who are in denial that they were deceived far wayward to the extent of adoring him like dummy god.

I agree out rightly that Abdullah was too weak a Premier and he never had a material of a Prime Minister, but UMNO was in denial then and blindly accepted Mahathir’s choice to put him in Putrajaya, without knowing Mahathir had his own raison d'être for choosing Abdullah.

UMNO leaders then went all out supporting Abdullah even though many of them came to term that Abdullah being a PM was not at all a good deal for Malaysian.

Abdullah’s popularity was short lived as people found him a misfit for that position and one of those who was openly throwing hard shots at him was Mahathir himself.

I was so eager to know what was inside Mahathir as he was starting the whisperings and commenting negatively on Abdullah and for that purpose we agreed among some friends and various NGOs to organize a forum like, which was chaired by me.

We invited Mahathir to speak on an officially organized forum for everyone to hear why he was too crossed with Abdullah.

Eventually the forum took place at Century Club, Taman Melawati on the 24 June 2006 and Mahathir wasted no time and bashed his protégé to the optimum on the stage.

He touched on only 3 issues: the AP, crooked bridge and the 4th floor boys and of course in deliberating all the 3 issues he never missed mentioning the name of Khairy Jamaluddin.

One of the participants passed me a question to be handed to Mahathir asking why he chose Abdullah to be his successor when large portion of Malaysian have reservation on Abdullah even before he was selected to be the PM. This question was never answered.

But many among the participants were on the opinion that Mahathir wanted Abdullah to succeed him because Abdullah was weak. To him a weak Abdullah would give him the pleasure of having a PM who could turn and curve with him.

But much to his disappointment Abdullah did not give him that concession and that made him so annoyed and crossed with his weak successor.

As for DS Najib, if he works his politics the way Mahathir did, it would bring UMNO and BN to the yard.

He should not say or do anything on personal premise as each an individual leader however small have his followers.

Many people think that the only way for DS Najib to be afloat is to have unity participation within the divisive intra party like what advance countries which adopt democracy in real sense.

I want to quote one of my commentators, flyer168 wrote in my blog. He said “the strongest chain is only as strong as the weakest link”.

A strong government can ultimately goes in disarray if we have weak link with the people at large however weak they are.

The fundamental issue that Najib is facing is the inter-racial problem that makes up the basic pillar of perpetual harmonious living in the country.

To the minds of serious and caring citizen of the soil, no unity means there is no good life in this country.

I have to brave myself saying this, but the fact remains a fact. If the national unity is eroding we must submit that nothing can any leader do, let alone to talk about development of this nation.

For the past decades we have been listening to the pranks of leaders who talk in rhetoric about nation building but cared too little about this very pertinent point which no leader should ignore.

The unity among races went well until mid 80s. Everybody was working hand in hand to achieve the agreeable solution among races, that was to work for 30% Bimiputra equity, and there was no quarrel on inter-racial premise.

The Bumiputra equity went up to 18.2 % in 1984 from 2.7% in 1970. The jump was tremendous and we were quite positive to achieve the target.

But personal politics was above everything as such that this statistics became stagnant and circumvented the effort to achieve the target.

When somebody else came in to take charge of the economy the statistic became so blunted and the reality came to the open just a day before Mahathir stepped down when he gave his parting speech in Parliament.

You and me heard it very clearly that the Buniputra participation was just at 18.6%; meaning that Mahathir and Daim had only succeeded in adding a fractional percentage to the statistics of 0.4 % in almost 20 years.

As I have written in my last posting that the formula of National Unity has not been followed through and like in Mathematics if we don’t follow the formula there will be no right answer to it.

During that important period we were too focused on gigantic projects to show the world that we are having the tallest twin tower and all kind of that sort to impress the world.

To us having those biggest and the longest and the tallest in the world were our ultimate and we forget the development of good and reasonable middle class population.

In all the 11 Scandinavian countries, we don’t see skyscrapers, and we can’t find elaborate physical development of our sort, but these countries have the population of the highest income bracket, many percent higher than even the G7 or G8.

We can’t see tall buildings in these countries like Switzerland, Sweden, and Denmark and around the rest of the Scandinavian countries.

Their leaders develop their country for the sole purpose of enhancing their people’s lives and never in their mind to show off.

Their leaders are not known to the world like ours and let me ask everyone: who is the Prime Minister of Sweden, Norway, Denmark and other members of the Scandinavian Nations?. Bet you less than 10% of Malaysian knows them.

With all these in place right in front of DS Najib, can he emulate that kind of values for us in this beautiful nation?

DS Najib whether he likes it or not he has to be sure that all leaders including himself have no personal encumbering baggage in order to bring this country to greater height.

As long as there are Ministers having proxy companies in hand and are competing in business with the people they rule than let us forget about everything and for God sake no more rhetoric please.

If this important component does not exist, we let nature finds its course and the water finds its own level. I hope I won’t be reprimanded for disposing my true and honest opinion.

Do remember this country is also mine. Let us agree to disagree on some matters.

That is all for me to write on this topic; it may be short but to a person of no consequence like me, I think it covers most of the essentials.


Thanks……………………………………………………………Aspan Alias

DS Najib - Hopes & Aspirations - If there's any Part 2

As I have said in my last posting DS Najib is under watchfulness of every quarter both locally and internationally.

Apart of Malaysia being known by the world community as a fast developing nation, it is also known as a nation with very nice and forgiving people who allow their leaders in the past and present to commit pricey mistakes to the tens of billions of ringgit, by just watching in droopiness and exhaustion.

Malaysia is always in the glare of publicity for every big and tiny happenings, and the whole world know every development that happens here, as we are inimitable in many ways.

Out of 200 odd countries in the world with government and constitutions, we are the only country where her sons of the soil, which is the Malays, are strongly defined by the constitution and we should give warmest gratefulness to our fore fathers for the forwardness in their thinking.

Any attempt to obliterate that part of the constitution has proven fatal in consequence like what happened in May 13 1969, and no one in this country want that dark patch of our history to recur.

As from then, Malaysian learned that life with mutual respect over race, religion and culture as the way of life of every individual race is the only solution for guaranteed harmonious living.

The May 13th’69 incident even though despicable and contemptible, it also had some disguises of blessings for everyone.

Everyone of every race realized that there were some serious outstanding issues among the various races that were not addressed when we achieved independence, which was to find the insulation for interracial tolerances for perpetual harmony.

The National Operation Council (NOC) which was headed by Tun Abd Razak which was formed instantaneously after the dark incidence swiftly brought political leaders representing every major race together with high government implementers and astute personalities to the negotiating table.

After 3 years of tireless deliberation and thoughtfulness on problems in place, the solution was found and there came the New Economic Policy (NEP) which was agreeably formulated with only 1 motive, which was National Unity.

The prescription was well set and like in mathematics if one does not follow the formula there will be no correct answer to it.

To achieve the National Unity, there were few processes to this:-

1) To eradicate poverty irrespective of races
2) To eliminate the process of recognizing a race through their economic activities
3) Narrowing the gap between the haves and the haves not
4) Equitable distribution of wealth among races

We can clearly see that the solutions were pure and sincere as our leaders those days were focused without a breath of personal interest embedded in the resolutions of securing answers to problems.

They resigned to the actuality of needs, only one, that was National Unity as that was the real and actual problems that created animosities among the multi-racial population.

It was only after that discovery, those leaders sat in meetings after meetings to determine the most viable and practical processes of actions towards achieving the National Unity as mentioned earlier.

Apart from determining the manners and modes of achieving the one goal, Rukun Negara was introduced which was forgotten after Hussein Onn’s administration.

Rukun Negara was not given regards at all and big leaders had never appreciated that Rukun Negara was formulated out of blood and tears of the rakyat.

If DS Najib is serious about doing soul-searching, these few important elements of importance to the nation should not be neglected and ignored.

To the minds of many people who are serious in finding solutions, the leaders in place must be having a mind which is uninhabited with personal greed and gains.

Once their mind is distorted with personal greed, gain and vengeance, no decisions made will be proper and fitting in perpetuity and consequentially politics and government will be in jeopardy.

The result of the NEP was seen successful in a very short period. The 3 major races were working hand in hand with deep revere for each other and the implementations of the policy suited well.

The working of NEP was very well underway both in the government and in private sector.

In the private sector there were all out effort by non-Bumiputra and we witnessed speedy Bumiputra participation in the middle and high management level in big and small companies.

At the government level, the Cabinet had strong Cabinet Committees to implement the policy in achieving the target of 30% ownership of the nation’s wealth by the Bumiputra.

Bumiputra then just owned 2.7% of the nation’s wealth inclusive wealth owned by government agencies which were holding in trust for the Bumiputra.

The Cabinet Committee headed by Tengku Razaleigh was splendid in formulating and implementing the policy.

One of the policies that he and the government successfully implemented was the transfer of wealth to the Bumiputra and the committee chose to distribute the wealth through the concept of unit trust.

And that was nor easy to implement. As a tiny unit of the team, I was with many others before that to give ceramahs to each and individual JKKK to exercise massive elucidation to the people and getting feedbacks and studying the pulse of them as to their acceptance of the project.

We wanted to see no mistakes in the implementations, as this exercise touched the nerve and breath of the rakyat.

The Implementation and Co-ordination Unit (ICU) in the Prime Minister Department was very pushy to see that this exercise be implemented with zero umbrage from the people.

Part of the Trust Deeds was amended to allow these units to be sold to the Bumiputra in the denomination of RM10 instead of minimum of RM1000 to make every Bumiputra could participate in the exercise.

It was finally launched on the 1st day of June 1981 and the response was massive.

I am proud that I played a very tiny role in this successful exercise and the pulse of self satisfaction was felt at the highest when I saw Bumiputra grinning and smiling 6 months after earning 20% dividend within 6 months on the skim.

As an UMNO Divisional Committee member in Kuala Pilah I was requested to help around the General Election in the following year.

I went around to few places and I was too happy to see the same JKKK committee members and various NGO’s at the places I visited working hand in hand with me as they have been together with me for 2 years in preparation for the successful Sekim ASN.

This time around they rallied behind me working for the success of BN in the first General Election which Mahathir led in 1982 which BN won with landslide victory.

I am writing all these not just for the sake of writing, or to be an impressionist as one of the commentators put me or as another one put as nak tunjuk terror or anything of sorts.

My reason was to emphasize upon the current leadership that getting the rakyat involved in anything that the government wants to do is the utmost important ingredient of rallying support for the government. That is all.

DS Najib should take this as part of recipe for his administration, but he can only do it if he does it without having to pact in the personal interests of his cronies and acquaintances.

His acquaintances should be the rakyat and not the few who are experts in amusing him. Administration after Hussein Onn had been ignoring this point which they think they didn’t.

For instance the rakyat became very suspicious when the agreement between the concessionaires of the North South Highway and other highways and motorways with the government are put under Official Secret Act (OSA).

Why must it be put in under OSA? The suspicions of the people are unsurprising.

There is an automatic imaginary answer to the question in place: there are dubious deals pacts with the project and some are making unnecessary wealth at the expense of the highway users and the rakyat as a whole…and don’t blame the people for putting their back on to the government.

Honestly to-date, we are still waiting for a new facet of image from the new administration, as there is still no indication of serious changes taking its place.

If there is any, many people on the ground have the feel that he has to concede a lot to the demand of what we meagerly have to others in order to be up there.

If that is real, then he is weak. I hope he would find the striking balance and use the formula of pre-Mahathir which had worked well. I am sure everyone thinks that the propensity of we losing in the next General Election is more than winning it.

Okay, I guess that is all for now, and I shall prepare for my last posting on this topic in just days to come.


Thanks………………………………………………………………Aspan Alias

DS Najib - Hopes & Aspirations - If there's any Part 1

Managing a beautiful nation like ours is not as easy as ABC, and DS Najib is certainly the man the nation and the world are focusing on with full watchfulness.

A leader cannot be called a leader by just being able to provide scholarships to the poor students or just by supplying electricity and water supply to the remote areas, the issue which is popular to the campaigners in any election.

We are still not considered to be leaders just by building infrastructures, first class motorways, high and impressive skyscrapers, high class Mariners, International Tournament standard Golf Courses, having lists of International Convention Centers and witnessing rows and lines of Rolls Royce and Daimlers running through our highways and city centers.

History has proven to us that many great governments and nations went into oblivion, like the Ottoman Empire and numerous other kingdoms and nations do not even inherit their remnants of their existence and we only find them in history books.

These are the points that many sons of the soil are worried as the conduct of leaders of today will determine the future fate of the nation and more so about our race.

Don’t take things for granted, as many races in history, has lost their existence because of poor leadership and spiky attitude and values of live.

The Red Indians is disposed as an ugly creature in cowboy films; exceedingly unintelligent, dim, obtuse and brainless being. They were the legitimate indigenous race of North America but because of their loose character of their leaders and the people made them look what they are today.

Being Malay I am personally worried, that my race will be in oblivion in this world like the Red Indians and the indigenous in Australia.

The race has come to a point where nobody recognizes and being looked as a parasite to the modern race and society of migrant in origin.

In United States the migrant are truly in power to the extent of controlling both the hemispheres politically and more so economically.

The trend seem so obviously looming and intimidating in our country and the indigenous Malay and Bumiputras, especially the leaders are becoming to be items of trade by businessmen and big taukehs and profiteeriees.

Once political leaders are in deep love with big businessmen nothing can go right anymore and we only have to wait for one thing, i.e. a total caving-in of our political and governing system.

From that very moment no leader big or small can ever make proper and fitting decision for the country anymore.

To my mind, UMNO which was formed to be a nationalist party has gone way ward as an exclusive party for the few so-called astute beneficiaries with massive number of membership. The millions of ordinary members are made-believed that they are up there for Malay struggles.

Whoever takes the mantle, he would first come out with imposing and inspiring slogans some which we can still remember; ‘Bersih, Cekap dan Amanah’, ‘Don’t work for me, just work with me’ and the newly talked about ‘1Malaysia’ which DS Najib professes.

In the end as I have said once, there were no Bersih, no Cekap and no Amanah. For the other slogan, people just couldn’t work with him as he didn’t have sufficient work to do.

The ordinary members are slowly beginning to believe that they are deceived by their leaders and no one should blame them as they are just as human as their leaders with differences in thinking and perceptions.

The difficulties DS Najib is going to face are not at all small with 1Malaysia slogan that he designed.

BN has not been careful enough to maintain the affable and splendid inter-racial interaction created by the New Economic Policy (NEP) as the leaders since 2 decades ago were more focused on physical development less other important ingredients of nation building with 1 ultimate that is National Unity.

The past 2 administrations have totally ignored this important issue that currently in place. We only start discussing about the issue when everything is already decrypted, and left with thin insulation to maintain racial harmony.

Rukun Negara for instance is history as no one talks about it anywhere anymore, but one must remember that is the best ever result of years of soul searching by our fore fathers we never care to give regards to.

I still say that the dismantling of NEP prematurely was the sure cause of what is happening today and we can’t listen to the persons who ignored this issue to do the corrective exercise if there is one.

We truly hope DS Najib would manage the nation by consultation and reduce intra-party move within UMNO as that would derail the effort to arrive at the point which we used to rejoice immensely.

DS Najib’s effort for amicable solutions is highly expected and he has to work double the effort than his effort to be the Prime Minister.

I shall continue this article, maybe late on the weekend.


Thanks……………………………………………………………..Aspan Alias.

Mohammad Nizar is the MB; BN vs Rakyat

The High Court finally decided Mohammad Nizar Jamaluddin as the legally legitimate Menteri Besar of Perak and for those having legal knowledge and with no political inhabitant in their mind welcomes the decision.

In the first place please remember that the rakyat had not given the BN to rule the state, however little the margin is and anyone shouldn’t have brought in the court to interfere in the legislature.

Zambry Kader, even though is allowed to appeal, it is morally unbecoming to do so as the rakyat has the final judgement.

It is not about who has the legal right to be the MB but it is the government which rakyat has the sole right to decide when political might of the Federal leaders has made the state to be in shuffle.

Morally whoever in the Federal, responsible for the attempt to topple the government of the rakyat should step down as we should give all regards to the moral of democratic system.

Mohammad Nizar has promised to advise HRH the Sultan to dissolve the State Assembly, if consented, to let the rakyat choose a government they want in a fresh State election.

If this is what is going to happen, Mohammad Nizar is going to have massive ground support as he has been perceived as the victim of wicked politicking of somebody with strong power in Kuala Lumpur.

Mohammad Nizar will definitely bring in the masses to support him against what the public perception as the BN agitation has made the State in serious adversities…and subsequently the mood on the ground will be a contest between the rakyat and the BN.

BN’s misadventure in Ipoh is the priciest lesson that we have witnessed with our naked eyes for a long while.

Anything less than the dissolving the Assembly, and calling for fresh State Election will not bring in political stability to the state.

The rakyat has the final say and I hope nobody with politically perverted mind should deny this crude fact. BN should have built up some pride and accept accountability for the fiasco.

Remember that the Sultan decision to replace Mohammad Nizar has not been followed through by vote of no confidence and Tuanku should not be blamed for all those.

Tuanku has done what he has to do that’s it. DS Najib should now come out with restful statement as he has to face the people soon after the dissolution of the Assembly.

He does not only face the rakyat of Perak but he has to face the whole Malaysian within the Federation as his disposition has to be magnanimous.

There is another point to ponder; is BN prepared to face the people with clear conscience? Is BN going to have some apprehension like it has for the Penanti by-election?

If there is a fresh State Election, the result is already predictable. The feelings of voters in Perak have been totally mutilated by the unfriendly and robust attempt of BN to gain power.

So to pen off I just want to ask a very simple question; can BN pull down bantings and banners which display ‘Rakyat vs BN’ or of that sort when the state election comes by? The answer is predictable isn’t it?


Thanks…………………………………………………………Aspan Alias.

Mahathir the happiest man Final Part

This will be my final part of ‘Mahathir the happiest man’. I chose this as a topic for a very simple reason: Mahathir has fascinating political existence and has always got what he wants until today.

He succeeded exceedingly in fulfilling his quench to be the longest reigning Prime Minister of Malaysia and he served the nation for 22 years, his personal success which will never be a broken record at least for the next 1 or 2 centuries.

His name is on the same and similar line with the longest serving leaders of the world in history.

Among others are Nicolae Ceausescu of Romania, Josip Broz Tito of Yugoslavia, Haile Salassie (pictured) the last Emperor of Ethopia, Fidel Castro of Cuba, Ferdinand Marcos of Phillipines, Suharto of Indonesia and many others which I am not able to list down.

There are a number of negative consequential outcomes to the nation with long reigning leaders like what were experienced by the countries that I have just mentioned.

Romania has almost lost her existence in the global map as a nation with strong consequence as she used to be.

In 1989, Romanian became so divided and the blame went to Ceausescu for overstaying and there were too wide a vacuum in his leadership, and in the same year he died after a military court convicted him and he was shot in front of the naked eyes of the public.

Ten years after the death of President Tito in 1991, Yugoslavia was a dismantled nation geographically and the divide was very clean cut along the ethnic and religious contour.

No leader after Tito was able to contain the country as a united nation because of the vacuum was apparent because of longevity of his cling to power (1939-1980).

Haile Salassie, the self-proclaimed Emperor, who ruled Ethiopia since 1930 until he was arrested in 1974 in a military coup and died while in detention. He died in 1975 and his remains were found 1992 beneath the toilet in the Imperial Palace in Addis Ababa.

Haile Salassie too inherited a very unstable government, also was due to large vacuum in Ethiopia’s political leadership and everyone can see by oneself how Ethiopia is right now.

Indonesia went through rough times when Suharto resigned after 30 years at the helm of power with the flavor of dictatorship and it cost the nation about 15 years to recover its political stability after almost total democracy is practiced at last.

Malaysia had Mahathir who sat on the chair of Premiership for 22 years, far too long for Malaysian.

Mahathir had enjoyed first few years as the PM as he managed to erase the image of his ultra-Malay, the brand that made him well received by the Malays especially the ones in UMNO.

While trying tirelessly to get the support from the non-Malays, there were already a few of the Malay leaders who are not too comfortable with his style of management of politics.

Bear in mind that at that material time the Malays were just about to rise economically and everyone then witnessed the rise in Malay middle class and Malay participation, in the high and middle management of companies as envisaged by New Economic Policy (DEB) by his predecessors.

Mahathir was in a rush to see the nation grow and he had too little patience, to the extent of going against the well thought-of decisions made by the previous cabinet.

For instance, the cabinet before his, in which he was a member, had decided not to allow any state government or any other government agency to launch or set up Unit Trust as all focus should be concentrated on Amanah Saham Nasional in the process of distributing wealth to the Bumiputras.

The only other Manager for Unit Trust for the Bumiputra that was allowed in operation was Amanah Saham MARA Bhd which managed a number of skim called Tabung Kumpulan Modal Bumiputra (TKMB). We must remember that he was the Cabinet Committee for Yayasan Pelaburan Bumiputra.

He did not revere the Cabinet decision which he was a member and he reversed the whole decision when he became the PM.

He allowed States Government like Selangor, Johor, Sarawak, Trengganu as well as Wanita UMNO with the launching of Amanah Saham Wanita (ASNITA) and true enough all went bust and small Malay investors went kaput to total of billions of ringgit.

Mahathir did not respect the decision of the previous cabinet; just like Abdullah did not respect Mahathir’s Cabinet decision on the crooked bridge or the scenic bridge or whatever we call it.

In actuality no one leader wants to be a dictator or to rule with iron fist. Like many others, Mahathir wanted to be a democrat and to go through populist line.

By going through populist line, one has to face the fact that it won’t last long, before normally he or she has to withdraw.

Hussein Onn just did that…he announced that he did not want to preserve his position as President of the party in 1981 General Assembly in 1978 when he was contested by Suleiman Palestin.

Mahathir wanted to wield and stretch his hegemony over the Malay mind in UMNO by introducing unprecedented rules in his party. Quota system in nomination for various positions in the party which he wants to do away with now was introduced by him when he was in power.

To him he is the only one who has the right to be powerful and for that reason I, to some extent agree to the view of many that he has a hardrock migrant mentality. To him he must have the absolute power and with absolute immunity.

Mahathir did not take any pain to assess personalities of whom he was to bring in the Cabinet as his main criteria was a total support: don’t complain or give opinions which were in dissimilarity to his…in other words he just took in the yes man’.

It was his Cabinet that was lined up with half past six personalities without the feel for the people.

He had no qualms to see Malay culture and values swiftly diminishing and he did not care about all Malay institutions are breaking down.

He enjoyed seeing everyone whom he divided to rule is amusing him, hence without realizing that he was treated like an Emperor by the parasites surrounding him.

It was during his time that UMNO starts to become like an exclusive club which was and still is the sanctuary for the rich and the famous.

He himself is the only ex-premier travelling locally and internationally in executive jet, the Global Express and nobody dares to talk about it.

In his final year of his Premiership, Mahathir travelled extensively to the tune almost every month. He throttled the world of which the biggest Kings and Emperors of the world never did, and nice Malaysian was happy to pay the bills.

There were lots of unhappy faces but they were not courageous enough to express as he had the support of benefiting personalities around him.

I should pen off at this point. To write about the tales of Mahathir will take days and weeks to end.

This last series of ‘Mahathir the happiest man’ is just to remind anyone reading it; that Tunku Abdul Rahman was actually not the happiest PM as Mahathir used to brand him; He (Mahathir) is the one who is entitled to the brand.

To be fair to him Mahathir deserved good credits for developing the nation’s modernization programs, but along the process he dismantled people’s unity with his serious divide and rule politics.

We only succeeded in seeing colossal structural development, but along those developments we now inherit divisive Malaysian with total obliteration of Institutions like the Judiciary, the Police, the Royal Institution and all other valuable values of lives.

We are all lost in the woods, without knowing where to find exit flap for a pleasant life which we used to enjoy.

I pray that we can recover politically like Indonesia and many other countries which had the matching experiences like us here in Malaysia.

Even though I have doubts about DS Najib, I pray that he can bring changes for a better Malaysia.

I admit and submit that God always works mysteriously.


Thanks……………………………………………………Aspan Alias

Mahathir the happiest man Part 6

The New UMNO was formed in February 1988 and Mahathir was member no 1 while Kak Hasmah was member no 2 and followed by Ghaffar, Anwar, Najib, Abdullah and the rest of the first group of the protem committee at the Federal Level.

Crudely speaking the New UMNO is much younger than my youngest son.

It simply means that a large number of old UMNO members were listed in the New UMNO and there were massive crossovers from the dead UMNO to the newly-registered party, which used the household name, UMNO.

So it would not be fair at all to call Datuk Ibrahim Ali a frog as most of the current leaders of UMNO and its members are nothing more and nothing less frogs themselves…and the chief of all frogs is none other than Mahathir.

Many were shock in disbelief and couldn’t comprehend that Mahathir did not used the Societies Act 1965 section 70 to give life again to the original UMNO if he really meant what he preached.

Meanwhile our losing group was not losing hope and we went to the Supreme Court arbitration and hope to get the old UMNO revived.

We knew anything less than reviving the old UMNO will bring a big split among the Malays as they have lost their premise for their struggles.

As this issue was really very significant in nature, especially for the Malay's struggles and for every Malaysian, Tun Salleh, the Lord President then decided to get all the 9 Supreme Court Judges to preside on the case and this made Mahathir and group’s mind in disorder.

By any legal calculation, UMNO were to be revived through the Supreme Court and Mahathir were prepared to do anything as long as the original UMNO continue to be in demise, as this UMNO would encumber his desire to stay in power.

“Killing the old UMNO is as good as killing the nerves of the Malays,” shouted the late Cik Gu Kahar the UMNO chief of Muar in one of his speeches.

“Saya tidak akan menyertai parti yang dipunyai secara peribadi oleh Mahathir. UMNO yang Mahathir wujudkan ini adalah atas perpecahan Melayu sedangkan UMNO asal ditubuhkan berdasarkan kepada penyatuan Melayu yang mewakili berbagai-bagai pertubuhan,” he said in enrage.

Cik Gu Kahar and many others died not as an UMNO member, together with other great sons of the soil like Tunku Abdul Rahman and Hussein Onn.

Mahathir was not happy with Tun Salleh for deciding to get all the 9 Supreme Court Judges on the bench; he wanted to teach the Head of Judiciary how to do his job and this was the beginning of encroachment and invasion of the Judiciary by the Executive.

Lord President was called and was politely told to only have 3 on the bench, the Judges preferred by Mahathir. Pressing for the resignation of Tun Salleh was not possible as he could only be ousted by his brother Judges.

The only alternative Mahathir had been to advise the King to set up a Tribunal to sack the innocent Lord President.

Mahathir went all out to find slip-ups in Tun Salleh to be expediently used to expel him before the Supreme Court preside on the appeal by some UMNO members to revive the party.

Mahathir was prepared to do anything, as long as the old UMNO is not revived; even to the extent of putting the Judiciary on trial.

The revival of the old UMNO risked him the position as the PM. He knew he was at the lowest ebb of support and he needed to bring everybody to a new party which he could control.

The Tribunal was set up in haste and finally it was set up on the first of May 1988, and today is the exact day of the setting up of the said Tribunal; the Labor Day and a Public holiday and worsts of it all it was on a Sunday.

A thinking person with a bit of grey matter can conclusively deduce who Mahathir was then by looking at the date and the day the Tribunal was set up.

To cut this part of the story short, Tun Salleh was unceremoniously sacked as the Lord President and the move by majority of UMNO members was stopped. Besides Tun Salleh, 5 other Supreme Court Judges became the victim.

Meanwhile Mahathir was busy organizing his new party and big names that he detested like The Tunku, Tun Hussein Onn and Tengku Razaleigh were sidelined and they were barred from joining the party.

Tunku Abdul Rahman then advised and requested TR to set a temporary party in order to cordon this unhappy group from joining the opposition parties and that was how Semangat 46 came into being in the hope that they would be united again when the political temperature came back to normal.

Semangat 46 was just an alternative name for the old UMNO as the constitutions of the party was 100 percent the constitution of the deregistered party by comas and full stop.

We were not allowed to use UMNO as the name of the party as that name was taken away by the new party that Mahathir had just formed.

Using Semangat 46, TR and the group went to Parliament to get the old UMNO to revive but it was instantaneously rejected by the House as we didn’t have the numbers.

Semangat 46 never relented in the effort to get old UMNO to be revived as that was the only party that could unite the members to continue the struggles for the Malays.

After failing the efforts through the court and Parliament, Semangat 46 then went to the people through the General Election in 1990.

Semangat 46 in its manifesto promised to revive the old UMNO if the people were to give them mandate, but the media went all out against the party as they were already under the grip of Mahathir.

We, in Semangat 46 were not able to secure sympathy from the unprofessional mainstream media; instead were unfeelingly bashed by them almost every moment.

The election result went to the favor of BN/the new UMNO and Mahathir had the grip of the situation but the split did not go away.

The slogan ‘Bersih, Cekap, Amanah’ remained a slogan. There was no Bersih, no Cekap and no Amanah in the government.

Mahathir hard hit criticisms on Abdullah’s administration as corrupt was fair but the corrupt practices at this length could not have been developed within 5 years of Abdullah’s administration.

Corruption to this extent must have been developed in at least 2 decades and Mahathir should also take accountability for this unhealthy and heinous practices.

What Abdullah failed miserably was to combat the massive corrupt practices that he inherited from Mahathir’s administration.

Mahathir meanwhile was on the alert at all time to find anything that may lie on in way that might be of hindrance to him politically.

To him politics is mighty, and to much extent he made believed that everybody was not above law except UMNO with him as the leader.

He had another encumbrance which was not finished, that was the Malay Ruler; which he had earlier in 1983 initiated to curtail their power in a small Constitutional Crisis.

However, the height of the Constitutional Crisis at last came in 1993; and it started when Tengku Majid of Johore hit one of the hockey coaches whom I have forgotten his name.

This occurrence came by as an expedient device for Mahathir to go for another round of war against the rulers.

Oh yes, I have isolated comments against me and 1 of them said that I was writing shit. But he did not elaborate which part of my writing is shit.

What I wrote were all in the mainstream media when the incidences happened and I am merely reminding everyone as it is important for one to know the truth.

The shenanigans of Mahathir in Malaysian politics are not small. Bear in mind that the current adversities in Malaysian political ambience originated from his administration.

I shall try to elaborate the issue probably in the next 1 or 2 postings after this.


Thanks………………………………………………………Aspan Alias