Cabinet Blinded Jawi's Peeping Toms, but ...

I am going to give credit where credit is due, and I take my hat off to Prime Minister Ahmad Abdullah Badawi for his decision to slam-dunk the so-called religious snoopers or Jawi peeping Toms.

Syabas (well done!), PM!

The PM led the Cabinet into ordering the Federal Territory Religious Department to cease and desist with its plans to have snoop teams peeping on Muslims. Their proposed action of peeping, prying and poking would be an invasion of privacy.

He further stated that it would be Cabinet's official policy to deny any such proposals in the future or in any State, considering the Cabinet had already told Mohd Ali Rustam, Malacca's Chief Minister, to bugger off with a similar proposal last year. The Cabinet (unanimous?) was determined that no group would ever be permitted to spy on people on so-called religious moral grounds.

Radzi Sheikh Ahmad, the Minister in the Prime Minister’s Department revealed that the Cabinet ministers have been pissed off with the nerve of some clown(s) in forming such a sneaky, shameless, sinister, scungy, snooping squad right under their noses. Then, he sneaked in a credit for Abdul Kadir Sheikh Fadzir for raising the matter at the Cabinet meeting. I thought Minister Nazri Aziz was the first to raise the alarm, though not necessarily in the Cabinet.

OK, KTemoc smells something going on, like a wayang kulit (shadow play) in Radzi's statements, because Radzi followed up with a comment that another minister in the Prime Minister’s Department - how many are there? - Dr Abdullah Zin, supposedly the bloke oversighting all matters Islamic including the notorious Jawi, was unfortunately absent, and thus wasn’t there to catch the bloody flak. I am just putting my own KTemoc-ish words to describe what the Star Online and al Jazeera reported.

Radzi said it’s nothing more than a blooming lame excuse for Jawi to suggest such a group could assist in disaster (in fact they would be the disaster!) or provide other assistance. I would suggest to Radzi to use the expression ‘What a crock of shit!’ rather than ‘lame excuse’. It’s more precise, forceful and effective.

But to KTemoc, it sounded like an UMNO internal manoeuvre already in execution. I detect the advertisement of ‘hey, this bloke is good, that bloke is not good, blah blah blah!’ in Minister Radzi’s briefing.

One would imagine by now that the Imam group of UMNO (Minister Dr Abdullah Zin?) has lost this round. But hang on a ding dong minute ........

Oh oh oh! it seems not so, yet! Jawi has come back defiantly, yes DEFIANTLY, against a Cabinet instruction for it to disband the snooping peeping Toms.

Jawi said it still intends to go ahead with its snoop squad, notwithstanding the Cabinet's decision. Jawi public relations officer Idris Hussein said it had not enjoyed the opportunity to explain to the Government its intention for the snoop squad formation, so presumably the Cabinet order doesn't count. It will proceed with its original intention. Wow!

It defiantly said that it will wait for its own Minister, Dr Abdullah Zin to return from Mecca to brief him on the matter. Presumably Jawi would only take instructions from Dr Zin.

Looks like the mullahs don’t comprehend that insofar as government bureaucracies go in a democracy, the Cabinet is the highest policy making body in the nation. But then, one must excuse them for not appreciating this democratic concept of government where a Cabinet decision must be obeyed by all government bureaucracies including and especially Jawi.

One must understand they may not even realise that their Minister Dr Zin is subordinated to the Cabinet decision, and that he is not an independent all powerful religious policy-making personality.

Jawi's defiant stand against a Cabinet instruction does provide us with a frightening glimpse of a mindset that hinted they would only obey the decision of a theocratic government where the highest mullah determines what ought to be done or not done, and not some bloody blokes, even if they are the democratically elected ministers of the Cabinet, or even the Prime Minister.

Hey, these guys may even believe that because Islamic affairs are so sensitive a subject, the Cabinet may be apprehensive about reprimanding them for their dismissive snub of a Cabinet policy instruction.

I really want to see how the PM will handle this MUTINOUS defiance.