Monday, May 30, 2016

Absolute power corrupts absolutely

FMT - PAS: Bill intends to enhance shariah courts


KOTA BHARU: PAS Vice-President Mohd Amar Nik Abdullah said today the Shariah Courts (Criminal Jurisdiction) (Amendment) Bill 2016 proposes to enhance the powers of the shariah courts.

He said those who spoke out against or criticised the Bill did not understand why it was tabled in the Dewan Rakyat.

He also said that the Bill only involved Muslims.

“We brought the Bill to enhance the powers of the shariah courts so that they can impose heavier penalties for offences.”

He said these courts could now only impose jail sentences of up to three years, a fine of RM5,000 and six strokes of the cane.


I wonder why PAS and people of their ulama ilk love, lust and salivate to punish others as heavily as possible?

recall when sweetie Kartika Sari Dewi Shukarnor was given 6 strokes of the rotan for yamsenging, the Islamic officers made a great show of demonstrating how light the caning would be, and the limiting extent to which the caning officer was permitted to raise the cane, and that the caning punishment was only symbolic, more about humiliating the offender so to make her/him repent rather than inflicting pain per se.



If that was the case, why then is there now a need to increase the hudud-ized flogging to as much as 100 lashes? And do you expect me to believe there won't be any pain involved?

If the aim is to shame the offender so as to make him/her repent, won't 6 strokes be as good (even better) than 100 lashes?

The underlying factor seems to be to punish, punish and punish as kau kau as possible.

We also know punishment usually follows prohibition and persecution (not prosecution), all on the say-so of the ulama, eg. reading the Quran must be in its original Arabic script, and that there will be greater merit for a Muslim in doing so than to understand what the Quran tells them to do so in any translation (into, say, Malay) of those script.

Really, is that what Allah swt wants of His human creations? To just read His divine teachings in Arabic even if the reader doesn't understand what He wants of the reader?

Did Allah swt say this? Who then said that?

Hundreds of years back, the Catholic Church used to do the same in Latin, thus preventing (deliberately or unbwittingly) ordinary Europeans and Latin Americans and other Catholics around the world from understanding the meaning of the biblical scriptures. Thus the priests were the sole link between their almighty and the ordinary people, by default holding and wielding enormous powers over the proletariat because of the latter's ignorance.

Quite frankly, I have never heard of any theocratic state which was tolerant, balanced or compassionate, not even in medieval theocratic (Buddhist) Tibet.

Invariably, lowly educated or/and young clerics or religious enforcement officers, given almost unrestrained powers, would sense an uncontrollable compulsion to prohibit, persecute (as mentioned, not prosecute, though that'd come subsequently), and punish - if anything, just to show their powers, and to invoke fears which they possibly mistake for respect.

That's right - punish punish and punish kau kau with enhanced powers given to syariah court officers until their victims quaked in holy terror, as was the case of the Qatif girl in Saudi Arabia.



She was a Shiite rape victim in Sunni Saudi Arabia. She was sentenced to 200 lashes of flogging after she was raped by 7 Sunni men, and when she wanted to appeal against her sentence, she was warned or threatened that her flogging would be increased if she did so.

That was the syariah court of Saudi Arabia.




The propensity for religious officers to bully bully bully was amply demonstrated in the infamous Zouk nightclub raid by JAWI officers, where and when we witnessed how supposedly trained JAWI religious officers behaved like savage predators.

Another cruel example was the arrogant kiasu mentality of JAWI. Its victim was another sweetie. Seems those religious officers like to bully women, sweeties like Nik Raina, Aisyah Tajuddin and as mentioned Kartika Sari Dewi Shukarnor.

I wonder whether you remember the JAIS Gombak lechery case in 2006 - we read in NST about the lustful leery lascivious behaviour of a JAIS officer who caught an unfortunate woman for khalwat.

The poor sweetie had gone to JAIS office in Gombak the day after her embarrassing encounter with JAIS, in a vain hope to 'settle' the case amicably. However, she claimed she got more than she bargained for.

She was molested and forced to perform oral sex on said JAIS officer as an inducement to let her off the hook. She also alleged the officer used criminal force to outrage her modesty by caressing her breasts and kissing her on the lips.

I wonder whether that binatang, a total disgrace to the good name of Islam, was ever charged in court?



Nik Raina

The persecution (not just prosecution) of Nik Raina is probably the worst case of misusing the name of religion to intimidate a woman. JAWI obviously wanted to punish her as manager of Borders KL for selling banned books even though JAWI's prohibition on those books was issued only 6 days after they had raided Borders and charged her.

Thus who the fuck knew the books were banned, certainly not sweetie. Maybe they had expected sweetie to see into the future, using Raja Bomoh's twin-kelapa crystal ball.




But both the civil and syariah court had the sense to dismiss the charges against her, though I questioned the syariah court's dismissal as 'qualified' that it did not amount to an acquittal, despite and in spite of the sequence of events which led to the stupid charge was evidently clear she was totally innocent.

Wait, there's more. FMT reported on another sin of the syariah court prosecutor, in personally serving notice of appeal directly to her in what was seen as a further act of intimidation.

Nik Raina, 38, broke down and wept in her office after she received the notice of appeal, which had been served on her instead of through her lawyer.

Her boss, Yau Su Peng, was quoted as saying: “I can’t help but wonder if that action was meant to further intimidate Nik Raina. She is understandably upset over this.”

Their aim seems to be to intimidate her even if that required breach of legal procedures - such was their arrogance. They didn't seem to care about the law unless the law allowed them to bully their targeted victims.

Yes, the aim would seem to be that, frightened the sh*t out of women, hopefully punished them to terrify the rest of the public into obeying, complying and stuff far worse, and not about legal justice which had already ruled Nik Raina was innocent.

Some people just cannot handle power, and as I have just mentioned, would feel an overriding compulsive and sometimes addictive need to exercise that power.

And as mentioned above, that’s exactly what occurred at the Zouk nightclub, where a religious departmental campaign to curb or stop un-Islamic, un-Malaysian behaviour, or that viewed as offensive to Asian values, degenerated into a disgraceful un-Islamic show of unfettered power and oppressive dominance by empowered officials.

Instead of counselling those young (and supposedly) social degenerates, the JAWI officials showed themselves to be degenerates when they arrogantly and lustfully exploited their position of religious power to humiliate and terrorize the victims.




Those co-called moral police immorally forced the young sweeties caught in the nightclub to urinate right in the open in front of their hot, hungry, lustful and ogling eyes.

Their barbaric bad binatang behaviour is guaranteed to happen again because the system provides near unbridled power to officials who lack knowledge in depth, and intellectual capacity or good moral character to handle such authority. Abuses are likely to occur when power is not moderated by knowledgeable, high moral behaviour and scrupulous responsibility.

The common denominator is the unauthorized and uncontrolled exercise of power by those in authority on their unfortunate victims, namely, the power to dominate the victims, to make them do what the authority so desires, sometimes to stretch the exercise of power as far as the oppressors' imagination permits.

In such an innocent matter as unisex hairdressing in Kota Bharu, and tentative attempts to curb Chinese koe-tai shows in Kedah, non-Muslims have already felt the adverse impact of Islamic rules, so what can we anticipate or forecast will be the case of the more punishing hudud for non-Muslims?

We now have to ask this question because it's evident from the Kota Bharu incident that we non-Muslims can no longer believe in PAS assurance the implementation of hudud won't affect non-Muslims.

When mortals lay claim to divine-sourced power, they become as what the old saying goes: Power corrupts, absolute power corrupts absolutely, and divined-source power is absolute power. 


Sunday, May 29, 2016

Azmin Ali still under Anwar's shadow

Malaysiakini - Does Azmin have vision to unite Pakatan folk?


Comments by MKINI's readers (just extracts):

ZhuGeLiang: A good leader must be able to unite the party and put all differences aside to fight for a common goal - win the next general election (GE).

Not Azmin Ali, though. Based on his records, I find him to be divisive and is only interested in pursuing his own agendas.

My view is that he will destroy the opposition if he remains in charge. Ironically, despite all the criticisms, PM Najib Abdul Razak is a much better leader than Azmin as Umno is firmly behind him.

I don't see much hope for the opposition in the next GE. Instead of helping Pakatan Harapan, Azmin is causing a lot of damage to DAP with his continuous association with PAS.

Don't Worry Be Happy: To step into Anwar's shoe, Azmin still has a lot of miles to fly and most importantly, needs to have his head 'transplanted' with an angelic brain.

Sorry Azmin, you are simply not ready and unsuitable.

The Analyser: The question should really be - can Azmin's philosophy replace Anwar's philosophy? And the answer is highly unlikely because Azmin has no philosophy nor apparently does PKR.

One could even say that Anwar's philosophy was not too wonderful, but to replace it with nothing is worse.

Azmin might well be aggressive and highly ambitious, but is that what Malaysia needs in a leader?

I would rather have a man who left his hormones at home and able to show some sort of insight into the problems of Malaysia, how to solve them and with some vision for the future.

Azmin's time in Selangor has hardly been a bright light in the Malaysian political scene.

Then over at M2Day, there was a completely different article (to above comments) by Umar Mukhtar who dismissed UMNO, PAS, DAP as jokes and wrote that PKR is the sole party to rescue future Malaysians. It was not a bad article in its entirety (the parts on UMNO, PAS and DAP) but I have enormous reservations, nay, total disagreement on his take on PKR and Azmin.

Now, especially with Azmin as its current de facto head (PKR loves de factos, wakakaka) I believe Umar Mukhtar's assertions on Azmin and PKR would have to be deemed as humongous jokes, for a start.

Then Umar wrote: "This is because PKR is a party of the future Malaysia. That was why it was founded. Not because of Anwar was being persecuted by a megalomaniac, it was just sequential to it. Anwar later hijacked it as his personal political vehicle" is patently incorrect, very very incorrect.

The raison d'etre of PKR or of its predecessor KeADILan has always been the freeing of Anwar Ibrahim from incarceration, full stop.

But I grant that many in the party including Anwar himself (only after he was freed by AAB) picked up the idea of an alternative coalition to get Anwar into the PM's seat without involving UMNO (ie. without Anwar getting back into the leadership echelon of UMNO), but this alternative conception arose very much later, indeed much much later after the formation of the party.

But nonetheless, PKR or KeADILan had in its start been a single-purpose party, namely, to free Anwar from jail.

Azmin's lack of vision and lack of big-picture leadership have been why the party is now floundering the moment Anwar has been incarcerated, and this time virtually-totally out of action for Anwar in the last effective phase of his political career.

Alas, Azmin just doesn't have the big-picture vision to be the leader, one as a future potential PM.

Azmin may be the consummate cunning crafty politician willing to sleep with enemies to get his political aims achieved but he has a weakness, a humongous fatal one.

Azmin is unlike Anwar who keeps a steady eye on the big picture of becoming PM regardless of whether it's DAP, PAS or PKR which provides the main thrust for his elevation into the high seat in Putrajaya. Anwar wouldn't care whether, as a hypothetical example, DAP won 70 seats to PAS's 30 and PKR's 13 to put him into Putrajaya.

But Azmin lacks that vision and graciousness of his former mentor and leader, wanting not only to be PM but also (and this is precisely his fatal weakness which put him at odds with DAP, PAS, Amanah, SNAP, whoever) to be head of the largest component party, namely PKR, in whatever coalition he will be part of.

Hence we witnessed his habits of preemptively seizing seats from his supposed allies (PKR announced it would contest in 40 of Sarawak's state seats, with 15 being non-negotiable to any Pakatan member), sabotaging them (PKR contested in 5 Sarawak state seats already allocated to DAP by Pakatan) in what we would termed as his 'promote PKR and suppress DAP' strategy.

He is so very jealous of DAP that this must have consumed him daily, and if a Pakatan were to be able to send him as putative leader to Putrajaya, he would have wanted the winning composition of Pakatan to be one of, say, PKR having 70 seats, DAP 20, PAS or Amanah 23.

Only UMNO can provide him the ketuanan forum to fulfil his pathetic pitiful piffling petty pendek-ish dwarfish vision, but alas, there are more than a few obstacles for him to becoming President of UMNO, wakakaka, though Mahathir might have some plans for him in this regard.

As a MKINI commentator wrote: Azmin needs to have his head 'transplanted' with an angelic brain because he currently has a nasty, mean-spirited and very ungenerous one, unlike Anwar who strangely enough or perhaps because of his big-picture vision the incarcerated PKR leader did have when he was leading Pakatan Rakyat.




Saturday, May 28, 2016

Prophesy of Tunku Abdul Rahman

The Star Online - A big misunderstanding


KUALA LUMPUR: There was a “misunderstanding” over the nature of the Private Member’s Bill tabled by PAS president Datuk Seri Abdul Hadi Awang in Parliament, said Prime Minister Datuk Seri Najib Tun Razak.

He said the proposed Bill was not about hudud.

“We have told our friends in Barisan Nasional that it was a big misunderstanding when Abdul Hadi brought in the Bill.

“They see it as hudud laws as he is closely related to the hudud issue,” Najib told a press conference yesterday after the Umno Supreme Council meeting.

He said the proposed Bill was on reforming the caning punishment meted out by the Syariah Court.

“It’s about enhanced punishment. From six times caning, it has been proposed that the number will depend on the crime committed,” he said, adding that as the proposed Bill touched upon the Syariah Court, it would only involve Muslims in the country.

Najib said the caning punishment would not be severe.

“In Islam, the caning method will not cause injury due to the limits on how the caning is carried out,” he said.

He said that the proposed Bill would not touch upon non-Muslims in Malaysia and that Umno would listen to its component parties’ views on the matter.

“If we want to amend the laws, of course we need to rely on the consensus of all of BN.


'Misunderstanding' is the second most used English word in Malaysian politics, wakakaka. The most used is 'calm' as in 'keep calm', wakakaka again.


It's said that under the proposed amendments the syariah court will have increased powers to have 'offenders' flogged up to 100 lashes, just what the clerics love to have, the powers to punish kau kau.

If what PM Najib said is true, that “In Islam, the caning method will not cause injury due to the limits on how the caning is carried out,” then why not leave it at 6 strokes as it is today. Why allow the syariah courts the power to inflict flogging up to 100 lashes?


Qatif girl, a rape victim but a Shiite to be punished under Sunni jurisdiction

when she wanted to appeal she was warned that if she did, the flogging would be increased

just Saudi Islamic justice 

Also heard has been the powers of the syariah court to pass the punishment of stoning in cases of adultery.

It seems the prophesy by allahyarham Tunku Abdul Rahman may be coming true.

In his PM days, when asked by a Western reporter on whether Malaya (not yet Malaysia) had stoning laws for adultery, the Tunku replied (words to the effect): "If we stone every adulterer in Malaya we'll run out of stones."

Time to invest in quarries.


and it must be halal



Friday, May 27, 2016

I lack confidence in Malaysian courts


Malaysiakini - Vivian Lee gets six-month jail for 'Bak Kut Teh' Ramadan greeting

Image result for Blogger Vivian Lee

Blogger Vivian Lee has been jailed for six months by the Kuala Lumpur Sessions Court after being convicted under the Sedition Act 1948.

Lee was convicted for a Ramadan greeting where she and her then boyfriend Alvin Tan told Muslims to break fast with pork (Bak Kut Teh), according to Bernama.

The sentence was passed down by Sessions Court judge Abdul Rashid Daud who said it is to serve as a deterrent.

In the readers' comments section, a reader wrote "Low Yat phone thief only got 4 months, she got 6 months. Brutal."

Firstly, Vivian Lee and her erstwhile boyfriend had been unnecessarily vile and offensive, but does she deserved 6 months for a moronic offensively insensitive joke or insult?

Was her bah-kut-teh Ramadan stupidity any worse than the vile offence of placing a cowhead in front of a Hindu temple in Shah Alam? Or Ustaz Ann Wan Seng's equally vile and seditious offence for doing worse in insulting Chinese Malaysians on their religious deities?



Secondly, I can't confirm whether the 4 months sentence received by Shahrul Anuar Abdul Aziz for the alleged theft of a mobile phone from a shop at Low Yat Plaza is correct as his trial was to have reached a decision on 24 May, 3 days ago - I don't know what's the outcome; can anyone help?

Anyway, leaving that aside for a minute, I had hope there won't be a racial analysis of this sentence (for a Chinese sweetie) versus the one said to have been handed down to the alleged Low Yat phone-thief (a Malay), because I want to bring your attention to another case involving a Malay man.

More than 6 years ago I posted 5 years jail for RM70 theft in which I wrote about an unemployed man Zulhaidi Hamzah being sentenced by the Magistrates Court in JB to 5 years jail for stealing 11 cans of beer worth RM70 from a mini mart in Pasir Gudang. - for more, read Star Online news Jobless man gets 5yrs for stealing some beer.

He was charged under Section 380 of the Penal Code for theft, which carries a maximum 10 years’ jail or fine upon conviction. The loot apparently was 4 cans of Guinness Stout and 7 cans of Tiger Beer. For stealing a mere 11 cans of beer, he was sentenced to 50% of the max jail term, that was, 5 years.

Now, compare that to the Low Yat case, that is, if he was found guilty and the said 4 months has correctly been the sentence handed down. Both have been Malay.

I believe the alleged Low Yat robber Shahrul Anuar was also found guilty of drug possession (methamphetamine) and fined RM2000 - compare this with the 5 years for theft of 11 cans of beer that Zulhaidi Hamzah was given.

Additionally, Shahrul Anuar (Low Yat bloke) and his mate Muhammad Shameer have been charged for wounding Hafizuddin Hamzah, 27, with a machete, in front of the Mizan Racing Tuned workshop in Jalan Jelatek on Feb 20.

Shahrul Anuar certainly has quite a CV.

But back to the case 5 years ago, namely, Zulhaidi Hamzah being sentenced by the Magistrates Court in JB to 5 years jail for stealing 11 cans of beer worth RM70.

In any language, that sentence was undeniably an over-the-top heavy handed judgement by the Yang Ariff. It’s monstrously out of proportion to the seriousness of the crime, more so when you consider heavier shit being committed by 'heavy metal' ar$eh#les in this country, none of whom has thus far been found guilty.

But I suppose Zulhaidi ought to be at least grateful for not being slapped with an additional whipping sentence by the Syariah Court for the haram items.

To further compound my already poor impression of the law, let us recall a couple of statutory rapes of 13 and 12 years old lil girls. Both statutory rapes occurred around the same period in time. This time I'm afraid I can't avoid the racial implications.

The two slugs, Noor Afizal and Chuah Guan Jiu, obviously shared the same taste for underaged girls, did it to them, and were charged under Section 376(1) of the Penal Code where they faced up to 20 years' jail and whipping.

For raping little girls, did they get any fraction of the max sentence or whipping?

Yes for maggot Chuah, who was jailed for 5.5 years, but only a mere 6 months more than Zulhaidi Hamzah for stealing less than a dozen cans of beer.

Noor Afizal? Well, the Appeal Court judges believed he has a 'bright future' as a national bowler and was let off by the hook. Yes, those judges had dared, in a case of statutory rape, to offer the excuse that Noor Afizal did not use force and that it was consensual sex.

Apart from insulting the 13-year old lil' girl, were the issues of (1) not using force while f**king a 13-year old lil' girl and that (2) such a lil' girl was able to participate in consensual sex were new laws no one other than the judges had been aware of?

Will we be stuck with and suffer from stare decisis (the law of precedence) offered by the judges' ruling?

I wonder whether the slug known as Noor Afizal is still representing the states or even the nation with his bowling ball with which he managed to brilliantly strike down the judges?

Don't blame me for not being at all confident in Malaysian laws and its courts.

By the way I wonder how's Tan Sri Abdul Rahim Thamby Chik? Haven't heard of him for a while!


Thursday, May 26, 2016

Azmin Ali - Pakatan's saviour or problem?

In an article Has Pakatan Harapan lost its self-belief? by Hare Kari, Agenda Daily, as obtained from RPK's blog (post is Azmin to be brought down before 2018) I left a comment saying:


The best sentence in Hare Kare's article above is:

"Azmin like Hadi is a classic example of a charlatan politician who runs with the hare and hound to serve their own bigoted political self-interests at the expense of their respective parties and the rakyat"

... though the idiom applicable to Azmin Ali should correctly be "... runs with the hare and hunts with the hounds", but Hare Kari's article is not completely without merits as that sentence encapsulates the problem of Pakatan Rakyat as well as Pakatan Harapan, namely, an Azmin Ali who so wants to be this (MB) and that (PM) that while he is already married to DAP and Amanah, he still woos PAS and is likely to flirt with UMNO (via Mahathir).

But it's okay as a Muslim can legally marry 4, wakakaka.


Of late, I view with great regret and particular disgust an Azmin Ali virtually destroying Pakatan Harapan (PH) by a number of unilateral decisions/actions, but which in reality are not new to PKR's character under Azmin Ali.

Indeed, prior to recent events I had also written about PKR making media statements as if those policy statements or seat allocations were determined by Pakatan after consultations among its members, but which were actually unilaterally announced (by PKR), sort of preemptive strikes (by stealth, sneakiness and shameless slyness), and which would invariably invoke parties like DAP to scream "WTF" the next morning when they read of PKR's unilateral decisions in the newspaper, wakakaka.

Note the following PKR recent unilateral decisions:

  • Despite the pompous fanfare about PH having drawn out a consultative agreement where no single party makes unilateral announcement to the surprise and shock of the other coalition members, PKR nonetheless went ahead to announce in Sarawak well ahead of the state elections that it would be contesting in 40 seats, in which 15 seats were NOT negotiable. Not negotiable by a member of a so-called coalition virtually meant 'suck my dick and like it or f**k off.'
  • He woos PAS by himself, inviting the Islamic Party to be part of PH, even knowing his Pakatan Harapan (PH) partners are hostile to PAS, and vice versa in what can be said to be in a currently irreversible state of enmity 
  • Though Baru Bian sent 5 PKR candidates to stand in seats in the Sarawak state elections already allocated to the DAP by PH's top leadership, it was said Azmin Ali was the decision maker, or at least the provocateur of Baru Bian's decision
  • He made promises to PAS, such as for PAS to stand back from the Sg Besar by-election to make way for PKR, with a quid pro quo promise to PAS of PH not standing in Sabak Bernam in GE-14 to make way for PAS. Wow, just who the f**k was he to unilaterally give Sabak Bernam away to PAS?
  • etc etc etc

Today RPK has a new post titled Azmin Ali's Triple-A rating. Please read it yourself and decide on its plausibility, but essentially RPK reminds us of the warning he gave more than 15 months back. The following are extracts from his new post to rekindle in our minds what he had told us before:

Malaysia Today was implying (or maybe even alleging) that Azmin had sold out Anwar and was attempting to replace Anwar with Mahathir as the new de facto Opposition Leader. But that would never happen because Azmin would bend over backwards for Anwar if need be (figure of speech of course and not literally) — or so they thought.

Today, that assumption has changed. And it changed not because Malaysia Today revealed 15 months ago about what Azmin discussed with Mahathir in London. It changed because Azmin himself has proven that Mahathir and not Anwar is his boss.

But then Azmin cannot help himself. That was the promise Azmin made to be able to become the Selangor Menteri Besar — that he would dump Anwar and not serve Anwar any longer. But whom did Azmin make this promise to? To who did Azmin promise that if he were appointed the Selangor Menteri Besar he would no longer serve Anwar or pledge loyalty to Anwar but would dump Anwar?

Yes, a most interesting question, don’t you think so? And I am sure some of you already suspect who that person is. Nevertheless, I am not going to mention his name just yet although I cannot promise you that some time in the future I will reveal who that person is. Suffice to say that Azmin got the job as Selangor Menteri Besar on the agreement that he must turn his back on Anwar.

And Azmin delivered his promise, although only 18 months later, by ousting Anwar as the de facto Opposition Leader and by not getting Mahathir to agree to a pardon for Anwar and by supporting Mahathir as the new de facto Opposition Leader to replace Anwar.

Anwar plus his four political strategists in the photograph above now know that Azmin has sold them out.

In short, without resorting to adverse descriptions such Et tu Azmin!, backstabbing, sellout, coup d'etat in PKR, etc, RPK is saying that Azmin has cleverly deposed of Anwar from the PKR No 1 leadership post, de facto of course, and even gaining the MB position in Selangor as part of his power grab.

I left a comment at one of RPK's posts but can't remember which. Essentially I commented on Azmin Ali's appointment to the Selangor MB post as follows (words to the effect):

Does anyone imagine for an instant that Azmin wasn't involved in the manoeuvrings behind the scene to undermine Wan Azizah from being appointed MB and by default to promote his own suitability.

Does anyone imagine for an instant that when Azmin was summoned before HRH and informed he was approved by HRH as the new MB to replace Khalid Ibrahim, poor innocent naive and clueless Azmin would gape at HRH with wide open eyes and utter surprise, and then stutter: "Paaaateeeeek Tuanku? Ampun Tuanku, patek sangat terkejut. Menjunjung Tuanku, Ampun Tuanku. Dirgahayu Tuanku, Ampun Tuanku".

Wakakaka.

Anyway, I'll leave it at that, and see what Rafizi Ramli will do next instead of beating around the PKR bush about corruption in PKR Selangor involving 'money & women', that is, if he has the balls like the state DAP who not only sacked Loh Chee Heng, their own ADUN in Selangor, for misuse of public funds allocated to his constituency of Teluk Datuk, Banting but also reported his misdeeds to MACC.

Then, where relevant only, I'll blog another post if I am able to detect links between Rafizi's recent noisy shouts about the above-mention issue of corruption involving 'money & women' and the current PKR internal power struggles, wakakaka.

Related: Machiavellian knot unravelling

Wednesday, May 25, 2016

Discarding own culture and history?

Dr P Ramasamy, also DCM II of Penang, asked of Professor Mokhtar Saidin, apparently a prominent Malaysian archaeologist, and rather sarcastically if I may add, is there really No scientific proof of Hinduism-Buddhism in Bujang Valley?, this news article being published by FMT.


a candi in Bujang Valley archaeological site

would it be like the one Parameswara prayed at? 


a Buddhist-Hindu candi in Muaro Jambi Sumatra

would it be THE one Parameswara prayed at? 
 

The tone of Dr Ramasamy's query (don't forget a rather sarcastic one, wakakaka) unhappily questions Prof Saidin's argument that in our famed Bujang Valley (as reported by FMT) animism rather than Hinduism or Buddhism was the dominant form of worship in Bujang Valley more than 2,500 years ago. Second, that Bujang Valley stands no chance of being gazetted by Unesco because there is no scientific research to date to verify that the temple ruins were Hindu or Buddhist structures.

Please read the FMT article yourself, but I wouldn't be wrong if I gather from Dr Ramasamy, and indeed I share his suspicions, that there is a gargantuan reluctance by Prof Saidin to admit Hinduism and/or Buddhism were practised in those ancient times in Bujang Valley.

Additionally, and perhaps because of this, there is also a home-grown reluctance to have a Hindu-Buddhist site gazetted by UNESCO, rather than UNESCO being reluctant to do so.

If Dr Ramasamy's (and indeed my) suspicions have grounds, then I really don't know why there is this local academic reluctance about admitting the Hindu-Buddhist heritage of Malaya, when virtually everyone knows that the founder of the golden Malay civilisation in Malacca was a Buddhist, namely, Parameswara, late of the Buddhist Kingdom of Srivijaya who scooted off from his Empire's capital in Palembang when Hindu Majapahit troops were hot on his heels.



It was even said Parameswara did not convert to Islam as history books have it, though how would we know when that's hundreds of years ago.

The Indonesians have never been ashamed of their Buddhist-Hindu heritage, nay, in fact very proud of it. They still maintain and indeed flaunt their proud heritage, a simple everyday example being in their names such as Parameswara (obviously), Purnawarman, Prabowo, Kertarajasa, Soekarno, Soeharto, Megawati, Rachmawati, Ratna Dewi, Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono, Joko Widodo, Panggabean without the need to Arabise their identity in order to prove they are Muslims.

Recently there was an academic forum on the worrying Arabisation of Malays and Malay culture in Malaysia. Malay scholars suspected that one of many contributing factors to this cultural colonization has been some Malays' low esteem of themselves.

The Malay Mail Online reported in its Forum explores creeping ‘Arabisation’ among Malays that Self-loathing, ignorance and insecurity were among the main reasons for 'Arabisation' taking root in Malaysia’s Malay community. 

Sociologist Syed Farid al-Attas was quoted as saying: “For some reason the Malays often feel very low about themselves. So when they ape the Arabs they believe they are the more authentic (Muslims).”

“What we are importing is not the faith but the practices and beliefs from a culture from Saudi Arabia.


“So what it is actually is not Arabisation, but the salafisation or Saudi Arabisation process… this is dangerous as this narrow interpretation of Islam can undermine (the diversity) of our religion.”

Another historian Eddin Khoo said: ... that prior to the Arabisation phenomenon, the Malays were known for their ability to “internalise” Islam with their own culture. The result was a rich mix of identity that became unique to this region.

But much of it, like Kuda Kepang and Dikir Barat, have been systematically erased as the community became more eager to prove who is the more “authentic” Muslim.

There is an internal struggle within the Malays… Malay culture has become the victim of the battle between factions vying for control over who is more Malay (and Muslim).

He was referring to the political rivalry between nationalist Umno and Islamist PAS.

On this note, we should remember that PAS has banned the wayang kulit in Kelantan because of the cultural shadow-play's narration of stories from the Hindu Ramayana and Mahabharata.



My fave person, Marina Mahathir, who was also a panellist at the forum, argued that one of the reasons why Malays want to appropriate Arab culture is because they ignorantly equate the community with Islam, whereas Arabs made up just 15 per cent of the world's Muslim population.

“Malays have this simple thinking that everything Islam is Arab. But there are so many types of Arabs in the region… so when we try and emulate Arabs, which one are we talking about?”

In my personal opinion wakakaka, the most notable (or notorious) of the Arabisation indoctrination has been the example given by one particular mufti on the required obedience of a exemplary Muslim wife who must accept her husband wishes even if to bonk on the back of a camel (why not a kerbau or a car?)

Thus Dr Ramasamy's queries on Prof Saidin's seeming reluctance to consider Hindu-Buddhist worship in ancient Bujang Valley are timely and welcomed, and perhaps even succinctly on target.


candi in Bujang Valley archaeological site 


animism worship?

Omitofu