Malaysia on the radar
Dean JohnsPublished: Jun 13, 2014 1:49 PM | Updated: Jun 13, 2014 1:58 PM
While my wife and I were having a coffee yesterday morning at Marrickville Metro, a suburban Sydney shopping centre, we were delighted to hear that the spirited conversation the five guys at the next table were having was about, of all topics, Malaysia.
While my wife and I were having a coffee yesterday morning at Marrickville Metro, a suburban Sydney shopping centre, we were delighted to hear that the spirited conversation the five guys at the next table were having was about, of all topics, Malaysia.
Or, more specifically, the mystery ‘disappearance’ of MAS Flight MH370. Just one more sign, as if we needed one, that the Barisan Nasional regime has finally succeeded in putting Malaysia on the world map, or rather the global radar.
And in a far from positive way. In fact in the polar opposite sense of that intended by former prime minister Dr Mahathir Mohamad back when he was perennially attempting to peddle his pathologically lying proposition that Malaysia was the ‘envy of the world.’
When in fact most of the world had never even heard of Malaysia, as utterly insignificant as it was then in any aspect whatever of the international scene as a result of unending rule by the corrupt and outright criminal nonentities of the BN regime.
And for the same reason is still virtually invisible in the global arena today from an economic, political, educational or any other meaningful point of view. But now Malaysia has become famous, or rather infamous, for precisely what has so long rendered it so irrelevant and impotent internationally, and so financially, intellectually, morally and spiritually impoverished internally: BN’s trademark combination of criminality, incompetence, secrecy and deception.
Not to mention callousness, as the BN regime clearly couldn’t give a damn about the mental suffering of the relatives and friends of those aboard flight MH370, let alone the ‘lost’ passengers and crew themselves.
According to Time magazine, despite the BN-style ‘promise’ by ‘acting’ Transport Minister and actual Defence Minister Hishammuddin Hussein that no effort or resources would be spared in finding flight MH370 and its occupants, Malaysia has thus far devoted a mere US$8.6 million to its search effort, compared with US$43 million thus far spent by Australia, and countless millions more by the other 20 or so countries involved.
In fact BN’s financial focus seems to be, as it has all along, on not so much finding MH370 and discovering whether its 239 passengers and crew are alive or dead, as on the prospect of making a killing for itself and selected cronies on an expensive upgrade of Malaysia’s current defence radar system or the purchase of a new one.
Hishammuddin first mooted this, as I recall, just a week or two after the aircraft unaccountably vanished on his watch as defence minister, and now the chief of the Royal Malaysian Air Force (RMAF), General Rodzali Daud, has urgently sought the allocation of funds for this purpose.
Solving the problem with a RM20 alarm clock
Never mind that Hishammuddin and Rodzali should long ago have resigned or been fired for dereliction of their duties, or that, as many besides me have suggested, the radar problem could be solved with a RM20 alarm clock or similar device to ensure that in future the operators aren’t having a kip when their screens show a blip, as they almost certainly were when MH370 went on its mystery trip.
Speaking of which, Prime Minister Najib Abdul Razak recently jetted-off on what many of us consider a highly-suspicious trip to Beijing, where he cosied-up to the potentates of the ‘People’s’ Republic but entirely gave the cold shoulder to the grieving friends and relatives of Chinese passengers aboard MH370, then came back flapping his lips about having been treated as such an important personage that his hosts boiled his eggs for 10 minutes out of concern for his safety.
When Najib’s typically nit-witted and self-aggrandising ‘eggs’ story appeared in Malaysiakini, lots of wags predictably wondered whether he was referring to the eggs he was served for breakfast or the ones between his legs. But as he hasn’t yet threatened to sue these jokers or any Malaysiakini editors over this, as he has over some previous japes at his expense, I assume that in this case he doesn’t care two figs.
Just as long as the Malaysian people’s attention is diverted from the true purpose of his China visit, which was likely much more about begging than egging, and Najib clearly welcomes any diversion of attention from his and his accomplices’ grubby doings.
Like the racial and sectarian division and dissension BN tirelessly promotes through such allegedly ‘non-government’ organisations like Perkasa and Isma, rabble-rousing fake ‘newspapers’ like Utusan Malaysia and other trashy ‘mainstream’ media, and compliant ‘religious’ authorities that seize Bibles, snatch bodies, disrupt weddings and in countless other ways contrive to play merry hell with social harmony, all for the blatantly obvious purpose of pursuing its policy of ‘divide and rule’.
But the wider world is not so easy to fool. And now that the BN regime has put Malaysia on the global radar screen for all the wrong reasons, the international community is not about to stop crying foul.
Even if other governments are in cahoots with Malaysia’s, as suggested by conspiracy theories ranging from US diversion of MH370 to Diego Garcia to a plot by China or some other country to hijack the aircraft or even shoot it down, there’s no chance that the scandal will disappear.
Reward to tempt whistleblower
As instanced by the campaign recently launched on the Indiegogo site by relatives of passengers from the USA, India, Australia, New Zealand and France ‘lost’ aboard flight MH370 to fund a sufficient reward to tempt a whistleblower to emerge with some or all of the real story, many people will stop at nothing to uncover the truth and achieve justice.
There are a great many such people in Malaysia, and I’m proud to know some of them personally.
But unfortunately there are also still millions of Malaysians who apparently couldn’t care less about anything but their self-perceived personal interests, and are thus as nonchalant about the diversion and disappearance of MH370 as they are of BN’s diversion of Malaysia from its rightful course as a nation and the disappearance of its riches into the secret bank accounts of BN members and cronies.
But maybe more of these people who have previously not bothered to register to vote, or publicly protest, or otherwise behave like anything but helpless passengers on their country’s one-way trip to disaster with BN at the controls, might be finally galvanised into action now that Malaysia and its rotten robber regime are up there on the global radar, and there to stay until the National Feedlot Corporation (NFC) cows come home, and Najib’s RM1 chickens come home to roost.
DEAN JOHNS, after many years in Asia, currently lives with his Malaysian-born wife and daughter in Sydney, where he coaches and mentors writers and authors and practises as a writing therapist. Published books of his columns for Malaysiakini include ‘Mad about Malaysia', ‘Even Madder about Malaysia', ‘Missing Malaysia', ‘1Malaysia.con’ and ‘Malaysia Mania’.
Or, more specifically, the mystery ‘disappearance’ of MAS Flight MH370. Just one more sign, as if we needed one, that the Barisan Nasional regime has finally succeeded in putting Malaysia on the world map, or rather the global radar.
And in a far from positive way. In fact in the polar opposite sense of that intended by former prime minister Dr Mahathir Mohamad back when he was perennially attempting to peddle his pathologically lying proposition that Malaysia was the ‘envy of the world.’
When in fact most of the world had never even heard of Malaysia, as utterly insignificant as it was then in any aspect whatever of the international scene as a result of unending rule by the corrupt and outright criminal nonentities of the BN regime.
And for the same reason is still virtually invisible in the global arena today from an economic, political, educational or any other meaningful point of view. But now Malaysia has become famous, or rather infamous, for precisely what has so long rendered it so irrelevant and impotent internationally, and so financially, intellectually, morally and spiritually impoverished internally: BN’s trademark combination of criminality, incompetence, secrecy and deception.
Not to mention callousness, as the BN regime clearly couldn’t give a damn about the mental suffering of the relatives and friends of those aboard flight MH370, let alone the ‘lost’ passengers and crew themselves.According to Time magazine, despite the BN-style ‘promise’ by ‘acting’ Transport Minister and actual Defence Minister Hishammuddin Hussein that no effort or resources would be spared in finding flight MH370 and its occupants, Malaysia has thus far devoted a mere US$8.6 million to its search effort, compared with US$43 million thus far spent by Australia, and countless millions more by the other 20 or so countries involved.
In fact BN’s financial focus seems to be, as it has all along, on not so much finding MH370 and discovering whether its 239 passengers and crew are alive or dead, as on the prospect of making a killing for itself and selected cronies on an expensive upgrade of Malaysia’s current defence radar system or the purchase of a new one.
Hishammuddin first mooted this, as I recall, just a week or two after the aircraft unaccountably vanished on his watch as defence minister, and now the chief of the Royal Malaysian Air Force (RMAF), General Rodzali Daud, has urgently sought the allocation of funds for this purpose.
Solving the problem with a RM20 alarm clock
Never mind that Hishammuddin and Rodzali should long ago have resigned or been fired for dereliction of their duties, or that, as many besides me have suggested, the radar problem could be solved with a RM20 alarm clock or similar device to ensure that in future the operators aren’t having a kip when their screens show a blip, as they almost certainly were when MH370 went on its mystery trip.
Speaking of which, Prime Minister Najib Abdul Razak recently jetted-off on what many of us consider a highly-suspicious trip to Beijing, where he cosied-up to the potentates of the ‘People’s’ Republic but entirely gave the cold shoulder to the grieving friends and relatives of Chinese passengers aboard MH370, then came back flapping his lips about having been treated as such an important personage that his hosts boiled his eggs for 10 minutes out of concern for his safety.
When Najib’s typically nit-witted and self-aggrandising ‘eggs’ story appeared in Malaysiakini, lots of wags predictably wondered whether he was referring to the eggs he was served for breakfast or the ones between his legs. But as he hasn’t yet threatened to sue these jokers or any Malaysiakini editors over this, as he has over some previous japes at his expense, I assume that in this case he doesn’t care two figs.Just as long as the Malaysian people’s attention is diverted from the true purpose of his China visit, which was likely much more about begging than egging, and Najib clearly welcomes any diversion of attention from his and his accomplices’ grubby doings.
Like the racial and sectarian division and dissension BN tirelessly promotes through such allegedly ‘non-government’ organisations like Perkasa and Isma, rabble-rousing fake ‘newspapers’ like Utusan Malaysia and other trashy ‘mainstream’ media, and compliant ‘religious’ authorities that seize Bibles, snatch bodies, disrupt weddings and in countless other ways contrive to play merry hell with social harmony, all for the blatantly obvious purpose of pursuing its policy of ‘divide and rule’.
But the wider world is not so easy to fool. And now that the BN regime has put Malaysia on the global radar screen for all the wrong reasons, the international community is not about to stop crying foul.Even if other governments are in cahoots with Malaysia’s, as suggested by conspiracy theories ranging from US diversion of MH370 to Diego Garcia to a plot by China or some other country to hijack the aircraft or even shoot it down, there’s no chance that the scandal will disappear.
Reward to tempt whistleblower
As instanced by the campaign recently launched on the Indiegogo site by relatives of passengers from the USA, India, Australia, New Zealand and France ‘lost’ aboard flight MH370 to fund a sufficient reward to tempt a whistleblower to emerge with some or all of the real story, many people will stop at nothing to uncover the truth and achieve justice.
There are a great many such people in Malaysia, and I’m proud to know some of them personally.
But unfortunately there are also still millions of Malaysians who apparently couldn’t care less about anything but their self-perceived personal interests, and are thus as nonchalant about the diversion and disappearance of MH370 as they are of BN’s diversion of Malaysia from its rightful course as a nation and the disappearance of its riches into the secret bank accounts of BN members and cronies.
But maybe more of these people who have previously not bothered to register to vote, or publicly protest, or otherwise behave like anything but helpless passengers on their country’s one-way trip to disaster with BN at the controls, might be finally galvanised into action now that Malaysia and its rotten robber regime are up there on the global radar, and there to stay until the National Feedlot Corporation (NFC) cows come home, and Najib’s RM1 chickens come home to roost.
DEAN JOHNS, after many years in Asia, currently lives with his Malaysian-born wife and daughter in Sydney, where he coaches and mentors writers and authors and practises as a writing therapist. Published books of his columns for Malaysiakini include ‘Mad about Malaysia', ‘Even Madder about Malaysia', ‘Missing Malaysia', ‘1Malaysia.con’ and ‘Malaysia Mania’.
View Comments0