$million Ministers

Recently, Emeritus Senior Minister (ESM) Goh Chok Tong incurred the wrath of many Singaporeans by asserting that “ministers are not paid enough” and that it was “very populist” to demand ministerial pay be slashed. To rub salt into wound, he said he had tried unsuccessfully to get two from the private sector (one earning $5 million and the other earning $10 million a month) to be future ministers, before adding that people who can’t even earn $500,000 a year are not minister material and in fact “very mediocre”.   

Netizens predictably gave him a earful.  Not a few pointed to the new bunch of ministers across the Causeway in PM Mahathir’s Cabinet, who are “all taking less than 20k ringgit a month”. In particular, they cited DAP secretary-general and former Penang Chief Minister Lim Guan Eng, who in addition to being a double degree accountant, also has the distinction of being jailed twice for his political convictions (1987 & 1994) in a lengthy political career. Lim told the press that becoming a minister was something beyond his wildest dream, as must be any thoughts of snaring a big fat minister pay. No less inspiring was the example set by DAP MPs Tony Pua and Dr Ong Kian Ming who volunteered their “half-year, no pay” services to the Finance Ministry to help Lim settle in. Pua was an ASEAN scholar with a degree from Keble College, Oxford while Dr Ong was a Fulbright Scholar from Duke University (USA) with a degree in Economics from the London School of Economics.

Netizens said these are the people we need in government - people who are not in it for the money but for the spirit of public service.  They are right.  However, one must also not forget that Malaysia’s situation is vastly different from Singapore’s.  Malaysia is at the crossroads where the new government has the historic opportunity to lift the country from the morass to which it has sunk. The people are enthused and the leaders (and wannabe leaders) fired with a sense of mission to transform the country. They are at the same stage in which Singapore found itself back in 1965. The new dawn that Malaysians seek today is the survival that Singaporeans sought in our immediate independent years. In such ‘revolutionary’ situations, how much you are paid as a leader meant little to you.  

But two or three generations down the road, if Malaysia is successful and prosperous, it may not be so easy even for them to attract people into politics simply because that impetus for action will not be as urgent or great.  This was what happened to Singapore.  With security and survival no longer a pressing issue, the PAP realised that people were content to let the leaders carry on. Hence the PAP’s self-renewal process that focused (some would say over-focused) on remuneration as a key indicator of one’s qualification for high office. Kevin Lim’s article (“Politics is much more than just a contest at earning millions of dollars”, published in TOC, 5 Aug 2018) rightly asserted that “truly worthy politicians are either thrown up through very challenging circumstances or imbibed with years of high ideals to do something worthwhile for their countries”.  But ESM Goh was also not wrong when he said that “in peace and prosperity where there are no dragons to slay, personal aspirations, freedom, privacy and life-style take precedence”. These are very challenging times for Malaysians but if all goes well for Malaysia, a time may come when KL will have to pay their ministers ‘Singapore salary’ to keep them in government or get people to join politics.

China standing up to American gangsterism

The Americans must be taken aback by the firm and strong stand of the Chinese in taking them head on in the trade war, a punch with a counter punch. The Americans thought the Chinese are still pushovers like before, like the time when they blatantly struck the Chinese Embassy with 4 Tomahawk cruise missiles for no reason and the Chinese could not hit back after suffering damages and lost of lives to the unprovoked attack. The American gangsterism must be stopped and China has been in a hurry to stop these international gangsters from their bullying.
 
The trade war is only the beginning, tit for tat, every move with a counter move and more. China is not going to be bullied again. In the preparation to invade Iran, the Americans have warned all countries to stop trading with Iran. The Nato countries have ignored this sanction. Russia and China too refused to abide by this unilateral and illegal sanction against Iran. Both Russia and China have increased their purchases of Iranian oil to the ire of the Americans.
 
The Iranians have warned the Americans that they would attack American ships and military bases if the American gangsters strike. China did not stop at just saying no to the Americans. For the past decades, the Americans had intercepted Chinese merchant ships in high seas on fabricated charges and even boarded Chinese ships to check their cargoes. This too would not be allowed to happen again.
 
China has sent 100 warships to the Indian Ocean and the Persian Gulf, to protect their tankers and merchant ships from harassment by the Americans. The stage is set for a high sea confrontation between the PLAN and the American Navy. Chinese ships are strictly out of bound from the American gangsters and China is prepared to defend its rights for freedom of navigation.
 
Would the American gangsters dare to attempt to intercept Chinese ships again and provoke an open conflict in the Indian Ocean? A 100 warship presence in the Indian Ocean say the Chinese meant business and would react to any American hooliganism against their ships.
 
The Russians too are standing up to the Evil Empire in Syria and the Mediterranean Sea. It is conducting a big naval exercise and telling the Americans to get their warships out of the way or they would not be responsible for the consequences. And against the threat of the American Evil to protect the remnants of IS in Idlib, the Russian, Iranians and Syrians are mounting a final assault to rid Syria from American sponsored and backed terrorists once and for all.
 
The Persian Gulf and Syria could see the Americans triggering a major war with China and Russia any moment.

The Evil Empire threatening the International Criminal Court

According to Wikipedia, ‘The International Criminal Court (ICC or ICCt)[2] is an intergovernmental organization and international tribunal that sits in The Hague in the Netherlands. The ICC has the jurisdiction to prosecute individuals for the international crimes of genocide, crimes against humanity, and war crimes. The ICC is intended to complement existing national judicial systems and it may therefore only exercise its jurisdiction when certain conditions are met, such as when national courts are unwilling or unable to prosecute criminals or when the United Nations Security Council or individual states refer situations to the Court.’
 
This court has more credibility and support from the UN than the commercial private arbitration court that the Aquino govt used to judge the South China Sea island dispute. The American rogues are condemning this ICC as ‘unaccountable’ and ‘outright dangerous’ but told its little USAs to blare that the commercial court in the Hague was a UN linked court and its rulings must be abided by like a UN supported court. The little USAs happily accepted this edict from the Evil Empire and went shouting at China as told by the Evil Empire, only to kena slammed by China for their shameless stupidity.
 
The ICC has been directed to charge some American war criminals for war crimes and crimes against humanity in Afghanistan and the rogues in the US are furious. They are not only above the laws, above international laws, they even threatened to arrest and sanction judges and officials of the ICC ‘if it moves to charge any American who served in Afghanistan with war crimes’.
 
The gangster in John Bolton threatened, ‘If the court comes after us, Israel of other US allies, we will not sit quietly down.’ This is not all. He added, ‘We will bann its judges and prosecutors from entering the US. We will sanction their funds, in the US financial system, and we will prosecute them in the US criminal system.’
 
What do these arrogant brags said about the Evil Empire? They are above the laws and can be lawless and no one can do anything to them even if they commit war crimes or crimes against humanity. And more, the Americans would use ‘any means necessary to protect our citizens and those of our allies from unjust prosecution by this illegitimate court’. John Bolton is claiming that the ICC is illegitimate! The Americans would not allow any courts, like the ICC, to ‘have higher authority than the US Constitution and US sovereignty’.
 
Compare this to the silly countries that allowed the American courts to impose its will and laws onto them, violating these countries’ sovereignty and constitution. And these silly countries could not see any wrong with it and obediently do what the American courts told them to, like the Najib case, the seizing of his boat in Indonesia.
 
The rogues in Washington has told the whole world in defiance that they do not come under any law or jurisdiction of any international organisation but expect others to do so and to come under the jurisdiction and laws of the Evil Empire.
 
Anything wrong with this? Should the rest of the world accept this state of affair dictated by the Evil Empire? The Evil Empire had made use of the ICC and other UN and non UN agencies to incriminate other people of war crimes and crimes against humanity that are of very insignificant scale compare to the hundreds of thousands or millions killed by the American forces and their cronies. Now the Americans said no one is allowed to charge them for war crimes or crimes against humanity, even their chosen agencies, agencies they made use to do the same thing.

Jack Ma is retiring

Jack Ma is a phenomenon that is short of a miracle. He is lucky that he is born and bred in China. If he is a Singaporean, he would end up in ITE and today may be a security guard or a taxi driver. But with sheer hard work and seizing on the opportunity available and an entrepreneur streak, today he is the richest man in China with a fortune worth at least S$50 billion. I think today Singapore's leaders would be calling him an above mediocre man, earning more than $500k a year and would be good enough to be invited to drink tea at the Istana and the potential of being a minister. And Jack Ma, if accepted the offer, could be a good case of telling the people that he took a big pay cut to be a minister.

Oops, I should not use Jack Ma as an example as it could interpreted as inviting a foreigner to meddle in Singapore's domestic politics. My sincere apologies. Jack Ma, please come here and apply for a Singapore citizenship. Sure get one, and then stand a chance to be invited to be a minister.

I got carried away with my adoration of this man. I brought this up because of his early retirement and opted to do philanthropy.  I hope when our millionaires here earn as much as him, they would also volunteer to do philanthropy, to give away some of their hard earned wealth.

Let me get to the crux of the matter. My first question is whether Jack Ma has gone on a world head hunting trip to find the best foreign talent to head Alibaba. I think this is more urgent as in China they did not have smooth talking talents to be the face of Alibaba. He should follow Singapore's strategy of looking all over the world for such an important position. It would be very good for Alibaba. And with more foreign talents to be brought in by the foreign talent head, Alibaba would look more international. You see, it is very important to have foreigners to run a company that operates internationally. The foreigners would have an advantage with their international exposure. Then Alibaba would be bigger than Apple. If not, Alibaba would remain as it is, cannot grow bigger.

Correct me if I am wrong. I read somewhere that Jack Ma has appointed a Frank Zhang, another Chinaman to replace him. This is a very serious mistake. To go international, Alibaba seriously need a foreign talent, never mind if the foreign talent has not build a company of his own or from the third world. A foreign talent is a foreign talent and an international company must be run by a foreigner. Even our kopitiams and char kway teow hawker stalls would be best to hire a foreign CEO.

Before Jack Ma makes the mistake of his life, he better change his mind and go around the world to hunt for the best man for the job. If that is too expensive, come to Singapore. This island has plenty of very eager foreign talents wanting the job. We may not have top talents among Singaporean. No Singaporean would apply as they have been told that they are daft and their degrees are useless. The only talented Singaporeans are in politics, in the govt. One thing for sure, we have many foreigners that are of top talent calibre here. Jack Ma better hurry up or these top foreign talents would soon be recruited to become ministers to run Singapore or GLCs, after given Singaporean citizenship of course. Singapore's political affairs can only be meddled by Singaporeans, including instant Singaporeans.

Mahathir – Malays are lazy, untrustworthy….

Mahathir has finally lashed out at the Malays for being lazy, untrustworthy, poor work attitude, unwillingness to work hard and many other things. And I quote this from him as reported in thenewpaper, ‘We accuse others. We accuse the government, accuse other races. When we fail, they are at fault. We are never wrong.’
 
What Mahathir refused to admit is that all the faults and problems of the Malays in Malaysia is his fault. And he is blaming the Malays for it. Not his undoing. During his reign of terror, he made 3 very damaging and irreparable policies that led to the Malays being what they are today, to be scolded by him as lazy and untrustworthy.
 
His first major blunder was to tell the Malays that they are the owners of the land and can take everything from the other races. There is no need to work, just take. His 30% bumiputra ownership meant that the Malays simply took from the others what others had worked for, struggled to achieve. This was clearly reflected in Robert Kuok’s book when he related how Abdul Razak called him up and told him to hand over 30% of his company to the Malays. But that was not the end, not just 30%. After taking 30%, they simply sold them to the non Malays for immediate cash. And the subsequent years Razak would go to Robert Kuok for another 30% as the earlier 30% was sold to the non bumis and the cycle goes on and on.
 
Now Mahathir is telling the Malays to work hard to earn his keep. What for, so many Malays have become billionaires and millionaires without having to work, just take. Why would they want to work hard, to change their attitude when the easiest thing to get rich is to take and not by working? This is the tragedy of the Malays under Mahathir’s promise to making them rich without working.
 
His second major wrong doing was to blame the non Malays, especially the Chinese, for the economic plight of the Malays. This racist policy continues today when the Malays feel so free to wave the kris whenever they like threatening another May 13. Racism and Malay superiority, Ketuanan Melayu, has been entrenched in the Malaysian Constitution and psyche and would not go away for several generations to come, or forever. This Ketuanan Melayu doctrine is the foundation of the 30% take and the control of everything in the country for the Malays. This is Mahathir’s so called for the good of the Malays, to protect the Malay interests, Malays should own everything in Malaysia without having to work for it. Today he is asking them to work hard, to be like the Japanese!
 
His most damaging policy was to push for the use of the Malay language in everything, from administration, commerce and education. Mahathir had promoted the use of Malay against the use of other languages, especially the English Language that today, most of the younger Malays could hardly read and write English.
What are the consequences of this policy? Look at India, despite all the Indian pride, they have chosen to embrace English as their language of govt and commerce. And the Indians are now swimming like fish in the world where English is the lingua franca and excelling in science, technology and IT and also the academia. The door to the English language world is closed to the Malays for good, after 5 decades of promoting Malays at the expense of English. Any country that wants to chase the world of science and technology cannot do without mastering English. The Chinese and the Japanese are also embarking on big scale learning of the English language. Why? They know that English is an important international and scientific language and not knowing English would put them at a big disadvantage.
 
Mahathir, in his blinded rage and zeal to endear to the Malays, chose to discard the English language and Malaysia and the Malays are paying a very heavy price for his folly today.
 
Mahathir should not simply blame the Malays for his wrong doings. His NEP is in ruins. If he had charted the course of Malaysia with a bid of wisdom instead of racial pride, Malaysia and the Malays would not have fallen back so far behind. Mahathir has held back the progress of the Malays in Malaysia by 50 years. He is regretting as he is seeing the result of his failed policies. But as usual, it is not his fault but the fault of the Malays. Luckily he is not blaming the non Malays for this.
 
His war cry for the Malays, the superiority of the Malays, for the good of the Malays etc etc, has led to the Malays in Malaysia living on crutches, feeding off from the other races, happily, without having to work for it. His latest craze, fluttering between Tokyo and Beijing, begging for aids and free money and technology, is a reflection of his inability to know himself and his shortfalls, a dependence mentality, wanting everything for free without having to work for it, but not knowing it himself. He thinks the world owes him a living. Does he really believe China or any country owes Malaysia an obligation to build everything for free? Does he think Malaysia can go to the world to ask and to take 30% for free?
 
Who do you think should be blamed for the state of affairs in Malaysia today? The Malays or Mahathir?
 
PS. Mahathir is a typical politician shouting ‘it is good for you, good for the country’, but destroying the people and country in what he is doing. Do not trust any politician that claimed he is doing it for you and your country, for your own good. Judge them by what they did and the results of their actions. Are the results favourable to you and country or to the contrary.