I don't usually read Brendan Pereira's comment pieces. No, not because I do or don't like him but because he has become predictable (and his 1-2-3 and A-B-C styles don't appeal to me). He used to write some readable pieces when he was the Singapore Straits Times correspondent in Kuala Lumpur, though.
I got hold of yesterday's news and read his latest A-B-C because Bandit, this blog's frequent visitor, found it fit to discuss the piece of in the context of the "deconstruction of Dr M".
At W, I said "Wicked!".
Brendan wrote: W is for winners. He may have been stripped of his position and pension benefits but in the court of public opinion, Syed Ahmad Idid is a winner. Now he should use that goodwill and do the right thing - lodge a report with the ACA.
The former judge had given NST, in Brendan's words, "arguably the interview of the year, speaking candidly about being forced to resign 10 years ago after alleging corruption and abuse of power in the judiciary".
Did the incorruptible former judge think he was doing the right thing by breaking his silence (at a time when silence is eloquent, according to Brendan, and elegant, according to Musa Hitam)?
Brendan wrote: S is for silence. Abdullah won praise for his eloquent silence in the face of some below-the-belt criticism. But his Government cannot keep silent for too long. A one-way flow of disinformation will only serve to confuse. That is why the Cabinet decided that all questions raised by Dr Mahathir will be answered in full.
Didn't the former judge do the right thing by giving the interview, after his own eloquent and elegant decade-long silence?
It is Brendan and the newspaper that should do the right thing, which any good newspaper and editor would do: see it through, bro, to the end.
The former judge was seeking justice, not popularity, when he went to the NST with his story. Now the NST and its group editor are telling him to do the right thing and go to the ACA.
And that, too, after de facto Law Minister Nazri Aziz had said (June 13) that there will be no further action on the (former) judge's letter.
Rockybru:
ReplyDeleteMore than a courtsey call here, not like some corporates visiting judges in their chambers to wish them Happy Birddays.
In the Brendan-Judge issue, it's best to leave IT to the Judge himself what he wants/need to do. The last time I heard, the judge was definitely above the age of consent -- therefore he need no Go-ahead from Brendan Nazri or any other Third Parties. for a man if not sacrifice his life to protect his name, what else has he got.
Leave the Judge alone to do THE RIGHT THING by himself.
We bloggers/writers can only wait for things to happen - then report/comment -- well, even commend.:)
Do I get a glass of Shandy? That's about my level!:)
Rocky! This is great. My blood pressure is really down, phew!
ReplyDeleteBut it is really like this. Apart from being a Moron, I am also a great observer of events and happenings. Once in Canada in the late 70's I was watching a black and white television in my University dorm. Lo and behold! There was this most uncanny movie with setting in a fictional island republic that were attacked with biological weapon by people from a country across a fictional causeway. I recognised the few Malay actors who were from Merdeka Studio or from Kris Film Prodiuction. One of the actors was M.Amin. He played one of the baddies. In this film M.Amin character and a few bad "Malays" were penetrating the fictional island republic killing people with biological weapon. I was rather upset to see how Malays were portrayed as Moronic marauders in that movies (way back in the late 70s) killing many innocent "Chinese" looking people in that fictional island republic.Well lets cut to the chase. My conclusion is the fictional island republic was Singapore and the country across the fictional causeway was Malaya. Of course the names in the movies were fictionalised. And I bet it was not shown in Malaysia. My contention is there is always more than one way to sking a cat, or to destroy a subject subtlely. Malays were portrayed in a movie as freally bad people. Brendan Pereira is a good writer writing subliminaly and catching the Malays, read Morons, always offguard. If you want to paint Malays as loosers just portrayed them as a country buffoon slurping his nescafe from the saucer, when the scene switched to his Chinese boss as lookng at his Malay driver with total dismay and disgust, this was the old Nescafe commercial by the way! Well Rocky what do you expect when Morons, reads Malays, have been totally portrayed as Moronic, sex-maniac, out of control idiots in our premier newspapers. But the question is what do we Morons going to do about it. You know what they are not capable of doing anything because due to a simple fact, according to a Chinese paper, they are totally idiotic non-confrontational Morons. Sigh! and double sigh! I quit.
Hey guess what my blood pressure is still normal! Yahoo!
Slightly off topic, but I need an outlet to voice my opinion and your blog looks like a good place to do so.
ReplyDeleteI flipped the pages of the NST today to see what's happening and there it was, an article saying that Deputy Finance Minister II Awang Adek requesting that MPs and State Assemblymen representing Kelantan should get a 10% increase in their allowances in order to serve their constituents better.
The article also said that Kelantan MB Nik Aziz disagreed with the request stating that elected representatives should not be given such an increase, after all they get tax free salaries, cars as well as other perks and that the elected representatives should also feel the burden of incresed living costs.
I have never been one to agree with Nik Aziz in the past but in this particular instance, the man does make sense. True MPs do get tax free salaries as well as other perks, why do they need to get an increase? Is it because Awang Adek needs the extra 10% to fuel his WCD 18 Mercedes S280 or his other high capacity luxury vehicles amidst the rising fuel and living costs? (cabinet members and office bearers think we don't know their lifestyle). Here we are asked to, as Najib so unintelligently put it, "adjust our lifestyle" and expect us, the taxpayers, to pay them more to serve us better.
I used to own a Proton Perdana, which was recently sold at a lousy price thanks to the National Automotive Policy, and a 2.8cc foreign car. Both of these cars I sold and am now driving a 1.5 litre Japanese car shared with my wife in my bid to stay financially afloat amidst the rising cost of living (i.e "adjusting my lifestyle") whilst the Deputy FInance Minister is asking for a 10% increase in his allowance. What nonsense is this?
Not only is the duty of the PM and his kitchen cabinet being delegated downstream, they are delegated to idiots. Everything about Pak Lah and his cabinet seems to contradict themselves.
It should be a crime for us to allow our lives to be dictated by stupid people.
It is a pity that the judge was made used by the NST to whack the government of Tun Dr Mahathir. The continued deconstruction of Dr M.
ReplyDeleteWe remember the saga of 1998 following the sacking of saudara Anwar. No matter how much you admire Dr M, you would stll say that it was wrong for him to have done in anwar the way he did. but, remember, anwar was atempting to topple a democratically-elected leader.he was not just criticising the prime minister. he was inciting people to go against Dr M. and no, i dont think that is what dr m is doing to pak lah. still, anwar was done in so mercilessly.
my deepest respect to the judge who answered the NST questions candidly and honestly. He had no ulterior motive. He was asked the questions. He answered them. NST chose to pick out those answers to questions on his sacking. Those answers are damning now and so relevant in the unremitting process of the deconstruction/demonising Tun M.
There will be more of such stories (from the past). NST will be revisiting the past, will play up incidents of injustices, corruption and abuses of power/position (during Tun M's regime.
As for those committed now? Well that is for NST of the future, under a different boss, appointed by the future PM.
My life's rule is simple. 1. Don't get caught by the police 2. If get caught, try to get out of it before they take you to police lock-up 3. Better to part with your money than your dignity and, possibly, your life 4. Don't get dragged to court. It takes forever and justice may neither be done or seem to be done 5. Don't read mainstream newspapers and watch local TV stations 6. Watch Astro's Animal Planet to restore yout faith in the animal kingdom 7. Please someone tell the PM that his "modal insan" is very successful. Kelantan Malay girls are big modal at karaoke lounges in Kuala Lumpur. 8. Shahrizat stop yepping. Go visit these joints.
ReplyDeleteBru, whatever it is, Brendan is much better than the two Datuks - Hishamuddin and Manja. I never read Hishamuddin write about serious issues. Last week, he wrote about "motivation"...I can't stop laughing...ha..ha..ha. Manja did not write at all. Syed Nazri and Zainul wrote better pieces...lah even they refrain from touching hot issues.
ReplyDeleteMentee
Guys, leave brendan alone. he just wants to cari makan. kali's paying him more than s'pore ST. So he joined NST. More pay means more kowtowing to do. he's doing just that. he doesn't care if NSt is turned on its head or dies as a result of too much blood rushing to the brain.
ReplyDeletewhy should he care about the malays, umno, mahathir or even pak lah? they are "no count". his boss is kali. kali goes, he goes. kali stays because he knows if he goes, brendan and the rest of the foreign press corp will have to leave.
Bru, please leave brendan alone. let him cook his alphabet soup. and don't say anymore nasty thing about kali. his daughter will call crying from Australia.
Dear Mr Rocky Bru,
ReplyDeleteI am still puzzled you still read the newspaper which you have put much time, effort and energy in...but kicked you out instead. I've lost my faith in both the NST and Malay Mail ever since they kicked the old guns...i hate to say this but I guess I now read to BBC news...guess you shuld start doing the same as well.
The naïveté of Dr M? A portentous poser to the rebel-in-chief
ReplyDeleteDear Dr M,
IN your repercussive broadside against the unimaginative administration you left behind, let me be a wet blanket and slap you with this portentous poser: were you not lopsidedly naïve to think that your legacy and the world class attitude and tangibles you constructed, the ones that made us proud to be Malaysians, would not be left undone?
I suppose your naïveté was understandable, given that you handed over power to a man you thought, as a religious scholar, reputed Mr Clean and faithful follower, would reliably maintain your sagacious work. You were after all pre-occupied with using him to neutralise Anwar Ibrahim. Nowhere did you ever comprehend his “hapless” disposition.
In giving Abdullah Ahmad Badawi the power you once wielded like a fanatical amateur singer holding on tightly to a karaoke microphone, your well-honed instincts failed to detect ominous red flags, only because they were simply under the radar. You also failed to contend with and neither did you suspect the ambitions of Abdullah’s unbaked underlings whose over-seized ambitions thoroughly outweighed Anwar’s.
Doc,
If you too fall on the wayside (I hope not), I would blame it, by your own admittance, on your unshakeable but suspect faith in your appointments, even if your appointees are devils clad in Hugo Boss, Armani or Burberry.
So, now you berate and remonstrate, starting from the time you contemptuously dismissed the Malaysian media as being controlled by a “Hindu God and Muslim priest.” That was an original phrase and I enjoyed the coinage.
You know acutely well that the Kalimullah Hassan–Brendan Pereira tag team perseveres to deconstruct you into submission. I’m not sure whether you put NSTP group editor-in-chief Hishamudin Aun in the same league, him under hammerlock a long time ago.
I’d like to tell you that when he took over in January 2004 after the deserved firing of that appalling loose cannon with the hide of a ghoul Dollah Keok Lanas (I remind you again that you endorsed his terrible appointment as NSTP GEIC), Kali told NST editorial staffers in a closed-door meeting that he wanted to manage the NSTP for ONLY two years although he claimed he was offered a three-year contract.
Oh, the slyness. As promised, Kali resigned as NSTP GEIC, only to surreptitiously and suddenly assume the deputy chairmanship. Nobody saw that coming. And a little later, a hastily conceived Editorial Adviser’s title, thus extending his power to not just controlling the NSTP but also his influence over friendly rivals in the Malaysian media.
Very soon, Kali may well become the NSTP chairman if Rocky’s earlier speculation hatches into a disturbing reality.
With that kind of comprehensive control in Kali’s hands, I’m afraid that you are virtually on your own although many political, corporate and civil service chieftains privately sympathise with and support your cause, disgusted as they are with Abdullah’s bumbling management of the Government and the economy, and disdainful of the Prime Minister’s callow underlings intervening in his appointment book, and the affairs and business of running the Government.
Doc,
Your mission is made tougher (more so that you are in a very advanced age, an octogenarian) after several well-placed Cabinet Ministers, they who once owe their allegiance to you, were quoted (coerced?) as denouncing you of unnerving the Government and interfering with their work.
The rounding up of these enslaved Cabinet Ministers looked as if they were part of a choir to warble denouncements in perfect harmony against you. ”Outraged backup singers” top it up by “conveniently” sending mail to the NST’s Letter to the Editor’s page to complement the hatchet job.
Then came that ridiculous conjecture that you would be ejected out of Umno, not that you don’t know how being expelled feels. Personally, I didn’t think the Umno supreme council had the balls and besides, they are not that stupid although they are capable of drowning in a bucket of water.
You can ruminate from the Kali-Brendan muckraking – Kali with his rambling New Sunday Times piece (NST June 11) and Brendan with his alphabetic assault (NST June 19) – that their vitriol was injected with the “Ebola spin treatment” and you know how vicious that virus can be.
Nevertheless, you have to expect the blunt opposition but if I know you well, you would expect your detractors to take you as a fool. I wouldn’t, not even in my sleep. The path to greatness are littered with discards the likes of Musa Hitam, Tengku Razaleigh Hamzah and Anwar Ibrahim; all falling ignominiously in the gutters of history after they thought that it was easier to take you on than it is to downsize Pas in Kelantan.
I sense the puppet master stringing Kali and the media may aspire to knock you down with the same confidence as your erstwhile rivals, otherwise why take the trouble of doing all the thinking for the Prime Minister.
But knowing you, you would sacrifice the pawns, bishops and knights first before you expose your invisible hand. Your over-exposed mouth is a different overture altogether.
So, I wait with unrelenting excitement at the outcome of this simmering powerplay, some days it quakes and some days it explodes, which I think will climax in a volcanic eruption or tempestuous tsunami at next year’s Umno elections.
For me, that would the political wet dream of this decade.
Sincerely,
Your long-time fan,
Bandit
Hey can I give my 2 sen. Reading about Kali and Brendan, I think you forgot to add Md Nor Yakob who gave the banking license to ECM Libra own by Kali.
ReplyDeleteSo is umno being run around by the 3 ....??
Is it ok to call a spade a spade?
You know the Malays have a long history with mamak and downfall. Malacca etc..