Category: Idiot Overlords

I sometimes wonder what has happened to the standards of journalism in the country. When lies are perpetrated and continue to be promoted by the main-stream newspapers, I wonder if they should be sued for disseminating mis-information.

Some noise was recently made about a sub-race requirement in university application forms. According to TheStar:

The application form was available at the UPU website http://upu.mohe.gov.my and applicants were required to fill up the “race” column and indicate their sub-race or dialect group under the sub-divisions column.

Applications had closed on April 4.

For example, under the Indian category, there are eight sub-divisions: Malayalee, Punjabi, Sikh, Tamil, Telegu, Malabari, Indian Muslim and Orissa.

Malays are sub-divided into Bugis, Boyan, Banjar, Jawa, Jawi Pekan and Minangkabau.

The Chinese, meanwhile, are sub-divided into Cantonese, Foochow, Hainanese, Henghua, Hokchia, Hokchiu, Hokkien, Khek (Hakka), Kwongsai, Teochew, Kongfoo and Hylam while the sub-divisions for the Orang Asli include Negrito, Semai, Semalai, Temiar, Senoi and Penan.

“The information is required because the ministry needs to tally it with the data at the NRD to check their citizenship status when processing the applications,” said Higher Education Ministry management of student admission division principal assistant director Rosmin Md. Amin.

What a shit-load of LIES!

Any Malaysian with brains will know that this is bull. The excuse given does not hold muster, even under a cursory examination. I would like to ask how they plan to check this against the NRD when the NRD does not even collect that information. The only information that the NRD collects in their forms is keturunan (ethnicity/race).

Please, do not believe me. Go download the forms from the NRD yourself and check to see if they collect the information. I have checked the MyKAD application form, the MyKID application form, and even the birth-certificate form.

As an Assistant Registrar for the SPR, I have seen hundreds of ICs in the country. Sometimes, I have to read the contents off the MyKAD chip because the person may not know what is the official information inside. I have yet to see someone claim to be a Chindian. We all invariably fall into one of the ‘official’ races in Malaysia.

NADA. I call your bluff.

I challenge TheStar to actually verify the information that they are given. All they needed to do is to call up the NRD to find out where such sub-race details are actually captured correctly. Otherwise, they have just been fed a shit-load of LIES by the Ministry and it is their duty as journalists to point it out.

Why can’t they even do the simplest thing. Sheesh!

Courtesy of Al-Jazeera – the most international news channel today.

We love our sales! Malaysia must be the only country in the world where we have mega-sales for police fines. Our government has extended the deadline for the 50% discounts on all traffic fines till the 10th of March. I felt odd that I had not received any fines since 2004 but after checking, found out that I had two out-standing fines in my name.

So, I duly went to pay up my fine today. However, I would not even have known about this if people did not make such a fuss about the first dead-line. Then, I found out that our government is planning to implement a system where fines will be given an automatic discount if paid up early but will incur a heavier fine if paid late.

Now, that’s sounds like a good system as it encourages people to pay up early, which is fine until you realise that one does not know that they have received a fine, sometimes for years. Like in this case, I did not know that I had been fined until I actually checked. This means that I would have to pro-actively check on my status regularly. In other words, I need to presume that I am guilty unless proven otherwise.

I hope that the police work out a system of immediately informing someone if they get fined. That way, this system would be fair. Otherwise, people are going to get penalised for police tardiness.

A lot can be said about the recent UM elections but I found it interesting that the Pro-Mahasiswa made a sweep and now owns UM student politics. It is generally accepted that these anti-establishment student representatives are opposition-aligned and may even get tacit approval from certain politicians.

I found this interesting because campus elections serve as an indicator of future voting trends. One must remember that by the time these students graduate from university, they would already be qualified to vote as long as they signed up as one.

It is generally accepted that the younger generation are opposition aligned and anti-establishment. It could be an extension of teen rebellion on the one hand. So, it will be interesting to see how things go in the other universities.

Interesting indeed.

According to the BBC, “Malaysia has stepped up a campaign to stop Muslims celebrating Valentine’s Day – labelling it a ‘trap’ that could encourage immoral behaviour.”

On one hand, I think that it is silly to suggest that Valentine’s Day is a western celebration and has Christian connotations. I think that it is silly because it is more a Pagan celebration that got hijacked by Christians than it is an actual Christian celebration.

However, on the other hand, I do agree that V’day is a trap – a commercial one!