You can get the results at themalaysianinsider.
WHAT DO YOU THINK? WILL THIS TEAM BE ABLE TO TRANSFORM UMNO'S IMAGE AND MORE IMPORTANTLY SERVE THE PEOPLE?
I think one would be too foolish to assume that merely because the UMNO elections have ended and that the "delegates" have cast their choice, hence all is now well in UMNO. There are already a few new challenges that lay ahead DUE to this election itself - allegations of rampant money politics have dominated the assembly and even the outgoing UMNO Presiden alluded to this in his speech.
There is also a problem that UMNO (and in particular Najib) will face - will UMNO/he be able to "manage" those perceived to be "not above board"? The normal process is that the ones who are elected will be rewarded with ministerial posts almost automatically. To detract from this practice will require the will to make radical moves in the larger interest of the Nation and UMNO itself.
However, if Najib is still confined to dubious "conventions and practices" that had proven not to serve the survival of UMNO itself, then it will only accelerate the death of UMNO. It will be an exact case of "biar mati anak (UMNO), jangan mati adat".
In the light of the warning given by the UMNO Disciplinary Board earlier, even those elected cannot be comfortable that they have won - the Lembaga may just put a "spanner in their dreams" if they find evidence of ethical breaches.
To me the next 35 days is crucial to determine if UMNO really has "new firepower" to radically change and convince the People that, though it is a Malay-based party, it has what it takes to be the backbone of the Government of the People of Malaysia.
Good indicators will be how the new UMNO leadership will determine who makes up the election machinery in the upcoming by-elections. The other being - who will be elected as ministers, etc. Election of leaders based on "UMNO political compromises" may actually compromise its own chances of being relevant politically come the 13th General Elections.
PEACE !
3 comments:
Yesterday I gave an interview to Sarah Stewart, the Bureau Chief of AFP in Malaysia. Among the questions she asked me was the unavoidable question about the international scandal linking Dato’ Seri Najib Razak with the murder of Altantuya Sharibuu and with the purchase of the Scorpene submarines.
I told Sarah that in my long experience as a politician the only way to clear one’s name when a scandal has broken out around oneself is to meet it head on in the court of law. The BMF scandal of the 1980’s also had its share of lurid detail. There too a large sum of money and a murder was involved. An unseen hand had woven the threads of the story around me to destroy me politically. But when international newspapers alleged that I was involved in any wrongdoing, I took action against each and every one of them in their home jurisdictions.
I sued The Telegraph and The Sunday Times of the UK, and The South China Morning Post of Hong Kong. I won all three cases, the newspapers published unreserved apologies and printed retractions covering half a broadsheet page each, and I came away with a tidy sum of money for my trouble.
It is safe to say that in the international media, the incoming Umno President and the presumptive Prime Minister is being evaluated through the Altantuya scandal. The UK’s Sunday Times, the International Herald Tribune, the French daily, Libération, The Australian Financial Review, the Far Eastern Economic Review and the New York Times have all published stories raising questions about the link between the murdered young woman, Dato’ Seri Najib, and the gigantic commission paid out by the French company Armaris to a Malaysian company for the purchase of submarines. This is now an international story.
And this story will not go away. With its dramatic details and the alleged involvement of elite Malaysian government operatives, it captures the journalistic imagination. But the story is now connected with an ongoing investigation into the dealings of a major French company. The story is also going to stick around because it is a handy looking-glass into Malaysia’s “increasingly dysfunctional political system.” It implicates our entire system of government, our judiciary, and our press, and it casts a shadow on our ability as a nation to face and tell the truth. Against this backdrop promises of reform ring hollow. The storyline of the New York Times article, for example, is that scandal-clouded succession reveals a once confident young country shaken to its foundations by institutional rot. I cannot say this is inaccurate.
The scandal is bringing shame to the nation and damaging our international credibility. For the honour of the nation, for the honour of the office of prime minister, for the honour of the sovereign institutions expected to endorse, confirm and lend authority to him should he become prime minister according to Umno’s plans, Dato’ Seri Najib Tun Razak should finally face these suspicions and implied charges, submit himself to legal scrutiny, and come clean on them.
Swearing on the Al-Quran is not the way out. Scoundrels have been known to do that. The truth, established through the rigorous and public scrutiny of the law, is the only remedy if an untrue story has gained currency not just internationally but at home among a large section of the people.
Najib should voluntarily offer to testify at the trial of the two officers charged with killing Altantuya Sharibuu. He could also write to these newspapers and if necessary he should take legal action against them to clear his name and that of our country.
Written by razaleighhamzah
March 25, 2009 at 7:30 am
We fear that part of the effort to distract attention from the controversies surrounding his person, Najib may reenact the strategies of Mahathir Mohammad, and embark on a massive campaign of arrests and detentions without trial of prominent Pakatan Rakyat leaders within days of his swearing in.
By Tian Chua, Suara Keadilan
Malaysians view with great shock the signals that the incoming Najib Razak administration is giving to the general populace as he prepares to assume power.
The harsh clampdown on media freedoms and the right to assemble this last week alone suggest that severe repressive measures may be the hallmark of Najib’s ascendancy to the premiereship.
His comparison of our current situation to the post 1969 era foreshadows a return to the policies of both Dr. Mahathir Mohammad, and his father Tun Abdul Razak who imposed Emergency rule on Malaysia.
Hishamuddin Hussein specifically targeted Opposition Leader Anwar Ibrahim in his speech, demonising him and making veiled allusions to entrapment and imprisonment, seemingly laying the ground for a wave of mass arrests such as was seen in Operasi Lalang.
This last week the newspapers of two opposition political parties were suspended without any plausible reason by the Home Ministry - a move which undoubtedly smacks of an intention to silence the legitimate voices of Malaysians who do not see eye to eye with the powers that be.
On a more visceral level, the heavy handed actions of the police in breaking up to Pakatan Rakyat political rallies in Bukit Selambau and Bukit Gantang have shown that Najib is perfectly willing to cause grevious physical harm to Malaysian citizens merely to ensure that they do not get the opportunity to hear opposing views and decide the truth for themselves.
Distracting attention from Altantuya
International media reports have increasingly put Najib in a bad light, raising burning and as of yet unanswered questions about his involvement in the murder of Mongolian national Altantuya as well as the connected payment of hundreds of millions of dollars in commissions for shady arms deals.
It is shameful that the designated Prime Minister of Malaysia would have to face such scandals in the eyes of the international community.
We fear that part of the effort to distract attention from the controversies surrounding his person, Najib may reenact the strategies of Mahathir Mohammad, and embark on a massive campaign of arrests and detentions without trial of prominent Pakatan Rakyat leaders within days of his swearing in.
[Tian Chua is a Pakatan Rakyat leader and MP for Batu. He is also information chief of KeADILan.]
REUTERS
Najib Razak, who is set to be Malaysia's sixth prime minister, has been in parliament for over 30 years, yet outside of a close coterie of friends and family he is an enigma.
On Thursday, the 55-year old who is the son of Malaysia's second premier is to be endorsed as the leader of the United Malays National Organisation, the main party in the National Front coalition that has ruled the country for 51 years. The position effectively guarantees him leadership of the country as well.
Although Najib trained as an economist at a British university, he has little direct experience of economic management. He has held the defence and education portfolios as well as his current posts of deputy prime minister and finance minister.
"Najib is the most known unknown," said Bridget Welsh, a Malaysia specialist at Johns Hopkins University in the U.S. He has promised to use the current global economic downturn to boost the Southeast Asian country up the economic value chain and to liberalise services, reduce dependence on commodities and oil exports as well as low-end electronics.
He has however provided few clues on how he can do that in an economy that relies on millions of cheap immigrant labourers to produce electronics that account for nearly 40 percent of the country's exports. Whether he can do that in a country of 27 million people that imprisons people without trial, divides on racial lines and with a ruling coalition that is still wounded from its worst ever election losses at national and state level a year ago is also moot.
He has been labelled as a hardliner by Malaysia's opposition which cites recent sedition charges against one of its lawmakers, a ban on their newspapers and pressure on opposition-supporting websites as evidence of a coming crackdown.
Najib initially appeared to promise action to end economic and social privileges for the 60 percent of the population that is Malay and that have been criticised for nurturing corruption and hampering economic growth.
But he recently backed off any "drastic" move. In his previous ministerial posts he spent lavishly and as finance minister unveiled Malaysia's biggest ever budget spend of 60 billion ringgit to help stave off recession and layoffs in an economy that is the third most dependent on exports in Asia after Hong Kong and Singapore.
AN ABLE ADMINISTRATOR, BUT CAN HE FIGHT? The composition of the budget spending showed caution. Only 15-17 billion ringgit was new government spending, the rest came from various investment funds and bank guarantees. That measure was criticised by some economists for lack of transparency or impact, but it cannily preserved Malaysia's credit rating and cash for a prolonged downturn where more firepower may be needed as government revenues slide. Najib is said by people who work for him to have a strong appetite for detail and he is also popular with his staff.
Married for a second time, Najib has five children and plays golf with close political allies from Malaysia's elite and has close links to business, including his brother who heads Malaysia's second largest bank, CIMB. Najib has taken his time to get to the top job, perhaps learning lessons from the fall of former deputy PM Anwar Ibrahim who was over eager in his bid to oust then-prime minister Mahathir Mohamad and ended up out of government and in jail. Some say that while Najib is good at details he lacks the capacity for decisive action.
Mahathir, who led the country for 22 years and is still an influential force, damned him with faint praise in a recent interview with Reuters, although much of his anger was reserved for incumbent Abdullah Ahmad Basawi who succeeded him. "Najib can do well, but we will have to see, because when I asked Abdullah to appoint him as deputy I had a lot of hope for him, but he did not perform the way I expected," Mahathir said.
There are also issues of character. Najib has been mauled on opposition-supporting internet sites that have linked him to the lurid murder of a Mongolian model, although there has been no evidence and Najib has repeatedly denied involvement.
Nonetheless it provides a rallying point for the opposition and any in UMNO who may wish to attack Najib's suitability to be prime minister. Those attacks are in public and becoming more intense, with an opposition legislator recently being banned from parliament for shouting "murderer" at Najib.
The honeymoon for Najib will be short, with one parliamentary by-election and two state seat by-elections on April 7. "Throughout his political career, Najib has never had to fight like this before," said political analyst Ong Kian Ming.
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