But the National Front is caught: the women senators brought the denigration of their sex to their notice at the last possible moment. The Lower House of Parliament had passed the Islamic Laws bill in September, so it thought it would bee too in the Senate. As it happened, three cabinet ministers were called in to sort the matter out. Finally the bill was passed after a promise was extracted to have it amended soon. All it needs to shake up an organisation like the National Front is an individual. It blinked when the former deputy prime minister, Dato' Seri Anwar Ibrahim, raised the banner of revolt after he was beaten to a pulp by the Inspector-General of Police. It has been downhill ever since.

But it still does not explain how Mr Khairy got his money. His father-in-law encouraged transparence, but the man does not believe in it. He got a PPE (politics, philosophy, economics) from Oxford and took a masters elsewhere for the Oxford degree was not good enough. He knew how to marry well. He was squiring Dato' Seri Anwar Ibrahim' s daughter, but switched attentions to Pak Lah's daughter, and married her. when the former deputy prime minister was arrested. There is talk of Dato' Seri Anwar would rejoin UMNO. But that is unlikely. UMNO politicis would not allow it. He had risen to the top the first time around, by discarding those whose backs he used to be deputy prime minister. When he was arrested, others moved in in the vacuum, and would have to vacate if that happened.

THE NATIONAL FRONT IS NOT absolutely in power as it thinks it is. It is true it has two thirds or more in parliament and 12 of the 13 state assemblies. but it keeps looking over its shoulders before it does any legislation. First it was the reformasi crowd, which was formed in the wake of Dato' Seri Anwar Ibrahim's dismissal as deputy prime minister and UMNO's deputy president and expulsion from UMNO. The National Front, in reality UMNO, the Malay party which controls the non-Malay parties in the front, at first did what it wanted. The other leaders of the National Front would do whatever it asked, whether right or wrong and did not care if the move affected the parties and communities they allegedly led, so long as it remained in the Cabinet. The National Front bypassed Parliament, and the state assemblies in the states they controlled, did not believe in getting them involved unless it, usually UMNO, wanted their support. It did not believe in consultation or approval. They had absolute majority in most cases. They introduced the New Economic Policy, to give the Malays a leg up in business while they held the political power to which the non-Malay party leaders, in the cabinet, agreed. The laws were passed in parliament and the state assembies, with the non- Malays and non-Muslims voting even if the law affected their members.

The National Front government saw this has a hot potato. More than one cabinet minister was roped in to quell the revolt, which got the women senators from government and the opposition PAS together. They drafted a letter to the Prime Minister, whose department had initiated the bill, requesting that it be withdrawn. It would not, if the political position of Dato' Seri Nazri Aziz is any guide. It would also restrict the government's hands in future. The non-Islamic parties in the National Front does not want to get involved, and will be thrown by the wayside in this. But the National Front has realised that it cannot have its way in parliament even if it controls most of the seats. It has dissensions within it - those who do not support the ruling group; those that support Tun Mahathir Mohamed, the former prime minister; those who support Tengku Razaleigh, the former finance minister; those that support Dato' Seri Anwar Ibrahim, the former deputy prime minister who is in the opposition. It has already seen Islam Hadhari, which is Pak Lah's version of Islam, to the sidelines when PAS is around. Now it is the women from the National Front who has caused Pak Lah to be careful of his legislative plans. He has ensured that the whip will allow the senate to pass the bill. But it would be like telling the Yang Di Pertuan Agung not to address a function he had agreed to. In this revolt by the National Front women senators, it loses whether it succeds in the senate passing the bill or not. The government would have to make its plans carefully and with consultation.

The independent Election Commission is around to ensure the continued dominance of Malay power, not to oversee free elections. Tan Sri Abdul Rashid, said so when he met Keadilan party officials about four years ago. He said in effect that his organisation is around to see that Malays will hold power until kingdom come, and his job is to see that happen. In the Malay Dominance that even Malays deny exists, the role of the Election Commission is to see that UMNO will always be in power. It has taken the current UMNO thinking that Malay=Islam=UMNO Malay. In the 2004 UMNO Youth assembly, a resolution said anyone who left UMNO is a 'traitor to UMNO and a traitor to the Malay race. The resolution was meant to affect Dato' Seri Anwar Ibrahim, but also included in it were the founding father of UMNO, who died a Party Negara leader, Dato' Sir Onn Jaffar; his son, Tun Hussein Onn, who was Malaysia's third prime miniser and father of the UMNO Youth leader; and Tengku Abdul Rahman, Malaysia's first prime minister. This was pointed out and hastily withdrawn. Otherwise, UMNO would also have been forced to remove their portraits from its headquarters.

THE MALAYSIAN GOVERNMENT IS in disarray. It tries to do what it can, but not what it should. It now takes what it must to divert attention. The Malaysian home minister, Dato' Azmi Khalid, has apologised to Beijing on his arrival there. He went in secret after that telling the press he could go on December 20, postponed after China was not informed of the visit. But the issue of the nude Chinese woman doing an illegal ear squat affects Chinese tourists as well as Malaysians. China does not allow its tourists into Malaysia because government agencies and authorities mistreat its citizens. An MMS videoclip, taken by a policeman probably for enjoyment, has spread like wildfire. The government tried denying, in various ways, that it mistreats tourists. But this is standard police procedure for any woman asked to go to a police station for, for example, leaving her passport at home. Malaysian women - housewives, who believe the former deputy prime minister, Dato' Anwar Ibrahim, students, illtreated over the years - confirm that they had also been asked by the police to undress and do the ear squat. The lock-up rules do not allow illtreating anyone the police had arrested, but the police justify it because the women might be carrying drugs on their person. The MMS videoclip has gone around the world. The official explations to show that the nude woman ear squat did not happen are not believed. It has become a Chinese issue, and even the non-Malay parties in the National Front has commented on it to the detriment of the government. The government accuses the Chinese, Indian and other non-Malays to be racist because they do not support it. Multiracialism in Malaysia means the races would eat together on racial celebrations. At other times, the races go their separate ways. There is nothing in common among the Malay, the Indian, the Chinese and others, who live their separate lives, often oblivious of the others. The government does not understand this. Its education policy, at best aimed at Malay as the language for all. ignores this trend and forces the races to teach, for instance, science and mathematics in English. If a Malaysian does not support Malay, he will be a fish out of water in a government department.

It is a fact that tourists from Asia and Africa are harassed. That to officialdom does not matter since the citizen in this country is also harassed. The nude 'ear squats' by women is not new. Police use it regularly to harass non-Caucasian tourists, and those it perceives are the enemy of government. Whatever the authorities say, it does exist. Malaysians and tourists have stepped forward to say they have been victims in the past. The authorities admit the police does it. It has set up a commission of inquiry, but they have refused to have on it opposition MPs, those who have a contrary view, and it comes after a royal commission of inquiry which showed the police could not be trusted. It had denied until it said in its report that the former deputy prime minister, Dato' Anwar Ibrahim, had been beaten to a pulp by the then Inspector-General of Police, Tan Sri Rahim Noor. The present crisis is not discussed in Parliament. It wants to resolve it in such a way it is exculpated. The authorities' attitude is that it is alone against the world. They have in the past harassed the public and they had taken courage that the public had kept quiet. The public is only to elect in the National Front so that it could harrass or sideline them. That is evident in Pengkalen Pasir, where two receipts are distributed to show the BN Bilek Gerakan (operations centre). This has not been denied, but it is investigating who bought the drinks which is giving the National Front a bad name. A small version of that happens in Kuala Lumpur about Chinese tourists not visiting Malaysia!

But that view has led to Chinese and Indians, whether foreigners or Malaysian, being treated as they are. The female nude ear squat is not limited to Chinese tourists. A few days ago, a Malay woman who protested against the treatment meted out to former deputy prime minister Dato' Seri Anwar Ibrahim was stripped naked and made to do the ear squat. The government instead of investigating the incident has accused her of waiting five years before she came public. It is suggested that she is lying. As they imply the Chinese tourists, who have told newspapers about their treatment by police and immigration in China, are. But this only gets more news coverage and the issue cannot be solved. Governments the world over has forgotten that its citizens have access the internet and reading what is on it gives a different perspective to the public relations writing of the mainstream newspapers. The writers will get their dato'ships for not rocking the National Front. But these newspapers report what it would not normally. Nothing gets in these newspapers without government sanction, and so the reports are regarded by China as government- inspired. The Malaysian officials believe the same thing about China for the newspapers there. So why should not China think the same of Malaysian newspapers?

But the Malaysian government is not serious in resolving the issue. Not yet. There is yet a statement to say it is. It is bothered that it has been caught out. The former deputy prime, Dato' Seri Anwar Ibrahim, was beaten to a pulp - by the Inspector-General, no less - but the police denied it until a commission of inquiry brought out the truth. If a man so high could be brutalised by the police, and no one knew about it until public pressure brought the truth, then what about the many cases involving Malaysians, and those without clout. Police brutality is common throughout the world. Malaysia is no exception. Movies from India, regularly shown on Astro and the cinemas, regularly show police brutality and the police in India does not say it is wrongly characterised. The California policeman involved in the assault of Rodney King did not admit until public pressure forced them to. Police brutality in the Middle East is so common that even the United States sends its prisoners for 'softening up'. What is the difference between a woman in Abu Ghraib prison telling Iraqis to strip and perform sexual acts on each other and the naked woman doing ear squats in Petaling Jaya headquarters?

If I am a 'dangerous' person, why do people in authority see me? Most of these people see me in secret, often late at night, - for being seen with me is dangerous to their safety - and they give me information that may or may not see the light of day. I am not as active after my strokes, but I do move around if I can persuade my sons or a friend to take me around. That was how I was at Dato' Seri Sanusi Junid's, and Dato' Seri Anwar Ibrahim's, houses for their Hari Raya gathering. The two men, who have known each other for more than 30 years, are in different camps now and cannot bear the sight of each other, but they know that what one tells me the other would not know. I do not follow the current fad of reporting what a man says. I always ask him whether I can quote him for particular views, before leaving. I did that yesterday (27 November 2005) with Dato' Seri Anwar Ibrahim, but I did not use the quote. I am interested in what is happening, not who said what. The sources are happy to talk to me knowing that I would not quote them except with permission. Often I will not. I rarely have an interview with my sources for publication, usually a discussion.

THERE IS EMBARASSED FACES in the Police as the Prime Minister has ordered an investigation of how a naked woman came to do the ear squat in a police cell. The Deputy IGP, Dato' Musa Hassa, however, wants to find out how the MMS videoclip came to be taken. He has eaten his words now that Pak Lah had said the incident must be investigated. If the former deputy prime minister, Dato' Seri Anwar Ibrahim, could be beaten to a pulp by no less than the then IGP, Dato' Rahim Noor, what about the ordinary man in the street? Dato' Rahim Noor justified beating Dato' Seri Anwar because the latter, trussed up, had hurled the word 'anjing' for beating him up. It seems standard procedure for the Police to beat up a suspect. What is worse is that Dato' Seri Anwar was arrested and beaten up because he was on the wrong side of the then Prime Minister, Tun Mahathir. Dato' Musa Hassan is promoted to his present post so that he could forestall Dato' Seri Anwar on his political comeback, that he was to stop Dato' Seri Anwar from rejoining UMNO, whose deputy president he once was. If high ranking Malaysians are treated badly by the Police, then what hope is there for a visiting tourist who is not Caucasian. Caucasian troops are treated gingerly, but they do not bring enough money. Depending on them alone will not fill the hotels and faciliies here. The rich Chinese would.

But UMNO has been sailing into the sunset long before Dato' Abdullah Ahmad Badawi (Pak Lah) took over as prime minister two years ago. He strengthened his position by winning the general election last year. But he is more interested in keeping UMNO together as he is challenged by warlords in the party, and reluctant to even reshuffle the cabinet he inherited from Tun Mahathir for fear that those dropped would go against him, especially in the 2007 party elections. He is more worried about UMNO than general elections, a trait his predecessor also showed. He is unsure of himself, and there is talk in Kuala Lumpur that he will bring Dato' Seri Anwar Ibrahim into UMNO - one stone he hopes would kill his two major political enemies, Dato' Seri Najib and his predecessor, Tun Mahathir Mohamed. It was Tun Mahathir who sacked Dato' Seri Anwar as deputy prime minister for committing sodomy but would not appear in court to justify it. No one has asked if Dato' Anwar would rejoin UMNO, from which he was expelled. He is not even a member of Parti Keadilan or its successor, Parti Keadilan Rakyat (PKR), former after its amalgamation with Parti Rakyat Malaysia, although his wife, Datin Seri Wan Aziz binti Dato Wan Ismail, is president. He has since said in press releases that he would rather join the opposition. The scuttlebutt in Kuala Lumpur is that he would join PAS and be its president before the next general election.

Pak Lah's government is becoming unstuck again. Ministers make contradictory statements on government policy. It was like this in Tun Hussein's time as prime minister. Both Tun Hussein and Pak Lah run governments over which they seem to have no control. In both cases, a hidden hand is or was responsible. Tun Hussein was in control of his government, but was slow in making his mind, but once he had made up his mind, nothing could shake him. But the time he took was over long, and into this vacuum came the hidden hand. The challenge to his UMNO presidency in 1978 by Dato' Sri Anwar Ibrahim's maternal uncle and an old UMNO hand, Dato' Sulaiman Palestine, put paid to him as prime minister and was only three more years at the job. Similarly, a hidden hand is orchestrating events now so that Pak Lah will turn belly up. He lives in his own world, he depends heavily on his son-in-law and daughter, and the civil service is generally against him. When he should have entered in the fray and took action, he keeps quiet or is overseas, and peole in their thirties. The ministers state government policy at cross purposes. The government services work against government policy. Chinese tourists would not come here even if Mr Hu Jintao is friendly to Pak Lah in Busan. The Chinese leader knows what he and his government should do when fellow Chinese are harassed in foreign countries. The Chinese government has taken a leaf out of its past. It had told the Malaysian government in 1974, when Tun Razak visited China, that it relations with the government of Malaysia will be at one level, and that of the Communist Party and the people of Malaysia is at another level. And this policy is now bleeding Malaysia, whether it likes or not.

Press conferences by the prime minister and others are in English when it matters overseas. They also address foreign and local conferences in English. Why can't they speak in Malay? Malaysian officals are more concerned that the English newspapers and media are censored, while the Malay, Chinese and Tamil papers are not. In Thailand, it is the other way around. The English papers are allowed to report as its likes, so the reporters fill in the requirements of a theoretical free press. But the Thai papers are not. Today, the government of Mr Thaksin Shinawatre has problems with the press, because the Thai newspapers object to being under a tight leash. In Thailand, the government knows which language press it must control. It is so in many countries. But not in Malaysia. It is the other way around. Civil servants readly the English papers, and they wait for summaries of the language press sent hours or even a day late. The English media knows which side their bread is buttered, and smartly follow what is expected of them. An ambassador from a Central Asian state spoke only French; he was laughed at by Malaysian officials. But he is a high official in his country today. Those who studied in this country since the May 13 racial riot studied in Malay. The universities from about 1982 were in Malay, but it is the English- educated who gets the preference in all facets of Malaysian life. So the well heeled, and the politicians sent their children to English schools and universities. Even Dato' Seri Anwar Ibrahim, a former minister of education but now expelled from UMNO, has sent his children to schools in the United States. But he is not the only minister of education to send his children overseas. We even have Oxbridge graduates who think they know the Malay-speaking rural folk,

IF THE MAYOR HAS been defamed in a book, he should have taken the author to court. Instead, the police showed they could do as they liked, decided that defamining the mayor was a threat to national security, began investigating two senior City Hall officials and the author, and jailed them for about a week - like common criminals. They should have done so after the mayor has won his action in court, if he dared take it. Even then, the police acting, as they have done, is illegal. They were illegal in arresting the former deputy prime minister, Dato' Seri Anwar Ibrahim, and the criminal case against him, for which he spent time in jail, is illegal. The then Inspector General of Police, no less, have apologised for beating him up and so have several people. Unless of course the government tells us clearly, and passes the required legislation, that it is an offence to defame either politicians or civil servants. That law would create problems on the ground, where it would be resisted, rightly. But because of the government in full control, with no opposition in sight, it do as it liked. The mayor is attacked because although he is a favoured civil servant, he should not have been appointed. The government is trying to cut dissent in the civil service, and uses the police to stop it. The book, in Malay, which upset the government writes of the newly appointed mayor's sexual affairs. He has not denied the allegations. Nor has he filed a defamation suit against the author of the book. So, who authorised the police to act as it did? Pak Lah must act against these man who lodged the police report, and the police for having harassed the author and the two senior City Hall officers. Since he is responsible for what happens in the government, he must take responsibility. He cannot act as his predecessor, Tun Mahathir, by repeating the allegations after he refuses to prove the allegations in the Anwar Ibrahim trials. He is now facing a defamation action by Dato' Seri Anwar for repeating the sodomy allegation after he has been cleared by the courts. But has he been investigated by the police? Why not? Is he lower in rank than the mayor of City Hall? Pak Lah cannot act as he pleases. He should have had the police investigate the former prime minister. What has not the police treated him as he treated the author and the senior City Hall officials?

Another factor making the American invader having a rough time is Saddam Hussein's trial. The man is behaving not as the United States expected, and his trial, with his principled stand, will give the Sunni and the Iraqi vicarious victory. The United States is now talking of shifting the trial to another Middle Eastern country. If it does that, he, and the Iraqi nationalist and Sunni has won. The United States, faced with an insurgency that has no end is now faced with the fallout of the Saddam trial and gowing US public reaction against the war. You cannot run an empire on other people's money. But that is what the United States is doing. Its only product is money, and so it allowed US companies to hive off its manufacturing to cheaper Asian countries. The public was kept quiet for a while, but it lost the jobs as a result. Now, President Bush and the neocons are in trouble with his own Republican Party over the war in Iraq. The smoking gun is in the closet of the highest offical, and he would be forced to pull back the troops in Iraq before the next election. Vice President Cheney is implicated, and would have to resign to save the president. But unlike Vietnam, the United States has gone to war on terror with a Muslim country, and blamed Al Qaeda for it, and has made plans to get rid of the Saudi monarchy. I think he would not be allowed to, for local reasons, as he does not want to invade Syria over the Hariri assassination. He hopes the IAEC will rein in Iran on its nuclear plans. But the IAEC is discredited, although it has won the Nobel Peace Prize. The United States has manouevred it such that he got it. But it has to fight its battle in Iraq, with or without troops, for it has started a battle with no end in sight. The United States undersecretary for public diplomacy, Mrs Karen Hughes, visited Muslim nations to get these countries over, and her record is patchy at best. In Malaysia, the newspapers sang in praise of her visit and her results, but would the National Front go against the war in Iraq? It would not. The National Front cannot be against the war on Iraq, knows full well that the people are with Al Qaeda in this war on terror. Pak Lah is chairman of the Organisation of Islam Countries, but he is in the minority in supporting the United States. His attempt to get Dato' Seri Anwar Ibrahim to the chairmanship of a Muslim fund of nearly a billion US dollars came to nought. All Muslim countries now supporting the United States in this war on Iraq must eventually change sides, or its Muslim street would not let it alone.

The New Straits Times today takes the people to task for suggesting that the former deputy prime minister, Tun Ghaffar Baba, 80, had died. He has been in ICU at Pantai Hospital, and critically ill. The Prime Minister and others had paid their respects to him. He is not allowed visitors. But the preparations to have him transferred to a hospital in England caused that rumours. I had not met him since my strokes, and he looked unwell then. He had grown too fat, and he appeared to lose his memory now and then. He was defeated as deputy president of UMNO, and therefore deputy prime minister, by Dato' Seri Anwar Ibrahim, later sacked by the prime minister of the day, Tun Mahathir, and retired when he lost. He has been out of the public eye since. He has been ignored by officialdom, especially since he was critical of some of the government policies, and not afraid to say so. The people I saw at his house in Bangsar were ordinary people. It is not giving the latest on a bigwig in retirement that is the problem. The people do not have ill intent. They spread rumours because official information is sparse. He has been in hospital for more than a month, but has any information been released? He may be a nobody today, but he was a somebody less than ten years ago. The rumours would not have spread if officials had given adequate information. The suggestion that the people deliberately gave out false information is not true. When they have to depend on rumours that later turn out to be true, they listen, and spread, rumours. They have no compunction in spreading it because the official media, and those close to the National Front, did not, or spread lies. Many of the news reports are in fact self-serving to the government, and often detrimental to the people.

Despite what those in power say, the ability to govern is not one of them. When UMNO took office in elections in 1955, everyone in power was inexperienced. They mananged. Today they are in power. To use the argument that they alone have the right to rule is unjustified. They know it in their hearts that it is wrong, but they say it nevertheless, for that is how they stay in power. UMNO or rather the National Front remains in power because the opposition is fractured. Those who leave the party to the opposition do not mount a challenge that will shake the National Front. Until Dato' Seri Anwar arrived on the scene. I do not think he can return to UMNO in the coming years. The last I heard is that he will head a opposition coalition to UMNO. He draws great crowds, is well in Middle Eastern governments, has the charisma of leaders and could well make a non-UMNO prime minister. He is the first politician to be a credible leader who can defeat UMNO. He does not have a political party yet, but he would get one when his legal disability to take part in politics disappears in 2008. He can ask for a pardon, but he would not since he says he is innocent of the charges for which he spent years in jail.

This should have put Malaysia in a good light in southern Thailand. But it does not. The southern Thai Malay leadership, now Islamic, does not trust the Malaysians. They see themselves as Kashmir in the conflict between India and Pakistan: an independent state. With petroleum on its land and in the Gulf of Thailand adjoining it, with help from the Islamic states, it slowly rejects Malaysia and the president of the Organisation of Malay States, Pak Lah. The Turkish Prime Minister, Mr Erdogan, rejected Pak Lah's entreaties to him not to appoint Anwar Ibrahim on the board of an Islamic fund. As Malaysian Prime Minister and as chairman of the OIC, he is not able to prevent a Malaysian Muslim to the fund which handles millions of US dollars. Now he has lost his clout with the souhern Thai Muslims! It is time for Malaysians (not Malays!) to put their heads together what ails this country. It has to cut losses, and chart a deliberate and definite course of action. It would not be gained by its foreign minister, for whatever reasons, going public on a tit-for-tat with Thailand. And it has lost southern Thailand.

That would not depend on Dato' Seri Anwar Ibrahim. He remains Malaysia's great crowd puller. He has threatened to sue Tun Mahathir for continuing to insist after the courts had decided otherwise that the Dato' Seri is a homosexual. Tun Mahathir sees his edifice, in politics and in building, collapsing within years of his leaving office. Pak Lah would like to see Dato' Seri Anwar in UMNO, but the latter would not join UMNO unless he gets a free pardon, for which he would not apply. In any case, his foray into politics ends in 2008. He has said he would not join UMNO, but be head of an opposition coalition. But many politicians in opposition think he would not miss a chance to be in UMNO. It is still politics at the top. The decisions are made without reference to the people, who will not be bothered with political chances so long as they have 24-hour television to while away their time. It is a cynical move by the politicians to keep the people quiet, and they would be aroused to anger only if their favourite television shows are missing from the screen. But there are people who do no like to be chained to their television sets, like idiots, and question the politicians about their stewardship. In Malaysia, the youth will take the initiative. So far, they keep quiet but are not quiescent. They have retained the moral fibre their parents lost. Pak Lah represents the parents. And his governance would soon be forgotten, as would UMNO.

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