The airport's argument is that these fellows are not doing enough to drum up business. They should have promotional offers to attract customers. The Malaysian Airport Berhad insists that although fewer passengers use KLIA, the MAB is a hive of activity and retailers have nothing to complain about. Times are difficult in Singapore, Hong Kong, Zurich, Heathrow, JFK, but not in Malaysia or KLIA, so why do these ungrateful retailers grumble about the rent? The MAB says they should make a profit, and they had better! But KLIA is more a feeder airport for Singapore than a regional transport hub. It is cheaper now to drive, even with the usurious tolls the bankrupt highway toll operators charge, to Singapore than take a plane there. With the economy in the doldrums everywhere in the region than in Bolehland, far few take the plane for the weekend in Kuala Lumpur from Changi. If they do, they do come to shop at the airport's stalls.

The UMNO youth small fry, Dr Adham Baba, stumbled on an earth-shaking discovery: lecturers in local universities poison the minds of undergraduates regularly with ten-minute anti-government homilies. These undergraduates are so dim between the ears, he implies, that they are easily misled. He wants to expose these anti-national lecturers. He does not have the evidence. But in Bolehland you do not need it to run your enemy out of town. He realises he has taken more than he dared. So, now he wants to collect the evidence. He says lectures set aside ten minutes of an hour lecture to attack the government. It was so striking a discovery that even vice-chancellors are grateful beyond relief.

So, Malaysia stands at the edge of a financial precipice. And postpones the inevitable by these frequent exhortations of fiscal probity amidst huge reserves other countries can only drool over. This somehow jars from the reality, with governance and leadership non-existent, and ministers, from the prime minister down, there to hector and scolds amidst national castle-building-in-the-air. In makebelieve Bolehland, the Petronas buying Sepang F-1 Circuit is as relevant as Malaysia's first Nobel Prize winner by 2020. Neither can be justified. But newspapers must fill space, the government should not look stupid or idiotic or seen to be run by nimcompoops, even if it is. So, it is gravely announced that Petronas is in talks to acquire the Sepang F-1 Circuit from a reluctant MAHB. And since the North-South Highway is running at a loss, it no doubt gives Petronas the "strategic advantages and synergies" it is told it desperately needs.

A berriboned Legal Profession Qualifying Board could not detect, or ignored, the corruption in its offices. It stonewalled all attempts to address the complaints since the Certificate of Legal Practice was introduced in 1984 for those who did not acquire their law degrees locally. When the Malay Mail got copies of its examination papers well before the date, the LPQB ignored them until it could no longer. But it would not go away. There is, in Bolehland, no smoke without fire. The LPQB then reacted in fright, haste and embarrassment, and decided only to ensure the CLP examinations should never be given the status it has. The director himself is now arrested, the shenanigans in the marking now admitted, while refusing to have the papers remarked. It puts conditions and shuts the door not in the interest of natural justice and equity, but to hope that by doing so the furore would die down.

On another front, officials move at blinding speed. Haste in Bolehland, it seems, is the only yardstick for efficiency. The LPQB chairman and Attorney-General, Datin Seri Ainum Mohamed Said, has written her report, which she hands in piece meal to the de facto law minister, Dato' Seri Rais Yatim. The report would be ready by the weekend, and Dato' Seri Rais would no doubt have his ready for next Wednesday's cabinet meeting! And, of course, he now agrees, the CLP examination must be modified to make it more "transparent, effective and responsible". Was it not why the berriboned board was set up? Datin Seri Ainum has a month before her resignation takes effect. She must be asked, as the DAP chairman, Mr Lim Kit Siang suggests, to remain until this mess is sorted out. What is frighting about this sordid episode is that no one in authorities seems the least bothered at what had happened. Nothing they have done suggests it.

Parliament has not passed the budget, but the ten-sen more tax per litre of diesel forced prices up so suddenly that the government scurries for cover. The finance ministry yesterday revoked it. It is unconstitutional, since a tax Parliament discusses in the budget should only be withdrawn in that House. But the government is caught with its pants down. Cabinet ministers, from the Prime Minister down, said it should not lead to high prices. In fact, they forbade it. King Canute could not turn the waves back, but in Bolehland, even the most ineffective cabinet ministers believes that is his birthright. Malaysian businessmen, on the other hand, deem it their birthright to defy any tax they deem wrong.

The Attorney-General, Datin Ainum Mohamed Said, first went on leave for one-month, which later became two. There is nothing unusual about it, except that it was not announced. When officials go on leave without any announcement for as long as this, Bolehland's favourite news agency, Rumour, fills in the silence of the official media. At first sight, when I first heard of it last night, after a friend of her's called me, I did not know about the leave or the rumour that she was under investigation.

Bolehland has one undeniable function: make life as difficult for the consumer with a panopoly of technological refinements. It does not matter what the product is, it is to make you, the consumer, in the end, to be as angry and frustrated as anyone could. Whether it is to draw money from your account at the bank through ATM cards, train tickets, or means to automatically pay your highway tolls, the promised ease soon is an illusion. We have the Internet, but try to top up your account, and see how frustrated you become. It does not matter if you sign up with Jaring or TMNet, the ease you get for embracing it must be paid for at some time or other; anyone who is happy with the system should not be allowed to stay that way for long.

Those who thought that having a Touch 'nGo card would make using the privatised highways painless and carefree paid about RM200 to have it. With a credit card or an authorisation to their bank, they would never have to queue to topup their cards, it would be increased automatically when it fell below a cut-off point. They could go through the special lanes at toll booths, and not have to stop and personally top up the limit every time it dries. The convenience made several hundred thousand sign up. This is called, not surprisingly, "Auto Reload". But it is important in Bolehland that one should not be too successful. The highly computerised company at the cutting edge of technology finds this all a terrible administrative problem. It cannot cope with its success. So, it must shut Auto Reload down.

When I asked a close friend in Washington about the ADC, he emailed me: "Thought you might like to see the clippings that relate to the American Taxpayers Alliance on the web. Incidentally, this "influential" enity does not have a web site of its own. Checking out with knowledgeable people in DC have not heard of either this or the American Defence Council! So much for being influential. I do not know where Bolehland operatives unearth "important" opinion makers! Does BERNAMA not check out the basis for its stories?"

I have a right to be a member of the Harvard Society but am not; I dropped out when it was made clear, when it was formed and I was on its drafting committee of its rules, that only full time undergraduates and graduates were allowed to hold office. I did not qualify; I had only spent a year as a Nieman Fellow in Journalism, did not read for a degree or postgraduate qualifiaction. Like all rules in Bolehland, this was changed to allow anyone who had spent time at Harvard to hold office. The Oxbridge is run on tighter lines, but the worldview is the same. The societies are there to give a self-importance to its alumni.

The ebullient Malaysian works minister, Dato' Seri S. Samy Vellu, whose close rapport with the Tamil Nadu government is in tatters with the emergence of Mrs Jayalalitha Jayaram, cannot understand how the Indian constitution could give so much powers to the states and the consumer who feels he is cheated. So, when he met the Indian Prime Minister, Mr Atal Bihari Vajpayee, during his recent official visit here this week, he pressed upon the Indian leader for help sort out problems caused by a Bolehland-type road project and of a Malaysian-owned palm oil mill which cannot get the fruit from a nearby estate to process. He also cannot understand the growing opposition to projects being awarded to Malaysian companies without tender and one a government-to-government level. Parliament dares to question why Malaysian companies was awarded a RM712 million road project in Andhra Pradesh (the Star, 16 May, p6).

Too many strands cannot be explained in this alleged corporate seppukku. He is a pawn in a larger political battle -- that of his father and the finance minister, Tun Daim Zainuddin. Like the Suharto family, the Bin Mahathir clan would fall by the wayside under a new regime, whoever succeeds Dato' Seri Mahathir. Like all Bolehland business men cronies, courtiers and siblings of the Establishment, they spun a business empire with all official help at their command. The Malaysian banking system is testimony to their avarice. So Danamodal and Danaharta. At one time, the three sons of the Prime Minister had debts, in Malaysia and Singapore, of billions of ringgit.

Why does the public get a sinking feeling at every deal like this, whether it be the building of a hydroelectric dam, the rescue of a Bolehland tycoons by Danadarta or Danamodal, bailling out MAS, unacceptable toll road charges, buying a personal computer all take us for an expensive ride? Why cannot, for once, the government come clean and tell us the rationale for what it does?

As government promises of speedy service go, the hype surrounding this announcement is as one expects. After all, the premise of this hype is as of the other hypes that surround Bolehland. The government is committed to the Multimedia Super Corridor, so every Malaysian, and in the belief of the RTD, every motorist not only owns a computer but also an Internet account. If you are a motorist and do not own a computer, then you deserve all the hassles that the RTD and the police would give you over your unpaid summonses.

Consultants are the rage in Bolehland. They come in all sizes and shapes. One needs one to open doors if one wants to be in the inner circle. One needs them to lobby for contracts, or to ensure the purchase of an overpriced irrelevancy. The consultants are paid handsomely, and some are very good at what they offer. That does not come cheap. But even I, used to hear such fantastic stories that have, in Bolehland, an undenial ring of truth, blanched when I heard of the RM100,000 an hour consultant. He is obviously so successful that he can live, without effort or debt, the life of the Bolehland business man. In my innocence, I asked about what he does that people willingly pay him that kind of money. I was soon put right. The fellow could charge twice that month an hour and people would still queue to see him.

Now, Dr Ling tells us it would be completed by year-end. And, as a cart is put before the horse, the fares would be between RM1.20 to RM2.50. How it could with construction costs running at RM100 million a kilometre is a question one should not ask in Bolehland. The monorail has another soft loan of RM610 million to complete the 8.6-kilometre system. It cost, we are told, RM100 million to build a kilometre of track. So, for a system costing RM860 million, it has soft loans of RM910 million. But at this price, with fares kept so low, how could it ever turn in a profit? Did not the concessionaires know not only it could not but never would? Or is it another scam to make the profit in the construction and then load the company on to an unsuspecting public, as the other transport consessionaires did?

Were it as simple! This is the theory and the plan. But in Bolehland, it does not work so simply. As the Super Bumiputra aka internationally known business man of unquestioned repute, one Tan Sri Dato' Seri (not yet Dr, but there is time for that!) Vincent Tan, knows only too well there's many a slip betwixt the cup and the lip. If Tan Sri Dato' Paduka (Dr) Candonodam had attempted to resolve his debts earlier on similar lines a few years earlier, he could well have got away. Now, with the Renong bailout, the MAS bailout, the LRT bailout, the Park May-Intrakota bus bailout, the Monorail bailout, a Tan Sri Dato' Paduka (Dr) Ting bailout would raise the hatred of Malaysians fed up with the government's throwing of good money after bad. But, no doubt, hope springs eternal in the human breast!

What honour do Indians acquire with a deputy minister not long ago accused of collecting RM100,000 from a party official for a minor bauble? Whether it is true or not is beside the point. But like much that happens in Bolehland, such accusations do not raise an eyebrow, though the naievity of the man who willingly paid such huge sums for what he thought was a title is touching indeed. He should clear himself of that. He has not. The doubts remain.

In this school's relocation, the immediate beneficiaries are the "Super Bumiputra" aka international business man of unequestioned repute, one Tan Sri Vincent Tan, and his brother, Dato' Daniel Tan. This is how they built their empire of debt in Bolehland. This is how they ingratiated themselves into the establishment's cronies. The Super Bumiputra's role in the humiliation of He Who Must Be Destroyed At All Cost remains to be told. His continued "success" in Bolehland depends on such roles for which he occasionally has to take the fall. And so "successful" is he that every privatisation given him on the proverbial platter is in trouble, but, like Oliver Twist, comes seeking more. But, unlike Oliver Twist, gets it. He is propped up, and given continued government largesse even after he proved himself incapable of producing what he promised. Why?

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