THE PEOPLE IN POWER are confused. They have not realised the people cHallenge them at every turn. The post-information age, which is now, is as destructive to the people in power as the Industrial Age was when it began in 1832. That enabled the rulers to ride rough shod over the people, who found their unique ways to confront that. What happens in society now was what happened before the Industrial Age. But the people will not succeed unless by intellectuals. In Malaysia, the National Front is still in power, since it attained power in 1955, but is worried at this development. The King, who had agreed to officiate a gathering, was told by officials in the Prime Minister's Department not to attend. It got intellectuals at the Hall angry. The National Front showed weakness which it could not control. This meeting was organised by dissident UMNO members, and attended by all Malays, intellectuals, from PAS and Parti Keadilan Rakyat, and who used to be senior figures in the ancien regime. It was better organised to cHallenge than the reformasi movement of former deputy prime minister, Dato' Seri Annuar Ibrahim. The reformasi movement failed because though it was a ground revolt most of the intellectuals stayed away. Even then it caused fright in the National Front. The intellectuals in the National Front realised what could happen if it had succeeded, and fear is the result. The National Front changed its policies, trying to solve some of the issues the reformasi movement reformed. But the reformasi movement has fallen into the doldrums after Dato' Seri Annuar Ibrahim was released from prison. Now by and large it second guesses what the reformasi movement had in mind and looks over its shoulders at what the reformasi movement is doing. But the reformasi movement lit a light for others to follow.

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?

The IGP's son is arrested. He is released on bail. The IGP must resign. It does not matter if the son is eventually acquitted. The son is arrested for asking RM11,000 for a RM250 licence. The Malay Mail reports yesterday that RM39,000 has been demanded from one potential hawker. The system is rife with corruption. The IGP's son is doing what everyone with authority does: being the middleman in the exchange of cash from those lower down with the peole that matter in City Hall (Dewan Bandaraya Kuala Lumpur). City Hall does not allow direct applications from hawkers for the sale, only through middle men. On is an electician who makes RM2.4 million and justifies it by saying that he has to give most of it to people in City Hall. This will inevitably continue when the aim is not the licence but the money behind it. The newspapers report the superficial news, and the arrest of the IGP's son is, and leave out the main issue of it. Why are we being asked to change the identity cards? Because there is money behind it. I am asked to change my identity card once again, and will be asked to change soon enough to another system. Besides the money that changes hands in the civil service, it costs one many several days daily wages to change the identity card. Why cannot police stations be the centre for changing identify cards?

THIS YEAR'S WORLD PRESS Freedom Day, marked every year on 03 May, in Kuala Lumpur began with a lie. In the official booklet given to those who attended, is the "World Press Freedom" rankings, which Reporters Sans Frontieres (Reporters without borders) prepare annually. A metaphorical ruler is used to rank press freedom in 167 countries, in which Denmark is annointed as the most free and North Korea the least. But only 166 countries are ranked. Several in the Hall looked long and hard for Malaysia's ranking. It is not there. Look at the data carefully and you would find Jordan ranked 121 and Liberia 123. It is fair to assume Malaysia ranks 122, a dozen places down from the 2004 rankings. This censorship undermined whatever the day was to mean.

The BN is a coalition of multiracial parties, each with equal power in its councils, that its life-time president, UMNO, is one among equals. That is the spin. In practice, all are beholden to UMNO, and their continued presence in BN is on condition it accepts UMNO's views, however unpalatable, unquestionably. Since their raison d'etre is the perks of office for their leaders, the only reason they are in BN, and learnt the art of mumbling "Sokong" ("Agreed") with conviction at any UMNO move. Debate and discussion, in its considered view, is a waste of time. The oracle speaks with precision and good intent; why should anyone cHallenge it?

?So when Parti Keadilan Rakyat hosted a Deepavali open house at the Girl Guides' Hall in Brickfields, with its eminence grace, Anwar Ibrahim on hand, the Hall was packed to capacity, perhaps 5,000 turned up, in a continuous flow of people, with the Hall packed at all times with about 2,000.

UMNO leaders are unused to the cut and thrust of election rallies, They are more tuned to orchestrated sessions where few or no questions are asked, If some from the audience livens up the meeting with unexpected or embarrassing questions, they often walk away or the chaps escored out of the Hall. They fear that at their election rallies, people would question them about their acts of commission and ommission, the rationale of government policies, and generally make a mickey out of them. Worse if Opposition supporters do that. They do not want that, and use this phantom security threat to coccoon them from the outside world.

The power struggle is more vicious now than ever. The BN - and UMNO - is split so many ways that even a strong leader could only patch it up so long as the former deputy prime minister remains in jail. He was destroyed politically because he dared to cHallenge Dr Mahathir as UMNO president and Malaysian Prime Minister. Dr Mahathir in pique sacked him as deputy prime minister and UMNO deputy president without regard to the legality of it, treated worse than a common criminal and a near cripple today that his political career is probably past him. But the BN's and UMNO's political difficulties rose only since his dismissal in 1998. Dr Mahathir believes Dato' Seri Anwar - or Pak Sheikh, as his followers and supporters address him - is a spent force. Perhaps he is, but so long as Pak Sheikh's current address remains Sungei Buloh jail, BN and UMNO is.

When the Dewan Bandaraya Kuala Lumpur (Kuala Lumpur City Hall) moved in to ban an Instant Cafe Theatre presentation, The Second First Bolehwood awards, a spoof on Malaysian politics and politicians, because one letter in one Malay newspaper thought it ought to be, it raised the spectre of mob censorship. That it acted posthaste suggests that the letter was a pretext of what it wanted to do. In other words, the letter was a plant. Is this how government institutions would do its work in the future: if the mobs decide otherwise, it would fall in line?

Astro sent a letter to subscribers of its Dynasty package of this once-in-a-lifetime upgrade to its Emperor package for a mere RM30 more a month. They must reply by 21 April 2003 to upgrade. If they did not receive the offer, did not want it but did not tell Astro of it, you are then automatically upgraded. In other words, if you want the package, you must tell them; but if you did not, you would it anyway. The ministry of domestic trade and consumer affairs keeps quiet, as it does of every deliberate, illegal price gouging as Astro's latest scam. The monopolies get away with it for the long-suffering consumer just do not have the wherewithal, the time or the inclination to cHallenge it.

UMNO HAS THIS INEXPLICABLE DESIRE TO SELF destruct. It is an old problem. It has gone worse in recent months as it renews itself, against great odds and without knowing how. It took a fatal decision in the past year to cHallenge PAS, not on the truth of its agenda and policies, but on Islamic dominance in a multi-racial society. Until now, UMNO had represented the Malay cultural constituency in which Islam plays a large part, against a PAS which insists Islam must supercede Malay cultural practices. A debate which continues to divide Malay political thinking and thought. What has changed if the realigning of political orientations. UMNO has adopted the PAS agenda. It is in the differences that each campaigns for the Malay soul. The difficulty with the UMNO position is that this drift towards an Islamic state was made off the cuff by the Prime Minister, Dato' Seri Mahathir Mohamed, in headmasterly righteousness, and pretty soon a lamb is led to slaughter in the tiger's den.

The deputy prime minister, Dato' Seri Abdullah Ahmad Badawi, has his in the cavernous Hall of the Putra World Trade Centre, but he would not have more visitors in Kuala Lumpur than Dr Mahathir in Putra Jaya. We are told a few tens of thousands came; in his parliamentary constituency of Kepala Batas 60,000. But Dr Mahathir had more, no less than 100,000. It is difficult, well-nigh impossible, for an ordinary man to get to Putra Jaya even in a car, but on Hari Raya Aidil Fitri, if we believe what we read in the newspapers and hear or see on radio and television, he would find the place with his eyes closed.

If you are a clerk, or a teacher, or a middling civil servant, or someone who cannot throw his weight around, an officer of the municipality would demand you break down the extension after you have built it or, typically, be fined RM250 a day until you do. One who built a house in Hartamas which inadvertently encroached on public land by six inches, is told to pull it down or be fined that amount a day until he does. He settled it for RM50,000, some to City Hall but most into the officer's pocket. The Prime Minister insists there is no corruption, and those who allege it must produce proof. But when his former, now jailed, deputy prime minister did, he looked the other way. His principle seems to be: Do as I say, not as I do.

Even that is chancy these days. UMNO, which dominates BN, is in sixes and sevens, not daring to show its hand for fear it would be rebuffed. At one UMNO divisional meeting recently, the crowded Hall would not let the mentri besar, federal cabinet ministers and senior UMNO officials present to leave after the opening. It so unnerved them that few venture into these meetings without a guarantee they would not have to suffer through the meetings. Suffer because those present have questions to ask of their leaders they cannot at any other time, even in parliament or state assembly.

Other political developments force the Prime Minister into a corner. His statement he is not a candidate in the next general elections evoked little shocked response. Unlike his earlier anouncement. At that time, UMNO leaders rushed to the platform at the UMNO Hall at the Putra World Trade Centre, including famously Datin Seri Rafidah Aziz, who lost her shoes in the scramble, to ask him to retract it. This time, UMNO called for calm and accept it for as the UMNO vice president, Dato' Seri Najib Tun Razak said, "because he had thought about it at length and is quite firm on the matter". The UMNO supreme council neither discussed it with Dr Mahathir or amongst themselves about it, but it reflects the UMNO feeling it is doomed without a new leader -- and soon. This exclude the jokers: The Pahang mentri besar, Dato' Seri Adnan Yaakob, believes the unbeatable of Dr Mahathir and deputy UMNO president Dato' Seri Abdullah Ahmad Badawi, could lead BN to another win and greater heights, and so he should remain. He forgot to mention that without the Prime Minister's protection, he is yesterday's man.

This does not faze the Great Man. He now demands 1,500 foreign workers to construct the "RM425 million state-of-the-art college" in Semiling, Kedah. "I am appealing to (Deputy Prime Minister) Dato' Seri Abdullah Ahmad Badawi to allow us to recruit 1,500 foreign workers to expedite the construction process," he said. It is contractors who apply for the permits. AIMST has no contractors yet, so it does not know if whoever is selected would have enough workers. But he assumes they would not have, and so he wants the law constricted because he is Dato' Seri Samy Vellu, and he cannot be cHallenged. Clearly there is a problem. All he had to do was to sidle up to Pak Lah after a cabinet meeting, tell him his problem, and walk away with it. That he has to make a public admission like this is proof he does not have the clout and power he tells all and sundry he has. He must beg in public what should have been as a matter of right.

But Tafe College episode suggests worse. MIC presumes Indian students study in its institutions on sufferance, so they are expected to be eternally grateful for it; MIC knows what is good for them, and woe betides any who dare question why. Indeed, late last year, some students asked the Tafe College principal questions he could not answer: Now that they are about to graduate, why had not the government recognised the courses they study as they were assured it would; and there were also other promises not kept. He, rather than answer why, called in MIC leaders, who ordered the students into the assembly Hall, had the doors secured, rolled up their sleeves and dared the students to repeat what they asked. The students were in no doubt they would be beaten up if they did.

The election was held in UMNO headquarters, then in Johore Bahru, since destroyed to make way for a road, the Tengku was reluctant, and went into the meeting with his two friends standing guard outside the two entrances to the Hall. There were three candidates: the Tengku, the head of UMNO's religious wing and a cousin of the later Saudi oil minister Sheikh Yamani, and Dato' C.M. Yusof. The UMNO supreme council cast 15 votes for the Tengku, 8 for Mr Ahmad Fuad, and one for Dato' C.M. Yusof.

This UMNO welcome charade to assure him more than Malaysians Dr Mahathir Mohamed is as strong as ever masks the reality of an UMNO palace coup. The reality of that sunk in after he was escorted to an antechamber at the PWTC conference Hall, where the UMNO general assembly was held. His wife, Datin Seri Siti Hasmah Ali, thought something amiss and ordered a doctor to attend to him. During his sojourn overseas, UMNO all but ignored him. The Malaysian media consigned him to an oblivion normally reserved for opposition leaders. UMNO leaders meanwhile pop up ever so often to say he is indispensible, a makebelief that maskes the UMNO acceptance he is thoroughly dispensible. As others, like Tengku Razaleigh Hamzah, his resignation wishes must be respected. If Dr Mahathir was in control, the Hermit of Langgak Golf would have kept his silence.

This year is more chaotic. Every nook and corner is taken that it is more than an effort to get through. Visitors to the PWTC and others edge their way through this typical pasar malam crowds to get to the conference Hall. The police are around as always on these occasions, but the organisation of it has deteriorated. In previous years, there was a place where one could hail a taxi. Not this year. One waited all over the place, and got a taxi only when one was nearest to where the taxi would stop. The taxi lanes are closed, so even a queue could not form. This is as disorganised as the pasar malam a few feet away.

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