Found 98 matches for Johore Bahru
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| 2005-08-31 | The Japanese won us our Merdeka We have nothing to celebrate on the 48th birthday of Malaysia. In Malaysia, the Chinese and Indians are relegated as "pendatang" (arrivals). Those who trace their background to the early days of british rule in Malaya cannot still get their citizenship while those from the Indonesian islands can get it after a year's stay here for that would increase the Malays here. In the 1931 census, the Malays in Selangor had their parents born overseas. Part of it is the British probem. They could not persuade the sultans to issue citizenship except by an involved procedure. It was only after the war, with the formation of the Federation of Malaya in 1948, that sultans could issue citizenships to those who had lived in their state for a number of years. My father became a subject of the ruler of Johore in 1952, 22 years after he had decided to live here. It was only in 1957 that he became a federal citizen, and I, who was born in Johore Bahru, became one as a result. But my father had thrown in his lot to Malaysia early on, and he was criticised by the Malaysian Indian Congress (now part of the BN) for forsaking his Indian citizenship! Now it is an obstacle course for a Chinese or an Indian to take his citizenship.
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| 2005-04-15 | Malaysia caught with pants down as the Glenn Braveheart flies the coop IN THE LATE 1930s, the then governor of Singapore, Sir Shenton
Thomas, would drop in at the Raffles Hotel barber shop to have his hair
trimmed by the popular Japanese owner, who was so discreet and
obsequious that he was regarded a harmless fellow. Caution was thrown
to the winds, and talk flowed freely when senior officials met there every
month. Along Jalan Ibrahim, Johore Bahru, in the 1930s, the Five Cent
Store occupied the spot where the K. Abdul Wahab news agent,
stationers and general merchants now does. Every item in the store
cost five cents and less. The amiable Japanese owner attracted much
custom from the British civil servants and estate managers, Malay
aristocracy, Chinese and Indian business men, and it became a
frequent meeting place for all who mattered in pre-war Johore society.
Even Sultan Ibrahim would on occasion drop in.
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| 2005-04-03 | The coming revolt of the middle class But this in one sense raises no political upheaval. But rise in
prices, of every day commodities and public transport, does. To
sidestep it, the minister for entrepreneurial development and
cooperatives, Dato' Khaled Nordin, shifts public furore over higher
fares to the alleged greed of public transport operators. They should
be concerned about service and not profit, he thunders. If they
disagree, they should leave for other fields. His spin is they
already make large profits. Besides, "the public transportation (sic)
industry is more a service than a business" and it should not amass
"a lot of wealth" nor room for companies "looking to reap large
profits." He continues: "If the expectation of companies is to make
lots of money, then they are in the wrong business," he said in
Johore Bahru, where he had the perfect foil – the opening of a
boutique – to announce his misguided view. He thinks the public would
be with him. It would not. The BN in the end would take the flak for
the rising prices.
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| 2005-02-06 | Which is the more valuable: Kota Gelanggi or the rainforest that embeds it?
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| 2005-01-14 | TNB scandals, the blackout, national security THE ORACLE HAS SPOKEN: The Tenaga Nasional Berhad is as much in the
dark as many Malaysians yesterday about the blackout which hit them.
The TNB deputy CEO, Dato' Abdul Hadi Mohammad Deros, is puzzled: "It
has never happened. Should not have happened. Cannot happen", nor why
or how. He is in the same boat as Che Mat Endot, Kuppuswamy, and Ah
Chong who does not what happened and why, and, like him equally
puzzled. But Dato' Abdul Hadi should know, and if he knows, not
saying. This, no doubt, is a cardinal rule in the code of
transparency that the Prime Minister, Dato' Seri Abdullah Ahmad
Badawi, wants. To be fair, he did say a little more, in gobbledygook,
which I translate: A switching gear tripped at the Sultan Salehuddin
Abdul Aziz power station in Klang, caused a shortage of 1700 MW, and
loadshedding from Kuala Lumpur to Johore Bahru.
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| 2004-11-23 | Pak Sheikh has an Open House TRADITION DECREES THAT MALAY homes invite neighbours, friends and
others on festive and religious occasions. So it was until
politicians and politics took over. The Malay traditions of my youth,
half a century ago, is far different from the Malay traditions of our
politicians and politics today. In those days, enmities and grudges
were forgotten for the occasion, friends and enemies met in amity,
with no one taking notes of who came and who did not. nor wonder why.
In the two kampungs I lived in and grew up – Wadi Hana and Dato' Onn,
in Johore Bahru – one saw mortal enemies of years embrace each other
to celebrate. Today, that is all but impossible. This Malay tradition
has taken root in Malaysia's multiracial communities, but who visits
whom is constrained by the demands of politics and politicians.
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| 2004-11-08 | A miss is as good as a mile They are, by extension, no better or no worse than party organs. The
government does not miss a trick to compare them with opposition
party organs. The Southern Thai Muslim affair is reported in critical
detail in Thai newspapers with the Thai prime minister, Mr Thaksin
Shinawantra, told to explain why he mishandled it. Malaysian
newspapers, on their part, sent reporters who reported as a crime
story on the streets of Johore Bahru. They went in with their eyes
closed, knowing not why, the history, the background, but decided on
no evidence that it is a Thai buddhist reaction against defenceless
Muslims.
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| 2004-10-19 | Dato' Seri Money Politics
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| 2004-10-18 | Could an iron tree blossom? When the first – the Middle Ring Road II flyover in Kepong – was
revealed, he laid the blame on every one he could think of but the
contractor, designer and architect. His view then was of a surgeon
who declares the operation a success but the patient dies. Then
several hospitals – in Johore Bahru, Kuala Lumpur, Ipoh – was
infected by a fungus that made it white elephants before it started.
But he declared the contractors free of blame.
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| 2004-06-07 | Dato' Shahrir Samad hurls a scalded cat amongst the BN and UMNO pigeons
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| 2004-03-30 | Malaysian Elections 2004: The end justifies the means
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| 2004-03-28 | Pak Lah names an interim Cabinet amidst a Malay minority in parliament
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| 2004-03-12 | Pak Lah has a little difficulty about UMNO candidates in Johore and Pahang
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| 2004-03-09 | When a BN party president does not know if his deputy president is a candidate
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| 2004-03-03 | The PPP nearly causes a crisis within the National Front
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| 2004-02-24 | Pak Lah faces General Election as head of a fracturing coalition
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| 2004-01-21 | This media frenzy over rape and security guards is to hide the BN's self-destructive acts
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| 2004-01-08 | Pak Lah - Surprise! Surprise! - reappoints the Mahathir cabinet as his own
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| 2004-01-03 | An UMNO bigwig is assaulted, so it is war on illegal racers Illegal racing has been around for decades. It used to be illegal bicycle racing in the Johore Bahru of my childhood in the 1950s, but it was looked upon as the exuberance of youth, given a tight slap, and sent packing if caught. And you hoped your father did not hear of it. Now it is different. Every weekend, often on weekdays, usually after midnight but not necessarily, these motorcycle riders race on the highways. The police know of it and have placed speedbreakers to slow them down, though how they are placed would more often kill them. In Kuala Lumpur and in just about every major town in the peninsular. The authorities see it as a law and order problem. The racers see it as a little excitement in an otherwise poverty-stricken drab lives in illegal hutments and cramped living.
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| 2004-01-02 | Nepotism, like corruption, is a crime in Malaysia only if the wrong party is guilty of it When the Malay Mail, which reported on it, asked the Selayang state assemblyman, Dato' Ahmad Bhari Abdul Rahman, about it, he did not want to be involved in it. "Why do you drag me into this? You were at the meeting and you saw what happened. I don;t want to give you any comments". When asked why none of the other councillors raised the matter, he said: "No comment". One did speak off the record. He thought Mr Bakaruddin breached no rules as the committee he chaired only affirmed what a sub-committee had endorsed it. But final appointment is made by this committee he chairs. When the Gerakan representative on the Johore Bahru Town Council lobbied for his brother with the Council to revoke a penalty, and then refused to step out of the meeting discussing it, and it became public, the party asked him to resign. This is not all. When the Ampang Jaya municipal council appointed a bankrupt as head of its enforcement unit, it raised a stink. It turned out there was more to it than had been revealed, that the state mentri besar, Dato' Seri Khir Toyo and another on his executive council were involved.
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This archive was created as a tribute to the late veteran
journalist MGG Pillai. We believed his writings are useful to develop a critical
thinking analysis.
By the way, the original mggpillai.com web site (2001-2006) was actually created
by one of us.
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