THERE AUSTRALIAN OUTCRY ON Singapore's anticipated hanging of an Australian of Vietnamese origin is expected. There was a similar outcry over Malaysia hanging two Australian Caucasians. There is no difference in the outcry. The Australians have found reasons for the media that the trials were unfair. But they make no such claim when Singaporeans, Malaysians, Thailand, Vietnamese citizens are hanged. Their attitude is they deserved it, and they were not 'our' citizens anyway. There is much wrong in the way death sentences are handed out in these two countries, and many have kept their date with the hangman innocent. So what is special about Western and Australian citizens hanged in Singapore and Malaysia? Nothing, only that these countries are the prostitutes of globalisation and should know their place. They should not upset on the West or Australia by hanging one of their citizens. Malaysia defied that, during Tun Mahathir's term as prime minister, by hanging two Australians and one Englishman. Singapore makes an issue once in a while, jailed an Englishman for breaking Singapore laws, sent an American home when he has sure of being convicted under drug laws and hung. The Australians are not interested if one of their citizens who is not Caucasian, and so he will be hung. As he should be. No country, not even a prostitute of globalisation, should be deterred against carrying out its laws. The death sentences for carrying minute amounts of drugs was put into the law books, in Singapore and Malaysia, at the West's insistence. It is now a problem in these countries, given their unfairness, that death sentences are carried out in secret, and the Malaysians know of it usually only after the fact. It a political issue here so it is kept hidden. In contrast, the Australian leaders are on the defensive that one of its citizens, a model, found with banner drugs in Indonesia, is in fact a Muslim.

So Tun Ghafar wearing charms is not odd. But digging his grave is. They had to dig his grave three times, because each time it was found not to fit his body. They had to dig it again and again. That is why those who went for Tun Hussein's tahlil on what would have been his birthday found an open grave. The grave diggers had no qualms about telling those who asked who it was for. They could not dig it and fill it with earth so it was easy to use it when required. It could not be hidden from the most observant who attended the tahlil for Tun Hussein on what would have been his birthday. But is this necessary? Why was not the grave dug up after he died? It is alright to have the grave earmarked, and could have been dug after he died. But in this official rush to make the prime minister a dictator, all niceties are forgotten of those before him. Tun Ghafar was ignored in retirement. His police protection was removed. I used to visit him often. Never did I seen an official from the government or UMNO visit him. And not a cabinet minister. But he has been active well before UMNO. It was he who turned Dato' Sir Onn's Rural and Industrial Agency into MARA. It was his support that hade Tun Mahathir turn UMNO from a nationalist movement into the political party it is now. He did not agree with much of what has happened, but that does not allow him to be forgotten. He may not hold public office now, but when the history of UMNO or Malaysia come to be written he would have a prominent role in it.

As it is, the government in power in Malaysia, which claims is Islamic, has little in common with its people. It uses the Internal Security Act to pressure its opponents into line. What started as a British legislation to keep the Koumintang and the others in line in 1924 has transfored into an anti-communist legislation in 1948 and into the ISA to remain in power. Few communists are detained under the ISA, but Malay extremists and opposition politicians are. The special focus now is on Malay extremists. We are forced to accept, because of the nature of the government, the official version of what has happened. This has been extended to intra-party struggles. What is reported is the President's version. All others are not. The former Prime Minister, Tun Mahathir, does not get the press he got as prime minister, when he controlled them, but only when he supports his successor or follows the official line. The presidents of the National Front's members is so treated. Those who are opposed to them do not get their reasons published in the media here. It is assumed that the president of the party, in office since 1978, should be elected for another term. The people have no say about their future. The result would be anyone's guess. What happened in Iraq is the worst example of what could happen. This would not mean that an Islamic government is inherently had but that its government has depended on outside forces to remain in power and has alientated the people.

That is why the National Front asks ministers other than UMNO to becomes buffoons like Dato' Chua Soi Lek. This is how it thinks it can stay in power. But it would not be so. More than half the population were born after Merdeka in 1957, but most of the younger Malaysians do not accept the National Front though their parents do. Policies take a generation to fruit. A generation is usually 30-35 years. Policies the government took after the racial riots of 1969 begin fruiting now. And the policies taken now will fruit 35 years or so from now. But unless UMNO takes the lead in attacking the people rather than asking the other party leaders in the National Front to do so, it would be in the opposition by a few years before 2020. The 2020 vision was taken to remain in power, and its policies disappeared with the retirement two years ago of the former prime minister, Tun Mahathir Mohamed. Today's policies are thought through by Malays. The non-Malay is ignored or kept away when possible. That is why buffons from the non-UMNO parties are asked defend the undefensible.

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?

We are told that UMNO was formed in 1946 to fight for independent. But UMNO was formed on 31 May of that year to fight against the British plan to reduce the Sultans to a digit. Dato' Onn was its first president, and he was clear in his mind why he formed UMNO. It was not independence. He walked out of UMNO in 1952 when it did not agree to his plan to invite the non-Malay into the party, and left it in 1951. He died twelve years later, as an MP but of the Malay nationalist party, Parti Negara. He was not a member of UMNO when he did, and this was the case in two of Malaysia's five prime ministers. He was elected from Trengganu, which is why his son, Tun Hussein Onn's first act as Prime Minister was to go to the state and why he had a preference for the state although like his father he is from Johore. UMNO moved with the times, and changed its goal to independence once Tengku Abdul Rahman because its president in 1951. The party formed the Alliance in 1955 because the British wanted proof that the non-Malay could co-operate with the Malay before it would consider giving independence to UMNO. After Burma left the Commonwealth on independence in 948, the colonial power wanted to make sure that all colonies and protectorates remained friendly after independence. The UMNO-led alliance got its independence because the Emergency (so named for insurance purposes) was hurting. The 1955 talks with Chin Peng was stage managed, and the Chief Minister of Singapore, Mr David Marshall, joined the talks as Britain's man and to make sure the Tengku did not give away more than he could. Malaysia became independent at the time it did because Britain wanted a government in Malaysia that was favourable to it and could take over from it the fight against the communists. It was in a sense a con job. But we are told that the UMNO-led Alliance fought for independence. Nothing could be further from the truth. But UMNO then is not the UMNO today. Dr Mahathir changed it from a nationalist movement to a political party in 1988 so that he could remain in power. The rot in UMNO set in, and continues.

The history of Singapore's ejection from Malaysia is not as simple as it is made out in Singapore and Kuala Lumpur. As it should be. But we are not interested in the past but the UMNO version of the day. We are now worrying over an UMNO MP's description of the Indian as "keling". But more than 30 years ago, the man who was to become Malaysia's deputy prime minister was convicted for using that word. Much of Malaysia's written history, particularly the Tunku's papers in government (which is how I know of the details, recovered from the wastepaper basket at a time when the Tunku was to be decried at any cost, and is now in the National Archives). We have to read the politician's account to find out what happened. Mr Lee's account, in the first part of his autobiography, is the first politician's account of the ejection, but it is from his perspective. No Malaysian politician has written his story (in English). Most are restrained by the official history, and I hear personal stories about the time, some important and some self-serving but nevertheless important. But they are a dying breed. The Malaysian politician who was one at the time of ejection is now in his late seventies or older. But he has not written his memoirs, although he has much to say. Once retired, the politician is forgotten and consigned to the political dustbin. Tun Mahathir does not see it that way. He is active in politics, though he resigned from office two years ago. But he has no plans yet to write his memoirs, which he should. He was elected in 1964, was against Singapore coming into Malaysia, was regarded as an ultra in Singapore, and against Singapore leaving, one of whom Mr Lee called the "ultras".

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.

We see that in Malaysia. The moment the regime changes, the old prime minister is put to pasture, is forgotten by the people, and the attention is on the new. That is sorely tested, as the former prime minister, Tun Mahathir, refuses to be a digit, and continue to state his views. These views were ignored by the mainstream media who not long ago threw petals as he walked, but because the former prime minister is getting support, he is now treated with respect in their columns. It shows that he who has a backbone, is sure of what he says or does, like Tun Mahathir or Saddam Hussein, will get respect even from their enemies. The people are always sympathetic to those who stand up and be heard. Saddam Hussein behaves like their leader, the victor's justice aside, and his presence in court has spread fear. The case was postponed because those who had agreed before to testify against him demurred, and did not turn up or refused to say their piece. He was in charge yesterday. Two of the judges had not been judges before the trial. Only the head judge was named, and it turns out that only a Kurd would take the job. No Sunni was among the judges. People who swung to the support of the invader either lived overseas or had supported Saddam Hussein not so long ago. It is so in Malaysia. They do not like to make a choice, but they are asked to. It is not only the people, but those close to power. They would criticise, but would ask those who would to do so, even attacking the fellow for so doing. The aim by being close to power is to make money, and they are single minded about it, refusing to criticise but asking others to do so. They would ask those in power to force the people to follow them, but they would not do it themselves.

But tensions have risen since Malaysia declared itself a Muslim state and internationalised the problem in southern Thailand. It is not Thai Malays but Thai Muslims now. Malaysia has translated the constitutional definition of a Malay to a racial definition in a foreign country. But by this definition, Kuala Lumpur has lost control of southern Thailand. What makes it worse is that Malaysian agents are more interested in money than in getting the job done. Pak Lah is not interested, and vaccilates. Unlike Tun Mahathir, his predecessor who was decisive. "It was a joy to work with him," said one agent on another matter, "You briefed him, and he asked for options, and once the decision was made, you went and did it. He never forgot it either and asked you about it when he next saw you." In Pak Lah's regime, you did not know who was in charge, or if the officer who was designated to receive your report was on the take - by foreign countries mostly - that would put the agent at risk. Do we place agents in foreign countries? Of course we do. I have met these agents from countries as disparate as New Zealand and Burma. And so other countries, both over and under cover. The Thais have their agents here. So do the Singaporeans. and every nation which has in intrest in Malaysia. The British. The Americans. The Chinese. The Russians. The Singaporeans. The Indians. The Middle Eastern nations. The Indonesians. With the embassies, or with private concerns. The is the way that the nations find out what a particular nation is doing, recruiting local citizens, both civil servants and private individuals.

It is the cabinet that orders what should be the preserve of a junior officer. But it is common in Malaysia to go the cabinet for a decision because the party involved can be UMNO or any party in the National Front. The civil servant may not want to take a decision on the company that would cause him endless difficulty later on, and so he passes it up the ladder until it lands on the cabinet. The Prime Minister is responsible for too many portfolios and UMNO, falls asleep at meetings, is late for meetings, does not keep up his paperwork, and cannot handle the matters referred to him. He also sleeps a lot if what happened to Tun Mahathir is typical. Tun Mahathir wanted to meet him and arrived half a hour before the appointment. Several hours passed. When he enquired, he was told, embarassedly, that that Pak Lah was still asleep at home! And the Prime Minister takes new responsibilities. Tun Mahathir works before and after work clearning up his paperwork. He does this after work because his day in office is spent mostly in meetings. He laft Pak Lah a clean slate, but would Pak Lah to his successor?

We see this lack of moral scruples everywhere. Putra Jaya is built to ensure the vanity of one man, Tun Mahathir Mohamed, The major government departments are now situated in Putra Jaya, and to get there costs money which the people going there often do not have. The civil servants and politicians in UMNO have got used to Putra Jaya, but not the people in whose name they govern. People who used to go the government departments in Kuala Lumpur often now have to go to Putra Jaya, costing money just to get there. A taxi driver told me he charged RM30 for the trip to Putra Jaya. The government departments are far apart and it is almost impossible to walk. In the past, it would be a loss of a day's wages; today it is that plus about RM100 to deal with a government department. The emphasis on money, the corruption in the civil service, police, almost every government servant is what has characterised it. Today laws are passed so that corruption can flourish. The petrol price would be raised any day. Explanations are given how the government is losing revenue by raising prices. But the impact of it is the people will pay higher petrol prices. No one in government is serious about resolving the problem of the people, for that would cut into what they collect for themselves. It is puasa month now, and you saw the traffic police unusually active. You see them everywhere, and they collect from you where in the past they collected later. The official reason that would be given to this is that all this is not true. But the government is run for those in government, and they have to protect themselves, do they not?

PARLIAMENT HAS BECOME A charade. The MPs from the ruling National Front are not given a free vote in the Rafidah Aziz affair. The two NF MPs who voted with the Opposition in referring Datin Seri Rafidah Aziz to the Committee of Privileges comes up for mention in newspaper reports and in Paliament as if they had done something terrible. It now seems the National Front never had any intention to put Rafidah Aziz through the hoop. She knows it, and almost every NF MP knows it. The result was predictable, although Parliament was allegedly given a free hand by the NF. The NF's majority in Parliament would see, as it turned out, that Datin Seri Rafidah would get into no trouble. And indeed she did not. She is in the New Straits Times today (6 October 2005) talking about her role in nation building, and that she viewed her international role more important than turning up in Parliament. Parliament is not important, she avers in the interview with New Straits Times. The leader of the Opposition, Mr Lim Kit Siang, is irrelevant, so his questions are less important than the Cabinet's. But in the Parliamentary system of government in force, it is more important than the cabinet. Tun Mahathir used to have cabinet meetings in Parliament. He at least paid lip service to the primacy of Parliament. The Natioanl Front does not. There is pressure on the National Front to penalise the two MPs who voted with the Opposition. And there is a collective sigh of relief that she is scot free. That was only possible by the massive majority the NF has in Parliament.

The US says, in effect, that it alone has the right to kill Iraqis – and 40 years ago, Vietnamese. It was nationalism that defeated them in Vietnam; the war was lost when its chief enemy, Ho Chi Minh, died mid-way through it. As far as the Vietnamese were concerned, the US were fighting a dead man, and could never win. The reaction is different among the US and its foreign troops, on the one hand, and the Vietcong, Vietnam, North Vietnamese and South Vietnamese, on other. Similarly, in Iraq. The information is in the hands of the US, but the war, as in Vietnam, is in the hands of the "enemy". It was nationalism that drove the Vietnam war; it is nationalism and religion that drives the Iraq war. Islam is on the defensive because the West has targetted it as the enemy. Those living in Muslim countries find they are targetted by immigration officers in the West. In Malaysia, the a/l and a/p (for 'son of' and 'daughter of' is removed from the passpost of Indians in Malaysia because computerisation does not allow the back slash in computer searches, and the al that comes out is often viewed by immigration officers as belonging to Arabs. I have been told by immigration officers that 'al Gopal Pillai' is a strange Arab name. It is, for it belongs to an Indian. So I will get my passport with an additional name. But it does not get over the fact that Islam and Muslim countries are targetted. The loss is the West's, as well as the Muslim countries. Schools are closing down in the United States because its embassies are reluctant to give visas to Muslims, and more important, Muslims do not want to go through the hassle of getting a visa. At the personal level, it works both ways. But as Tun Mahathir has put it succinctly elsewhere the West has taken Islam for an enemy.

In Malaysia, a similiar sort of control as in Iraq is in place. You are expected to believe the Prime Minister, Pak Lah, or his government, and forget the discordant voices. Pak Lah supports the United States in Iraq, and the people of Malaysia are expected to do so too. Discordant voices, except in UMNO, the ruling party, is not published in the mainstream newspapers. But the government has taken the Islamic route for which it cannot back off. It has turned Thai Malays into Thai Muslims, and calls its majority community as Muslims not Malays, though if you are both you are given a privileged place. The West has Malaysia in its pocket, but the people are not with it. And the government, with or without Western blessings, would not want to find out. This happens when a country is dubbed pro-West by Westerners because the government is pro-West. But there is a discordant political voice in the country, the Islamicists. The National Front, which governs the country and 12 of the 13 states, follows the national trend, believing as gospel what UMNO thinks. The Islamicists control one of Malaysia's 13 states, but it is disorganised now. UMNO has dubbed itself an Islamic party, but it cannot be one. It can push Islam as a political agenda but it will have to convince Islamicists that it will be an Islamic ruler as well. UMNO is caught in a transition, as PAS is, and Pak Lah is not confident of himself to lead UMNO as a president should. He is an accidental Prime Minister at a time when the UMNO warlords are showing their mettle. He could not remove from the cabinet those he should. In fact, he has not had a cabinet reshuffle since he took office, although it is time he did. He is afraid that those he drops would join his oppents. He is watched like a hawk, especially among the rank and file. And his oppenents, PAS and his predecessor as prime minister, Tun Mahathir Mohamed, and as deputy prime minister, Dato' Anwar Ibrahim. He will find he has no friends if he assumes that his word is law. And the rules made so that he has no opposition in policies will not last. His opposition in UMNO is severe, and those that are against him are former leaders of the party. He must find a way by which he gets ground support. He might think there is, but those who support him now support him as UMNO leader and Malaysian Prime Minister. He will be put out to dry by the ordinary UMNO member who supports him now, if he should ever be challenged.

TUN Mahathir GOT IT RIGHT. He did not apportion blame on the Bali bombings to Al Queda or the Jemayah Islamiyah or to other Muslim groups. But the ease with which both these organisations were blamed, and that this has been on the news particularly round-the- clock ever since the bombings last week, and the defensive posture of the Indonesian government followed by the British blaming the Australians for not letting it know of its 'early warning' to Australian revellers in Bali, and the constant berating of those who would listen that Al-Qaeda was involved, suggests something has gone wrong. The Western governments, or its intelligence agencies, are behind it, and keep at it because the people on the ground in Indonesia and elsewhere do not believe the events in Bali last week. The United States (and Australia, among others) created incidents in South Vietnam in the 1960s, blaming it on the Vietcong. There is no unanimity among Western reporters that Al Qaeda was involved, Jason Burke of the Guardian thought that Al Qaeda could not be involved, and the discordant voices in the Western media is matched by the ordinary people around the world, Muslim or otherwise, having doubts on the official story of the Bali bombing.

Datin Seri Rafidah will not resign. Nor would Tan Sri Isa Samad. So, the public attention is on the Customs and Excise Director-General, Tan Sri Halil Mutalib. But he would not resign either. He would be allowed to go on retirement as scheduled, early next month. But Tan Sri Halil should never have been in the closed service, the customs and excise department. Not only was he bought into the service from outside, he was also given an extension by former Prime Minister, Tun Mahathir Mohamed. He looked the easiest to get rid of, but as the story unravelled, it became a fight between the present Prime Minister, Pak Lah, and the former Prime Minister. Pak Lah cannot force him to resign although he could spread the corruption bit on Tan Sri Halil and damage Tun Mahathir. But it did not work as he planned. His 'boys' had accepted favours from Datin Seri Rafidah, Tan Sri Isa Samad, and Tan Sri Halil Mutalib, and if he did not close their cases quickly he would be hurt. The public perception that he is against corruption is not true. For when he was faced with corruption in his cabinet and his civil service, he could not act for that would have moved the UMNO warlords against him, those he would rather not, and so he took the easy way out, and went after Tun Mahathir. But that backfired. For it would have affected his 'boys', and he could not afford that. The mainstream newspapers, all owned by one or other Barisan Nasional newspapers, and all beholden to the Prime Minister, all today its readers that Datin Seri Rafidah should resign, that Tan Sri Isa Samad should resign, that Tan Sri Halil Mutalib should resign. But they are all in office, will not resign, and the newspapers find creative reasons why they should remain in the jobs.

UMNO, or the UMNO Baru today, is not the nationalist political organisation that brought this country independence. UMNO that brought this country independence died in 1987, by court order, and in its place rose UMNO Baru. That UMNO Baru is formed is orchestrated by leaders of the old UMNO who led UMNO Baru. They were still in power, and they ordered the registrar of societies to declare Tengku Abdul Rahman's request for UMNO to be re-registered. He had filed the application several days earlier, but it was Tun Mahathir's UMNO Baru that was registered. As it happened, the founder of UMNO, Dato' Onn bin Jaffar, and the first UMNO president of Malaysia, and his son, the fourth president and third Malaysian prime minister, went to their graves without joining UMNO Baru. The flag of UMNO Baru is of different dimensions than of UMNO, but at first sight, they seem similar. In the Johore Bahru byelection, when UMNO Baru warlord, Dato' Shahrir Samad, stood as an independent but with strong support of the old UMNO adherents, the present Prime Minister, Pak Lah, told me at that time that when the two processions met at the crossroads before the nomination station in Johore Bahru, tears came to his eyes, for he saw two UMNO processsions where the two parties had met. It goes without saying that it was the independent who won. It is UMNO the political party that rules, and Dato' Shahir joined the party afterwards, and remains in Parliament as UMNO Baru MP. The question asked by diplomats and even UMNO bigwigs and members is whether Pak Lah would be challenged. I think he would, Dato' Shahrir Samad being the last minute candidate if the other warlords decide not to. Pak Lah is UMNO Baru president held hostage by UMNO warlords, which is why he has not sacked from his cabinet the two warlords - Dato' Isa Samad, found guilty of money politics; and Datin (or rather as she would prefer to be called, Dato') Rafidah, who was guilty of giving her son-in-law a monthly wage of about Rm 1.5 million by giving him sufficient APs. (It is said, and not in jest, that she should be known as Rafidah AP Aziz). But both will not resign from the cabinet and neither will they be sacked. They hold enormous power in their areas of strength, Isa in the Linggi area and possibly Malacca; and Datin Rafidah, in the Kuala Kangsar area that she is MP of. Fearing that either or both would go to those opposed to Pak Lah in UMNO is why they both remain in the cabinet.

Tun Mahathir spoke what was happening in the world, but it was not what Western diplomatics, including the EU representatives and the British ambassador, wanted to hear. They walked out. Earlier, the NGOs, which prescribe their narrow points of view on rest of the world but not in their eventual countries of origin, protested Tun Mahathir's human rights record before the event, and most boycotted the event. As they would. They thought that their protests would stop Tun Mahathir, so the Western diplomats would not have to walk out. I fault Tun Mahathir on a lot of things, but speaking what is right, especially of matters Islamic and the Middle East, is not one of them. He is part of what is wrong with UMNO's rule of Malaysia, but his role in the larger picture was ignored until he resigned as Prime Minister after 22 years. Today, he is ignored at home, the changes at Proton, where he is adviser, took place without his knowledge, as he himself, had admitted, but his comments on wold topics are eagerly awaited. He is, like Abdullah Ahmad Badawi, a Prime Minister was not educated in England. He is the best example of an UMNO leader who could throw fear into Western eyes in what he says, as the human rights talk last Friday revealed.

The minister of international trade and industry and UMNO women's wing president, Datin Serii Rafidah Aziz is the next cabinet minister proven corrupt. The mainstream newspapers and mainstream TV media have confirmed it. Which means it is true. There are other stories of cabinet ministers and others corrupt, but if the alternate media write about it, then the laws of defamation apply, and they are stopped in their tracks. One UMNO leader has said he would have sued a mainstream journalist, but would not since that fellow does not have money. In other words, money is used to bankrupt the fellow. If one the other hand, an alterate journalist seems to be winning or gets a fairer corum of jiudges, on appeal, then the case is delayed as long as possible. The cynicism extends to UMNO members who are used to defame opposition figures. They are dropped and they are not supported in court or are not helped with the amount ordered by the courts to be paid to the opposition figure. So, Datin Seri Rafidah Aziz, like the warlord before here in the cabinet, Tan Seri Isa Samad, is banned from UMNO for corruption but will not resign nor be sacked from the Pak Lah cabinet. The Prime Minister sacks from his cabinet only those who defy him personally: Tun Ghazali Shafie, Dato' Shahrir Samad and Dato' Seri Anwar Ibrahim, all by the then Prime Minister, Tun Mahathir Mohamed.

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