Mind you, the Naza Group, the blanket company under which the minister's son-in-law operates, also offers, besides the luxury cars, 40 Kia Carnival vans as official vehicles. It will provide 24-hour technical support. Besides, the foreign minister, Dato' Seri Syed Hamid Albar, says the government would rent 200 Proton cars in addition. After all, the national car manufacturer cannot be left in the lurch, could it. But what a fall for it from the sole supplier of Protons for those who came here for 1998 APEC Summit to a "gofer's" car at NAM? What a fall! Does this faze the good minister? Certainly not! "We need the contribution of other car companies to show that all companies operating in Malaysia look at Malaysia as a good place for doing business."

The pressure comes from other UMNO leaders as well. As it once happened. In 1988, when the MCA cabinet minister, Dato' Seri Chan Siang Sum, died. He was the MP for Bentong. The MCA had proposed Dato' Chan Kong Choy as the candidate in the by-election. But the Sultan of Pahang insisted it should be Dato' Lim Ah Lek, then a state executive councillor in the state. He was returned. The MCA then proposed the deputy minister, Dato' Kok Wee Kiat, be promoted to Dato' Seri Chan's portfolio. But UMNO wanted Dato' Lim, and like the foreign minister, Dato' Seri Syed Hamid Albar, was appointed to the cabinet without first holding junior posts in the government. So, when the mentri besar of Pahang offered Dato' Lim the choice of three Chinese majority parliamentary constituencies in the next general elections, it was proof enough that even the state BN leaders are wary of Dr Ling.

Why is Dato' Jamaluddin specially favoured to leap into the cabinet from the backbenches? He is chairman of the electricity utility, Tenaga Nasional Berhad. Therein lies a tale. When Dr Mahathir desperately wanted to have tea and scones with President Bush in the White House, the State Department was lukewarm. So private channcels were lobbied. Three Malaysians got into the act: the former cabinet minister, Tan Sri Megat Junid Megat Ayob; the minister of justice, Dato' Seri Rais Yatim; The foreign minister, Dato' Seri Syed Hamid Albar, through Wisma Putra, th foreign ministry. Tan Sri Megat Junid pulled it off, with a budget of US$10 million, to which TNB contributed the most at the behest of its chairman. Many crony business men, like Tan Sri Francis Yeoh of the YTL Group, chipped in so that all could claim credit, and get contracts in the future. A Malaysian Malay woman married to a Jew and living in Washington lobbied and spread the lolly around. This use of money is not new. One key member of the Prime Minister's immediate staff charged a fee for meeting the Great Man, which the business men, especially Japanese and others, were only too happy to pay. Dato' Jamaluddin is rewarded with a cabinet post. Dr Mahathir wanted to reward Tan Sri Megat Junid with the IWK sewage privatisation, but the Cabinet baulked at it, and so he could not.

What makes this somewhat bizarre was that a Filipina lodged a similar report when he was ambassador in Manila: she alleged rape but he said he had accidentally bumpted into her well-endowed breats. And, when a young diplomat in Phnom Penh, he turned up at a diplomatic function with five under-aged Cambodian girls in tow, and shortly after an Australian ambassador was recalled after having been found to be a paedophile. But he had earned Dr Mahathir's trust and kudos for his able handing of the Abu Sayyaf kidnap. So he was reassigned from Manila to Canberra. The foreign minister, Dato' Seri Syed Hamid Albar, is furious and wants to recall the ambassador. But that cannot happen if Dr Mahathir decides if he should be where he is.

MALAYSIA'S INTEMPERATE decision to cane and jail those illegal workers who did not leave the country by 31 July turns into a fiasco. With one fell stroke, she quarrels with her immediate neighbours, insisting she is right which none should object. But when domestic policy is enforced without thought to relations with foreign countries, especially when their citizens are involved, its repercussions would cause more than diplomatic fury. This has happened. Southeast Asian countries are horrified not so much as the caning as the speed with which the new rules came into force, without negotiations and forcing the illegals to rush out to escape the punishment. Indonesia and the Philippines sent warships to rescue their citizens from certain caning. When this policy is defended in injured anger at suggestions of foreign interference in domestic matters, it spills over into domestic reaction in those countries which affect Malaysians. Indonesians now target Malaysians for abuse and manhandling. So widespread is this that the Malaysian foreign minister, Dato' Seri Syed Hamid Albar, asks Malaysians not to visit Indonesia.

The flag is an important attribute of a national will, to be treasured and honoured. I was once sent to detention class, in the 1950s, for inadvertently letting the Federation of Malaya flag fall to the ground, at the English College, Johore Bahru, while hoisting it. But these traditions are ignored by those nations which does not see much value in them. Here it is an object of commerce, people asked to fly it so some crony business men could make money selling them. It started with devaluing the flag by hoisting a larger version of one atop what is billed as the tallest flagpost in the globe. It is plastered on motor vehicles, allegedly to reflect the patriotism of the vehicle owners, but what is reflects is the devaluation of an important symbol of nationhood. No one pays much attention to the importance of a national symbol, including, I am sorry to say, the Prime Minister himself. This deliberate but unthinking devaluation of the Jalur Gemilang happened during the 21 years he has been head of government. The flag therefore has lost its symbolic meaning. If it had not, Dato' Seri Syed Hamid Albar would have lodges the strongest diplomatic protest to the Indonesian ambassador in Kuala Lumpur. And Dr Mahathir would not have dismissed it as a trifle not worth bothering about.

The Prime Minister, Dato' Seri Mahathir Mohamed, insists his cabinet is at the cutting edge, not chopping block, of Malaysia's development and progress. He does not say it is in the same league, no doubt, as Perwaja Steel, the Employees Provident Fund, Renong, United Engineers Malaysia, Petronas, Telekom, MAS, Putra Jaya, all synonyms for Malaysia's "development and progress". But hear him out: "This cabinet of ours, which we know and other's don't, is more relaxed than those of other countries. Sometimes we hear raucous laughter in the Cabinet as if they are not serious and are just attending a social function." He implies that others like Mr Goh Chok Tong, Mr Tony Blair, Mr Atul Bihari Vajpayee drool at the prospect of having the excellent Malaysian ministers in their cabinet as Dato' Seri Ling Liong Sik, Dato' Seri S. Samy Vellu, Datin Rafidah Aziz, Dato' Seri Syed Hamid Albar, Datin Shahrizat Jalil. With them around, Malaysia's future is in good hands. No doubt theirs too. No doubt it is. Which is why they insist on staying on in the cabinet even after they have long begun their retirement in office. So they could be auctioned off to the highest bidder from foreign countries who need them.

The US secretary of state, Mr Colin Powell, passed through Kuala Lumpur this week, with a not-too-subtle warning that the jailed former deputy prime minister, Dato' Seri Anwar Ibrahim, continues to impinge on bilater ties. His counterpart, Malaysian foreign minister, Dato' Syed Hamid Albar, impotent and frustrated, wanted bilateral ties anchored on more than one man or one issue. Mr Powell ignored him. The less than subtle hint that Malaysia's regional role in the US war on terror is conditional on its human rights record, the main prop of which is the political vendetta against Dato' Seri Anwar. Mr Powell contradicts Dato' Seri Syed Albar to make clear Dato' Seri Anwar was convicted in unfair trials for his political views. Malaysia's role in the US war on terror, he implied, depends on to its human rights record, and what happens to one man, with pressure not let up.

Nothing in Malaysia is what it seems. The Prime Minister, Dato' Seri Mahathir Mohamed, last month, at last called on President Bush as he desired, but not how he would have liked. It could not be arranged as an official visit. The State Department was lukewarm and the National Security Council was none too keen to have him call on the President just yet. Wisma Putra and the foreign minister, Dato' Seri Syed Hamid Albar, having failed, four key men stepped in with the help of US insurance companies, to make the visit happen: The former cabinet minister, Tan Sri Megat Junid Megat Ayob; the current cabinet minister, Dato' Seri Rais Yatim; the business men Tan Sri Francis Yeoh and Tan Sri Lim Kok Wing. It was Tan Sri Megat Junid who got the visit put back, but the other three insist it was they. And now all four want to paid for their "success" -- in contracts and perks that could run into billions of ringgit and political IOUs.

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