Sigma’s Simulacrum of Reality

A fellow blogger has joined the political fray recently on the side of PKR. I first came across Nik Nazmi’s blog through the Malaysian politico blog network a few years back, and I’ve been a regular reader of it since.

Nik was educated at the MCKK and read law at King’s College in the UK. He was Special Advisor to Anwar Ibrahim before being nominated to help PKR take the DUN N32 Seri Setia seat.

I feel that Nik Nazmi would make an excellent new addition to the Selangor state parliament, and especially so for the urbane residents of Seri Setia in the heart of Selangor. Nik Nazmi is a guy who is well versed in debating about the various political and philosophical theories with other fellow political junkies. I would say that he’s a fellow social democrat as well We all know there’s no riches involved in Opposition politics, so what is this bright Malay chap doing in it? This clearly shows that this guy in genuinely in it to serve his fellow Malaysians. And here’s another reason why I like him. He’s a ‘Malaysian Malaysia’ kinda guy. That’s the direction Malaysian politics should be moving towards.

A vote for him therefore will be a vote against the ugly race-based politics of BN.

So you lucky Seri Setia people, what are you waiting for (oh yeah, the polls…. )? Go out there and put Nik Nazmi into your parliament!

Vote Nik Nazmi = Vote PKR = Vote multiracial party

Sigma therefore wholeheartedly endorses Nik Nazmi’s candidacy for Seri Setia!

On the final count, PKR is contesting 56 parliamentary seats. Take 7 away (due to being bought over by BN to disqualify themselves) and we’re left with 49. Full list of parliament and state seat candidates here.

DAP actually suprised me by contesting actually contesting in 47 parliament seats. I initially thought it was less. Anyway, here’s their list. And their state seats.

Instead of PKR, in fact it’s PAS that’s going for a big sweep strategy with 63 parliament seats. I stand corrected. Their parliament and state candidate list can be found here, and here.

Initially I though the 7 seats that were won uncontested by BN were because of the Opposition’s disorganisation. Unfortunately, this was not the case.

According to Dr Syed Husin Ali, those bloody traitors were bought! Fuck them! I think unfortunately most of them were PKR candidates. They should be expelled from the party. Although the PKR naysayers will now use this with glee in demonstrating that PKR’s integrity is suspect, I will say that I still have faith in it. Sure, especially for PKR, there will be a few bad apples there. I would like to think of of those who betrayed it were the ex-BN scums and unprincipled ship-jumpers, so no big loss for the party to now name and shame them. After all, it’s exactly these members who will VERY likely jump ship to BN after the election if they had won their seats.

I tried looking for the exact seven seats that those PKR candidates went AWOL, but its difficult. The compliant BN-controlled media is helping to obscure those candidates with their ill-gotten gains. But here’s what I’ve found:

1. Pengerang (Johor) - Norazan bin Abdullah
2. Kalabakan (Sabah) - Bachok Pendrongi
3. Pensiangan (Sabah) - Danny Andipai (but this guy can be given the benefit of the doubt, as he claimed to have been blocked from registering on Nomination Day)

Feel free to tell me the names and seats of the others. Let’s name and shame those traitors!

So yesterday was Nomination Day for the candidates in Malaysia’s coming GE. And as usual, it was a chaotic affair. There were accusations and counter-accusations of technicality errors from both sides, some bordering on farcial.

But when the dust has settled down, the final tally for parliamentary seats are:

BN: 7
Oppositon: 1

Six Opposition candidates were MIA during Nomination Day, while one submitted his nomination papers too late. In Kelantan, the PAS stronghold state, the BN candidate was disqualified for failing to declare he was a bankrupt, gifting PAS one seat.

A huge turnout for Dr Wan Azizah’s nomination by PKR and PAS supporters in Permatang Pauh points to her probably winning her seat for a third term. I also agreed with Wan Azizah’s conduct of clearly declaring that she’s acting as a proxy for Anwar Ibrahim in her contest. This confirms my earlier prediction that Anwar Ibrahim will be Permatang Pauh’s new MP after April 14 through a by-election.

I don’t think Nurul Izzah will be able to defeat Shahrizat. The latter’s profile is just too high, and her performance as a Cabinet Minister isn’t super-crap, unlike many others. There’s only one way Izzah would be able to do that, and that is to act as a proxy for Anwar as well. She has to try turning her contest into an Anwar vs Shahrizat, instead of an Izzah vs Shahrizat.

Wow wow wow! Now we’re talking!

Finally the much discussed election is starting soon. And what an election this is gonna be

For the first time in Malaysia’s 50 years of existence the Opposition is seriously organising among themselves to try and give one helluva trout slap to BN.

(For the uninitiated on M’sian politics, please refer to the sidebar articles on PKR and Guide to M’sian politics for background info)

It seems from yesterday onwards new bits of political news just keeps popping up. I got most of my info from Malaysia-Today, which is an excellent compilation of M’sian news from various publications and run by the irrepressible Raja Petra.

Anyway, Nomination Day is due tomorrow on the 24th of Feb, and so most of the parties have been negotiating, finalising and releasing their candidate lists. The first one to press was DAP, releasing their Penang parliament candidate list. DAP plans to make Penang their frontline state in their bid to deny BN 2/3rd’s majority in both the state as well as federal parliaments. Towards this aim, DAP has amassed its heavyweights there:

DAP

1. Bagan: Lim Guan Eng
2. Bukit Gelugor : Karpal Singh
3. Tanjong: Chow Kon Yeow
4. Bukit Mertajam: Chong Eng
5. Batu Kawan: Prof P. Ramasamy
6. Jelutong: Jeff Ooi
7. Bukit Bendera: Liew Chin Tong

Lim Guan Eng, whom I have much admiration for, is making his political comeback after 10 years in Penang. Karpal Singh has done a seat swap and move to Bukit Gelugor. An aside: I was shocked to see Mr Singh still in a wheelchair a year after his accident. Luckily, I was relieved when I further read that his injuries are not permanent and that he’s still slowly recovering.

Chong Eng is virtually undefeatable in my hometown of BM I thought her husband would also be competing in a seat, but he ain’t on the list. Maybe he’s gonna gun for a state seat instead.

Prof. Ramasamy and prominent blogger Jeff Ooi rounds out the the star-studded list. Unfortunately, the Prof has a tremendous fight on his hands against former Penang CM Dr Khor Tsu Koon. Mr Ooi should be able to win his seat considering it’s deemed a DAP stronghold.

Other DAP news: The Fong Po Kuan debacle has finally ended favourably. Why Ms Fong did what she did I have no idea. I mean, if she wanted to shame those internal DAP warlords she could have sable-rattled months BEFORE the GE, and not a week before Nomination Day. This is assumings she still supports the DAP party as a whole. Both parties (Ms Fong and the DAP warlords) are at fault here.

PKR

PKR was the next party to release their parliament candidate list. Unlike DAP, PKR has just released its almost complete parliament candidate list, which can be found here.

PKR is again going for a ‘big sweep’ strategy, with it contesting in 56 parliamentary seats. One wonders where they got so much money for their deposits But good attitude, I say!

As I see it, no matter what, Anwar’s gonna get back into parliament as long as either his wife or his daughter wins their seats. More realistically he would probably be the next Permatang Pauh MP through a by-election after April. His daughter is also being used by the party to gauge how strong the ‘Anwar brand’ remains by going for the Lembah Pantai seat. But she’s up against a hotshot Puteri UMNO heavyweight: Shahrizat Abdul Jalil, Malaysia’s Minister of Women and Family Development.

Other prominent PKR candidates and the seats they will be contesting in:

1. Sungai Siput: Dr D Jeyakumar - Who’s going up against unpopular MIC President S Samy Vellu
2. Gombak: Azmin Ali - Anwar’s right-hand man
3. Subang: Sivarasa a/l K. Rasiah - PKR Vice President
4. Batu: Tian Chua - PKR Info Spokesman, rally leader and well-known political agitator
5. Rembau: Badrul Hisham Bin Shaharin - Unknown newcomer who’s tasked to take on the repugnant Khairy Jamaluddin (who has to contest in this rural seat instead of the more logical urban seat for this supposedly ‘urbane’ guy. Ptui!)

Another fellow blogger will be contesting under the PKR ticket, Nik Nazmi for the state seat of Seri Setia in Selangor. I’ve also just been informed renowned human-rights activist and blogger Elizabeth Wong will also be contesting in the Selangor state seat of Bukit Lanjan. Good luck to the both of them!

That’s it so far guys. Until later then!

Finally, after months of speculation, Raja Petra of Malaysia-Today was proven right again in his uncanny predictions and Malaysians are going into an election on the 8th of March. As usual, the chickeny BN headed by PM Abdullah has made a mockery out of democracy by announcing only a 13-day campaigning period. PM Abdullah has also showed that despite all of his party’s bravado talk, they are actually still worried about Anwar Ibrahim’s participation in the elections and hence the reason for Abdullah calling the election a month before Anwar is eligible to contest in it. Pathetic. I mean, even though I’m an Opposition supporter, after his Ijok by-election defeat, if I were the PM I would have tried putting the nails in his coffin by calling for the election in April. Instead, Abdullah chickened out. Does BN know something about the voters’ mood that I don’t?

My predictions for this election is that it is the Opposition’s wet dream. Without a doubt, DAP will have its best results in recent memory. Not sure whether it can top its record best haul since gerrymandering has reduced many of its former strongholds of old. But I’m sure it will still get its best result in its past 4 GE performances. I think it will rout Gerakan in Penang for the parliamentary seats, and hopefully make some inroads in state seats (which Penangites have always been reluctant to give to Oppositions for fear of not getting any funds and infrastructure in their areas). DAP should also do well in the urban seats of Sabah, Sarawak, Selangor and Perak. But there’s no pretending that DAP is concentrating all its resources on Penang, and as a former Penangite I damn well hope it will oust Gerakan out from the two houses.

PAS will basically just do what it did in 1999, in that it would try to increase its majority in Kelantan and reclaim Terengganu. I don’t think it would be able to expand into Kedah though, despite what their head honcho has stated. PAS will serve as a great reminder to BN that it doesn’t have a monopoly on all the states and all the Malay vote. So keep it up PAS.

But ultimately, both DAP and PAS are only serving as flank attacks for the Opposition Front against BN. The most important thrust falls on PKR to execute. PKR HAS to take on as many UMNO Malay-majority seats as it can afford, and WIN them. Seize BN’s heartlands, this is the only way towards power. There are no other alternatives. PKR aims to help DAP seize Penang by concentrating on Seberang Prai while DAP work on the island proper. The same partnership seems to be materialising between those two parties in Sabah, with PKR acting as the senior partner in that state instead. I say instead of PAS, PKR should be the party to try and take Kedah, since Kedah is a more multiracial and multireligious state compared to Kelantan or Terrenganu. PKR should concentrate on making inroads on all mixed states such as Kedah, Sabah, Sarawak, Melaka, and for God’s sake, JOHOR! Wtf is wrong with those damn stupid Johoreans man?? I’ve lived in Johor for 7 years, and I could not believe that no seats have EVER been lost to the Opposition before 2004! And in 04 that was only because the BN candidate disqualified himself due to a technicality. Even when considering racial/religious divide politics, it was and still is inconceivable to me how seats like Johor Bahru, Kota Tinggi, Muar, Batu Pahat, etc is not being attempted by DAP or PKR. These seats are so Chinese-orientated they make Penang look like an Anglo state. Chinese-educated Chinese there makes the overwhelming majority in those seats. I should know since as a national-ed guy I was more of an endangered species in my JB high school than the white rhino. But since Johor as a whole is still more Malay-dominated, I feel this state is perfect for PKR to work on, instead of PAS.

Let’s all hope BN gets a good hiding soon. And make BN lose their 2/3rd’s majority. Onwards Opposition!

I have this love-hate relationship with the Japanese. And this is especially evident in their WWII conduct.

I absolutely detest their incomprehensible blood-lust and rape-lust that they unleashed on their vanquished opponents, especially on the then hapless Chinese. There was absolutely NO reason why they couldn’t follow the Geneva Convention for POWs. I blame the Japanese ruling elite for fostering a god-Emperor cult and a racist mindset among its populace for this, as well as the compliance of the Japanese populace in general.

But despite all that, I still have to admit that I admired their combat prowess. Their lightning fast and comprehensive defeat of the British in Malaya is one example of this. Their courage and tenacity in battle is another.

Which leads me to their kamikaze attack. This was the suicide attack which was devised and used by the Japanese Imperial Navy during the end stages of the war when they were sustaining heavy losses.

One can only look on in respect and awe at someone who is so willing to die for their country, irrespective of what side of the war they were on.

I was reminded of the kamikaze due to this video. Btw, awesome soundtrack.