Can we talk about the economy?

Looking ahead: In 1997, we spent on massive highway infrastructure and got ourselves out of the recession. Today, we need to spend in ways that will fundamentally change the majority of our society from backward and inward-looking to modern and progressive. YES. Let’s not talk about sex, lies or videotapes. I am just not very interested […]

Malaysian education and quota: The Endgame

IN my last article, I took us along memory lane through the 60s and 70s when our education was world class. As I said, we prepared our bumiputra students at foundational levels in secondary residential and semi-residential schools to be able to competently compete on merit with others, at primarily international universities overseas. After the […]

Malaysian education and quotas

IF there is one other thing that I am passionate about, it is education. Education is the bedrock of progress in society. So today, I want to walk all of us down the memory lane of Malaysian education. For my generation, Malays that grew up in the late 60s and 70s, the emphasis on education […]

The war for the hearts and minds of Malaysia

MALAYSIA is at a crossroads. Almost a year into the new government, the vision of a new Malaysia seems truly dead and buried. Don’t get me wrong, Tun (Dr Mahathir Mohamad) is doing his very best to right the economy and to banish much of the corruption that has plagued the nation at every level […]

Not what Islam teaches

No barriers: People forming a ‘ring of peace’ around a mosque in Toronto, Canada, to show solidarity with victims of the Christchurch mosque attacks in New Zealand. The majority of whites and Christians in the West are against the white Christian supremacist ideology espoused by the terrorist who perpetrated the attack. — Reuters THE Christchurch […]

A plea to Pakatan Harapan’s Malay leaders

Malaysia’s moral compass: The idea of a nation is enshrined within our Rukun Negara, a philosophy worthy to be repeated and reminded to all today. I AM going to start my epistle with this quote “Throughout history, it has been the inaction of those who could have acted; the indifference of those who should have […]

What’s in a ‘digitus impudicus’

THE world’s oldest insulting gesture, flipping the bird, or sticking out the middle finger, dates to ancient Greece and was adopted by the Romans as digitus impudicus – the impudent finger. A public intellectual, expressing his contempt for a gas-bag politician, reaches for a familiar gesture. He extends his middle finger and declares: “This is the great […]

Let’s go back to basics

The right fundamentals: By cutting out the ‘fanciful non-productive’ elements, we can beef up our core curriculum that would increase the standards of our education at no additional cost overall. Reforming Malaysian education can be affordable and simple – if we put our minds to it.  THIS piece was prompted by a very interesting exchange […]

The Land Below the Wind – where we are at our very best

SABAH, famously known as “The Land Below the Wind”, is the second largest state in Malaysia, sharing the island of Borneo with Sarawak, Brunei and Kalimantan. Well, I am in Kota Kinabalu for the Borneo Rainforest Law Conference and the Opening of the Legal Year (OLY) 2019 for Sabah and Sarawak. I attended the same […]