Datuk Seri Najib's Budget Gaffe

The Prime Minister Datuk Seri Najib made his Budget 2012 disclosure on Friday October 7, 2011. I thought he was doing a good job, offering the business concerns and the public this and that until when nearly at the end of his speech, he, in the humorous style of his, almost like tongue in cheek, mentioned that the members of the parliament will even have their allowances raised if both the ruling Barisan Nasional Party and the Opposition parties agreed. The members of the ruling party laughed. This is money freely given. Surely the opposition party members will agree along! Others, too, laughed together. Even I could not help smiling. It is all about money, then.

But I had my reservation. This will be a fodder for the opposition party to use it in this time of approaching election  to tell the Malaysians that they have the economic well being of the people at heart foremost, and that they are foregoing the increase in their allowance so that the money can be used for the people’s urgent needs.

That is exactly what happened. Next day I saw in an English Daily that opposition party members Dr Dzulkefly Ahmad and Azmin Ali opposed the plan saying that the time was not right and focus should be on the people and the rising cost of living and not on the allowances.

Poor PM. He should be regretting he said it. Knowing the opposition, they would be harping on this matter during their election speeches.

Deeply tinted helmet visors...grumble...grumble..

I wish the government did not rescind on its requirement for motorcyclist not to wear deeply tinted helmet visors. Deeply tinted visors do pose social setbacks. For one, we would not even realize the person who had just passed us by or near us is our friend because of his fully hidden face. Hesitation will always be there when we should be greeting each other unreservedly.

And we need not say a lot about robberies, burglaries or snatch-thefts done by the rogues wearing fully tinted helmets. No one can recognize them. Even pictures taken by hidden cameras won’t be of any use.

I hope the authorities bring back the rule forbidding motorcyclists wearing helmets with deeply tinted visors.

Help the paupers, please.

The Second Finance Minister of Malaysia, Datuk Seri Ahmad Husni Hanadzlah had recently said, in Ipoh, that those earning less than RM3,000 per month will be helped to get through the rising cost of living.

This really baffles me a bit. In my small town of mine, namely Taiping, if one were to even mention that he was a RM2,000 per month earner he will get some respect. He should be a senior staff or something. For RM3,000 one could be a manager. From what I have seen most of the people in the private sector are getting monthly salaries of way below RM1,000. If people getting RM3,000 per month are taken as low wage earners, then the latter ones are surely paupers.

One day we may see the managers and the paupers queuing up together for some food stamps. I hope the government takes care of the paupers first. Me? I am a pauper, too!

A believer of all religions.

Hari Raya Puasa is just around the corner, most probably, on the 30^th of August, 2011, and I am sure my Muslim friends should be eagerly waiting for their great day. A day when they can openly consume food and drinks without looking over their shoulders for the Puasa enforcing authorities. 

Oh, no, this does not mean I am saying all my friends do not observe the Puasa obligation. There do exist a few whose stomachs seem to be unable to go without food. They don’t seem to have the will power to do as the religion of Islam asks them to do; to fast during the day for a month.

I am a great respecter of religions and their faiths and when I see hordes of Malays queuing up to buy breakfast and lunches at the kedai mamaks, I don’t know whether to be understanding or to give them a look of disapproval.

Seems like there is a great deal to be done by the Islamic authorities to convince these puasa-faulters to observe the requirement of Islam.

Obedient Wives Club - my friend has a FCP for a wife! Thanks to Dr. Rohaya!

There they sit, my good friend and his loving wife, at a table in a popular restaurant in town, chatting away happily. They have been married for thirty years now and they are still as loving as when they were newly married. Quickly, the words of the Malaysian OWC’s vice-president, Dr. Rohaya Mohamad came into my mind. Could it be that the reason why they are still together and loving was because his wife had been a FCP to him? If you are thinking that the acronyms, OWC stands for Oil Wholesaling Countries and FCP for Football Club of Penang you are wrong. He he! OWC is the contraction of Obedient Wives Club which came into prominent news last month. FCP? Well, ask Dr.Rohaya Mohamad, she should know. She was the one who said women should serve their husband as a FCP or better so that the husband won’t look for other women.

More on OWC. It was formed by Global Ikhwan, a Malaysian business firm dealing in household materials and the miscellaneous. Global Ikhwan is said to have had dealings with the banned Al-Arqam Islamic group previously. The club was launched in Rawang, Selangor on Saturday June 4 2011. In Malaysia its founder member is Dr. Rohaya Mohamad. OWC has branches now in Jordan, Indonesia, Thailand and Singapore. It says wives should take more than good care of their husbands (this is putting it mildly) to prevent them from straying adding that its concepts are based on the edicts of Islam.

To my friend in the restaurant, “sorry friend, you have a got a FCP there with you!” Well, I am just saying that in my mind, mind you. Can I say to him directly that he got a FCP for a wife? Of course not! He would kill me! Mmmm… that FCP word again! Quick, rush to Dr.Rohaya. She will tell you more! Ah, never mind! FCP stands for 'First Class Prostitute'. Sorry! Not my words. That's Rohaya's.

The queen is your neighbor

Once upon a time, long long ago and far far away, in a nation called Britain, there lived a girl called Catherine Elizabeth Middleton. She was the daughter of a simple man, who had worked as a flight dispatcher for an airline, and then became an owner of a successful mail order company called, Party Pieces. The company sold party supplies and decorations, and was worth millions of dollars. (Not a simple man, you say?) and the man had no notion that his daughter would one day become the queen of that nation. 

Well, you know what I am talking about, don’t you? Catherine Middleton, a graduate of the University of St Andrews, Scotland, married Prince William of Wales on Friday, April 29 2011 at 11am GMT, and they became the Duke and Duchess of Cambridge, and future king and queen. 

Ha ha! I just had a strong desire to start off on Kate this way. Reading a lot of fairy tales when I was young had made me come to this! 

Oops, here am I now; calling the future British queen, simply Kate, as though she is living next door! Well, this is what the Internet does to you. Reading and watching news about people who interest you, make you feel closer to you, than they really are.