DURING the first weekend of November 2011, the PPSMI (the Teaching and Learning of Science and Mathematics in English) policy trended on Twitter. This evidence of PPSMI’s importance to large numbers of tech-savvy Malaysians came shortly after Deputy Prime Minister Tan Sri Muhyiddin Yassin’s back-to-back statements on the policy. Muhyiddin first reiterated that PPSMI would […]
guest column
Lessons in social media from Bersih 2.0
IN the days before and after the Bersih 2.0 rally for electoral reform, Malaysian social networks were buzzing like never before. Internet chatter was centred around the biggest campaign in town: the street march in the heart of Kuala Lumpur on 9 July 2011. Thanks to Facebook, Twitter and YouTube, users had a platform to […]
The need for access to environmental information
GIVEN the public opposition against Lynas Corporation‘s proposed rare earth processing plant in Pahang, it is timely to revisit the due process that is supposed to govern the inception of such projects. How did the public come to know about the project so late after federal approval had already been given for it? Can public […]
The hypocrisy surrounding Interlok
THE debate about the novel Interlok by Malaysian national laureate Abdullah Hussein continues to rage, but among a select few. The Malaysian Indian Congress (MIC) wants the book to be withdrawn from the Form Five syllabus for Malay literature on the grounds that the novel contains “offensive” words and depictions of Indian Malaysians. The MIC […]
Remembering Benjamin McKay (1964-2010)
WALKING around Bangsar one balmy night six years ago, I bumped into filmmaker Amir Muhammad and film academic Khoo Gaik Cheng sitting with a rather foppish Mat Salleh man. It took less than an hour of my being introduced before all of us banded together to bully the hapless Australian Mat Salleh to prove that […]
What’s missing in Selangor’s FOI law
EVEN as the Selangor government is being lauded for introducing freedom of information (FOI) legislation in the state, much is lacking in the Pakatan Rakyat-led government’s enactment. Indeed, the Selangor government may be shortchanging citizens in the state with its version of FOI. There are two reasons why access to information is a vital right […]
Taking on the army
I’VE always wanted to join the army. I remember telling my parents as a teenager that I wanted to be a soldier. Maybe it was initially a boys-with-guns thing, or later, a higher calling to serve the nation … A few months ago, I met General Shahrom, Commander of the 508 Regiment of the Malaysian Territorial Army or Rejimen Askar Wataniah. He had heard of my interest and wanted to get me involved in his Negeri Sembilan-based regiment.
Women can’t become menteri besar?
(Scroll by ba1969 / sxc.hu) ON 29 Jan 2010, Perak’s Barisan Nasional state executive councillor Datuk Hamidah Osman said female politicians cannot become menteri besar. Her reason: a menteri besar “has to meet the [monarch], where protocol is involved, and one has to meet religious officers … in such situations it is not possible for […]
My East-West Allah
Go not to the temple to put flowers upon the feet of God, First fill your own house with the fragrance of Love. – Rabindranath Tagore MY first reaction to the news that a church was attacked was one of disbelief. Most East Malaysians, I think, would be confused as to why this is even […]
Why secularism? Learning from Ireland
PICTURE a former British colony where the majority of people practise a religion that has become closely tied up both with national identity and with bitter anti-British sentiment. After a violent war for independence, the new state’s earliest leaders align themselves with the religion by censoring anything that upsets its hierarchy. A group of religious […]
