MCA big names in Perak

The announcement of Dr Chua Soi Lek as part of the Perak BN Election Committee came as no surprise to me. He is after all the Perak MCA State Chief.

However, being the President of MCA whose base is in Johor, I wonder if it is the right move.

Let us take a look at what Dr Chua Soi Lek will be facing. Perak MCA consists of strong leaders who weren't in the same page as Dr Chua before the Party EGM election on 28 March 2010 (328).

Notably, Datuk Lee Chee Leong was with Datuk Seri Ong Tee Keat and he was frequently seen in campaigns with the former MCA President. (Datuk Lee received support from all 3 camps in the recent election which made him a CC member with the most votes)

Another heavyweight is the popular Perak politician Datuk Seri Ong Ka Chuan, whose support was given to Tan Sri Ong Ka Ting for his Presidential bid in March.

Ka Chuan is currently the MP for Tanjung Malim which is categorized as a safe seat for Barisan Nasional.

Changes of plans on the part of the incumbent could also spark a "misunderstanding" between the camps of the popular Perak politician and the Party President.

With the President holding the baton in Perak, any failure to lead his charges to victory will be used to assess the President's popularity, support and leadership be it the result of a machinery sabotage or a genuine lack of public support.

The situation is quite fragile, I must say. Any wrong move will be disastrous and I hope everyone sticks together for the Party's plans in Perak.

DAP currently has more seats than MCA in Parliament and they certainly have more support from the Chinese as compared to MCA, generally speaking, with or without internal conflicts (an excuse used by MCA for the poor Chinese support in Hulu Selangor).

DAP supremo Lim Kit Siang is based in Ipoh Timur together with titans of DAP such as M Kulasegaran in Ipoh Barat and Fong Po Kuan in Batu Gajah ( who is very quiet since 2008 by the way, why? ).

It will be hard for any local MCA leaders to break DAP apart in Perak, but let's leave that aside for now. It is certainly a mammoth task even for Dr Chua Soi Lek, from Johor, to win it big for Perak MCA.

Take a look at the current list of MCA big names in Perak.

• Datuk Seri Dr Chua Soi Lek (Former Health Minister, MCA President)


• Datuk Seri Kong Cho Ha (Cabinet Minister, MCA Secretary General)


• Datuk Seri Ong Ka Chuan (MCA Central Committee member, Former Cabinet Minister),
  


• Datuk Dr Mah Hang Soon (MCA Deputy Youth Chief, Perak State Exco)
  


• Datuk Tan Chin Meng (MCA Central Committee member, Perak MCA Secretary, Special Officer to MB)


• Senator Heng Seai Kie (Wanita MCA Vice Chairman, Deputy Minister)


• Datuk Lee Chee Leong (MCA Central Committee member, Deputy Minister)
  

Perak MCA lost badly in the 12th General Election. With so many top ranked Party and Government leaders from Perak, I don't know what to say if Perak MCA fails recapture a majority of seats contested in the next election.

Failure is certainly unacceptable.

PKR's New Dawn

YB Wee Choo Keong left PKR recently. He is not the only one.

He joins a long list of Pakatan Rakyat leaders who have left the marriage pact formed on the principles of convenience by 3 strange bedfellows (as a mainstream blogger puts it correctly).

This is the argument by JebatMustDie - Mereka yang telah meninggalkan Anwar Ibrahim. And the blogger wrote a strong argument.

Jika mereka yang di atas, yang pernah menjadi orang kuat dan panglima terkanan Anwar Ibrahim sudah meninggalkan parti PKR dan Pakatan Rakyat, mengapa saudara saudari sekalian yang saya rasa tidak pernah mengenali Anwar secara dekat, yang hanya pernah melihat beliau dari jauh atau hanya dalam televisyen, atau mungkin pernah berjabat tangan hanya sekali dua dengan beliau, masih mahu menyokong Anwar?

I will go one step further. People from the Opposition, especially PAS, labeled Tun Dr Mahathir with all sorts of names - diktator, mahafiraun, kejam, kuku besi.

Some in DAP accuse Tun Dr Mahathir of cronyism, nepotism, corruption, and scandal laced.

Interestingly, almost all of Tun Dr Mahathir's men did not leave him and in fact, his supporters base remain strong till today.

Many Government officials, senior leaders, and experts who served under Tun Dr Mahathir continue to vouch, argue and stand by the well respected statesman.

In contrast, some of Anwar Ibrahim's loyalist left him and remained in UMNO when the former DPM was sacked.

Some of course joined him and they are widely known today as the Reformasi boys. But today, his list of close confidantes are slowly but surely getting shorter by day. Why, we ask ?

The best thing is, all of them left with a lot of negative accusations and allegations be it on the mechanics and functions of their former Party or their de facto leader.

Anyway, PKR wants their elected representatives to quit the Party within one month once and for all.


They don't even know who is loyal and who is not in their Party. They don't even know who can be trusted and who can't. Not so long ago, they told the voters to believe in A New Dawn and support them to form a Federal Government.

While BN works and propels ahead with the Government Transformation Programme and New Economic Model, Pakatan Rakyat continue on with their political games.

I waited for quite some time, but neither Ronnie Liu nor Gobind Singh filed any defamation lawsuit against Wee Choo Keong for his blog posting that Ronnie Liu knew about the sand mining scandal since February.

Wee, a practicing lawyer, surely knew the law before he published such an attention grabbing blog posting and possess some form of concrete evidence ? He provided a new article for this - Sand mining scandal in Dengkil

Salam 1Malaysia.

Hanky Panky Selangor Government

At first, we had the scandal of Elizabeth Wong. When the photos popped up in the internet, Pakatan Rakyat leaders were quick to point their fingers at Barisan Nasional.

[ Article : Irresponsible Statements ]

However, as the truth began to unfold that Hilmi Malek was at that time an aide to a PKR MP, PKR leaders began to sing the same tune - leave Elizabeth alone and let us not talk about it anymore.

Tian Chua went a step further though when Agendadaily posed a question to Tian Chua about his relationship with Eli.

He scoffed at Agendadaily's reporter and said "If you ask me again, I smash your head".

[ Article : A Reflection for Pakatan Rakyat 2 ]

Then, we had A Thiruvenggadam who claimed that Alam Flora contracts are divided by percentage among the 3 political parties in PKR.

Well, these were later rebutted by the Selangor State Government as false allegations and A Thiruvenggadam was subsequently dropped from being a MPPJ Councillor.

[ Article : Selangor Govt crumbling ]

Of course, next we had Teoh Beng Hock's mysterious death. Pakatan Rakyat leaders were quick to politicize it and linked up with Teoh's family.

At the peak of the hoo-haa over TBH's mysterious death, one man came up to say something. This came from YB Wee Choo Keong - a PKR MP at that time.

YB Wee Choo Keong mentioned about an open secret where a Selangor EXCO misused his/her office for underground business activities two weeks ago.

[ Article : Teoh's death mystery ]

Recently YB Wee left Pakatan Rakyat - the coalition which promised a Sept 16 Federal Government and A New Dawn.

Before he left, he wrote a blog article - YB Ronnie Liew knew about the sand mining scandal in February 2010!

It came hot with the allegation by PKR MP of Kapar on the Selangor sand mining scandal in the State owned Kumpulan Semesta Berhad - only to be "rewarded" with red paint splashed at his cars and death threats.

Many questions go unanswered in Selangor.

• Why is Selangor DAP so quiet when they are the loudest proponents of competency, accountability and transparency ?
  


• Should there be a Royal Commission Inquiry formed to investigate this and if so, why didn't Kit Siang propose it as he always will when it involves BN ?
  


• Will the national Disciplinary Board of DAP haul up Ronnie Liu for questioning ?
  


• What happened to the Selcat Inquiry by Speaker Teng Chang Khim and Azmin Ali not so long ago ? No results ?
  


• What will be the outcome if there will be an internal party investigation ?
  


• Why wait for MACC when Selangor Menteri Besar and his State Exco Members know what is happening in Selangor unless they are sleeping on the job ?
  


• What are the comments of Selangor State Economic Advisor ?

For now, I will stick to a rumored story that Selangor PKR Government's mess is due to the political tussle between factions in PKR while DAP ... (you fill in the blanks) ...

And I think young leaders like YB Hannah Yeoh should be more pro active in learning about their State Government leadership before going out to preach the holier than thou concept.

Time for Khalid Ibrahim and the Selangor State Government leaders to resign.

Sydney From My Lens (2)

This is a continuation from Sydney From My Lens (1). For this Part 2, I will share with you some pictures of Sydney's Central Business District (harbour view) and pictures taken INSIDE the Sydney Opera House.

Click on the pictures for bigger images.

Sydney From My Lens (1)

Dear readers and followers of A PIECE OF MY MIND, allow me to share a personal collection of my pictures of Sydney.

I was browsing through my pictures recently and found several nice shots that I took when I was studying in Australia.

Enjoy. This will be Sydney From My Lens Part 1 - Sydney Harbour Bridge & Sydney Opera House.

Cyril Takayama's magic in Taiwan

A very interesting magic video, thought I should share it will all my readers. My close pals were shocked and puzzled too :)

If anyone knows how Cyril did it, do share with me ! ( Political articles will come in a week or two, kinda busy at the moment! )

To Hell With MarGeeMar

I believe my blog readers and followers all have interests in politics. Allow me to point to you why Barisan Nasional folks are way better than Pakatan Rakyat.

From my writing thus far, I write based on hypothesis, facts and reasoning. Compare it with this blog, I let you judge - http://margeemar.blogspot.com

I have no idea why but this blog's writers have constantly been attacking me personally and politically.

I am fine with having differences politically but to discredit me or bring my family members into the scene clearly reflects the level of civilization in Pakatan Rakyat supporters camp.

Since I am pro Barisan Nasional, lately I have been subjected to intense efforts by pro Opposition netizens behind veils of anonymity

• to counter me on Facebook
• attack me at my blog
• impersonate me or sign off with my name when commenting at blogs

I wish to clarify that whenever I write any comments, it won't be an anonymous comment but it will be under a Google/Blogger account name : Goh Wei Liang.

If clarifications are needed for any comments made online at other social networking sites or blogs, I can be reached at my email. All clarifications will be replied promptly.

Hiding behind veils of anonymity make you no warrior, leader or true politician. Only cowards and dirt-coated folks do that.

Attacking my family members is far worst than being cowards. It is the act of fools which also reflect the level of maturity and professionalism of the blog.

I can say that MarGeeMar has crossed the line. To hell with MarGeeMar.

(No information will be released on career placement/employer/family at the moment to protect the image, interests and privacy of all parties)

Extremism in MCA

MCA is actually a party heavily divided not just by warlords but also by objectives.

Some groups are in MCA for business purposes and they don't care what happens to the country as long as their pockets are save.

There is another group who cares only about positions and play politics all the time where they sway their stand according to the wind flow.

Our focus today is on a group which always talk about the Chinese without ever thinking of other races.

This group is actually a pain for MCA because they are largely influential in MCA politics and they are heavyweights within the Party's four walls.

"More Chinese schools, more money for Chinese education, more businesses for Chinese, more contracts for Chinese, more allocation for Chinese NGOs ..... "

Any failure to fulfill these, the MCA leadership will have to be prepared to be voted out in the next party election.

Change the word "Chinese" to "Malay" and make it Perkasa's demands, won't MCA criticize it ? Why slam the role of Perkasa and its relationship with UMNO or former leaders ?

All these while, MCA and the Chinese NGOs and the extremist Chinese group in the Party are like blood brothers.

So, am I wrong to say MCA has extremist elements ? No I am not.


So before the leaders start talking about UMNO and Perkasa, my advice to MCA leaders is to first look at our own backyard first.

This is coming from someone who boldly and vocally supports MCA, me.

Why are we slamming others when our backyard looks dirty and we make ourselves vulnerable to retaliation attacks which we probably can't defend ?

Will MCA dare to distance themselves from the Chinese NGOs ? MCA leaders cannot and must not be seen as saying one thing but doing another.

The fault does not lie solely in Perkasa for MCA's failure to win Chinese votes. So, please. Get the cards right.

Next, I will point out to you why MCA's New Media Unit might turn out to be a big joke. And yes, MCA copied not just UMNO's concept but their unit name also - Unit Media Baru (UMB).

MCA & Perkasa

I didn't want to say much about MCA & Perkasa but due to demands at my Facebook page and my blog, here it is.

I was wrong when I turned sour grapes after BN lost at Bukit Gantang but I realized that if a certain cluster of the population is not voting us, we must see why and how we can improve on it.

Turning our backs to them will only make things worse.

I believe UMNO Youth, Dr Chua Soi Lek and Datuk Ti Lian Ker were right in criticizing Ibrahim Ali's suggestion to cut spending to the Chinese community in Hulu Selangor and I share their views.

But one cannot deny the facts and the truth of Ibrahim Ali's response to Dr Chua.

The words were so true that I don't see any MCA leader comment further on this matter at all except to say that Ibrahim Ali is looking for publicity. A cornered argument I must say.

Datuk Ibrahim Ali's haunting words were

"Whether Perkasa exists or not, the results would have been the same. The Chinese voters have rejected MCA even before Perkasa was formed."

MCA is really in an awkward position. He has a point, you know ?

These days, everyone keeps focusing on what UMNO leaders and Perkasa's struggles are. Naturally and evidently, these two organizations champion the causes of the majority - the Malays - in Malaysia.

Every word UMNO and Perkasa's leaders utter, it will be classified as uncomfortable to the Chinese and Indians.

May I ask, what MCA's struggles or objectives are if not for the Chinese ?

Week in week out, we have the Chinese NGOs collaborating and discussing with MCA on various Chinese issues - commerce, education and welfare.

And what gives MCA the rights to talk about Chinese community matters but not Perkasa on Malay related issues ?

As far as I know, Ong Tee Keat was the only one in MCA talking about the interests of not just the Chinese but Malaysians as a whole.

He wanted to change the way we think in MCA and the way we function though he could not proceed now.

If you ask me, from my observations, MCA leaders aren't clear at all where they are heading politically.

"Chinese Extremism in MCA" is probably my next article.