Anwar Ibrahim |
- Skandal Pusat FIDLOT Kebangsaan
- Checkpoint Charlie Museum: One Man’s heroic Determination To Fight Tyranny With Truth
- Pakatan Will Not Retrench or Sack Civil Servants, Anwar Slams Umno News Reports
- Kemana Subsidi RM40 Juta Kedai Rakyat 1Malaysia?
- RM1,500 Minimum Wage For Selangor Gov’t Firms
| Skandal Pusat FIDLOT Kebangsaan Posted: 09 Nov 2011 06:19 AM PST BARISAN NASIONAL MENGELAK DARI ISU PENYELEWENGAN DANA RAKYAT Selepas pendedahan KEADILAN mengenai status dana rakyat sebanyak RM256 juta (RM250 juta dalam bentuk pinjaman dan RM6 juta dalam bentuk geran) yang telah disalurkan sepenuhnya kepada National Feedlot Corporation Sdn Bhd (NFC), ahli-ahli Dewan Rakyat dari Barisan Nasional cuba mengalihkan fokus rakyat daripada isu yang sebenarnya. § Kebiasaannya, escrow account dipegang oleh pihak bank atau peguam yang bertanggungjawab menerima arahan dari pemberi pinjaman sebelum menyalurkan pinjaman kepada si peminjam. § Apabila si peminjam telah memenuhi syarat-syarat perjanjian pinjaman yang dipanggil Conditions Precedent (CP), barulah pihak ketiga menyalurkan wang ke akaun bank milik peminjam. § Di dalam kes pinjaman RM250 juta yang diambil oleh NFC, KEADILAN telah membuktikan bahawa wang-wang pinjaman sebanyak RM130 juta (bayaran pertama) dan RM120 juta (bayaran kedua) telah masuk ke dalam akaun milik NFC. § Akaun-akaun NFC di Maybank dan Public Bank bukanlah di atas nama pihak ketiga seperti mana konsep escrow account tetapi benar-benar di atas nama NFC. § Oleh sebab itu jugalah, mengikut peraturan International Financial Reporting Standard (IFRS) yang digunapakai dalam penyediaan penyata kewangan, pinjaman yang telah masuk ke akaun milik peminjam mestilah ditunjukkan sebagai hutang jangka panjang di dalam penyata kewangan peminjam. § Saya ingin menegaskan sekali lagi pendirian KEADILAN bahawa bukti jelas menunjukkan keseluruhan RM250 juta telah disalurkan kepada NFC berdasarkan rekod penyata bank; bukannya diletakkan di dalam escrow account seperti alasan yang diberikan Barisan Nasional. § Daripada rekod kewangan NFC, pelbagai perbelanjaan melampau dan pindahan wang dibuat sepanjang tahun 2008 dan 2009. § Ini termasuklah pindahan wang ke dalam akaun-akaun deposit tetap milik NFC yang bakinya berjumlah RM119 juta pada 31 Disember 2009, pindahan wang kepada syarikat-syarikat milik keluarga Dato' Seri Shahrizat Jalil sehingga mencecah jumlah RM83 juta pada 31 Disember 2009, perbelanjaan perjalanan luar negara dan keraian berjumlah RM828,000 dalam tahun 2009 dan subsidi kepada restoran Meatworks milik keluarga Dato' Seri Shahrizat Jalil berjumlah RM3 juta dalam tahun 2009. § Jika benar semua perbelanjaan ini datangnya dari dana yang diletakkan di dalam escrow account seperti yang didakwa Barisan Nasional, bermakna kementerian-kementerian terbabit telah cuai dan membiarkan sahaja perbelanjaan yang membazir dan menyeleweng ini dibuat. § Ini mengheret keseluruhan pentadbiran Barisan Nasional yang melindungi penyelewengan seorang menteri dan membiarkan sahaja keluarga beliau berbelanja wang rakyat sesuka hati. § Ini membabitkan simpanan deposit tetap di atas nama NFC berjumlah RM119 juta, hutang Meatworks kepada NFC berjumlah RM3 juta, hutang lain-lain kepada NFC berjumlah RM626,000, dana yang dipindahkan ke syarikat-syarikat lain berjumlah RM83 juta, baki lembu belum disembelih yang dinilai berharga RM6 juta dan nilai bersih aset tetap (selepas susut nilai tahunan) berjumlah RM28 juta. § Jika hanya RM181 juta yang disalurkan setakat ini, bagaimana pula NFC boleh berbelanja lebih besar sehingga aset bersihnya berjumlah RM239 juta pada 31 Disember 2009? This posting includes an audio/video/photo media file: Download Now |
| Checkpoint Charlie Museum: One Man’s heroic Determination To Fight Tyranny With Truth Posted: 09 Nov 2011 04:15 AM PST by Thor Halvorssen While there are hundreds of military museums around the world, Haus am Checkpoint Charlie, or the Checkpoint Charlie Museum, is one of few memorials that expressly document the tyrannical force of dictatorship — in this instance, the Communist cruelty that operated with an iron fist thanks to a methodically conceived Iron Curtain. The museum ranks with far wealthier museums that document the horrors of fascist tyranny, such as the Holocaust Memorial Museum in Washington, D.C. The story of the Berlin Wall begins on Saturday, Aug. 12, 1961, a seemingly lackluster summer day in Berlin. Residents from the eastern and western parts of town traveled to their favorite summer spots, to luxuriate in the last summer rays of the sun. Little did they know that something strange was unfolding, and by the end of the night, casually traversing to the opposite end of the city would become impossible. It would be a day Berliners would never be able to forget, and a day Rainer Hildebrandt's Checkpoint Charlie Museum will try to make sure the world too never forgets. The same night, leading Politburo members of the German Democratic Republic (Soviet-controlled East Germany) were partaking in an awkward "get-together" at the government guesthouse in Döllnsee. While it was not uncommon for the Politburo to have conferences in Döllnsee, there was something different about this particular gathering. The housekeeping staff was ordered to spend the night, as were the guests. The uneasy small talk and forced socialization — as some noticed, under the supervision of military men — lasted for what seemed like hours, until around 10 p.m., when the decision to close the sector borders between East and West Berlin was presented as a fait accompli. Just a few days earlier, Soviet premier Nikita Khrushchev had given the Politburo permission to build a wall to stop East Berliners from moving to the western sector. The explanation? This migration was undermining the GDR's credibility and workforce. By midnight, more than 30,000 East German troops had left their garrisons to surround the entire West Berlin border. When news of the blockade spread throughout Berlin the next morning, people were unsure how to react. It had become increasingly difficult to cross Berlin without being harassed for identification and paperwork by the Soviet forces and their accomplices in the East Berlin security forces. The "American Sector" (West Berlin) was a small island of Western freedom inside the GDR, and the exodus to this zone had begun well before the border was closed. In the twelve years since pro-Soviet Communists had taken over East Germany, more than 2.5 million people voluntarily moved to the West — of which 144,000 left in 1959, 199,000 in 1960 and 207,000 in the first seven months of 1961 alone. Germans yearned for freedom and were keen to get out of the Communist sector. But rather than address the root causes of the exodus (dictatorial oppression), the Soviets decided they had the right to keep what East German Stalinist Walter Ubricht called "their" labor force from leaving, so erecting a wall was seen as the most efficient social-engineering solution. Overnight, barbed wire festooned the perimeter, and suddenly it was official: Millions of Germans were trapped in East Berlin — unable to leave the enormous prison that had become East Germany. No exit. It was not enough for the Politburo that most East Berliners were silent about this sudden change — they needed to be certain they had the citizenry's full support. To do this, they rounded up people they considered dissenters, including not only those who overtly criticized the government but also people who had studied or worked in the West — the "border-crossers." And they were sent to prisons run by the GDR state police, the infamous Stasi, and to "labor-exchange factories," a euphemism for a term many historians continue to deny: slave-labor factories. According to official numbers, 28 people managed to escape East Berlin on the first day, and 41 on the second day. That night, shots were fired at a couple swimming the Teltow Canal. Although there were no casualities, it was an ominous harbinger of what was to come. East Germans who lived on Bernauer Straße — the street that lined the Berlin Wall — were throwing themselves out the windows of their apartments to cross into the West. Even after all their windows were sealed with bricks, some attempted to jump off their roofs. West Berlin sympathizers and firefighters would stand on the Western side of the border with sheets to break the escapees' falls, but, between the East German police that came after them and the sheer impossibility of surviving such a fall, many simply plummeted to their deaths — preferring death to life without freedom. One year later, Peter Fechter, an 18-year-old bricklayer, was shot by a border guard and left to bleed to death while his chilling calls for help could be heard on both sides of the wall. Fechter became the first victim of the Berlin Wall guards. When the GDR realized that the border-control guards, many of them young boys around the same age as the West Berlin demonstrators on the other side of the wall, were not shooting to kill, some sections of the wall were lined with motion-detecting automatic machine guns. In the next 28 years, 191 more people lost their lives in attempts to cross to West Berlin. While the Cold War may seem far removed from 2011, the 50th anniversary of the construction of the Berlin Wall, it is important to reexamine the devastation caused by Communist regimes and the historical framework in which something so atrocious as the splitting of a city was allowed to happen. Further, it should serve as a powerful reminder that a country that does not allow you to leave is, by every conceivable standard, a totalitarian state (today this is best exemplified by Burma, Cuba, North Korea, and Vietnam, where having a passport is not a right of the common person, but rather a privilege the government reserves for a very small number of propaganda ambassadors and diplomats). German historian and anti-Communist activist Rainer Hildebrandt understood the necessity of this better than anyone else. On Oct. 19, 1962, a mere 13 months after the barrier was formed, Hildebrandt hosted his first exhibition in a modest two-room apartment on the infamous Bernauer Straße. "We suggested that tourists be thankful to those border guards who do not shoot to kill: 'See through the uniform!' we would tell them. Some guards saw that we understood, and after their own escapes came to work with us," wrote Hildebrandt. "The large number of visitors encouraged us to look for new premises." A year later, Hildebrandt opened Haus am Checkpoint Charlie, also known as Mauermuseum, a collection of photos, stories, and miscellaneous items documenting the damage the wall had caused. In a stirring testimony to the irrepressible spirit of liberty, the museum today documents the daring successful escapes — most of them involving ordinary people with nothing at their disposal except courage and creativity. Home-made submarines, military disguises, secret compartments in cars, home-made airplanes, human catapults, identity theft — the museum contains information and objects detailing the most breathtaking of escapes. Located next to the prominent border-crossing checkpoint from which it took its name, the museum also became a sort of safe haven for escapees and a place from which escape-helpers monitored movement at the borders. Hildebrandt's dogged fervor for this cause culminated in the creation of an exhaustive repository of GDR memorabilia that to this day remains open every day of the year at its original location near Checkpoint Charlie. The museum also houses the Czechoslovakian Charter 77 typewriter, the death mask of Elena Bonner's partner Andrei Sakharov, and Mahatma Gandhi's diary and sandals, making it certainly one of the first museums of international nonviolent protest. Hildebrandt's project, marked by his indefatigable attention to detail, has served as a far more captivating reminder of Soviet cruelty than anything that can be found in the United States or Western Europe. The best effort in the United States to document Communist history was the formation of the Victims of Communism Memorial Foundation. This non-profit was established by an Act of Congress and is chaired by the American equivalent of Rainer Hildebrandt, Lee Edwards, who originally intended to raise $100 million for a memorial and museum with plans to create an exhibit that included statues of notable freedom fighters and a recreation of the gulag, in addition to artifacts of Communist regimes. Regrettably, owing to an unforgivable lack of interest by philanthropists and institutional donors in the United States, the museum project had to be put on hold. Undefeated, Edwards soldiered on and on June 12, 2007, the 20th anniversary of Pres. Ronald Reagan's "tear down this wall" speech in Berlin, a monument was unveiled on Capitol Hill to memorialize the victims of Communism. It is a sculpture of the "Goddess of Democracy," a bronze replica of the statue constructed by Chinese students in Tiananmen Square in 1989 (prior to their being murdered by the government that continues to rule China). I was there with Lee Edwards that day in June, and what made it particularly moving was that it was the late Tom Lantos, a Holocaust survivor, and the only American congressman to have survived the horror of Nazi Germany, who drove the point home about Soviet Communism. Edwards has since focused his efforts on education, founding an online Global Museum of Communism, with an extensive trove of Communist-era remnants, interactive graphics and texts, as well as evidence of Communist atrocities. Arguably, an online museum can reach more people than an actual edifice. Edwards's foundation is now preparing a curriculum on the history of Communism for use in American secondary education. November 9, 1989, was the day that Politburo official Gunter Schabowski announced that travel "abroad" from East Germany would be allowed. Immediately, Berliners from the East and West stormed the Berlin Wall, ignoring the caveat that permission still had to be granted for travel. For a few hours, the confused border control attempted to hold the crowd back but was soon overwhelmed by the crowd's euphoria and began allowing people to pass through freely for the first time in 28 years. This is when the history books tell us that the Berlin Wall "fell." No, dear reader, it was torn down, mostly by young people with hammers, pickaxes, tractors, pulleys, and a strength of spirit that was made stronger over the years by the peaceful actions of those who stood against, documented, and bore witness to the cruelty and inhumanity of the Communist tyranny. Recognition and attention should be paid to men like Hildebrandt whose life's work has affected millions yet who seldom get the recognition they so richly deserve. Tonight in New York City, the Atlas Foundation, a global public-policy think tank focused on "advancing the cause of liberty," will host a dinner to commemorate the tearing down of the Berlin Wall. Let's hope someone raises a glass to Hildebrandt's work. Meanwhile, at the Checkpoint Charlie Museum, the current curator, Alexandra Hildebrandt, has wasted no time carrying forward her husband's struggle beyond Berlin: On November 15, the museum will unveil the "Sergei Magnitsky Exhibition." To be opened by the German justice minister, Sabine Leutheusser-Schnarrenberger, the exhibit will detail the life and ghastly death of 39-year-old Sergei Magnitsky, tortured to death by Vladimir Putin's government for blowing the whistle on corruption in modern Russia. The Magnitsky case is a key element in any discussion of human rights in Russia and the exhibit is well worth a visit. The museum previously had an exhibit about the continued imprisonment of Russia's most egregious political prisoner case in post-Soviet Russia: Mikhail Khodorkovsky, another Putin adversary. Hildebrandt well understands that in places such as Russia, North Korea, Syria, China, Cuba, Burma, Saudi Arabia, Iran, and too many African countries to list here, entire peoples are still besieged within their nations by oppressive governments. Lucky for them, there still exists a piece of "the American Sector" in Berlin at the Checkpoint Charlie Museum, where they will find allies in the struggle for liberty. |
| Pakatan Will Not Retrench or Sack Civil Servants, Anwar Slams Umno News Reports Posted: 08 Nov 2011 10:37 PM PST Opposition Leader Anwar Ibrahim has confirmed that Pakatan Rakyat would not be slashing the civil service, refuting the Umno-controlled newspapers which have been front-paging comments they alleged were made by DAP’s Tony expressing the intention to whittle down the country’s bloated civil service. “I have asked our leaders to correct that perception. Pakatan will not disturb the civil servants. (Due to the sensationalised news reports), this froup is worried that they might be retrenched and unemployed if Pakatan takes over the federal government. Although, it makes a lot of economic sense, when it comes to politics, it makes no sense,” Anwar told a dinner talk in Subang Jaya on Tuesday. Anwar’s clarification came even as the Public Services Department vowed to increase the civil service, the largest in the region. The PSD statement carried in the mainstream stunned many economists and prominent citizens. “I cannot take the PSD statement seriously. They seem to be playing to some sort of gallery. I hope the Pakatan will take a more balanced approach. What Anwar can do is of course, don’t sack anyone. But don’t replace those who retire. Put a moratorium on recruitment and slowly engineer the civil service to the right size,” Ramon Navaratnam, the former secretary-general of the Transport ministry and past president of Transparency International. “This way, nobody is sacked or deprived of a livelihood while the nation has a concrete plan to reform an really overlarge civil service. This is something that we must acknowledge has to be done. But for PSD to rebut and try to get one up on a political rival by promising to increase the civil service is irresponsible and most incredible.” Limit PM to 2 terms, control excessive powers In wide-ranging speech, Anwar had also vowed to limit the Prime Minister’s tenure to two terms. Pakatan will also prohibit the prime minister from holding the post of finance minister, as this could give rise to excess power held in the hand of one man and result in massive corruption. “I was finance minister before. A finance minister is busy from morning to night. However, our prime ministers have been holding the post of finance minister as well since 1998, because they do not trust others – maybe it involves too many projects,” he said, adding that an overstaying PM more often than not aspired to become an “Emperor”. Asked whether a Chinese could be Prime Minister, Anwar dodged the highly sensitive issue. “If I answer ‘yes’, it would become the headline in Utusan Malaysia; if I said ‘no’, it will become headlines in the Chinese dailies. So my answer is: the current consensus of Pakatan is that Anwar will be the next prime minister,” quipped a smiling Anwar amid loud cheers from the audience. Earlier in his speech, he had also confirmed that PKR would not support PAS as far as Islamic hudud law was concerned, saying that hudud had no place in Pakatan policy. |
| Kemana Subsidi RM40 Juta Kedai Rakyat 1Malaysia? Posted: 08 Nov 2011 10:33 PM PST Pakatan Rakyat mempersoalkan kemana hilangnya subsidi sebanyak RM40 juta yang diberikan untuk pembukaan 85 unit Kedai Rakyat 1Malaysia (KR1M). Ini berikutan terdapat produk-produk yang ditawarkan oleh KR1M jauh lebih mahal berbanding produk yang dijual di pasaraya tempatan. Sehubungan itu, Ahli Parlimen Lembah Pantai, Nurul Izzah Anwar mempersoalkan peruntukan berkenaan yang diumumkan perdana menteri, Datuk Seri Najib Razak dalam ucapan Belanjawan 2012, 7 Oktober lalu. "Di mana perginya (wang itu)? Bagaimanakah ia dibelanjakan? Tujuan utama Kedai 1Malaysia adalah untuk meringankan kos serta mengurangkan beban rakyat dengan 250 produk 1Malaysia sehingga 40% lebih murah. "Kalau dia kata memang murah dari harga dipasaran, kita (Pakatan) buktikan sebaliknya," Katanya di Parlimen hari ini. Ahli Parlimen Petaling Jaya Utara, Tony Phua yang turut hadir pada sidang media sama membandingkan beberapa barangan termasuk peluntur yang dijual RM0.60 sen lebih mahal berbanding pasaraya lain. Beliau turut melampirkan satu salinan harga sebanyak 23 barang keperluan yang membuktikan ia tidak semurah didakwa malah ada yang lebih mahal. "Kenapa PM kita menjanjikan 'langit' kepada rakyat yang kononnya harga barang lebih murah tapi sebaliknya? "PM boleh cakap pada rakyat bahawa barang di Kedai 1Malaysia lebih murah tapi dia juga perlu promosi pasaraya lain yang lebih murah," sindir Tony Pua. Dalam sidang media sama, Nurul Izzah turut mempertikaikan tindakan Majlis Agama Islam Wilayah Persekutuan (MAIWP) mewujudkan Kedai Rakyat MAIWP yang kononnya "menawarkan harga rendah bagi membantu rakyat di sekitar ibu kota terutama golongan asnaf dan rakyat termiskin. "Saya bangkitkan soalan ini kerana MAIWP pernah terbabit dalam salah guna dana apabila RM31,150 wang zakat diguna bagi membayar peguam dalam kes tuntutan qazaf Ketua Pembangkang, Datuk Seri Anwar Ibrahim," kata Izzah. Sebelum ini, Setiausaha Agung KEADILAN, Saifuddin Nasution mendedahkan wang itu dikeluarkan bagi membiayai yuran guaman Menteri di Jabatan Perdana Menteri, Datuk Jamil Khir Baharom dan Ketua Pengarah Jawi, Datuk Che Mat Ali. Perkara itu diakui sendiri Timbalan Menteri di Jabatan Perdana Menteri, Datuk Dr Mashitah dalam jawapannya di Parlimen sebelum ini. |
| RM1,500 Minimum Wage For Selangor Gov’t Firms Posted: 08 Nov 2011 10:30 PM PST Selangor today beat the federal government in a race to implement a minimum wage policy, with a pledge to pay RM1,500 in wages for state owned companies beginning next year. The announcement was made in Menteri Besar Abdul Khalid Ibrahim's speech when tabling the state's budget for next year at the Selangor state assembly today. Khalid said employees of financially stable state-owned companies will be the first beneficiaries of the policy before it is expanded. These companies includes Perbadanan Kemajuan Negeri Selangor (PKNS), Perbadanan Kemajuan Pertanian Selangor (PKPS), Permodalan Negeri Selangor Berhad (PNSB) and Worldwide Holdings Bhd. As for companies with an unstable financial status, Khalid said the state government will provide RM10 million to support the increase in wages. In contrast, the federal government is still far from implementing a minimum wage policy, which unionists and Pakatan Rakyat claims was necessary to deal with poverty and help the country deal with an increasingly evident middle-income trap. |
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