Malay Mail: Comments from Teresa Kok’s blog

I am simply flabbergasted at the quality of the Malay Mail!

Take a look for yourself here - http://www.mmail.com.my/Comments_from_Teresa_Kok-as-s_blog.aspx

This is what's reported.

As you read it, do also go to Teresa Kok's blog and verify for yourself whether Malay Mail engages in "fair and accurate reporting" or not.

Malay Mail highlighted 6 comments.

Yet, I count that Teresa Kok's blogs generated easily over 100 comments in articles relating to her ISA detention and the issue of "food quality".

http://teresakok.com/2008/09/25/youll-cringe-as-you-eat/#comments - 10 comments
http://teresakok.com/2008/09/25/syed-hamids-attack-on-murugiah-is-most-disappointing/ - 11 comments
http://teresakok.com/2008/09/24/isa-makanan-anjing/ - 41 comments
http://teresakok.com/2008/09/24/dont-turn-isa-into-outcry-about-dog-food/ - 6 comments
http://teresakok.com/2008/09/22/syed-hamid-patut-cuba-solitary-confinement-sendiri/ - 23 comments
http://teresakok.com/2008/09/22/senator-probes-dog-food-scandal/ - 21 comments
http://teresakok.com/2008/09/19/isa-experience/ - 42 comments
http://teresakok.com/2008/09/19/what-have-i-done-what-have-i-said/ - 10 comments
http://teresakok.com/2008/09/19/detention-is-political/ - 21 comments

Is this the most blatant government propoganda to discredit Teresa Kok amongst the public with no internet access?


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Comments from Teresa Kok’s blog

September 26, 2008 Categories: News

When Seputeh member of Parliament Teresa Kok had allegedly described the food served to her during her detention under the ISA as "slightly better than dog food", she could not have predicted the firestorm it would spark off.

Kok’s comments drew numerous postings on her blog (teresakok.com) from Malaysians who recounted their own experiences at having to survive on meagre meals.

$Below are excerpts of the postings.

● Joy_richer:
Did you know that while I was growing up 30 years ago, that was the meal that my grandmother packed for me?

● CRUSADER:
You get to eat eggs and yet you complain. Have you ever thought about those who can’t even afford a decent meal and need to share one egg with the whole family?
There are families who sleep on the earth, not even on cement with cardboard. Rather than taking our taxpayers’ money to upgrade jail facilities, please give it to the needy, not criminals.

● dtecconan:
This is not a matter of the ISA food being bad. The statement you made sounded as though you were insulting those who are used to eating hard-boiled eggs. Maybe your life has been easier, always able to eat good food, so it is easy for you to link what the less privileged usually eat to dog food.

● labu_air:
I was truly saddened by your statement. Dog food or not, whether you realise or not, that is the main course for a large number of Malaysians, not just for weeks but years.

● seetha:
Never mind the food, because nobody has died of starvation in our cells. Of course, we have to provide a decent meal to the detainees and prisoners. There must be international standards regarding this and we have to comply with these standards. The fact that you got two eggs, some curry and something else is far better than many poor Malaysians can afford. Right now, there are many people in the kampung who do not eat as well as this. Even my own sister-in-law is earning RM400 monthly working in a factory and eats plain rice with watery sardine curry every day. So, you have indirectly insulted perhaps one million Malaysians who would love to eat what you got during your detention.

● Think Tank:
The meal fed to you is what many Malaysians, myself included, are eating right now, and you mirrored it to dog food. Don’t forget that we are your voters.

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Report lodged against Teresa Kok for insulting egg?

Can anyone insult an egg to the extent that it deserved filing a Police Report? Apparently so. Read here - http://www.sun2surf.com/article.cfm?id=26013

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KUALA LUMPUR (Sept 24, 2008) : The Seputeh Umno Youth division lodged a police report today against Seputeh MP Teresa Kok, claiming she had insulted the Royal Malaysian Police and the egg, which is an essential food of the underprivileged.

The division’s deputy head Alawi Dahalin and several other members lodged the report at the Brickfields police station.

Alawi said he had heard Kok complain about the food she was given while detained under the ISA, at a press conference at the DAP headquarters in Petaling Jaya, shown on the night news on TV on Sept 20, a day after she was released from custody.

He said Kok had said the food she was served was "fit only for dogs".

"By saying this, she had insulted the police and the poor. Eggs are an important food for low-income earners and the poor. As an elected representative of the people she should not have said that," he said.

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So, what do you think? As for me, I am simply flabbergasted by UMNO Youth's Police Report! Here's what I think:

1. A "genuine complaint" is not the same thing as an "insult".

2. Teresa Kok had genuine grievances on the quality of food served. The poor quality of food directly contributed to her suffering unnecessarily from diarrheoa. The Malaysian public has the right to know. There is nothing wrong to mention this in the press for ALL Malaysians to know.

3. The Deputy Minister in the PM's Department whose portfolio includes the Public Complaints Bureau sees it fit to even visit Kok personally to inquire - see http://teresakok.com/2008/09/25/syed-hamids-attack-on-murugiah-is-most-disappointing/. However, the Home Minister Syed Hamid thinks otherwise, and threatened Murugiah by saying "Murugiah had better look after his own ministry."! Has Syed Hamid forgotten to bring his brains with him, when he said this to the press?

4. I personally find the flawed and distorted logic employed by UMNO Youth to be simply appalling and unacceptable! The attempt to equate the egg as a food for the under-privileged to gain sympathy or to even imply that Teresa does not understand the under-privileged, is simply downright insulting to all right thinking Malaysians! Isn't egg a food for all Malaysians regardless of social and economic status? :-)

Imagine if all Malaysians are as equally "sensitive". Should all Malaysians then lodge a Police Report against UMNO Youth for insulting the "egg" since the egg is also consumed by the rich, the middle class and the poor alike? Wouldn't the country be completely chaotic if all of us behaved in this frivolous and irresponsible fashion as UMNO Youth?

5. Doesn't UMNO Youth have better things to do than to lodge such frivolous claims and Police Reports?

6. Doesn't the Police have better things to do, real crimes to solve, than to accept frivolous claims from UMNO Youth?

7. Doesn't the Press and the newspapers have better stories to investigate, real news of substance to report, than to be diverted and having to report stupid acts like this? Doesn't UMNO Youth realize this?

8. Doesn't UMNO Youth realize - when looking at the bigger picture - that a much bigger and a far more serious wrong has been committed against Teresa Kok?

Doesn't UMNO Youth realize that detaining Kok under the ISA is simply wrong?

Doesn't UMNO Youth realize that at least 2 other parties - namely a certain exMB and a certain newspaper, and ignoring the role of the Police, the IGP, the Home Minister - are still at large, and still free, even though prima facie evidences indicate that they are the ones responsible for spreading lies to Malaysians which contributed to the wrong and unnecessary detention of Teresa Kok?

9. Doesn't UMNO Youth realize that the primary purpose of ISA detention is "prevention" rather than "punishment"? Isn't this simply wrong to serve anyone under detention with substandard quality food, to the extent of causing diarrheoa?

10. Bakri Musa wrote something which I find beautiful about the Islam religion, and it coincides with my understanding of many of the other worldly religions as well - http://blog.limkitsiang.com/2008/09/24/pak-lah-desecrating-ramadan/. Allow me to quote what he wrote here:

"As per the teachings of our Prophet, s.a.w., when we see an injustice, we are to do whatever in our capacity to stop it. If we are unable to do so with our hands (that is, physically), then we are to use our tongue (voice our disapproval). Failing that, then at least acknowledge in our heart that we disapprove of it, though that would be the option least pleasing to Allah."

UMNO Youth claims to represent Malaysian Malays and by default Muslims. So, in the case of Teresa Kok's detention under the ISA, is this detention "justice" or "injustice"? When Teresa Kok was served with food that unnecessarily caused her diarrheoa during her unnecessary detention, is this "justice" or "injustice"? When the Police had over a week to investigate and yet found no evidence to justify detaining Kok under the ISA, is this "justice" or "injustice"? If the answers to any one of these 3 questions are "injustice", then, why is UMNO Youth deafeningly silent? Doesn't UMNO Youth realize that remaining silent when an injustic is done is against the teachings of Islam, as quoted by Bakri Musa?

11. Is this action by UMNO Youth a good or bad role model for Malaysian youths? Why should any right-thinking Malaysian youth support UMNO Youth, let alone join such a distorted-thinking party?

12. Is this (filing a Police Report because Teresa insulted egg) UMNO Youth's version of Malaysia Boleh?

13. The world is still laughing hard at Malaysia for sending 50 of its MPs to Taiwan just because of the fear of 916, Malaysia has become a laughing stock in the eyes of the world with a repeat of DSAI's 2nd sodomy charge which is completely unoriginal in its plot, not to mention all the other hillarious acts apparently led and caused by the incapable and incompetent Malaysia Government. Will this latest act by UMNO Youth joins the long-list of "Malaysia Boleh" achievements in cementing Malaysia as a world leader in laughing stock, in the eyes of the entire world?

Sigh!

Why Raja Petra, Tan and Kok were detained?

Published in The Star today - http://thestar.com.my/news/story.asp?file=/2008/9/13/nation/2022372&sec=nation

Yesterday, human rights lawyer Malik Imtiaz blogged this when RPK was first arrested:

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"The Government must also do its part and explain clearly how RPK is a threat to national security and why he has been detained. He had presented himself everytime he was asked to at police stations and in court. ..."

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I shared his opinion as I blogged here last night - http://fusioninvestor.blogspot.com/2008/09/rpk-detained-under-isa.html

Why? Because only by giving clear explanation will the Government have a chance to win back Rakyat's trust. Without a clear explanation, the Government will create even more distrusts amongst Rakyat.

Unfortunately for the Government, they continue to choose to give a vague explanation, and created even more distrusts amongst Rakyat:

"PETALING JAYA: Malaysia Today news portal editor Raja Petra Kamarudin was arrested under the Internal Security Act for allegedly being a threat to security, peace and public order.

Raja Petra, 58, who was arrested under Section 73(1) of the ISA, is alleged to have posted articles deemed seditious and that also belittle Islam."

Instead of explaining HOW RPK is a threat to national security, the 2 sentence above simply asserted that he is a threat.

When one simply say X = Y, logically, does the assertion make it so?

Yes, in public relations exercises, it is a well known principle since Hitler's time that when X = Y is repeated with enough times, more and more people can be led to believe that X = Y so long as the truth is suppressed and the economy is fine. But those were the days before the Internet.

Today, such an article in The Star has little impact.

It leaves Rakyat wondering HOW is RPK a threat to national security.

It leaves Rakyat wondering if ISA Detention can be used against anyone that the Government doesn't like.

It leaves Rakyat wondering what wrong have RPK committed?

Again, the charge is RPK is alleged to have posted articles deemed seditious.

The Government has simply not explained HOW it is seditious.

As a long-time MT reader, I can say that I have personally never found any one of MT's article seditious when I read them.

So, if its readers don't find it seditious, it begs the question by all right-thinking Malaysians - who finds it seditious?

The Government has also charged that it belittles Islam.

Again, HOW does it belittle Islam?

Specifically and exactly which part of RPK's writings is the problem?

If the Government cannot be transparent with the problem, if the newspapers cannot even quote or even refer to the problem, how can the Government expects bloggers to know the solution?

How can Rakyat knows what to write and what not to write when the big stick - as draconian as the ISA - is used on something with Rakyat doesn't know?

All great religion teaches us to not fear the truth.

To seek the truth at all times.

What does the Government fear?

Why can't the Government point to specific article - specific paragraph - specific sentence that shows how RPK belittled Islam?

Because I for one - as a regular reader of MT - have yet to find any of RPK's article belittling Islam or any other religion, despite reading thousands of MT articles.

But I'm willing to be corrected and I keep an open mind.

I do differentiate between the article written by RPK, against the individual comments that do not belong to RPK.

If the Government has a problem with certain individual commentators, then, point out specifically the problem comment and who commented that, so that RPK is given the chance to explain why he left it there and not delete it or ban that commentator, etc.

In other words, why is such a trivial issue (disliking comments) requires such a draconian act like the ISA to resolve?

Doesn't the Government realize that in blogosphere, every blogger - not just in Malaysia but around the world - is theoretically exposed to the same problem of extreme commentators? Is every blogger in the world a criminal to the same extent as RPK and deserves ISA detention? Surely not! There are more bloggers in this world than there is space in the entire Malaysia, let alone Kamunting Detention Centre!

So, notwitstanding The Star article which simply doesn't explain anything or add anything new and merely repeats the same message which led me to think it is simply Government Propoganda, I strongly urge the Government to please clearly explain to Rakyat exactly HOW is RPK a threat to national security?

Similarly, I urge the Government to do the same for Tan and Kok.

Explain to us Clearly HOW these 3 individuals are a threat to national security.

Explain to us Clearly HOW individuals like Ahmad Ismail is NOT a threat to national security.

Otherwise, don't be surprised if Rakyat comes to the conclusion that since Ahmad Ismail is an UMNO member, the Government plays favoritism, by detaining others except UMNO members.

And don't be surprised if Rakyat comes to the conclusion that the present Government simply don't have Rakyat's best interests in minds, despite the constant rhetorics.

And don't be surprised if more and more Rakyat prefers Pakatan Rakyat to be the next ruling Government.

In conclusion, I strongly urge The Government to either explain clearly how the 3 individuals are a threat to national security, explain clearly how the 3 individuals have caused social unrest, test these assertions openly and transparently in the court of law.

Or if not, release them immediately. And repeal the draconian ISA.