BARKING AT THE ROAD SIGNS

Briefly this is the state of the country as at Tuesday 11th November 2008.

1.Business Times Singapore reports that according to the latest figures from Bank Negara, Malaysia's international reserve position shows a further US$7.4 Billion decline to US$100 Billion as at 31st October. That amount according to Bank Negara is sufficient to finance 8.1 months of retained imports.

For the month of October Bank Negara's reserves fell by US$9.5 Billion compared US$12.8 Billion for the month of September. In fact, Malaysia's reserves have fallen by US$25.5 Billion since it peaked at US$125.7 Billion in June.

Any Barisan Nasional politician concerned of the falling reserves ? Nope.

2.Next, The Finance Minister recently informed that the government will borrow RM5 Billion from Employees Provident Fund, yup ! Simpanan Hari Tua Anda, to fund the government investment agency Valuecap Sdn Bhd. Basically what Valuecap would do is use your money to invest in companies where the share prices are low but have strong fundamentals and potentials.

Any Barisan Nasional politician raised any objections in Parliament ? Nope. Only the Pakatan Rakyat M.P's are engaging the Government in a furious debate.

3.Next,according to Malaysian Insider, it has learned that the Finance Ministry is conducting an audit of assets that it owns or has a stake in and apparently the government is mulling the possibility of raising cash by disposing its assets. Fire sale?

Any Barisan Nasional politician concerned ? Nope.

Now, contrast that to the reaction by Barisan Nasional and UMNO politicians to the decision of the Pulau Pinang state government giving its approval to Majlis Perbandaran Pulau Pinang,to erect multi lingual road signs. Barisan Nasional and UMNO politicians are behaving like bats out of hell and attacking the Pulau Pinang government and its Chief Mininister Lim Guan Eng.

Its not as if Lim Guan Eng has decided to make all road signs in Pulau Pinang multi lingual. But the way the issue is being potrayed is as if Lim Guan Eng has decided to errect multi-lingual road signs in the whole of Pulau Pinang. Not that Lim Guan Eng has decided to change the name Kepala Batas to Kitsiang Jaya or Bukit Glugor to Bukit Karpal. All that Majlis Perbandaran Pulau Pinang is doing is to put up road signs in Chinese, Tamil and Arabic along with the national language in the heritage areas of Georgetown which was recently declared a World Heritage Site by Unesco.

In fact Lim Guan Eng has gone on record stating that multi-lingual road signs will take account of characterictic of the area. Thus if it is a Malay heritage area, the road sign will be in Bahasa Malaysia and Arabic/Jawi. Alas, Barisan Nasional UMNO politicians chose to turn the whole issue into a racial issue and try to pit the Malays against the Non Malays. Despite the clarification by Lim Guan Eng, it does not pacify Barisan Nasional and UMNO politicians who are continuing with their protest, even though it was revealed that the previous Barisan Nasional state government had approved multi-lingual road signs and had even allocated funds for the project. So why the hypocricy?

Yesterday members of UMNO Tanjung went unannounced to the Majlis Perbandaran Pulau Pinang office to hand in their memorandum. The memorandum stated that such a move would incur the anger of the Malays in the state and it warned what would happened to the state if chaos broke out. Malay anger or UMNO anger?

Prior to this, a member of the pro-tem committee of Gabungan Graduan Melayu Muda (don't they have better things to do like helping out unemployed and unemployable graduates?)filed a law suit against the Pulau Pinang state government and Majlis Perbandaran Pulau Pinang. Apparently the roads signs are at odds with article 152 of the Federal Constitution. Of course other bedfellows like academicians, linguist and nationalists have all joined in and had their three minute fame on TV and in the newspapers particularly Utusan Malaysia, lambasting the Pulau Pinang state government and its Chief Minister Lim Guan Eng. Some of these creatures who find it an impossibility to articulate a sensible and valid argument,instead revert to the all encompasing and all weather war cry "mencabar ketuanan Melayu".

Funny, no Barisan Nasional UMNO politicians, academicians or any nationalist raised article 152, ketuanan Melayu or warned about rising anger and chaos, when the the Court Complex in Putrajaya was (for a long time) known as the Palace of Justice simply because it was not politically right to call it Istana Keadilan. There are no demonstation or filing of lawsuits seeking a declaration that the streets in Putrajaya remove the prefix "prescint" and "boulevard" because it is at odds with article 152 of the Federal Constitution. No one foamed in his mouth or marched into the Sarawak Chief Minister's office and demanded the Sarawak state government and Kuching City Council to remove the Chinese road signs. And what's this Ain Arabia in Chinese heartland of Bukit Bintang. No Barisan Nasional politician has objected to the Kuala Lumpur City Council bending over and pandering to the Arabs. I know of one road in Kuala Lumpur named Jalan Isfahan. I am sure that road will not lead you to Isfahan, Iran ( though some has genuine fear that's where the country is leading to).

So what's the hue and cry over the multi-lingual road signs in Penang. Why the double standard?

I must applaud Lim Guan Eng for standing firm in his decision.