About Yeo Bee Yin's condescending letter (updated)

Okay, apparently the Pakatan anti-Lynas people got quite excited over an open letter yesterday from minister in charge of environment Yeo Bee Yin to Lynas workers whose workplace she is trying to shut down.

Some went to my last posting about Dr Mahathir and Proton X70, which has nothing to do with Lynas, and started to bitch about that letter.

Ya, they did that despite claiming that they were tired of me writing about the Lynas issue which they said is outdated and boring.

The letter was quite long but basically, Yeo Bee Yin was telling the Lynas workers that she is sweet, nice and cares for them and that if they lose their job, it's because the Lynas management refused to take care of the residue of their plant in Gebeng Kuantan due to greed.

The Pakatan people were really lapping it up.

Especially, the part where Yeo Bee Yin said the amount of residue was so dangerously huge and that Lynas had promised to ship it to Australia.

Well, I don't actually want to write too much about it because I know the Pakatan trolls will just turn around and say I'm spinning (maybe even racial spinning too :).

So, since it's about the residue, lets look at what the Lynas review committee, which was set up by the Pakatan government and expert members appointed by Yeo Bee Yin herself, has to say about it.

This is from page 57 of the committee's report;

So how? Okay or not.

For the residue, got words such as "dikendalikan dengan sempurna" and "menunjukan hasil yang positif dan berpotensi untuk dikomersialkan".

The committee - (again I repeat) set-up by Pakatan government and members appointed by Yeo Bee Yin - said Lynas was doing exactly what they were told to do by the authorities and there was no danger from the residue of the plant. In fact the residue could even be turned into useful stuff.

The committee - (again I repeat) set-up by Pakatan government and members appointed by Yeo Bee Yin - went to the plant to check things out (properly I believe) and came out with the report, but of course Yeo Bee Yin, who has never been to (and refused to visit) the plant  doesn't like it and made her own conclusions to suit her political agenda.

Yup instead of considering the committee's report, she straight goes to "you ship out the residue or we'll shut you down" and "you refuse to ship out the residue because you are greedy money grabbing bastards".

Why?

For the answer, read this previous post of mine again, okay;

Why Yeo Bee Yin and gang want to close down Lynas

Anyway, for the part where she said she cares for the Lynas workers.....this one I have to laugh, okay.

She never even wants to see them.

Yes, Lynas invited her multiple times to visit the plant in Gebeng, Kuantan to check the place herself and also meet the workers there.

You know, any caring minister would have accepted the invitation. After all, the livelihood of hundreds of workers is at stake here and the welfare of their families will be affected.

But no....she didn't want to go. For her, Lynas and everyone associated with it are enemies. That's the DAP mentality as I understand it.

That's how she sees them from the start.

And when she sent in the committee, which members she herself appointed to check on the plant, she refused to follow its findings and recommendations, which didn't point towards the closure of those people's workplace.

Seriously, you all think she cares about those workers losing their job and finding it difficult to support their families. Think again. They are not even her type of people.

She tried to sound nice in the letter merely because that's the expected public relation exercise.

To me, she just sounds condescending.

If she is really sincere about those Lynas people, she should at least visit their work place, meet them and get to know them.

Then she would know that there are among those people whose livelihood she was tyring to take away for her political agenda, individuals such as a single mother who is rising seven children on her own, a man who lost his leg in an accident and given a job by Lynas at its office and a girl from one of the villages near the plant whose education was financed by the company since she was in school and later given a job there so that she could support  her poor family.

There are many more such individuals working for Lynas and the orang kampung near the plant who support the existence of the Lynas plant there because it benefits their community. Yeo Bee Yin should meet and talk to them.

Those are real people, I'm talking about, okay.

Then again, I believe Yeo Bee Yin sees them as mere statistics that not worth her time to meet.

All that she cares for is the political mileage to be gain by shutting down those people's workplace.

And when she said in the letter that she is in Poland, I really laughed aloud.

Biodiversity conference or something....err, Yeo Bee Yin, you didn't tell people ka your own state of Johor got three Ramsar sites in danger?

Yeo Bee Yin, you stay there so long ka?

All those past months you can't see them? Why? So busy is it?

Hey Yeo Bee Yin, you are taking away their livelihood and causing them and their family to suffer and you didn't even bother to check on them.

That's not nice okay.

UPDATES at 08:23 Dec 15 2018

Lynas refutes minister further

KUALA LUMPUR – December 14, 2018: Lynas Corporation Ltd. has clarified that the letters of undertaking concerning the removal of its residue that it signed in 2012 requires the company to first find out if the residue can be recycled.

If that fails, Lynas must then store the residue in a permanent depository facility (PDF), failing which the residue must be taken out of Malaysia, explained the company in a statement today following a claim that the letters were proof of Lynas’ non-compliance.

“The letter signed by the then Lynas executive chairman on February 23, 2012, explicitly states that Lynas Corporation Australia hereby gives a full undertaking to, if necessary, remove from Malaysia all wastes generated by the Lynas Advance Material Plant in Gebeng, Kuantan, during the temporary operating licence’s (TOL) period,” says the statement.

The Atomic Energy Licensing Board had issued three consecutive operating licences to Lynas — the September 2012 to September 2014 TOL, and the September 2014 to September 2016 and September 2016 to September 2019 full operating licences.

The issue of residue-removal non-compliance was highlighted by Energy, Science, Technology, Environment and Climate Change Minister Yeo Bee Yin yesterday when she questioned the commitment of Lynas to remove its residue from Malaysia.

While Yeo claimed that it would only cost Lynas about 10 per cent of its earnings to export the residue, the company retorted that her figures were inaccurate and that she misquoted the analysts who Yeo based her arguments from.

“The analyst also referenced Lynas’ security deposit paid to the Malaysian government’s AELB (not insurance) which had, as one of its purposes, the establishment of a permanent deposit facility.

“In reaching his view, the analyst had assumed that this deposit would be used to pay for some of the cost of exporting the WLP (Lynas’ residue), on the basis that a permanent deposit facility would no longer be required,” states Lynas.

The company’s latest tangle with the ministry happened after the latter ordered it to export its WLP residue which contradicts an independent review committee’s recommendation that the residue be permanently stored in a PDF, which it is currently working on.

In the review from the committee formed by the ministry, Lynas earned a favourable verdict and was vindicated from any malpractice but yet the ministry made decisions contradicting the committee’s findings and recommendations, something which Lynas finds most inappropriate.