A matter of conscience

Once again, someone sent me screenshots of a Facebook post by former New Straits Times group editor Mustapha Kamil Mohd Janor this morning,

Please click for better view

Honestly, I was not really sure what Mus was referring to in the post, because I hardly read blogs these days except those in my blog roll.

I'm also not on Facebook or Twitter or other social media platforms.

But since Mus had offered to be investigated, I think those who accused him of whatever, should initiate it.

As people nowadays like to say, if you want to accuse someone of something, you better have the evidence to do so.

Well, I hope Mus get to meet his accusers and convince them that he quit his job simply because of his conscience as he previously claimed.

Right or wrong in the eyes of others, one must act according to his/her conscience.

It doesn't matter whether a person is for or against the establishment. As long as he/she acts with an intact conscience, the person should be alright.

I believe in that.

Here's a video clip from the movie "A Man For All Seasons" on the matter of conscience,

Relax Relax sahaja (updated)

UPDATES

Found another Black Dog Bone song which I think many of you would like to hear.

It's especially suitable for angry people during Ramadhan :)

ORIGINAL POST

Fasting make things more relaxed than usual.

Well, at least that's how I'm feeling now.

I don't feel like being in fighting mode at all at the moment.

Just want to take it easy and not get agitated about anything.

People want to hate and fight, let them be lah.

I just want to do my own things and be at peace for now. 

So, for today I just want to introduce (to those who don't know them yet) my father's 1970s favourite "local" band,

Black Dog Bone 

The then Singapore-based band became famous for their catchy Malay songs but my father considered them as being Sino-Malay.

The band members are Isshar Masrom (lead guitar),  Tahir Ali (main vocalist and drummer),  Masron Ali (trumpet, horn, trombone), Hamid Ahmad (bass), James Chai (tenor, flute, trombone, saxaphone), and Michel Heng (keyboard).

Here they are performing together this very Malay song years after their glory days,

Nice song, isn't it?

Jangan marah-marah....relax relax lah sahaja, okay :)

Anyway, it's also nice seeing the guys still being friends till their ripe old age.

Guess, theirs are real friendship.

It doesn't seems to matter that they are Malays and Chinese.

Let's hope we all Malaysians can be like them too.

Note: Please don't believe it if there are people accusing them of being DAPsters later on just because they are Malays and Chinese friends featured in my blog :) Anyway, if I'm not mistaken, the guys are all Singaporeans. Maybe they are PAP members. That one I don't know lah.

A benefit of fasting

I was told during buka puasa last night that someone wrote a very long blog post whacking me for the start of Ramadhan yesterday.

The length of the post was said to be at least three times my normal posts.

I was like "Oh really....hmmm....hehehehehe..."

It became funny to me probably because of the fasting.

Less cholesterol in my blood, I guess :)

Can't get angry much when fasting, okay, which is good.

I didn't even bother to find and read the offending blog post.

Wasting time only.

Anyway, it must take a lot of hate to write bad things that long about someone.

I honestly can't do that. I can't sustain hate for too long.

I wish I can suggest to the person who wrote the hate blog post to try fasting.

Maybe can reduce the hate level....and at the same time lose some weight too.

Good what.

Hating is a tiresome thing to do for me.

Really, I tried it before.

It didn't take long for me to feel ridiculous about it and soon after that the whole thing turned nonsensical and even funny to me.

It's even more so during fasting month like this.

I have just enough energy to go through the day that there's nothing much to spare for anything else.

And hating takes a lot of energy, okay.

I was also told by friends currently campaigning in Sungai Besar and Kuala Kangsar that they didn't do much yesterday.

Feeling lethargic they said.

Well, first day of fasting is always like that.

Things will however return back to normal after a few days.

Should be okay.

Hopefully, the campaigning will go smoothly and everyone observe the fasting diligently.

That way there will be no hate campaign and such.

I had been to a by-election during fasting month, that was the one in Kuala Besut, which was the first after the last general election in 2013.

It was perhaps the most peaceful by-election ever at that time.

Really nice.

I will write about my experience there later.

Somehow it's good that the first by-election after the last general election was during Ramadhan and the last ones before the next GE are also in the holy month too.

It sorts of cool off things a bit.

Ramadhan pledge and wish

It's Ramadhan again and I just had my first sahur as I start writing this using my phone.

So, it's just a short one.

Just want to wish all good Muslims "selamat berpuasa ".

May you all be blessed by Allah.

I'm not a very religious person, but I will try to make my fasting  be a good one.

Will try my extra best to restrain from doing bad things.

Must remember not to be vulgar.

Will not write too much naughty stuff such as telling people things that they don't want to hear like  they have smelly armpits and such.

Doesn't matter even if it's the truth.

Truth is annoying to some people.

Kadang-kadang, kita tak kata dia pun dia terasa.

Nothing much we can do in such case, isn't it?

I will also try to do good as much as I  can while fasting.

Hopefully  all these will stick even after Ramadhan.

Eh, you all who are fasting, try to be good too, okay.

Try not to fight with each other too, or even better if you all can make peace.

Dr Mahathir, Najib, can?

Okay, never mind. I know I'm asking too much there 😑

Also, you all, try not to eat too much when "buka puasa". Don't get fat during fasting month as it will make you look ridiculous.

Okay, that's about it. I  need to do other things necessary now.

Cheers and all the best with the fasting....for those who fast la.

Here's a favourite song of mine for the road,

Bersekutu bertambah mutu

There have been quite a lot of chatters nowadays about some people from my home state Johor promoting it to get out of Malaysia.

Even my blogging captain Rocky wrote about it in his latest post,

Republic of Johor

I actually wrote my opinion on the matter last month,

• We are Malaysians from the state of Johor, no more no less

I had more or less expressed my unhappiness with the idea that Johor should not be part of Malaysia.

I had also clearly stated that I didn't and will never subscribe to the concept of Bangsa Johor.

Those who have been following this blog from the start should know that I love my home state.

Nonetheless, I was also critical of its administration whenever I felt that it was doing the wrong things.

It was so because I wanted those in power to correct the wrongs so that Johor and its people will not suffer later on.

I know that because of it, I am not in the good book of people in Kota Iskandar.

Nowadays, there are even people who used that as part of the basis to accuse me of being a paid DAP cybertrooper.

Well, whatever lah.

Don't want to waste my time with that.

Layan orang tak betul, kita pun jadi tak betul nanti.

It doesn't matter to me as I feel that what I did was worth it.

I consider it as my tiny contribution for the betterment of my home state.

Back to the issue of Johor getting out of Malaysia, I hope Prime Minister DS Najib Razak will be firm on this and not tolerate any attempt, be it short or long term, to break up the country.

I also hope that Johor Menteri Besar DS Mohamed Khaled Nordin to come up with a strong statement that Johor will remain part of Malaysia "selagi ada bulan dan bintang".

I wrote about this thing a year ago,

• Idea of secession must be stopped

For me, Malaysia must remain united for it to survive.

No one should be allowed to talk about taking out any of the states out of Malaysia.

Let's learn the lesson from what happened when Singapore was kicked out of Malaysia back in the 1960s.

No matter how anyone wants to put it, that was a loss for us all.

Let's not be afraid to promote peace and unity among us Malaysians so that we can defend our country's sovereignty.

I'm talking about uniting ALL Malaysians here, okay.

Tak kira agama, bangsa or from which state.

Promoting those good things  doesn't make you a DAP cybertrooper as suggested by some people about me.

And please, do not succumb to the goading of those that promote dissension among us by telling us that  Malays must oppose Chinese, Muslims need to hate Christians or Johoreans should feel superior than other Malaysians.

Note : Bersekutu bertambah mutu - Unity is strength, is from this coat of arms of Malaysia,

Mus' story

I wrote a bit about Mustapha Kamil Mohd Janor in this post,

An advice for pro-establishment newsmen

excerpts;

Anyway, Mus is the New Straits Times group editor since last year.

However, I heard he had tendered his resignation and will leave the newspaper by end of this month.

Lucky NST reporters, no need to eat paper balls :)

If it's true, Mus is the first one to voluntarily resign from that post, as far as I know.

Group editor of NST is a very important post.

It's like being the captain of a flagship in a naval fleet,

But of course he still needs to take orders from the Admiral who is of even higher rank. 

It turned out to be true.

Mus has indeed resigned and left NST.

Someone sent me a screenshot of his Facebook post where he explained his reasons for resigning from the post,

(Please click for better view)

(please click for a better view)

(Please click for a better view)

Well, that's about conclude Mus' story.

Whatever it is, I'm once again wishing the guy all the best.

Cheers.

Please let Anifah do his job

I was a bit amused when I read this story the other day,

Sabah not a political football, Rahman tells Philippines 

I know that the Foreign Minister is a Sabahan,  but he is definitely not Datuk Abdul Rahman Dahlan.

The Foreign Minister is DS Anifah Aman.

Rahman Dahlan is the Urban Well being, Housing and Local Government  Minister.

That's why I find it quite funny that he was making a statement as if he was a foreign minister.

Okay, I know, it's probably because he was speaking as a Sabahan member of parliament.

But still, Anifah is a Sabahan too, okay.

Whatever it is, I think for the Sabahans, it should be Chief Minister DS Musa Aman who should issue any such statement on their behalf.

It's more fitting that way.

I may be wrong but shouldn't Rahman Dahalan, as a Cabinet Minister stick to just commenting about things related to his ministry?

That should be the case if our government is to avoid people from getting confused.

In this case, Rahman Dahlan seemed to be quite angry towards the new Philippines president Rodrigo Duterte.

Well, at least that's how I felt due to the tone of the statement.

If I'm a Filipino diplomat, I would be a bit concerned after reading it.

After all, it comes from a Malaysian minister.

I think that's not really good as our government may want things to be cooled off in a more diplomatic way.

We have a good foreign ministry and Anifah has been doing quite a good job as its minister so far.

I believe Anifah knows how to handle the Duterte situation.

I heard he had even met with Filipino diplomats over the matter and things have been cooled off quite well.

As everyone knows, the new Filipino president is akin to the abrasive loud mouth US presidential hopeful Donald Trump.

I bet that many intelligent Filipinos are not taking him too seriously.

He's like one of those popular characters that people like to have as a tough leader but actually knows nothing about things.

So, there's no need to get all worked up over what he said.

We don't have to be obnoxious ourself to counter such a person.

Just be cool and let the right people handle the situation properly.

In this case, I very much prefer for Anifah to handle it as he is the best man to do so.

It's his job in the first place.

And yes please, with all due respect, I think Rahman Dahlan should give Anifah the space to do his job.

Instead of potentially making things worse by issuing such statements which have nothing to do with his portfolio, he should concentrate on his urban well being, housing and local government stuff.

And of course Rahman Dahlan also needs to take care of his jobs as BN strategic communication director and MP of Kota Belud.