Bahasa: the language
I’ve not seen a people who are more proud of their language than the Malay. Bahasa Melayu or Bahasa Malaysia or simply Bahasa is more than the national language. It’s the vehicle of thought, the culture, and (paraphrasing Ahmad Deedat) the key to the heart of the Malay.
I’ve found that a good way to make friends with the Malay or people in general is to ask about the meaning of their names; how the names were derived or who they are named after. But the snag in this strategy is that you’ve to get the name first; and names are not usually the first thing people give to strangers.
But it’s perfectly normal to walk up to a stranger, thrust my phrase book in his face and ask him to explain ‘bunga telur’. To the Malay, this is a big honour. Firstly I’ve chosen him as my - guru – teacher. And secondly it’s most flattering that a foreigner has chosen to learn his language. You instantly become a brother descended from heaven.
Bahasa or ‘the language’ encourages humility in all forms of verbal expression. And although the speakers are humble, they are far from apologetic about speaking their language. This attitude is unlike that of some people who take pride in demeaning their own language.
For example, I’ve observed that some foreign students here raise their voices when they see you approaching. Doing that tells you, they hope, that they’re proficient in English enough to have a discussion in it.
Two weeks ago, I went to the Indian Pongal (rice harvest) celebration. There, I asked a student to explain a Tamil word to me. He proudly told me that he didn’t understand Tamil. He said that they spoke English in his family. And since I was not there to learn his heavily accented English, I simply moved on to other Indian students who could explain the term to me.
I once asked a friend – from another race – to explain the significance of a certain yearly celebration to me. She asked me to go and Google it. And when I pointed out how little she knew about her culture, she took offense!
You’ll never catch a Malay in such self depreciating undertaking. You can approach a student or a professor and all will be only too proud to tell you whatever you want to know about the language or the tradition.
At UPM most of the lecturers have a degree or two from North America (Canada and US) or from UK. But sometimes switch to Bahasa in their lectures and allow local students who want to do their presentation in Bahasa to do so. It exasperates some foreign students but I find it amusing. My respect always goes to people who cherish their language rather than those who think consciously or unconsciously that another language is better than their own.
In Malaysia children in nursery and primary schools are taught in their mother tongue. So basically there are three types of primary schools; the Chinese schools, Tamil schools and Malay schools. It’s at secondary school level that integration occurs. In secondary schools subjects are taught in Bahasa except English, Mathematics and Science which are taught in English.
Bahasa Melayu is simple to learn by any student who’ll devote the time; there are willing teachers everywhere and the structure of the language is not too complicated. For example, there’s no the plural form of a word in Bahasa. To give a word a plural meaning you simply repeat. Thus, ‘tuan tuan’ means gentlemen. Tuan means mister or a polite way of addressing a man.
Bahasa words are also articulated the way they are spelt. Thus ‘pendahuluan’ meaning introduction, although a long word, is pronounced exactly as it’s spelt. But student must watch out for the tricky ‘e’. It’s sometimes pronounced as if it’s not there. ‘Sekarang’ (now) is pronounced ‘skarang’. Another important thing to note is that in Bahasa as in Arabic and unlike in English, a noun comes before its adjective. ‘Bunga telur’ which literally means ‘flower egg’ is actually egg flower – used at weddings.
There are some words in Bahasa Melayu that are – although they take different meanings – similar in sound and spelling to some Hausa words. ‘Kaka’ means elder sister. ‘Bapah’ is father. ‘Malam’ means night. Thus, ‘salam malam’ means good night.
There are also words that have the same sound and meaning in Hausa and Bahasa Melayu because both languages borrowed them from Arabic. For example the days of the week sound the same in the three languages. ‘Hamis’ (Bahasa), ‘alhamis’ (Hausa), and ‘yaumul hamis’ (Arabic) all mean Thursday.
Do I find Bahasa Malaysia fascinating? Yes. Do I want to learn it? Yes. But I’ve never been a serious student. I go to the multimedia section of the library in the mornings to study the language using Linguaphone books and cassettes. But I’ve to battle sleep in the mornings. The battle I’m always eager to lose because I go to bed at 2 am. But writing this piece has committed me to learn Bahasa – the language.
Thursday, 29 January 2009
They don’t forget they don’t forgive
They don’t forget, they don’t forgive
A reader asked me to write about the Malays, their culture, their climate, their language, and their idiosyncrasies. I’ve attempted to do that today in the hope that others will find the treatise interesting and informative.
Let’s start with the climate. Malaysia has only one (weird) season; I’m yet to figure out what to call this season but the locals call it summer. But even in this rapidly changing world where human meddling has confused the seasons, it’s difficult to define Malaysian weather. Two things, however, stand out; the torrential rains and the burning sun.
Sometimes the rain drizzles, sometimes it buckets. And in between is a tempestuous storm. The first time I experienced it, I thought the world had come to an end. It starts from the downpour changing to a trickle – waiting for the sky to vent its anger. Then, the lightening sparks, inserting its fingers in your chest and waiting for the thunderclap to rip out your heart. The sound threatens to uproot the house and take you away with it. Even if you don’t know enough science to understand that with lightening comes thunderclap, you’ll become classically conditioned because of the repetitive pairings of the light and the sound. So when you see the light, you jump in fear but there’s nowhere to hide because it’s coming from above you. This nightmare can continue for hours. Helpless, you raise hands heavenwards thanking God for His kindness and asking Him to forgive you in case it’s your last day.
The extreme opposite of the thunder is the afternoon sun. It doesn’t burn you directly the way it does in Nigeria, but it burns you. Five minutes in it and you’ve got a headache. At least that’s how my body reacts to it. As I write this, I’m nursing the headache I got from yesterday’s adventure in the sun. Then there’s this irritating humidity. Even Lagos can’t compete. It’s so thick you’ll need a cutlass to cut it.
But the beautiful thing about Malaysians is that they are a sensible people. Before you can tell them this is the right thing to do, they’ve already done it. They’ve installed air cooling systems everywhere – even at bus stops – so that man can cope with the weather. There are also trees planted everywhere you go. These trees function not only as objects of beautification but also as oxygen factories. And no matter how badly looking a car or bus is, it has a working air conditioning system. So you end up spending more time in an air conditioned environment than outside it. That’s why our people don’t come back to Nigeria darker; some times they even get lighter.
There’s a middle ground between the two extremes. It’s a time when it’s neither hot nor cold. This happens between 5 and 7pm. The trees wave in uniform parade and the beauty of the country becomes apparent. The campus gets busy with sporting activities. There’s a sport for everyone; football, rugby, baseball, basketball, volleyball, martial arts, tennis and other competitive sports that you can only find in South Asia and are yet to make it to the Olympics.
As far as Malaysian weather is concerned, your closest friend is the umbrella. Because it’s certain that it will either rain or shine and because of the intensity of both situations, you need an umbrella. This is especially true when you’re going out in the late morning, at noon or in the afternoon.
This may explain the reason why umbrellas are expensive here. In Abuja you can get a decent umbrella for N350 even during the rainy season when prices are high. Here it’s sold throughout the year at the same price and you can’t get it for less than N400. If you need something big you’ve got to cough out more money.
All in all, Malaysian weather is like an orb with cold, hot, storm, and serene all orbiting haphazardly within it. Some you like and some you don’t. Some gladden and some irritate. Which ever one pushes forth, you’ve to live with it whether you like it or not because you’re also in the same orb.
Next, I’m going to tell you why Malaysians never forget a wrong done to them and also tell how their good nature most of the time obliterates this dark side of dendam and amuk.
A reader asked me to write about the Malays, their culture, their climate, their language, and their idiosyncrasies. I’ve attempted to do that today in the hope that others will find the treatise interesting and informative.
Let’s start with the climate. Malaysia has only one (weird) season; I’m yet to figure out what to call this season but the locals call it summer. But even in this rapidly changing world where human meddling has confused the seasons, it’s difficult to define Malaysian weather. Two things, however, stand out; the torrential rains and the burning sun.
Sometimes the rain drizzles, sometimes it buckets. And in between is a tempestuous storm. The first time I experienced it, I thought the world had come to an end. It starts from the downpour changing to a trickle – waiting for the sky to vent its anger. Then, the lightening sparks, inserting its fingers in your chest and waiting for the thunderclap to rip out your heart. The sound threatens to uproot the house and take you away with it. Even if you don’t know enough science to understand that with lightening comes thunderclap, you’ll become classically conditioned because of the repetitive pairings of the light and the sound. So when you see the light, you jump in fear but there’s nowhere to hide because it’s coming from above you. This nightmare can continue for hours. Helpless, you raise hands heavenwards thanking God for His kindness and asking Him to forgive you in case it’s your last day.
The extreme opposite of the thunder is the afternoon sun. It doesn’t burn you directly the way it does in Nigeria, but it burns you. Five minutes in it and you’ve got a headache. At least that’s how my body reacts to it. As I write this, I’m nursing the headache I got from yesterday’s adventure in the sun. Then there’s this irritating humidity. Even Lagos can’t compete. It’s so thick you’ll need a cutlass to cut it.
But the beautiful thing about Malaysians is that they are a sensible people. Before you can tell them this is the right thing to do, they’ve already done it. They’ve installed air cooling systems everywhere – even at bus stops – so that man can cope with the weather. There are also trees planted everywhere you go. These trees function not only as objects of beautification but also as oxygen factories. And no matter how badly looking a car or bus is, it has a working air conditioning system. So you end up spending more time in an air conditioned environment than outside it. That’s why our people don’t come back to Nigeria darker; some times they even get lighter.
There’s a middle ground between the two extremes. It’s a time when it’s neither hot nor cold. This happens between 5 and 7pm. The trees wave in uniform parade and the beauty of the country becomes apparent. The campus gets busy with sporting activities. There’s a sport for everyone; football, rugby, baseball, basketball, volleyball, martial arts, tennis and other competitive sports that you can only find in South Asia and are yet to make it to the Olympics.
As far as Malaysian weather is concerned, your closest friend is the umbrella. Because it’s certain that it will either rain or shine and because of the intensity of both situations, you need an umbrella. This is especially true when you’re going out in the late morning, at noon or in the afternoon.
This may explain the reason why umbrellas are expensive here. In Abuja you can get a decent umbrella for N350 even during the rainy season when prices are high. Here it’s sold throughout the year at the same price and you can’t get it for less than N400. If you need something big you’ve got to cough out more money.
All in all, Malaysian weather is like an orb with cold, hot, storm, and serene all orbiting haphazardly within it. Some you like and some you don’t. Some gladden and some irritate. Which ever one pushes forth, you’ve to live with it whether you like it or not because you’re also in the same orb.
Next, I’m going to tell you why Malaysians never forget a wrong done to them and also tell how their good nature most of the time obliterates this dark side of dendam and amuk.
Politics and elections in Malaysia II
Politics and elections in Malaysia II
Although Arif Shah knew that his people considered him to be a perfect gentleman, and although he knew that he was loved by the two other races, he still campaigned with all his energy. I can still see him as he visited his constituents in the flooded areas, knee deep in water. Unlike Anwar, he promised to focus on local issues and even refused to use Anwar’s sodomy trouble to his advantage. Instead he called Anwar his guru (in Malay, guru means teacher). He explained that he served under Anwar when Anwar was a BN chief.
He was so exhausted that after the elections, the wife took him home to check if had lost any weight. The meter read 98.2kg. He lost 7kg. But weight was not the only thing he lost. Arif Shah lost the election too. He trailed 15,000 votes behind Anwar.
Although the Prime Minister, his deputy, - the crown prince who had been promised the premiership come 2010 – and the party knew that Anwar was a big trouble, they did not use the 3-letter word which is the chief ingredient of Nigerian elections.
I was baffled that nobody even mentioned it. As if the word, RIG, didn’t exist. Even the sometimes critical media did not mention it.
A person that is not afraid of calling diabolical acts like rigging by their names is Dr. Mahathir Muhammad, the former Prime Minister. But he conceded it was the people’s decision when he said, “Anwar did not win. BN lost”. In other words, BN did not do a good job in the campaigns. So people had no choice other than to elect Anwar.
Arif Shah said he lost the election because, “people believed PKR promises”. But according to The Sun newspaper of 28th August, 2008, it was not only Anwar’s promises that swayed the people to his side.
In its analysis titled ‘Umno conflicts hurt own campaign’, it said that the fact that Arif Shah Omar was picked as the BN candidate over his division chief who had lobbied to be chosen as the candidate, contributed to what happened in the last ten days.
The Sun further said that, “It was a difficult campaign for the amiable Arif Shah. It is learnt that while the Umno by-election machinery was up and running and many BN posters and streamers were printed, none of these were accessible to the candidate.
“The most glaring sign was that despite having a by-election operations centre, Arif Shah was found operating from his home”. And what did Arif Shah think about this? “He was his usual amiable self denying there was any sabotage of his campaign.”
The beautiful thing about Malaysian politics is that the politicians genuinely believe that the choice belongs to the people.
After the by-election, Dr. Mahathir warned the ruling party to “take note of the message sent by the voters this time”.
But the Prime Minister, Ahmad Badawi, believes BN still has the people’s confidence. “The result of the by-election cannot be interpreted as a trend that can happen in other constituencies. The BN, which won 140 parliamentary seats in the March 8 general elections, still commands strong support from the people. What happened was not something so big as to change the situation that existed after the last general elections”.
However, Anwar thinks it is big enough for the opposition to form a national government come September 16. But Dr. Mahathir doubts if Anwar will become a Prime Minister. He said Anwar can not get at least 30 MPs from BN to cross over to the opposition to form a simple-majority government.
But Anwar’s camp said they don’t need the 30 MPs to cross over, they only need them to cross over. I’m still battling to understand the differences between the two cross-overs.
Whether Anwar will become Prime Minister or not, remains to be seen. But, for a BA graduate in Malay Studies, he has come along way.
Two years after he joined Umno in 1982, he became the Youth Leader. And another two years later, in 1986, he became the ruling coalition Vice-President. He was both finance and education minister; two portfolios that are important in any country. For example in Malaysia, the position of the Minister of Education is the most politicized. Every person - except Tun Abdul Razaq - who has been Prime Minister had been the Education Minister.
Anwar has also held teaching positions at Oxford University in UK, Johns Hopkins School of Advanced International Studies in USA and School of Foreign Service, Georgetown University. He is also the Honorary President of the London-based think-tank, Accountability since 2006.
Anwar was the Deputy Prime Minister between 1993 and 1998. It was from that position he fell to corruption and sodomy charges. On the corruption charge, he was sentenced to six years in jail and banned from politics on the 14 April, 1999. On the sodomy charge, he was sentenced to nine years on 8 August, 2000. But the sodomy conviction was overturned in September 2004 and Anwar was released. However, he could not participate in active politics until 14 April 2008. Therefore, he could only collect back the baton he passed to his wife in 1999 in the August 26 2008 by-election.
Even if Anwar becomes Prime Minister, can he change anything? As I switched between Obama’s speech on CNN and Anwar’s interview on Aljazeera, I observed the pains Anwar took to explain the changes he plans to make without changing the structures on which Malaysia was built. “Other races understand that Islam is the religion of Malaysia and Bahasa Melayu is the official language but….”
Malaysians are pretty comfortable with the way things are now. And nobody dares make any major changes. For example, UiTM (Universiti Tecknologi Mara) admits only the Malays. When the politicians wanted to test the waters by suggesting that 10% of the admission space should be given to other races and foreign students, 10,000 thousand students protested the next day.
Although Arif Shah knew that his people considered him to be a perfect gentleman, and although he knew that he was loved by the two other races, he still campaigned with all his energy. I can still see him as he visited his constituents in the flooded areas, knee deep in water. Unlike Anwar, he promised to focus on local issues and even refused to use Anwar’s sodomy trouble to his advantage. Instead he called Anwar his guru (in Malay, guru means teacher). He explained that he served under Anwar when Anwar was a BN chief.
He was so exhausted that after the elections, the wife took him home to check if had lost any weight. The meter read 98.2kg. He lost 7kg. But weight was not the only thing he lost. Arif Shah lost the election too. He trailed 15,000 votes behind Anwar.
Although the Prime Minister, his deputy, - the crown prince who had been promised the premiership come 2010 – and the party knew that Anwar was a big trouble, they did not use the 3-letter word which is the chief ingredient of Nigerian elections.
I was baffled that nobody even mentioned it. As if the word, RIG, didn’t exist. Even the sometimes critical media did not mention it.
A person that is not afraid of calling diabolical acts like rigging by their names is Dr. Mahathir Muhammad, the former Prime Minister. But he conceded it was the people’s decision when he said, “Anwar did not win. BN lost”. In other words, BN did not do a good job in the campaigns. So people had no choice other than to elect Anwar.
Arif Shah said he lost the election because, “people believed PKR promises”. But according to The Sun newspaper of 28th August, 2008, it was not only Anwar’s promises that swayed the people to his side.
In its analysis titled ‘Umno conflicts hurt own campaign’, it said that the fact that Arif Shah Omar was picked as the BN candidate over his division chief who had lobbied to be chosen as the candidate, contributed to what happened in the last ten days.
The Sun further said that, “It was a difficult campaign for the amiable Arif Shah. It is learnt that while the Umno by-election machinery was up and running and many BN posters and streamers were printed, none of these were accessible to the candidate.
“The most glaring sign was that despite having a by-election operations centre, Arif Shah was found operating from his home”. And what did Arif Shah think about this? “He was his usual amiable self denying there was any sabotage of his campaign.”
The beautiful thing about Malaysian politics is that the politicians genuinely believe that the choice belongs to the people.
After the by-election, Dr. Mahathir warned the ruling party to “take note of the message sent by the voters this time”.
But the Prime Minister, Ahmad Badawi, believes BN still has the people’s confidence. “The result of the by-election cannot be interpreted as a trend that can happen in other constituencies. The BN, which won 140 parliamentary seats in the March 8 general elections, still commands strong support from the people. What happened was not something so big as to change the situation that existed after the last general elections”.
However, Anwar thinks it is big enough for the opposition to form a national government come September 16. But Dr. Mahathir doubts if Anwar will become a Prime Minister. He said Anwar can not get at least 30 MPs from BN to cross over to the opposition to form a simple-majority government.
But Anwar’s camp said they don’t need the 30 MPs to cross over, they only need them to cross over. I’m still battling to understand the differences between the two cross-overs.
Whether Anwar will become Prime Minister or not, remains to be seen. But, for a BA graduate in Malay Studies, he has come along way.
Two years after he joined Umno in 1982, he became the Youth Leader. And another two years later, in 1986, he became the ruling coalition Vice-President. He was both finance and education minister; two portfolios that are important in any country. For example in Malaysia, the position of the Minister of Education is the most politicized. Every person - except Tun Abdul Razaq - who has been Prime Minister had been the Education Minister.
Anwar has also held teaching positions at Oxford University in UK, Johns Hopkins School of Advanced International Studies in USA and School of Foreign Service, Georgetown University. He is also the Honorary President of the London-based think-tank, Accountability since 2006.
Anwar was the Deputy Prime Minister between 1993 and 1998. It was from that position he fell to corruption and sodomy charges. On the corruption charge, he was sentenced to six years in jail and banned from politics on the 14 April, 1999. On the sodomy charge, he was sentenced to nine years on 8 August, 2000. But the sodomy conviction was overturned in September 2004 and Anwar was released. However, he could not participate in active politics until 14 April 2008. Therefore, he could only collect back the baton he passed to his wife in 1999 in the August 26 2008 by-election.
Even if Anwar becomes Prime Minister, can he change anything? As I switched between Obama’s speech on CNN and Anwar’s interview on Aljazeera, I observed the pains Anwar took to explain the changes he plans to make without changing the structures on which Malaysia was built. “Other races understand that Islam is the religion of Malaysia and Bahasa Melayu is the official language but….”
Malaysians are pretty comfortable with the way things are now. And nobody dares make any major changes. For example, UiTM (Universiti Tecknologi Mara) admits only the Malays. When the politicians wanted to test the waters by suggesting that 10% of the admission space should be given to other races and foreign students, 10,000 thousand students protested the next day.
Politics and Elections in Malaysia, the Anwar upset I
Politics and Elections in Malaysia, the Anwar upset I
Many people were shocked when Anwar Ibrahim’s wife, Dr. Wan Azizah, vacated her seat as Permatang Pauh representative at the parliament. This she did to pave way for her husband to contest the by-election, so that he could reclaim the position he left at the parliament ten years ago. And may be get enough MPs to cross over so that he can become the Prime Minister and thereby achieving his life long ambition.
Having been made the party president and having been elected as the opposition leader in the parliament, Dr. Azizah could be excused for being too confident that her husband could win the election. But it was still a risky move. Or so I thought as a Nigerian. For example, who from our National Assembly can willingly resign to allow her husband or his wife to contest an election against the PDP?
Dr Azizah resignation came at the time her husband was facing fresh sodomy charges, which made her decision more precarious. But instead of the husband viewing that as a weakness, he added the trial to his campaign arsenal and called it persecution. The Star of Monday 11th August reported him to have said, “Things are getting bad for me now as I have been accused and slandered by those who are preventing me from winning in the by-election. It is an uphill battle for me”
Earlier, Anwar, who has just turned 61, alleged after his arrest, that he “was striped naked and measurements (of my privates) taken. I was placed in a lock-up on the seventh floor of the IPK; the lock-up for major criminals. I was also made to sleep on a cement floor.” But he didn’t give his DNA sample because he feared that it could be tampered with.
He also refused to allow the police and medical personnel to photograph him because he feared that the pictures may end up on YouTube. Anwar finally asked, “Why was I treated like a major criminal and a public enemy?”
All these happened between Thursday, 17th and Friday 18th July – the wife resigned on the 31st of July.
The events that led to his arrest were also as dramatic. Anwar scheduled a press conference at Quality Hotel on Sunday, 29th June. But he quickly cancelled this conference and took refuge at the Turkish Embassy because of what the wife called a “second political conspiracy” to finish him off politically.
The person that caused the uproar and panic was Saiful, the 23-year old former aide of Anwar. On Saturday 28th June, he lodged a police report that Anwar had sodomized him.
The wife didn’t see any sodomy case at all. She saw, “a second conspiracy and an attempted murder. There’s a serious threat on his life. They did it in 1998 and they’re doing it again now.”
Anwar himself said, “I have been told that my assassination has not been ruled out as means to subvert the people’s will and bring an end to the transformational changes taking place in Malaysia.”
Anwar’s conspiracy theory forced the Prime Minister to react. “Umno (the ruling coalition) has never thought of disturbing him like this. BN (the Prime Minister’s Party and Anwar’s former party) also has never thought of making his life difficult or making up something like this or doing anything bad towards him. We don’t have such intention. It never crossed my mind to frame him.”
Now Anwar was in the Turkish Embassy. Although he had immunity there, the government could summon the ambassador. It was also obvious that the good relationship between the two countries could suffer some damage. Anwar had to leave. And the ambassador had to explain to the government that Anwar came to his personal residence – not to the embassy. And that he came as a friend and not as a refugee.
The politicking, accusations and counter accusations may be familiar to Nigerians but Malaysian politics are quite different from our own as you shall soon see.
Campaign and election
After the by-election date was fixed to be 26th August, the candidates had only ten days to campaign. Within the ten days, they gave talks, visited markets, traveled to remote villages and granted interviews to the media.
The contest was between two main candidates: PKR’s Anwar and the ruling party’s Arif Shah. Arif is a man I personal think is too good to be a politician.
Although Anwar knew that he had previously held this same seat on contest for 17 years, then his wife held it for 9 years, he didn’t take the people for granted and campaigned vigorously. He gave several promises. To the Malays he promised to protect their interests. To the Indians and Chinese, he promised more opportunities. To the Malaysians in general, he promised to chop off RM.50 from the fuel price. It’s currently fixed at RM2.70 (N99.9).
To be continued
Quotes are taken from The Star, New Straits Times, Malay Mail, the Sun and TV3.
Many people were shocked when Anwar Ibrahim’s wife, Dr. Wan Azizah, vacated her seat as Permatang Pauh representative at the parliament. This she did to pave way for her husband to contest the by-election, so that he could reclaim the position he left at the parliament ten years ago. And may be get enough MPs to cross over so that he can become the Prime Minister and thereby achieving his life long ambition.
Having been made the party president and having been elected as the opposition leader in the parliament, Dr. Azizah could be excused for being too confident that her husband could win the election. But it was still a risky move. Or so I thought as a Nigerian. For example, who from our National Assembly can willingly resign to allow her husband or his wife to contest an election against the PDP?
Dr Azizah resignation came at the time her husband was facing fresh sodomy charges, which made her decision more precarious. But instead of the husband viewing that as a weakness, he added the trial to his campaign arsenal and called it persecution. The Star of Monday 11th August reported him to have said, “Things are getting bad for me now as I have been accused and slandered by those who are preventing me from winning in the by-election. It is an uphill battle for me”
Earlier, Anwar, who has just turned 61, alleged after his arrest, that he “was striped naked and measurements (of my privates) taken. I was placed in a lock-up on the seventh floor of the IPK; the lock-up for major criminals. I was also made to sleep on a cement floor.” But he didn’t give his DNA sample because he feared that it could be tampered with.
He also refused to allow the police and medical personnel to photograph him because he feared that the pictures may end up on YouTube. Anwar finally asked, “Why was I treated like a major criminal and a public enemy?”
All these happened between Thursday, 17th and Friday 18th July – the wife resigned on the 31st of July.
The events that led to his arrest were also as dramatic. Anwar scheduled a press conference at Quality Hotel on Sunday, 29th June. But he quickly cancelled this conference and took refuge at the Turkish Embassy because of what the wife called a “second political conspiracy” to finish him off politically.
The person that caused the uproar and panic was Saiful, the 23-year old former aide of Anwar. On Saturday 28th June, he lodged a police report that Anwar had sodomized him.
The wife didn’t see any sodomy case at all. She saw, “a second conspiracy and an attempted murder. There’s a serious threat on his life. They did it in 1998 and they’re doing it again now.”
Anwar himself said, “I have been told that my assassination has not been ruled out as means to subvert the people’s will and bring an end to the transformational changes taking place in Malaysia.”
Anwar’s conspiracy theory forced the Prime Minister to react. “Umno (the ruling coalition) has never thought of disturbing him like this. BN (the Prime Minister’s Party and Anwar’s former party) also has never thought of making his life difficult or making up something like this or doing anything bad towards him. We don’t have such intention. It never crossed my mind to frame him.”
Now Anwar was in the Turkish Embassy. Although he had immunity there, the government could summon the ambassador. It was also obvious that the good relationship between the two countries could suffer some damage. Anwar had to leave. And the ambassador had to explain to the government that Anwar came to his personal residence – not to the embassy. And that he came as a friend and not as a refugee.
The politicking, accusations and counter accusations may be familiar to Nigerians but Malaysian politics are quite different from our own as you shall soon see.
Campaign and election
After the by-election date was fixed to be 26th August, the candidates had only ten days to campaign. Within the ten days, they gave talks, visited markets, traveled to remote villages and granted interviews to the media.
The contest was between two main candidates: PKR’s Anwar and the ruling party’s Arif Shah. Arif is a man I personal think is too good to be a politician.
Although Anwar knew that he had previously held this same seat on contest for 17 years, then his wife held it for 9 years, he didn’t take the people for granted and campaigned vigorously. He gave several promises. To the Malays he promised to protect their interests. To the Indians and Chinese, he promised more opportunities. To the Malaysians in general, he promised to chop off RM.50 from the fuel price. It’s currently fixed at RM2.70 (N99.9).
To be continued
Quotes are taken from The Star, New Straits Times, Malay Mail, the Sun and TV3.
Freudian Fraud
Freudian Fraud
About three weeks ago, a professor invited me to her son’s wedding in Kajang in the state of Selangor. When I decided it was time to go home, it was already twelve midnight. At that time, it was no longer possible to get a taxi to take me home because the house is tucked in the highbrow areas of the farthest part of the city.
So one of the professor’s sons – Usman - was asked to take me home. With Usman were two of his postgraduate students from Petronas University. After first expressing their ‘wow’ as people usually do when they learn that your study is in psychology, Usman and his friends engaged me in a discussion about the human behaviour. And I was actually impressed by the breadth of their knowledge in behavioral sciences.
They asked me what I thought of Freud. I said Freud was a fraud. They said that they agreed with Freud ‘because one has to find a way to express his sexual desires.’ I explained to them that if they take Edmund Freud’s psychosexual theory and his studies in general in to consideration, they’ll agree with me that Freud wasn’t a hero some people take him to be. They challenged me to enlighten them.
What I told my friends that night is what I’m about to tell you today. But to enjoy reading it, you may want to don your best sense of disgust. The first reason why I advised you to that is because Freud’s thoughts have a way of offending people; especially if you’re a parent. Secondly you’ll not be the first person to do that; some psychologists regard Freud with contempt beginning by some of his own students. Thirdly, I desire for you to understand his ideas as clearly as possible. And to facilitate that understanding, I will not coat Freud’s thoughts in nice words; I’ll disrobe them as far as decorum allows.
The first example: Freud argued that when a baby sucks his mother’s breasts, he’s not only doing so to satisfy his hunger but that the child is also sexually engaged with those breasts. In other words, the child is sort of making love to the mother.
If you were shocked by that, don’t worry. There are more appalling details ahead.
What I’ve just described is what Freud called the oral stage. It starts from birth to age one. According to him, the oral and other stages I’ll soon describe, are not just phases in a child’s life but they shape the personality of the child in adulthood. For example if what the child can put in his mouth is restricted by the society, the consequence will be a fixation. Fixation is a situation where an individual becomes stuck in a conflict because his sexual urges and the demand for conformity by the society are not resolved. Over-dependence on others, passiveness, an unenterprising adulthood, smoking, sucking of fingers are all manifestations of oral fixation.
The next stage in Freud’s psychosexual theory is the anal stage. This stage occurs in children from age one to two. This is the time that a child starts gaining control over his bowel movement. Freud said that a child derives pleasure from controlling these actions. However, if a child is prevented from painting the house with his faeces and is subjected to rigid toilet training, conflict may result. Because of this conflict, fixation in adulthood will take the form of excessive cleanliness.
In 1910 in an article titled ‘A Special Type of Choice of Object Made by Men’ Freud introduced the Oedipus complex. Another name for this term is phallic stage. This stage is characterized by a child developing intense sexual desire for the opposite-sex parent and a jealous hatred for the same-sex parent. Let me clarify this. Freud said the five year-old boy wants the mother and sees the father as a competition. In the case of a girl, she desires the father and is jealous of the mother.
Freud asserted the universality of this complex in 1920 in a note he added to his book ‘Three Essays on the Theory of Sexuality’. In the note he said: “Every new arrival on this planet is faced with the task of mastering the Oedipus complex.”
But Andrew Colman was right: “He never fully clarified his views regarding the nature of the complex in girls.”
Rather, Freud contradicted himself in 1931 when he published the article titled ‘Female Sexuality’. He wrote: “It is only in the male child that we find the fateful combination of love for one parent and simutaneous hatred for the other as a rival.”
From age six to thirteen, children enter the latency stage. (Fortunately), Freud said any sexual impulses are pushed to the background because the child is busy learning cognitive and social skills.
Finally in adolescence, the sexual desires resurface again. The child enters the genital phase and the focus is on the pleasures of sexual intercourse.
Psychosexual theory is only one of Freud’s numerous theories (or Freud’s ideas where they’re not testable). Have you heard of Freudian slip? It’s a term people use to refer to one Freud’s ideas on unconciousness. For instance if you’re attracted to your female colleague and in trying to comment on her competence to a third person and say: “She is the breast person I’ve ever worked with” Freud said what actually happened wasn’t a mistake but your unconciousness that’s doing the talking.
A final note on Freud
Do not be offended if Freud viewed your sweet baby as a randy scoundrel; although his ideas inspired research in areas of human sexuality, unconciousness and development, few psychologists regard him with respect.
Romero and Kemp commented: “ Freud’s theory of personality development did not lend itself to scientific investigation. His work on personality is descriptive. This means that his theory is not testable using the scientific method.”
Despite his untestable theories, Freud was not overburden with humility. Wade and Tavris commented on how he saw himself and how others see him: “ Freud saw himself as one of the great geniuses of history, and many people agree with that assessment. But many modern scientists think he was a flat-out fraud whose ideas have not stood the test of time.” Medawar called him “ a dinasour in the history of ideas”.
About three weeks ago, a professor invited me to her son’s wedding in Kajang in the state of Selangor. When I decided it was time to go home, it was already twelve midnight. At that time, it was no longer possible to get a taxi to take me home because the house is tucked in the highbrow areas of the farthest part of the city.
So one of the professor’s sons – Usman - was asked to take me home. With Usman were two of his postgraduate students from Petronas University. After first expressing their ‘wow’ as people usually do when they learn that your study is in psychology, Usman and his friends engaged me in a discussion about the human behaviour. And I was actually impressed by the breadth of their knowledge in behavioral sciences.
They asked me what I thought of Freud. I said Freud was a fraud. They said that they agreed with Freud ‘because one has to find a way to express his sexual desires.’ I explained to them that if they take Edmund Freud’s psychosexual theory and his studies in general in to consideration, they’ll agree with me that Freud wasn’t a hero some people take him to be. They challenged me to enlighten them.
What I told my friends that night is what I’m about to tell you today. But to enjoy reading it, you may want to don your best sense of disgust. The first reason why I advised you to that is because Freud’s thoughts have a way of offending people; especially if you’re a parent. Secondly you’ll not be the first person to do that; some psychologists regard Freud with contempt beginning by some of his own students. Thirdly, I desire for you to understand his ideas as clearly as possible. And to facilitate that understanding, I will not coat Freud’s thoughts in nice words; I’ll disrobe them as far as decorum allows.
The first example: Freud argued that when a baby sucks his mother’s breasts, he’s not only doing so to satisfy his hunger but that the child is also sexually engaged with those breasts. In other words, the child is sort of making love to the mother.
If you were shocked by that, don’t worry. There are more appalling details ahead.
What I’ve just described is what Freud called the oral stage. It starts from birth to age one. According to him, the oral and other stages I’ll soon describe, are not just phases in a child’s life but they shape the personality of the child in adulthood. For example if what the child can put in his mouth is restricted by the society, the consequence will be a fixation. Fixation is a situation where an individual becomes stuck in a conflict because his sexual urges and the demand for conformity by the society are not resolved. Over-dependence on others, passiveness, an unenterprising adulthood, smoking, sucking of fingers are all manifestations of oral fixation.
The next stage in Freud’s psychosexual theory is the anal stage. This stage occurs in children from age one to two. This is the time that a child starts gaining control over his bowel movement. Freud said that a child derives pleasure from controlling these actions. However, if a child is prevented from painting the house with his faeces and is subjected to rigid toilet training, conflict may result. Because of this conflict, fixation in adulthood will take the form of excessive cleanliness.
In 1910 in an article titled ‘A Special Type of Choice of Object Made by Men’ Freud introduced the Oedipus complex. Another name for this term is phallic stage. This stage is characterized by a child developing intense sexual desire for the opposite-sex parent and a jealous hatred for the same-sex parent. Let me clarify this. Freud said the five year-old boy wants the mother and sees the father as a competition. In the case of a girl, she desires the father and is jealous of the mother.
Freud asserted the universality of this complex in 1920 in a note he added to his book ‘Three Essays on the Theory of Sexuality’. In the note he said: “Every new arrival on this planet is faced with the task of mastering the Oedipus complex.”
But Andrew Colman was right: “He never fully clarified his views regarding the nature of the complex in girls.”
Rather, Freud contradicted himself in 1931 when he published the article titled ‘Female Sexuality’. He wrote: “It is only in the male child that we find the fateful combination of love for one parent and simutaneous hatred for the other as a rival.”
From age six to thirteen, children enter the latency stage. (Fortunately), Freud said any sexual impulses are pushed to the background because the child is busy learning cognitive and social skills.
Finally in adolescence, the sexual desires resurface again. The child enters the genital phase and the focus is on the pleasures of sexual intercourse.
Psychosexual theory is only one of Freud’s numerous theories (or Freud’s ideas where they’re not testable). Have you heard of Freudian slip? It’s a term people use to refer to one Freud’s ideas on unconciousness. For instance if you’re attracted to your female colleague and in trying to comment on her competence to a third person and say: “She is the breast person I’ve ever worked with” Freud said what actually happened wasn’t a mistake but your unconciousness that’s doing the talking.
A final note on Freud
Do not be offended if Freud viewed your sweet baby as a randy scoundrel; although his ideas inspired research in areas of human sexuality, unconciousness and development, few psychologists regard him with respect.
Romero and Kemp commented: “ Freud’s theory of personality development did not lend itself to scientific investigation. His work on personality is descriptive. This means that his theory is not testable using the scientific method.”
Despite his untestable theories, Freud was not overburden with humility. Wade and Tavris commented on how he saw himself and how others see him: “ Freud saw himself as one of the great geniuses of history, and many people agree with that assessment. But many modern scientists think he was a flat-out fraud whose ideas have not stood the test of time.” Medawar called him “ a dinasour in the history of ideas”.
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