Political parties banking on votes from the civil servants, the sacrosanct!

The civil service is sacrosanct, politically speaking. If you are a politician, you better think twice before speaking up against it.

ALTHOUGH more non-Malays are beginning to join the civil service, the fact that Malays make up the overwhelming majority of the 1.4 million-strong public sector remains.(The highest ratio of civil servants in the world)

It is said that nearly every Malay family has someone either in the civil service or the uniformed services.

Thus, the civil service is home to a sizeable percentage of voters. Therefore, their welfare and livelihood is a key priority of the Barisan Nasional Government which likes to project itself as its protector and benefactor.

On the other hand, the Chinese and Indians predominate in the private sector as small businessmen, professionals and wage earners.

They are largely cut off from the civil service. They have little clue how the civil servants, as a unified special interest group, think and respond in a crisis.

This is the reason why some Chinese and Indian politicians and even some thoughtless Malays make insensitive remarks about the civil service and pay a price for their faux pas.

The more seasoned politicians in Umno and other Barisan component parties managed to avoid making insensitive remarks, preferring to work with the civil service rather than against them.

When civil servants die in the line of duty, Barisan gets all worked up. It immediately moves in to comfort and reassure them as it is mindful of the civil services' vote bank.

When security personnel were killed by Sulu insurgents, the Government's game plan changed as well.

Prime Minister Datuk Seri Najib Tun Razak ordered an all-out assault by a combined force of army and police personnel.

Resources were rapidly mobilised, villagers told to move out and security forces encircled the red zone and the shooting war started in earnest.

When Najib announced the decision to attack on March 5 at a gathering of religious leaders at Putra Stadium, he was given a standing ovation.

The civil servants had rejoiced that the initial decision to negotiate was over and that the army and police were on attack mode.

The Opposition, on the other hand, had fallen flat. They had failed to connect with the powerful emotional impact the crisis had on civil servants and the Malay voters.

In fact, they committed a faux pas of the worst kind imaginable when PKR vice-president Tian Chua remarked that the Lahad Datu crisis was a sandiwara by Umno and Barisan Nasional.

His remarks, published in Keadilan Daily on March 1, had riled up the Malay groups, including former servicemen, who vented their anger and demanded an apology and retraction.

Not a day passes by without someone burning or stomping on pictures of Tian Chua and lodging a police report and urging stern action.

At one anti-Tian Chua session, even former IGPs and former deputy IGPs were out condemning Tian Chua and rooting for the Malaysian security forces.

The message out there is simple while the armed forces are risking their lives in protecting the country, Opposition politicians are playing politics.

The civil service is sacrosanct, politically speaking. If you are a politician, you better think twice before speaking up against it.

Former Selangor Mentri Besar Datuk Seri Dr Mohd Khir Toyo had angered civil servants when he gave out a broom as an “award” to two underperforming local councils in Novem-ber 2007.

While he wanted to improve the service, the civil servants saw it as demeaning and felt slighted. They took it out by spoiling their votes when the general election came, contributing to the fall of Barisan in Selangor.

In more recent times December 2011 Petaling Jaya Utara MP Tony Pua was forced to eat humble pie after he announced that Pakatan Rakyat would slash the civil service by half, if it takes power.

Pakatan leader Datuk Seri Anwar Ibrahim had to step in and assure the civil servants that Pakatan would do no such thing if it is in power.

Even Pua, who stands in an overwhelmingly Chinese seat, was forced to clarify that he did not mean “slash by half” but reduce its numbers through synergies.

The civil service is overwhelmingly Malay and largely pro-Barisan, who is their protector and benefactor; although PAS and, to a lesser extent, PKR are making a dent.

However, it is not big enough a dent for the supposedly neutral civil servants to change direction as yet.

Comment by BARADAN KUPPUSAMY

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Using radiation to grow herbs: Tongkat Ali, Kacip Fatimah and Ginseng

BANGI: Low dosage radiation has been used to spur the growth of Tongkat Ali, Kacip Fatimah and ginseng in a pilot project by the Malaysian Nuclear Agency.

This technology can produce about 100kg of Tongkat Ali within 60 days and ginseng within 30 days, said the agency's Agrotechnology and Biosciences Division mutation breeding and plant biotechnology senior research officer Dr Rusli Ibrahim.

“For Tongkat Ali that grows in the wild, it would take 20 to 25 years to produce only 4kg,” he said after the launch of the Symposium on Radiation and Nuclear Technologies for Crop Improvement and Productivity in Sustainable Agriculture.

Dr Rusli said they would use low dosage radiation, such as gamma rays, on the roots of Tongkat Ali, Kacip Fatimah and ginseng.

“This will accelerate the growth of the root,” he said, adding that the pilot project was located in the Industrial Park in Nilai.

“The system is the first of its kind in Malaysia and South-East Asia,” he said, adding that he had studied about the technology in South Korea.

Toxicity tests will be conducted at the end of the production to ensure they are safe for consumption.

He said the three plants were chosen as there was high demand for them in the United States, South Korea, Europe and the Middle East.

“We are looking for industry partners who are interested in taking up the technology for commercialisation purposes.”

Dr Rusli stressed that the agency had come up with a safe way to use nuclear technology to increase the productivity of agriculture products in the country.

It is a common misconception that nuclear radiation is dangerous, he said.

“We are talking about using gamma rays and X-rays in small amounts to accelerate the growth of the plants.”

“X-rays are being used on humans for health check-ups. So, it is safe,” he said.

Its director-general Datuk Dr Muhamad Lebai Juri said they had been able to increase the productivity of certain plants in a shorter time due to the use of nuclear technology.

“This advanced bioreactor system was developed for the production of raw materials and bioactive compounds from herbal and medicinal plants for commercial production.”

Earlier, Forum for Nuclear Cooperation in Asia coordinator Dr Sueo Machi said the use of nuclear technology played an important role in agriculture.

“It reduces the excess use of pesticide and chemical fertilisation. The overuse of chemicals can possibly pollute the environment,” he said.

By WONG PEK MEI 

The Star/Asia News Network

China massive restructuring to boost efficiency, fight corruption

China’s Communist Party Chief Xi Jinping reads as attendants serve tea at the Great Hall of the People during the third plenary session of the National People’s Congress in Beijing, yesterday.  

VIDEO: LC: TIAN WEI ON NPC CPPCC CCTV News - CNTV English

(Reuters) - China unveiled a government restructuring plan on Sunday, cutting cabinet-level entities by two and dissolving its powerful Railways Ministry, as the country's new leaders look to boost efficiency and combat corruption.

The reforms mark the biggest reduction in ministries since 1998 when then-premier Zhu Rongji oversaw the overhaul of the State Council, and coincides with growing public concern over transparency and overlapping bureaucracies.

The government will join the Family Planning Commission -- the agency that controls the controversial one-child policy -- with the Health Ministry, and strengthen the powers of the food and drug regulators, it said in a report released during the on-going annual meeting of parliament.

"Currently, numerous operational, organizational and division of labor problems exist in State Council ministries," State Council Secretary-General Ma Kai said in a speech on the plan to the National People's Congress.

Ma added that "breach of duty, using positions for personal gain and corruption" under the structure had not been effectively constrained.

China's president-in-waiting Xi Jinping and premier-designate Li Keqiang assume their new roles after the annual congress concludes next week.

The Railways Ministry and Family Planning Commission have been particularly unpopular, and their restructuring was widely expected.

The Railways Ministry has faced numerous problems over the past few years, including heavy debts from funding new high-speed lines, waste and fraud.

Railways planning will be coordinated under the broader transport ministry. The government has pledged to open the rail industry to private investment on an unprecedented scale.

Family planning officials, meanwhile, have been known to compel women to have abortions to meet birth-rate targets. High profile cases have sparked national fury, such as when a woman in inland Shaanxi province was forced to abort her 7-month pregnancy last year.

Some analysts have said the merger of the health and family planning agencies would be a blow to the political base needed to maintain the one-child policy, which many demographers say should be relaxed.

The report said family planning must continue "on the basis of stable and low birth rates", but added that policies would be "improved". China's one-child policy is still generally enforced, although there are a number of family situations exempt from the rule.

A recently retired official from the Family Planning Commission who maintains close ties with the agency, said the merger does not mean the commission's power will be reduced.

"For such a long time, hundreds of millions of people had to have contraception and birth control, this kind of work is necessary. But it's possible that there will be fewer things done by force," the retired official said.

SUPER MINISTRIES

The restructuring plan, which will cut cabinet-level agencies to 25, will also boost the role of the food and drug regulators, placing it within the cabinet in response to an almost never-ending series of scandals over product safety.

Prosecutions for producing or selling fake drugs or toxic food jumped to more than 8,000 in 2012, more than five times the number in 2011, according to a report by the office of China's top prosecutor also issued on Sunday.

China's maritime enforcement agencies will be consolidated, as well, giving the National Oceanic Administration control over coast guard forces, customs police and fisheries enforcement as China faces growing tensions with Japan and South East Asian neighbors over disputed seas.

The move will bring China's maritime law enforcement forces, currently scattered among different ministries, under the unified management of a single administration, according to a report delivered by State Councilor Ma Kai at the annual parliamentary session on Sunday.

The new agency will still be named the National Oceanic Administration (NOA). It will have under its control the coast guard forces of the Public Security Ministry, the fisheries law enforcement command of the Agriculture Ministry and the maritime anti-smuggling police of the General Administration of Customs, Ma said in his report about the plan on the institutional restructuring and functional transformation of the State Council, China's cabinet.

The NOA currently has only one maritime law enforcement department, China Marine Surveillance.

The proposed administration, administered by the Ministry of Land and Resources, will carry out law enforcement activities in the name of China's maritime police bureau and under the operational direction of the Ministry of Public Security, said Ma, who is also the secretary-general of the State Council.

In addition to law enforcement, other functions of the new administration include outlining the oceanic development plan, supervising and managing the use of sea waters, and protecting ocean ecology, Ma said.

A high-level consultative and coordinating body, the National Oceanic Commission, will also be set up to formulate oceanic development strategies and coordinate important oceanic affairs, Ma said.

One parliament delegate said on the sidelines of the congress session that the move was not linked to the military.

"Our coastline is very long and our oceans cover a vast area. There is no military thinking behind it," said Zhang Guibai.

China will also merge its two media watchdogs -- the General Administration of Press and Publication and the State Administration of Radio, Film and Television -- and restructure the National Energy Administration, Ma said.

The move is meant to coordinate the resources of each sector and promote the reform of cultural institutions, Ma said in his report on the plan for the institutional reform and functional transformation of the State Council, China's cabinet.

The new administration will be responsible for promoting the development of these sectors and supervising related agencies and their businesses, said Ma, who is also secretary-general of the State Council.

The merger will be conducive to establishing a modern communication system, which is rapidly shaped by digital information technology, and boosting the country's cultural influence, said a statement from the State Commission Office for Public Sector Reform, which explains the reason of the institutional reform

Sources: Reuters - Reporting by Michael Martina, Shen Yan, Sui-Lee Wee and Ben Blanchard; Editing by Jonathan Standing and Michael Perry; CCTV, Xinhua

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Chavez’s legacy will live on

While his death sparked an outpouring of grief, his legacy will forever be remembered.
 
HUGO Chavez, who died last week, mourned by millions of Venezuelan citizens and people around the South American region, was a figure that was larger than life.

During his 14 years as president of Venezuela, he managed to institute profound changes with effects on his country and the developing world long after his death.

Some leaders and media outlets in the West have been giving misleading or trivialised commentaries, just as they tried to demonise him during his lifetime.

This is to be expected, since Chavez was felt by the establishment as a thorn in the flesh.

He had not minced words in criticising and acting against the so-called Washington Consensus, a nexus of policies and institutions (including the International Monetary Fund, the World Bank and the US Treasury) that promoted a version of free-market fundamentalism that adversely affected the economic and social life of the Latin American region.

Chavez’s greatest feat was to identify and break out from the straightjacket of the Washington Consensus and to formulate policies that were very different, which he believed would benefit the people, especially the poor.

One of the first things he did as president, after being elected in 1998 with a large majority, was to re-organise the national oil industry and to play a leading role in reviving Opec, the organisation of oil exporting countries.

The price of oil shot up from around US$10 (RM30) a barrel in 1998 to US$20 (RM60), and then to around the US$100 (RM300) level where it now is.

The country’s net oil export revenues climbed from around US$14bil (RM42bil) in 1999 to US$60bil (RM180bil) in 2011.

The hugely increased oil revenues was the basis for financing many innovative social programmes.

Known as “missions”, they included raising literacy and education levels, providing healthcare to the poor through thousands of doctors and health assistants in the communities and providing cheap food for the urban population through special supermarkets.

In the rural areas, there were separate “missions” to look after the peasants, resolve problems of mining communities, and meet the interests of indigenous peoples.

These well-documented social programmes and accompanying economic policies did much to improve the lot of the poor.

According to data compiled by the London-based Guardian, from 1999 (when Chavez assumed the presidency) to 2011, GDP per capita rose from US$4,105 to US$10,801, (RM12,740 to RM33,530) extreme poverty decreased from 23.4% of the population to 8.5% and infant mortality fell from a rate of 20 per 1,000 live births to a rate of 13 per 1,000 live births in 2011.

On the other hand, Venezuela still faces serious problems: an over-dependency on oil, high inflation and a high crime rate.

The pro-poor orientation and policies of the state were responsible for the strong support of the poor for Chavez.

Their devotion to the president was evident in the outpouring of grief and the massive turnout at his lying in state and his funeral.

To his critics, Chavez had simply used oil money to “bribe the poor” to vote for him.

But for Chavez and his colleagues in what they termed the “Bolivarian revolution”, re-orienting institutions and policies to benefit the poor was the main reason to be in government.

Chavez’s influence went far beyond Venezuela. His policies, and fiery rhetoric, set alight the imagination of social movements and the public in South America, and started an important trend.

Following his ascent to power, several other leaders assumed political leadership in neighbouring countries who also bucked the ideology and policies of the Washington Consensus.

The assumption to power of so many such leaders have broken the political sway of Washington and the economic spell of the Washington consensus in the region.

Chavez’s legacy may just be as important as a master builder of regional unity and integration.

In his tribute to Chavez the former Brazilian President Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva credited Chavez for his leadership role in the setting up of so many regional institutions in recent years.

They include the 2008 treaty that established the Union of South American Nations, the setting up in 2011 of the political forum of the Community of Latin American and Caribbean States (that does not include the United States and Canada) and the Bank of the South.

“Of the many leaders I have met, few have believed so much in the unity of our continent and its diverse peoples – indigenous Indians, descendants of Europeans and Africans, recent immigrants – as he did,” said Lula of Chavez.

Chavez was also a believer and practitioner of broader South-South solidarity and cooperation.

He used his country’s oil revenues to finance economic and social programmes in poorer neighbouring countries, from selling oil at below market prices to treatment for the blind.

His memory and grasp of issues and people were also phenomenal.

When I approached him in the main aisle of the conference hall of the Copenhagen Climate Conference in December 2010, and introduced myself as director of the South Centre, he immediately recalled his knowledge of the centre and his meeting with and admiration for Julius Nyerere, the former Tanzanian President, founding chairman of the centre and another towering pioneer of South-South cooperation.

Without hesitation or ceremony, Chavez invited me to visit Caracas and to organise a large conference to promote South-South solidarity. Alas, we were not able to make that proposed conference a reality before Chavez passed away.

Chavez lit up that Copenhagen conference by telling the thousand-strong audience, that included many heads of state and governments, of his disappointment with the rich countries for not doing enough to contain the climate crisis.

“They spend trillions of dollars bailing out the banks. If only the climate was a bank it would have been saved by now,” he said.

The straight talking and colourful Chavez will be missed; his legacy will live on.

Global Trends By MARTIN KHOR

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'Latin Spring' still on course after Hugo Chavez' death from caner

The post-Chavez era is unlikely to be very different, mainly because the West is still unprepared to change.

 A supporter lines up to pay her last respects to late Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez, outside the Military Academy in Caracas on March 8, 2013. Venezuela gave Hugo Chavez a lavish farewell on Friday at a state funeral that brought some of the world's most notorious strongmen to... 

THE expected death of Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez from cancer has produced predictable reactions all-round. The left mourned a fallen hero who had “made” a revolution, the right basked in quiet hopefulness for change, and the rest offered condolences to the extent their politics afforded.

Yet the leader who broke the mould of Venezuelan politics seemed to deserve less conventional responses to his 14 years of reshaping the country.

In an otherwise balanced airing, the BBC featured pundits variously calling Chavez “a communist” and “anti-American”, blithely repeating the familiar line about his links with Iranian and Russian counterparts being merely superficial.

CNN took a business angle in accusing Chavez of under-investing in Venezuela’s oil sector. And so on. Critics elsewhere alleged that he was just another Latin American strongman who promoted the cult of the individual and undermined democratic institutions.

Evidently, Chavez did not dampen public enthusiasm for his leadership. But his failure in upholding democratic institutions applies particularly only within the narrow context of formal democratic procedure.

His biggest contribution to Venezuela is to awaken the people to their democratic birthrights like adequate housing, healthcare and education.

This change has been so profound as to remake national politics, so that even opposition politicians now have to promise the same thing, only more. In a primal democratic institution and process, the masses would vote with their feet against any candidate who dared to offer the people less.

This transformation is further based on overturning decades of unquestioned allegiance to the Washington Consensus of “open markets”, “privatisation” and “deregulation”. A Latin America that has changed thus is not about to change back too soon.

True enough, Chavez had been a Latin American strongman. But that quality was more cultural than political, as he adopted the classically paternalistic, macho style of the Latin caudillo.

The difference, again, is that while previous Latin American caudillos tended to be pro-US right-wing dictators, Chavez was not that. So he is regarded differently or not at all.

There is no doubt that Chavez and his policies were popular and not just populist. One of the biggest problems for his opponents has been his transformation of the state to serve public, rather than privileged private, interests.

Critics have also tended to fundamentally misread history, believing that Chavez had reinvented Venezuela. The reality is that Chavez himself had been a product of the times in the region, rather than the other way round.

The same regional moment had also produced similarly progressive leaders in Argentina, Bolivia, Brazil, Chile, Ecuador, El Salvador, Honduras, Nicaragua, Paraguay, Peru and Uruguay. This so-called “turn to the left” in the region may instead be named the “Latin Spring”.

Since the turn of the century, the movement swept a region like the “Arab Spring” later did, but with key differences. The Latin Spring involved more countries, far more people, and was established democratically rather than through bloodshed and foreign military intervention.

But despite its strengths, it was not regarded positively by the Western establishment and mainstream media, because another key difference was that it went against Western-friendly despots rather than Western-averse ones.

And Chavez was placed at the head of the movement because Venezuela was seen to have started it all. From the lack of a positive reception came the negative perceptions.

But the fact is that neither Chavez nor any other individual, however gifted, could have masterminded or stage-managed a historic regional movement even if he wanted to.

The various Latin American countries are all sovereign nation states dominated by no single individual. There is also no single power “guiding” them other than the US that had done so before.

The new era is one of each country taking charge of its own affairs for itself, based on the people taking charge of the state. The time of death squads, Iran-Contras and transnational corporations lording it over the peasants is past.

It happened before, but in piecemeal fashion: the fall of Nicaragua’s Somoza, Bolivia’s Suarez and Chile’s Pinochet. It was never a broad movement like today’s.

The scale and reach of the present movement is much larger than any single country’s experience. It is also set to outlive individuals like Chavez.

Failing to recognise this will mean failing to deal adequately with these countries, at a time in history when they are also becoming more important. It would also allow Cold War ideology to claim more unwitting victims.

Chavez’s opponents and critics have long linked him with Cuba’s Fidel Castro, an apparent error that is true and justified but only unintentionally. Like Castro, he was essentially a Third World nationalist pushed into making less than ideal linkages around the globe by default.

But today’s newly awakened Latin America cannot be pushed into the fold of a non-existent Soviet Union, nor of a Russia or China too preoccupied with its own internal challenges and anxious only for foreign markets or sources of raw materials.

Instead, they are more likely to be pushed more closely to one another, finding common cause among themselves and in relation to Washington and its Consensus”. The new Latin America will remain different from before, long after Chavez ‘s presidency despite its significant national contribution to it.

Behind The Headlines by BUNN NAGARA

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http://youtu.be/jFqcMG6XjgQ