Thursday, July 3, 2008

Smears thicken the plot in Malaysian politics

Smears thicken the plot in Malaysian politics
From The Guardian

JULY 4 ─ A national drama involving leading government figures, conspiracy claims, personal smears, sodomy allegations and a grisly murder appears to be driving Malaysia inexorably towards its biggest political upheaval since independence in 1957.

Act One of this unfolding epic was played out in March's general election when the ruling Barisan Nasional coalition suffered heavy losses at the hands of Datuk Seri Anwar Ibrahim's PKR party and its allies. Although it held on to power, the government's parliamentary majority was slashed to 58 seats.

The results seriously wounded the prime minister, Datuk Seri Abdullah Ahmad Badawi, already criticised as a weak, uninspiring leader, and triggered a power struggle within his Umno.

With the party facing defeat for the first time since the British left, and with tens of millions of dollars in public contracts and patronage at stake, the plot has thickened in recent days.

First Datuk Seri Najib Razak, the ambitious deputy prime minister and Abdullah's presumed heir, was linked in sworn court testimony to the 2006 murder of a Mongolian female translator with whom, it was claimed, he once had a sexual relationship. The killing of Altantuya Shaariibuu was particularly gruesome, her body having been blown to bits with explosives in a jungle clearing.

Then last week a university dropout told police he had been sodomised by Anwar in a luxury apartment. The allegation was similar to claims made against the married father-of-six in 1998 after Anwar, as deputy prime minister, fell out with Tun Dr Mahathir Mohamad, the prime minister at the time. Anwar was beaten by police, tried, found guilty and jailed ─ only for the verdict to be overturned by the federal court after Mahathir retired.

Anwar has dismissed the allegation as a transparent, repeat attempt to smear him, part of a conspiracy that he said was hatched by Najib and high police officials to block his path to power. "He [Najib] feared that I will use the Altantuya case against him to embarrass him and probably lead to his downfall," he said this week.

Najib firmly denies involvement in any conspiracy and also denies any connection with the murdered Mongolian.

Malaysia's raucous media has, meanwhile, been having a field day. Writing in The Star, commentator Suhaimi Aznam even suggested Anwar had invented the sodomy allegation to embarrass the government ─ and labelled him a drama queen.

Dr Mahathir also weighed in, saying he was "not surprised at all" by the new claim. And the complainant's fiancee, who says shoes are her real passion in life, has told the papers that she will stand by her man and bravely weather the storm.

Tian Chua, the PKR party information chief and a new MP, said the sodomy claim had backfired. "This allegation is not sticking. The latest poll shows 60% of people think it's nonsense, only 10% believe it's true," he said. "The government did it to get some breathing space, to deflect attention from the crumbling of their party."

Tian said Anwar had started legal proceedings against his accuser and against senior police officers involved in the previous case 10 years ago. The opposition leader would also begin a "national fightback tour" this weekend. "We are going on the offensive for the next 100 days," he said. The final act of the drama would come in September when he predicted the opposition would have enough parliamentary seats to defeat the government.

Not everyone agrees that denouement is certain or even likely. Anwar's political comeback has become one of the longest running shows in Southeast Asia. Abdullah has vowed to stay on. And Dr Mahathir reportedly suffered a mild heart attack yesterday. Amid the furore, cooler heads urge caution.

"I think we have to wait and reserve judgment until the police investigation [into the sodomy claim] is complete," said a leading political analyst in Kuala Lumpur. "All of this is beginning to resemble a circus. We are becoming a laughing stock."

1 comment:

Anonymous said...

Sex and the C4

Sodomy is a useful word
recently said and heard,
in Malaysian homes and offices
it’s all about famous orifices.
What is going on, you wonder
when Bala steals the thunder,
finger pointing the magic word
to the delight of a horny herd
Organs united, names forgotten?
VIPs are really rotten
Saifool he knows and did not know
doubts about Aminah begin to grow
of whose loose lips he was afraid
but liked her other end instead;
of course he knew it wasn't right
but it felt so good and tight!
You could not hump like Greeks
the Hindenburg’s fat cheeks;
what her hubby found so succulent
was making Rosmah trucculent.
And so she thought, the time was due
for a nice Mongolian barbecue.
Enter the analyst, not so anal,
who found the girl too banal;
fearing supernatural harm
from her juicy feminine charm,
he hired Bala straightaway
to keep the honeytrap at bay
but private dicks were of no match
for Aminah's superlative snatch
and now that Najib had had his fill,
he would not share the till;
right after the submarine deal,
Aminah's fate he would seal.
Now Rosmah had one idea
on how to kenakan dia
"Let’s bomb the bombshell,
let's send her to hell."
Thus perished the hapless beauty
after translation and booty duty;
now Rosmah’s ass was happy
until one blogger got yappy;
this Hindenburg nearly caught fire
yet to sue she has no desire.
But Najib's part in this murder
will travel much further;
despite his media actions
and one or two retractions,
some questions will remain
a big part of his bane–
how did Altantuya really die?
and why did he have to lie?
Did he pay off Bala savvily,
or threaten to C4 his family?
What acts could be more despised?
With his money, we’re not surprised;
after all, he's such a bully beast,
to him and him alone, at least,
magic words that cannot apply–
are useful for making rivals die.