Rilek1Corner

Tag: Najib Razak

  • Pegawai Myanmar: Komen PM Najib Di Rapat Rohingya “Tidak Benar”

    Pegawai Myanmar: Komen PM Najib Di Rapat Rohingya “Tidak Benar”

    Kehadiran Perdana Menteri Malaysia Datuk Seri Najib Tun Razak di rapat pro-Rohingya di Kuala Lumpur sudah mencetuskan bantahan di Myanmar.

    Ucapan PM Najib di rapat itu tentang perlunya menentang “pembunuhan kaum” Muslim Rohingya di Myanmar, tidak membantu keadaan, kata seorang pegawai Myanmar kepada Mediacorp.

    “Apa yang beliau katakan di Malaysia itu tidak benar. Kami sedang cuba menghuraikannya bersama para penyokong antarabangsa. Tapi ini pilihan kami, negara lain tidak boleh membuat keputusan tentang negara kami,” kata Nyan Win, anggota sekretariat Liga Nasional bagi Demokrasi.

    “PM NAJIB GUNA ISU ITU UNTUK TAMBAT SOKONGAN”

    U Zaw Htay, timbalan ketua pengarah Pejabat Presiden, memberitahu The Myanmar Times bahawa pemerintah Myanmar akan mengeluarkan kenyataan rasmi bagi membantah penyertaan PM Najib dalam bantahan di Kuala Lumpur itu.

    Beliau juga memberitahu akhbar itu bahawa tindakan PM Najib itu boleh mencetuskan ekstremisme agama, dan menambah PM Najib menggunakan isu itu untuk menarik sokongan warga Malaysia.

    Beliau mengeluarkan komen-komen itu setelah para penduduk Myanmar mengadakan tunjuk perasaan membantah PM Najib setelah beliau menyeru negara-negara asing supaya campur tangan dalam menghentikan “pembunuhan kaum” Muslim Rohingya.

    Sekitar 150 orang, dipimpin para sami Buddha dari Persatuan Sami Kebangsaan Myanmar, berhimpun semalam (4 Dis) di Pagoda Sule di bandar Yangon, sambil mengibarkan panji-panji.

    Malaysia kian lantang bersuara tentang cara Myanmar menangani keganasan dan dakwaan pencabulan kuasa di wilayah Rakhine, yang memaksa ratusan orang Rohingya melarikan diri merentasi sempadan ke Bangladesh.

    PM Najib dalam ucapannya di satu rapat di Kuala Lumpur berkata “Dunia tidak boleh hanya berdiam diri dan menyaksikan pembunuhan kaum berlaku.” Beliau menambah bahawa beliau akan meminta Indonesia turut mengadakan rapat sebagai menunjukkan perpaduan dengan orang Rohingya, dan berkata beliau mahu lebih ramai rakyat Malaysia keluar dan membantah tindakan Myanmar.

    Kementerian Ehwal Luar Malaysia menyifatkan keganasan di Myanmar itu sebagai “pembersihan kaum” kelmarin. PM Najib pula meminta Pertubuhan Bangsa-Bangsa Bersatu (PBB), Mahkamah Jenayah Antarabangsa dan Pertubuhan Persidangan Islam (OIC) supaya campur tangan.

    KOFI ANNAN: CARI HURAIAN YANG AMAN

    Mantan ketua PBB, Kofi Annan mengunjungi wilayah Rakhine di Myanmar pada Jumaat lalu dan kelmarin sebagai Pengerusi Suruhanjaya Penasihat Wilayah Rakhine.

    Saluran televisyen Myanmar menunjukkan Encik Annan bertemu dengan beberapa kumpulan masyarakat, termasuk kumpulan Buddha dan Muslim Rohingya.

    Suruhanjaya itu termasuk Muslim Rohingya serta masyarakat Rakhine yang beragama Buddha. Ia fokus terhadap mengelak konflik, bantuan, perdamaian, hak asasi manusia dan pembangunan, menurut pemerintah Myanmar.

    Tentera dan pemerintah Myanmar menafikan dakwaan oleh para penduduk dan kumpulan-kumpulan hak asasi bahawa para askarnya merogol wanita Rphingya, membakar rumah-rumah dan membunuh orang awam semasa operasi ketenteraannya.

    Di satu sidang media, Encik Annan menggesa semua pihak supaya mencari huraian kepada “isu-isu mereka secara aman.”

    PBB menyatakan sekitar 30,000 orang kehilangan tempat tinggal akibat keganasan itu.

    Pemerintah Myanmar tidak mengiktiraf orang Rohingya sebagai rakyatnya. Keganasan yang berlaku di Rakhine baru-baru ini adalah pertumpahan darah kedua paling dahsyat di Myanmar sejak rusuhan kaum pada 2012 meragut ratusan nyawa.

    Akibat ditindas dan dibelenggu kemiskinan, ribuan orang Rohingya melarikan diri dari Myanmar menyusuli keganasan antara penganut Buddha dan Islam di sana empat tahun lalu.

    Ramai daripada mereka diseludup atau diperdagang ke negara-negara jiran, kebanyakannya ke Thailand dan Malaysia.

    Source: Berita MediaCorp

  • Malaysia PM Najib Razak: Hudud Is About Empowering Sharia Courts

    Malaysia PM Najib Razak: Hudud Is About Empowering Sharia Courts

    KUALA LUMPUR: Malaysia’s prime minister has expressed support for strict Islamic laws as he seeks to consolidate support of ethnic Malay Muslims at a party meeting this week, as frustration over graft and the economy cloud prospects for the next election.

    Prime Minister Najib Razak has battled calls to resign over the last 18 months, as a scandal at his pet project, 1Malaysia Development Berhad (1MDB), drew the anger of the public, opponents and members of his own United Malay National Organisation (UMNO) ruling party.

    A new opposition party led by former Prime Minister Mahathir Mohamad and a former deputy prime minister, Muhyiddin Yassin, who Najib sacked for questioning his handling of 1MDB, is threatening to split the majority Malay vote that has handed UMNO victory in every election since independence in 1957.

    Ahead of the annual party meeting, Najib said it was the responsibility of Muslims to support a plan by the rival Pan-Malaysian Islamic Party to push for the adoption of hudud, the Islamic penal code, that sets out punishments such as amputation and stoning.

    “We want to develop Islam,” Najib said in an interview with pro-government broadcaster TV3.

    “Non-Muslims must understand that this is not about hudud but about empowering the sharia courts.”

    With rising prices and poor economic prospects for next year, Najib is expected to bank on ethnic and religious sentiment to woo majority Malay voters. An election is due by 2018.

    Najib said his policy speech at this year’s UMNO meeting would focus on the interests of Malays and Islam.

    “This is my speech as UMNO president, so my main audience are UMNO members and the Malays and bumiputera,” he said, using a term that roughly translates as sons of the soil, and includes Malays but not members of the ethnic Chinese and Indian minorities.

    “It doesn’t mean we don’t care at all about the others, but this is an UMNO assembly,” he said.

    Najib faced the biggest challenge to his leadership last year after reports that hundreds of millions of dollars was misappropriated from state fund 1MDB, which he founded.

    He acted swiftly to preserve his position – sacking critics in his administration and closing a graft investigation.

    Nevertheless, the scandal clouds prospects for an early election that Najib could call to cement his position, with multiple international investigations going on and a suit related to the case filed by the U.S. Department of Justice.

    Adding to his troubles is the plunge of the ringgit currency after Donald Trump’s U.S. election win. It is Asia’s worst performing currency, shedding nearly 7 percent over the past two weeks.

    “Najib’s big problem is market confidence,” said James Chin, director at the University of Tasmania’s Asia Institute.

    “Tycoons will move against him if the ringgit keeps going down, but more importantly, SMEs and traders will go to the wall as prices will go up 20 percent across the board,” he said, referring to small- and medium-sized enterprises.

    (Editing by Robert Birsel)

     

    Source: www.channelnewsasia.com

  • Malaysia’s PM Najib Razak To Join Gathering Protesting Myanmar Government’s Treatment Of Rohingyas

    Malaysia’s PM Najib Razak To Join Gathering Protesting Myanmar Government’s Treatment Of Rohingyas

    Malaysia’s prime minister will be joining a gathering organized by the government to protest violence against Rohingya Muslims in Myanmar, according to his deputy.

    Deputy Prime Minister Ahmad Zahid Hamidi told a press conference that the Dec. 4 gathering would later determine Malaysia’s diplomatic ties with Myanmar’s government if it decides to continue military operations in troubled Rakhine State — home to around 1.2 million Rohingya.

    “The gathering would be attended by Prime Minister Najib Razak and other political leaders. To-date, PAS President Abdul Hadi Awang has confirmed his participation,” he said late Saturday, referring to the Malaysian Islamic Party.

    Hamidi also urged other major opposition political parties, namely the People’s Justice Party and the National Honest Party, to join the gathering.

    “We put aside our political differences and as Muslims we gather to express our concern for our fellow Muslims in Myanmar,” he underlined.

    The announcement came after thousands of people protesting violence against Rohingya joined demonstrations Friday in the capitals of Malaysia, Indonesia and Thailand.

    Over the past six weeks, rights groups have expressed concern over reports of killings, rapes, arbitrary arrests and other violations in villages predominantly inhabited by Rohingya in Rakhine amid military operations launched after fatal attacks on police outposts last month.

    Myanmar has said that since Oct. 9, at least 86 people — 17 soldiers and 69 alleged “attackers” (among them two women) — have been killed, and property destroyed in the area.

    Rohingya groups, however, claim that the number killed in one weekend alone earlier this month could be as high as 150 civilians.

    Humanitarian outfits have called for independent investigations into the initial attacks, the ongoing operations and reported rapes and rights abuses in Rakhine, as with the area placed under military lockdown, rights groups and international reporters have been unable to enter.

    Hamidi said Malaysia remains firm on the principle that it cannot interfere in the affairs of other countries, but said that on humanitarian grounds, it must express its concern to Myanmar authorities.

    “We are not belittling other countries, but we have demonstrated our deep concerns over the Rohingya issues because as fellow Muslims we can feel their sufferings,” he stressed.

    The deputy premier also said the gathering would discuss, and state the country’s stance, on calls for the withdrawal of the Nobel Peace Prize awarded to Myanmar’s democracy icon Aung San Suu Kyi, currently the country’s state counselor-cum-foreign minister.

    “If someone who is given the award can no longer maintain peace, it [the conferment] can still be questioned,” Hamidi underlined.

    Meanwhile, Malaysia’s government is also due to send a protest note to the Myanmar government to demand their concern regarding persecution faced by the stateless Rohingya community.

    “A cabinet meeting has decided to send a protest note to the Myanmar Embassy in Kuala Lumpur,” Hamidi added.

    A law passed in Myanmar in 1982 denied Rohingya — many of whom have lived in Myanmar for generations — citizenship, making them stateless.

    The law denies the Rohingya rights to Myanmar nationality, removes their freedom of movement, access to education and services, and allows arbitrary confiscation of property.

    Myanmar nationalists have since taken to referring to the Rohingya — which the United Nations calls one of the most persecuted people in the world — as Bengali, which suggests they are not Myanmar nationals but interlopers from neighboring Bangladesh.

     

    Source: www.worldbulletin.net

  • Thousands Of Malaysians Participated In BERSIH March Against Government

    Thousands Of Malaysians Participated In BERSIH March Against Government

    When they were completed in 1998, the Petronas Towers in Kuala Lumpur were the tallest buildings in the world. At 1,483 feet, they beat out Chicago’s Sears Tower — which had held the record since 1973 — by only 10, but all the same, the superlative was a trophy for a Southeast Asian nation that had transformed itself from a sleepy agrarian society into a crucial economic center in less than a quarter of a century. Specifically, they were a point of pride for Prime Minister Mahathir Mohamad, who had led Malaysia in its rebirth; so personal was the accomplishment that he himself chose the fixtures in the skyscrapers’ bathrooms.

    On Saturday, Mahathir was one of the many of thousands of people who gathered in the shadow of the towers to demand that Malaysia’s current Prime Minister, Najib Razak, step down from office. “Time has come for us to topple this cruel regime,” Mahathir said, standing on a portable stage before a crowd of roaring supporters dressed in yellow. “Najib is no longer suitable to be the prime minister. He is abusing the law.”

    Saturday’s protest, organized by a group of pro-democracy and anti-corruption activists collectively known as Bersih (the Malay word for “clean”), was the second massive display of outrage towards Najib since July 2015, when the Wall Street Journal and investigative news website Sarawak Report reported that his personal bank accounts held nearly $700 million in cash apparently siphoned from a state development fund called 1Malaysia Development Berhad (1MDB). Najib has strenuously denied the allegations.

    The rally — which attracted around 40,000 people, according to local media reports, though one organizer placed it at twice that — was peaceful, even festive, despite the endemic frustration here. Attendees blew vuvuzelas and shared bottles of water when the equatorial heat proved too oppressive. (Before afternoon thunderstorms accumulated overhead, the thermostat hit close to 90 degrees.) Police blocked access to Merdeka Square, where the march was scheduled to culminate, so organizers deftly regrouped and informed participants over social media that they would instead head to the Petronas Towers. Reports that violent pro-government groups would be there to provoke demonstrators proved false.

    “We’re not out here to create any sort of problems — we just want to be seen and be heard,” 37-year-old Rizal Ahmad, who says he is currently unemployed, tells TIME. “The situation is getting worse, and people are becoming more desperate. We need to be heard.”

    Fahmi Reza, a street cartoonist who has previously been arrested for his work, is blunter. “We live in a country that’s full of clowns and crooks stealing money from us,” he says, raising over his head a large cutout of a caricature of Najib.

    It is hard to discredit their frustration. Najib took power in 2009 promising to bring the country into the 21st century, emphasizing ethnic plurality, economic growth, and good governance. Instead, he has supported not only policies that not only reinforce the country’s ethnic tensions — Malaysia is about 60% ethnic Malay, 25% Chinese, and 10% Indian — but plot the blueprint of a security state. In the year and a half since the 1MDB scandal erupted, he has penalized his detractors, shutting down or prosecuting media outlets that aspire to transparency in their political reporting. His party, the right-wing United Malays National Organization (UMNO), is stronger than ever.

    “We are looking at a collision between what has been a clubby, insular Malaysian political order and the norms and the expectations of the wider world,” Michael Montesano, a researcher at Singapore’s Institute of Southeast Asian Studies, tells TIME. “The nagging question is whether movements like Bersih point to patterns in social change in Malaysia that will lead to a different outcome.”

    The prelude to Saturday’s protest was an anxious one. The night before, it was reported that Maria Chin Abdullah, Bersih’s chairperson, and her colleague Mandeep Singh had been arrested at the Bersih headquarters on charges of “activity detrimental to parliamentary democracy.” On Monday, Rafizi Ramli, a prominent opposition politician, had been sentenced to 18 months in prison for revealing “state secrets” concerning the 1MDB scandal.

    The prosecution of two largely popular progressive figures “tipped the scales,” opposition lawmaker Wong Chen says, prompting Malaysians to flood the streets rather than stay at home. “The government really wants to keep people away, and I think it’s backfiring,” Ambiga Sreenevasan, a human-rights lawyer who organized earlier iterations of Bersih, tells TIME. “The Malaysian people are fuming.”

    Rafizi Ramli is currently out on bail, and when he showed up at Saturday’s demonstration, he was treated as a celebrity. He was a good sport about the dozens of selfies he was asked to pose for.

    “I’ve been in the so-called reform movement since I was 21, and every year we make gains inch by inch,” he told TIME late in the afternoon, as rain began to fall over the city. “It may not seem momentous, but it’s 10 or 15 times more than what it once was. The fact that people come out, in spite of all the intimidation, means that we have reached something that is unstoppable.”

     

    Source: http://time.com

  • Najib Razak Risks Backlash In Malaysia Following Deals With PRC

    Najib Razak Risks Backlash In Malaysia Following Deals With PRC

    KUALA LUMPUR: Malaysian Prime Minister Najib Razak is facing grumblings back home that he is “selling off” his country after returning from China with about US$34 billion worth of deals, which could help lift the economy ahead of elections.

    The concerns emerge from a deep-seated distrust of the Chinese among Malaysia’s Malay-Muslim majority, who form the support base for the ruling United Malay National Organisation (UMNO).

    Najib was quick to dismiss the concerns after concluding his six-day visit to China.

    “Some have scaremongered that Malaysia is being sold off. This is absurd and absolutely false,” Najib said in a statement on Friday (Nov 4), insisting the projects will be owned and run by Malaysians.

    The deals include Malaysia’s first significant defence deal with China, an agreement to buy four Chinese naval vessels.

    Najib’s visit followed that of Philippines President Rodrigo Duterte, who announced his country’s “separation” from the United States and signed agreements and loan pledges worth an estimated US$24 billion with Beijing.

    Malaysia’s Transport Minister Liow Tiong Lai also defended the deals with China, dismissing fears of overt Chinese influence in the country. Speaking on the sidelines of a memorandum of understanding (MoU) signing between Malaysia’s Tunku Abdul Rahman University College and China’s Tsinghua University, he told Channel NewsAsia that “we actually attract foreign direct investment (FDI) from any countries who want to invest in Malaysia”.

    “At the same time, we buy anything also from those countries who can give us the best offer and that is natural,” he said. “So I think if we buy ships from China, it’s because China offered us the better deal. If it’s any other country, we can buy from France or we can buy from the US.”

    The minister was also asked to respond to criticism from Malaysian opposition MP Tony Pua, who referenced a media report that suggested Malaysia had spent a “ridiculous price” on the “most expensive rail infrastructure project in the world in its class” – the East Coast Rail Link project.

    Pua had questioned why Malaysia had borrowed RM55b (US$13b) from China, given that Liow had said that was not the cost of construction, but only the value of the Financing Framework Agreement.

    Liow reiterated that the price was for the “framework of cooperation”, and that it was an outline. He added that the cost was not finalised.

    UMNO leaders expect Najib to brief them soon so the party can start allaying any fears about China’s rising influence in Malaysia, said Shahidan Kassim, a senior member of the party’s supreme council and a federal minister.

    “All of this has its pros and cons, but in UMNO we must have a policy statement on this,” he told Reuters.

    ETHNICITY AND RELIGION

    Ethnicity and religion are sensitive issues in Malaysia, where Muslim Malays form a little over 50 per cent of the population of 31 million. Ethnic Chinese make up about 25 per cent and ethnic Indians about 7 per cent.

    Malaysia’s ethnic Chinese have long been a scapegoat for the Malay community, with UMNO leaders pointing to ethnic Chinese economic dominance to unite Malays and keep a firm grip on political power.

    Last year, ethnic ties became strained under the weight of two opposing demonstrations largely split along racial lines. A ‘Malay pride’ rally blocked off Chinatown in Kuala Lumpur in a show of strength following an anti-government rally dominated by Malaysian-Chinese. Najib’s government summoned China’s ambassador over his remarks ahead of the “Malay pride’ rally.

    Clashes are expected again this year as thousands of anti-government demonstrators plan to protest in Kuala Lumpur on Nov 19, calling for Najib to resign over the money-laundering scandal linked to Malaysian state investment fund, One Malaysia Development Berhad (1MDB).

    A member of UMNO’s policy-making Supreme Council, Irmohizam Ibrahim, said Najib’s deals with China have stoked concerns among party leaders.

    “We’re expecting the prime minister to address these issues at our next Supreme Council meeting,” Irmohizam told Reuters.

    “We will then need to go down and explain to the grassroots that … the deals are purely for the economy and trade,” said Irmohizam, who also serves as Najib’s strategic director in the party.

    Malaysia’s opposition is questioning the China agreements but for different reasons, saying it is tilting the country toward Beijing.

    “Malaysia’s economic dependence on any single nation is unreasonable and will affect the country’s freedom and geo-political strategy and foreign policy,” jailed opposition leader Anwar Ibrahim said in a statement issued from prison.

    “GOLDEN JEWELRY”

    Najib is planning elections in the second half of 2017, a government source has told Reuters.

    The investments from China could help the prime minister pump-prime Malaysia’s economy before then. A 2017 national budget Najib announced last month calls for only a modest spending rise, amid a continuing slump in commodity prices.

    Senior UMNO leaders and urban Malays, however, are uncomfortable that Chinese money will drive the development of strategic assets, according to James Chin, director at the University of Tasmania’s Asia Institute.

    Chin says the Malay elite welcomes Chinese investment in purely commercial deals such as property purchases, but are more wary about agreements such as a 55 billion ringgit (US$13.11 billion) deal for the Chinese to develop a rail network.

    “The problem with these deals is that they are seen as selling the country’s golden jewelry,” Chin said.

    Ties between Malaysia and China reached a high point last December when Beijing came to Najib’s rescue with a US$2.3 billion deal to buy 1MDB assets, helping ease concerns over its mounting debt.

    Relations with Washington became strained after the U.S. Department of Justice filed lawsuits in July implicating the prime minister in the money-laundering probe at 1MDB, the advisory board of which Najib chaired until recently.

    SHIFTING POSITIONS

    China and Malaysia agreed to enhance naval cooperation, after sealing the deal to buy four Littoral Mission ships, fast patrol vessels that can be equipped with a helicopter flight deck and carry missiles.

    Malaysia, along with three other members of the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) – the Philippines, Vietnam and Brunei – are among the countries contesting territorial claims with China over the South China Sea. China claims nearly the entire body of water as its territory.

    Najib said last month the disputes should be resolved through dialogue with Beijing.

    Duterte during his visit persuaded the Chinese to let Philippine fishermen operate around a disputed shoal, before declaring his unhappiness with Washington over its criticism of his lethal antidrug campaign.

    ASEAN, meanwhile, has struggled to come up with a unified position on the South China Sea disputes at its meetings.

    “ASEAN will not go away… but increasingly the idea of the multilateral track will be downgraded as now we see a swing from two key claimants to a more bilateral approach,” said Euan Graham, director of the international security program at the Lowy Institute, a Sydney-based think-tank.

    (US$1 = 4.1950 ringgit)

     

    Source: www.channelnewsasia.com