JAC, MACC and Malaysia's Financial State? (Don't really know a lot, but I'd love to comment(criticise) on it)

As you know, our beloved PM (I'm going to love him if comparing him to the one planning to go up in March 2008) laid down a double bill to be discussed and debated in the Parliament, the JAC and MACC bills. One thing I'd really want to criticise is that a lot of things are still in the powers of the PM, and these powers would soon end up in another PM's hands which I doubted greatly whether or not his hands are actually clean (Please don't catch me for this, I merely doubted...). If the final say of the appointment of judges, even after through several stages of filtering through the interviews and recommendations of the JAC, cronyism might still happen (PM determines the allowances of the JAC members and also the final decision to appoint). Would there be a clash with the doctrine of separation of powers then? PM might be there to keep a check on the judiciary but PM's interest is still in the government, shouldn't the judiciary be more independent so that the government would not be involved so much (though I don't really suggest that the government be absolutely ignorant of the judiciary's processes or else there won't be check and balance).

I don't really know if judges are still sent for "kursus" or so called boot camp for deciding against the government, but JAC still is a good thing compared to what we have now, much better than the secret sounding (korek, korek, korek) technique of appointing judges. So do the MACC, with 5 different institutions keeping a check on it, it would at least be better than the one in ACA now. But in a nutshell, whether there can actually be a significant drop in corruption in Malaysia would still be determined by the people appointed in all of these institutions. It still depends on their conscience and I'd really hope that these guys won't be paid so little that they have to resort to corruption to at least support their family. Sometimes we cannot blame on the people as well, in a financial state that Malaysia have today, growing inflation and all, we should know how difficult it is to find money. But if these guys are already rich, then corruptions are definitely not justified.

Now how easy it is to find money? One recent article that I have read in The Star, shows that how one can be billionaire by dealing with the government and by having connections with the ones at the top. Do common people have all these connections? Essentially, no. But if one managed to get one, its a great opportunity. And it's just that one opportunity that changes one's life (remember Eminem's song?).

Another recent news, that the government recommended that we don't retrench workers to prevent rising unemployment that had happened in so many countries (Sony in Japan slashed 16k people off their jobs, GM and Chrysler in US which are pretty much on the brink of bankruptcy, highest jobless claims in 25 years in US, Europe especially U.K. not doing very well, you could see that in their depreciating currency).Why do they do that? Isn't that because they aren't doing very well due to the submortgage crisis that caused one of the largest bankruptcy (Lehman Bros.) in history? But Malaysia is pretty insulated as our banks aren't involved as much as other banks in other countries, would the damage still be coming next year?

In my opinion, keeping workers that aren't productive (simple waste of money) isn't justified at all. If a company isn't doing well already, why keep that fellow who simply saps on the lifeline of the company and not doing anything else? This goes for government as well. But those at sub-standard productiveness will now also be affected isn't it? Those who did their work, but does not have much contribution to the company, became the next target to retrench after the least productive ones. Those who got retrenched would be out of their jobs, and what else could they do? In this age where a lot of degree holders had difficulty to look for jobs, would they be able to look for jobs (jobs equivalent to the one they had) elsewhere? Or would they just resort to a downgraded job to support their family or even their own lives? Or would they have enough money to upgrade themselves through education, increasing their mobility in job seeking? Then, would there be enough aid from the government to help these retrenched people to upgrade themselves? I have seen a programme in Hong Kong where in HK they had a governmental committee which offers monetary aid to those who wants to upgrade themselves, and those who had less than $7000 in wages are exempted from education fees to study. Is there something like that in Malaysia? Would SOCSO aid and Job Carnivals be enough?

But how can there be not enough jobs in Malaysia? Please think who are the ones working as waiters (in coffee shops and stalls, not the ones in hotels or large restaurants), construction workers, and maids in Malaysia? Immigrants took these jobs out of Malaysian's consideration, or was it Malaysians that are so fussy that they do not want to work in these jobs? Competition for these jobs seems to be out of Malaysians' mindset.

Oh well, speaking of competition, the ASEAN Open Skies programme are gonna be another step towards globalisation, opening up Malaysia to more tourists and more competitions. And we get to have cheaper flight tickets for flights in SE Asia! Hope there's the same move of removing on import duties of cars. Protectionism isn't good (kept Proton in a state of stagnancy, though I would say that Proton tried improving, but not much).

I've been asking too many questions today, but as Socrates says, questioning improves your intelligence. So go and ask more and more if you don't know of anything (I am contradicting myself again! I didn't ask as much. Yes, this generates self-awareness and creates accountability. ). Don't leave it unanswered or you'll be ignorant of it for the rest of your life.