MCMC, Pemandu answer broadband criticisms

Broadband Issues (3)

G. Sharmila

KiniBiz

September 10, 2014

In today’s instalment, Malaysian Communications and Multimedia Commission (MCMC) chairman Mohamed Sharil Mohamed Tarmizi and Fadhlullah Suhaimi Abdul Malek, director at the Performance Management and Delivery Unit (Pemandu), reply to criticisms that broadband is expensive and slow in Malaysia.

So why aren’t Malaysians getting cheaper, faster Internet on par with our Asean neighbours? Industry regulator MCMC says the capability is actually there but lack of demand and the need for equitable access are factors accounting for this.

KiniBiz asked MCMC chairman Mohamed Sharil why the target is only 50Mbps by 2018 when Singapore is already able to offer 1Gps to home users. Industry experts say that Telekom Malaysia, the dominant broadband player is believed to be able to offer that capacity to users already and therefore this should be possible.

“While we’re looking at this, we want to be equitable and egalitarian. Even today there are some parts of KL that can be serviced with 100Mbps already. But when we announce 50Mbps it is for every household – any household that wants broadband by that time (2018) will have access to that minimum of 50 (mbps),” says Mohamed Sharil.

“We want access to be equitable. The national target for household access is 50Mbps. By the end of this year we’re looking at 10,000 homes in downtown KL with 100Mbps already . So it’s not that we’re not doing that, we are; but the bigger message is no Malaysian gets left behind,” he adds.

He explains that in areas such as Mont Kiara and KLCC today, service providers are able to provide 100Mbps speeds, but people are not subscribing. “Not everyone feels the need for 100Mbps. How fast does your connection need to be if all you’re doing is emailing and web browsing? …let’s do a sanity check and think about how much speed do we need. What is being offered today at 5, 10, 20Mbps on Streamyx or Unifi is quite adequate for most needs.”

Is there no demand for higher speeds then?

Mohamed Sharil says: “People always want things faster, but for what purpose? Don’t get me wrong, today if you ask TM how many people actually subscribe to the 20Mbps package? A small percentage (of their customers). If people are clamouring for better speeds, then subscribe. It’s available, why don’t they subscribe?”

But people don’t want to subscribe to higher speeds as prices are still high and they blame this on Telekom Malaysia (TM)’s monopoly in the broadband space. Mohamed Sharil however, denies that there is a monopoly and says there are other players like Maxis who provide broadband services under the HSBB (High-Speed Broadband) project.

However industry experts argue that TM’s wholesale charges to other service providers under the HSBB project are exorbitantly high, which has led to a trickle effect that causes high broadband prices to the end user.

“It’s easy to blame others for my own shortcomings,” quips Fadhlullah of Pemandu, who explains that the HSBB network was designed to accommodate other players. He adds that wholesale prices are monitored by the regulator.

“At the wholesale level, many of the points raised by so-called industry players need to be challenged. It’s easy to say “it’s so expensive, TM is a monopoly” but from a licensing standpoint, other players have the same license to invest. So why didn’t they invest (in the network)?” he questions.

In the days before MCMC came about, there was a difference, says Mohamed Sharil. TM was the only fixed line (player), with Celcom, Maxis and Digi offering only mobile services. Now, these players have what is called a converged license, hence they can offer mobile, fixed broadband or wireless broadband services, he says.

“There’s nothing stopping them. Look at the EBITDA (earnings before interest, tax, depreciation and amortisation) margins of Maxis, Celcom and Digi, they’re very high. Why aren’t they investing?”

Dr. Fadhlullah explains that MCMC has a roundtable with CEOs every quarter, which means, for all these grouses, they have a platform to raise them.

“But they tend not to because when they are all around each other the attitude is ‘Why are you complaining? You have the same license that I have.’ It’s just that for business reasons, they’ve opted not to invest in a particular technology,” he says.

At the end of the day however, the fact remains that broadband prices are still high for the end consumer.

According to Pemandu’s Fadhlullah, the answer lies in content. “Because we as consumers tend to consume a lot of foreign content, somebody needs to pay. The service providers need to invest to support our consumption behaviour, so that translates to costs. In Korea for example, they access Korean content. So the costs from connecting from Korea to US or anywhere else is near zero. But for us, 90% of content accessed is still outside Malaysia,” he explains.

He added that the regulator is taking measures to try and bring companies to host content here, such as Google and YouTube. “If you recall your experience with YouTube in 2007, even with a 1Mbps Streamyx connection, you had to wait for a video to buffer. Today on the same speed, the buffer line is ahead of the play line. It’s because a lot of YouTube content is hosted in Cyberjaya,” he says.

He added that efforts are underway to bring in more of these companies and data centres to host content locally, and if that works, it will bring the costs of bandwidth down.

But how long is this process expected to take?

“You need to ask yourselves, as Malaysians, are you prepared to go for local content? It will take awhile. We want to see more Zaloras versus Amazons, as a lot more traffic is kept locally, if that works then it becomes a positive multiplier. The price of broadband will also come down because traffic is kept over here and less needs to be invested in submarine cables. You ask me when, I don’t have an answer to be honest,” says Fadhlullah.

Below are further excerpts from the interview:

KiniBiz: How satisfied are you with the broadband penetration rates in the country right now?

Mohamed Sharil: Well, we can always do better. On one hand, we’ve come a long way over the past three years, before all this started we were below 30%, now we’ve actually gone past 65%. So that’s not a small achievement, that is a significant achievement over a three-year period. Having said that, 65% is just another target, what’s more important now is what are we using the broadband for? That is the key question, how we are using it to improve our lives, how we’re using it to improve business, how we’re using it to be more efficient in our service delivery, whether it’s the private sector or public sector.

A World Bank study has shown that countries that exceed 30% of household broadband penetration, the focus is no longer on putting the pipes on the ground (that will continue to happen, as normal). One of the key things that we are looking at with Pemandu is generating economic activities which have a multiplier effect on the economy. We have one or two examples of people in the rural areas using broadband. Every year we will find these icons, which we consider thought leaders or change agents. There was a case of a lady in Sabah earning RM400 a month selling seaweed; we helped get her daughter online and she got in touch with people outside of the area. The lady now earns in excess of RM30,000 a month.

So this is the kind of economic transformation we want to try and generate. At the end of the day this is the whole focus of the economic transformation programme by the government.

KiniBiz: What is the split of the current broadband penetration level, between urban and rural areas?

Mohamed Sharil: About 70:30, there’s still a lot more to be done in terms of bringing the services to rural areas and also we have our outreach programme. We have our Universal Service programme, the next goal is for 1,000 towers to be built within the next three years.

KiniBiz: How is the rollout of that initiative going to be carried out?

Mohamed Sharil: Through the Universal Service Provision (USP) process, eligible licensees can come in and bid according to the specifications we have set. Now, they will then be able to put in their proposal for Universal Service deployment in a given area and we will evaluate these people based on their submissions and then we will award them accordingly. Each tower is neutral, so therefore it has to be shared with all the service providers.

This (the USP fund) is something we’ve been quite successful doing, we’ve become a benchmark for the Asean region and some other places as well.

KiniBiz: What kind of budget has been allocated for this rollout?

Mohamed Sharil: The total broadband requirements (this is a combination of industry plus USP funds) to uplift the broadband supply is almost RM6 billion. From the USP fund it is about RM3 billion and from the industry itself about RM3 billion.

KiniBiz: I think a lot of people are interested in the timeline for broadband initiatives. We’re supposed to get 45Mbps to 50Mbps (broadband speeds) by 2018.

Mohamed Sharil: That is the desired target of provisioning broadband.

KiniBiz: Is this through the 1,000 towers?

Mohamed Sharil: No, the towers are more for rural areas. The 2018 goal is upgrading the broadband network through fixed broadband.

That’s why for the 1,000 towers, the first batch was 400 towers we broke it up into 32 clusters each cluster has 12-14 towers. So we carried out open bidding for the 400 towers, so again the idea is to open as much as possible. The USP fund amount for the 400 towers is about RM600 million. We’ve done the tender, we’re just finalising the details before the award. Then after this there will be another batch of 300 towers.

Dr. Fadhlullah: A lot of the technology adoption will be likely on fixed broadband. That was what the Minister was talking about–increasing the capacity in urban areas up to 100Mbps.

Mohamed Sharil: It’s got to start at the core and be improved along the way. I mentioned about the upgrading, we haven’t spent that kind of money it was only a full upgrade — one of our estimates a long time ago we were looking at this in 2008, to fully upgrade the country — to fibre up, to wire up, we’re talking about in excess of RM50 billion.

KiniBiz: Did that include wireless technology as well?

Mohamed Sharil: Everything, including wireless. And that’s about what Australia said it would also cost them via their NBN program. But we couldn’t justify that kind of expense, so we’ve been doing this progressively. We started with the fixed first then wireless, so we built in the city and then rural, then we’ve tried to connect the dots in between. The government’s policy is that no one should be left out, to provide equitable access (to broadband). Some countries don’t have that policy, some of our Asean neighbours for example. Because they are also relatively large, they have remote places like us as well but they are just focusing on the major cities.

But it (equitable access) takes time and is expensive. But can we say to people in our rural areas: “sorry you have to wait ten years before we get to you”? We can’t, that’s why the towers and everything needs to be rolled out.

KiniBiz: I know that the Ministry has an initiative called Konsortium Rangkaian Serantau and I heard that it has not gone too well and the submarine cable project has been postponed.

Dr. Fadhlullah: No, it is not postponed. Let me take a step back, in 2010, we did the industry lab and we said that by 2020 we will need capacity to the tune of 7 terabits. The 7 terabits does not come only from this consortium, it also comes from the licensees out there in the market. So what we did with the consortium was to catalyse a sense of competition in the market. The consortium has smaller players who may not have wanted to invest on their own and the big boys who have deeper pockets, decided to invest in the consortium. And while the consortium may not have invested anything in the cable, from 2010 to now, the international capacity has grown fivefold to 30 Tbps.

So, in a sense, the capacity is already there. So the submarine cable is not postponed, it is strictly left to the consortium to come up with it and the consortium, for their own business reasons, have decided not to make the investment. At the end of the day, the telco market is pretty much market-driven.

Mohamed Sharil: I would argue that there is not yet enough private sector investment in the infrastructure build-up area. There are some who are doing it, including TM. By the way, TM is a smaller company now – both Axiata and Maxis are bigger than TM. Digi is twice as big as TM.

My question is, if you have that kind of market capitalisation, why isn’t Maxis, Celcom, Digi investing in that same order of magnitude, in that kind of infrastructure for the future? Again, I’m not defending TM but what’s the market cap of Telekom? If I’m not mistaken it’s less than RM20 billion. So, TM is the big bad boy?

KiniBiz: A point of contention that some industry players have is when HSBB first came about, why weren’t there several players brought in to build and operate infrastructure, which would have created competition and driven broadband prices down?

Mohamed Sharil:  The players already had the licenses to do that, so why wait for the government? Everybody is looking for a handout. When the HSBB plan happened, basically the government rode on TM’s plans. TM said I can’t do this (the entire supply-driven rollout) otherwise I’ll be out of money, and the government said “okay, we’ll top up.”

Everybody thinks about the RM2.4 billion the government invested, but nobody thought of the RM8.9 billion of its own money that TM spent. Because to carry out the HSBB, they needed to spend the RM8.9 billion first; over the last five years, has Maxis, Celcom, Digi collectively spent RM8 billion?

Dr. Fadhlullah: On-ground costs for HSBB (phase one) was RM4.8 billion, of which RM2.4 billion was reimbursed by the government. It was never free money. So the government requested for it to be equally spread in terms of infrastructure. Government imposed that TM must sell to other licensees. Where is the (perception) that TM was the preferred choice of the government? No, TM had actually gone out on its own.

KiniBiz: Are there any updates on HSBB phase two?

Mohamed Sharil: For the first phase of HSBB, rightly or wrongly, the decision for HSBB was to go for, meaning the areas that were decided first for rollout, the major towns and industrial parks, and public universities. These were seen as the important areas that needed to be addressed first. There were 98 exchanges then and there were many other exchanges that were not able to be upgraded. What happened then was that places like Malacca town wasn’t on the map. Ayer Keroh had HSBB but not Malacca town as the former had MITC (Melaka International Trade Centre) – the industrial area.

Looking back at some of these things, we can argue: where was the wisdom, going here instead of there, but everyone can be wiser after the fact. But the thinking was (and remains) that we wanted to promote the industrial parks, universities, and the Southern Corridor, even government offices were not part of it.

Phase two, we want to expand to other towns and rollout as fast as we can. (Note: The government has allocated RM3.4 billion under Budget 2014 for HSBB phase two, where RM1.8 billion will be spent on expanding coverage in urban areas and RM1.6 billion will be for expanding coverage to suburban areas).

Some of the rollout is already underway now, it is also part of TM’s business anyway.

Dr. Fadhlullah: The regulatory framework, in all fairness allows the market to be competitive. We wanted the industry to be competitive and have multiple players, because we believe that with competition prices would go down and they have.

Can anyone take a monopolistic position? You can’t, because the CMA (Communications and Multimedia Act) has a provision for anti-monopolistic behaviour, whereby the regulator will come down hard on you.

Why not predetermine access prices so everyone can get cheap broadband?

The answer is, investors will run away from Malaysia. Because on one hand we say we embrace the free economy, but on the other hand you are putting restrictions on how much a player can charge. You see the global image we are projecting?

Mohamed Sharil: On one hand, people want market liberalisation, on the other hand people still want the good old days where the government monopoly provides everything. If you want liberalisation, then accept the good, the bad and the ugly of liberalisation.

                This entry was posted on Sunday, 14 September 2014, 4:25 pm and is filed under
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Why broadband access will continue to be pricey

Broadband Issues (4)

G. Sharmila

KiniBiz

September 11, 2014

Telekom Malaysia’s monopoly over the provision of basic broadband infrastructure and its drive for profit, is likely to keep broadband prices in Malaysia high. Only a drastic change in scenario, which is unlikely to happen, will make a difference.

While Telekom Malaysia (TM) has been lauded as the ‘national broadband champion’, particularly after the implementation of phase one of the HSBB (High-Speed Broadband) initiative, many will say that it is not.

TM itself argues, in an e-mailed response to KiniBiz, that there is little room to bring broadband rates down and maintains that there are special circumstances in Malaysia which makes broadband rates here higher than in other countries.

It is now four years since its fibred broadband service Unifi has been introduced, yet prices of the service are still high and so are prices of its Streamyx broadband service, which runs using ADSL (asymmetric digital subscriber line) technology on copper lines.

In our previous article, Malaysian Communications and Multimedia Commission chairman Mohamed Sharil Mohamed Tarmizi and Fadhlullah Suhami Abdul Malek of the Performance Management and Delivery Unit attributed our slower-than-our-neighbours’ broadband speeds to less demand for such speeds over here. They also said that the reason that broadband is so costly in Malaysia is because of our demand for foreign content, which leads to higher international bandwidth costs and hence higher prices to the end consumer.

But back to TM. One can argue that Streamyx packages should cost much lower than they do today, considering that Streamyx was introduced in 2001. Today, an 8Mbps (megabits per second) Streamyx package bundled with TM’s IPTV (internet protocol tv) service HyppTV costs RM160 a month. In Singapore, SingTel offers a similar ADSL service at 15Mbps with IPTV channels worth S$51.90 (RM131.34) a month.

The comparison doesn’t stop at ADSL services. A 10Mbps fibred Internet package offered by Maxis Bhd costs RM148 a month, whereas a 10Mbps Unifi package by TM costs RM199. A 15Mbps fibred broadband package by Time dotCom Bhd costs just RM179.

So, where did things go wrong for TM’s services to be priced as high as they are? As owner of the country’s largest broadband infrastructure network, can’t it afford to bring prices down further so that Malaysians can enjoy broadband at more affordable prices?

The point we are trying to get across here is economies of scale. During the announcement of TM’s second quarter results on August 27th, its group chief executive officer Zamzamzairani Mohd Isa said that to date, the company has 1.58 million Streamyx customers and more than 685,000 Unifi customers.

It is telling that Streamyx, a copper-based servicetm-unifi-logo-thumbnail, still outnumbers Unifi, the fibred service by more than two to one, implying that the HSBB has not truly taken off yet despite the RM11.3 billion already spent on HSBB infrastructure.

An industry insider KiniBiz spoke to said that TM’s high prices are due to various factors. “TM has a lot of legacy infrastructure, such as old telephone exchanges and copper lines which it it is still paying to maintain. The other reason is that the company itself is bloated, what with over 20,000 employees when other telcos like Maxis are much leaner,” he said.

“They have not yet recouped their investment in the first phase of HSBB and the second phase is upcoming and they will need to invest in that at well. It’s not fair to ask them to reduce prices with them being a profit-seeking entity,” a telco analyst with an investment bank told KiniBiz.

However, the analyst did admit that full-blown competition among players is needed to bring prices down, but he does not see that happening in the near future. “The alternative for the public is to use mobile broadband, however it has yet to be as stable as fixed broadband,” he added.

What TM says

In an email response to KiniBiz on what TM is doing to make broadband services more affordable, its group chief executive officer Zamzamzairani Mohd Isa said that the company has “the most comprehensive and holistic Internet and broadband value offerings for all Malaysians across a spectrum of affordability”. Going forward TM will still focus on delivering more value in line with growing needs of customers, he added.

On the high cost of broadband, he said that that it should not be treated as an apple-to-apple comparison with other countries. “There are many factors that influence the costs of deploying network infrastructure in a particular country, which include the geographical factors as well as the size of the country. In Malaysia, with rural areas and mountain ranges covering a significant percentage of the country, it makes establishing a fully-connected nation a challenging task,” he said.

“TM had adjusted the pricing for our Streamyx broadband packages in 2010 with the introduction of our Unifi high speed broadband offerings and in line with the government’s announcement of the National Broadband Initiative.

“We don’t have plans to raise our broadband prices but will continue to offer more value-added services to enhance our existing offerings hence providing better service experience besides continuously embarking on special promotions to increase the broadband usage and take-up,” he added.

On competition in the local broadband space, the industry insider KiniBiz spoke to said that TM is monopolistic in nature because it has a two-week head start for the rollout of HSBB services in new areas, where during this period other players leasing access from TM are not allowed to market their services.

TM’s Zamzamzairani however denied such claims. “That’s not true. There has been no discrimination in the offering of TM HSBB infrastructure for all players. The moment HSBB infrastructure is declared available in the respective areas, all players inclusive of TM will have equal opportunity to provide their services based on a first-come-first-served basis.”

“From an infrastructure perspective, TM is positioned as a neutral service provider by encouraging other local network operators, application service providers, Internet service providers and other access seekers to ride on both its BAU (business-as-usual) and HSBB network infrastructure,” he added.

For now, there does not seem to be a solution to bring greater broadband affordability to Malaysians, except time, namely time in allowing market forces to gradually bring prices down as companies like TM need time to recoup their infrastructure investments.

So, while things are the way they are now, they do not have to be the same forever. In our next article, KiniBiz looks at some steps that could be taken to bring broadband prices down and change the local landscape forever.

                This entry was posted on Sunday, 14 September 2014, 11:45 pm and is filed under
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51st Malaysia Day – reaffirmation of a Malaysian Dream as an unifying vision for all Malaysians for a harmonious, democratic, competitive and prosperous Malaysia

51st Malaysia Day Message

Tomorrow September 16, 2014, the 51st Malaysia Day, should be an occasion for reaffirmation of a Malaysian Dream as an unifying vision for all Malaysians, regardless of race, religion or region, for a harmonious, democratic, competitive and prosperous Malaysia.

There are gathering dark clouds on the national horizon, for instance:

•	The blitz of sedition prosecutions of Pakatan Rakyat MPs and State Assemblymen as well as social activists, including members of the academia, the press and the legal profession, to create a new climate of fear which  signal the end of a decade of very tentative and unsteady democratic flowerings after the end of the 22-year authoritarian Mahathir premiership.

•	Greater intensity of the rhetorics and politics of race which had not only drowned out Prime Minister Datuk Seri Najib Razak’s signature 1Malaysia policy, but  saw the worst racial and religious incitement and  polarisation in the nation’s history in the past year.

•	Failure to make public the report of the Royal Commission of Inquiry into Illegal Immigrants in Sabah although the report had been presented to the Federal Government for more than four months, making a dismal comparison between the Cobbold Commission Report on the formation of Malaysia, whose report was made public within seven months of the commission’s appointment (as compared to the RCI on Illegal Immigrants in Sabah, which was first approved by the Cabinet in February 2012,  took six months to finalise its terms of reference and members of the commission, and the report is still to be made public after more than two-and-a-half years after the  Cabinet decision on the formation of the Commission).

The voices of extremism and intolerance, however, come from a raucous minority and we must keep faith with the overwhelming majority of Malaysians, from all races, religions and regions, who believe in moderation and the middle path of unity, harmony, tolerance, justice and fair play for all Malaysians.

Malaysia’s future as a nation is assured so long as the overwhelming majority of Malaysians promote a Malaysian Dream transcending a Malay Dream, Chinese Dream, Indian Dream, Kadazan Dream or Iban Dream.

Happy 51st Malaysia Day.

                This entry was posted on Monday, 15 September 2014, 4:33 pm and is filed under
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All Cabinet Ministers on Wednesday must decide whether they want a new Attorney-General who is committed to the goal of  making Malaysia the  “best democracy in the world” or they support the current sedition dragnet and “white terror” to turn Malaysia into the world’s worst democracy

The time has come for every Cabinet Minister to take a stand whether he or she supports the goal as promised by the Prime Minister, Datuk Seri Najib Razak, to make Malaysia the world’s best democracy or the reverse – supporting instead the sedition dragnet and “white terror” unleashed in the past month to turn Malaysia into the world’s worst democracy.

The country should be spared the farce of the Attorney-General Tan Sri Abdul Gani Patail announcing last Tuesday that his Chambers will review the cases of several individuals who were recently charged with sedition, including academician Dr. Azmi Sharom, followed by the outrageous response by the Home Minister, Datuk Seri Zahid Hamidi that the police will not cease and desist from sedition investigations aimed at suppressing criticism and dissent.

In the first place, was  Gani sincere and truthful when he said that his Chambers would review the blitz of sedition charges? Let the Attorney-General announce details of such review, who are the officers in his Chambers who are conducting the review, when the review started and the terms of reference including time-frame of such review.

In fact, Gani owes the Malaysian people a full explanation why he gave the green light for such a spree of sedition charges as well as full accountability as to why those responsible in openly inciting racial and religious hatred, ill-will and conflict have been spared from any prosecution, despite the lodging of many police reports against the culprits?

Or is Gani not in full control of the blitz of sedition charges, with someone else usurping the discretionary powers of the Attorney-General under Article 145(3) of the Federal Constitution to “institute, conduct or discontinue any proceedings” as far as the current spree of sedition prosecutions is  concerned?

Is this the reason why Gani is reviewing the spree of sedition prosecutions?

The question that has been posed by the former Attorney-General Tan Sri Abu Talib Othman is most pertinent and warrants an answer by Gani.

Talib had asked whether it was the pressure from some groups rather than the strict application of the law and evidence that is behind the sedition dragnet against opposition leaders and activists.

Talib said the Federal Constitution gave the Attorney-General the absolute discretion whether to institute, conduct or continue criminal cases but that must be exercised judiciously.

“It is your call based on evidence and applicable law, not at your whims and fancies or dictated by a third party,” he said.

Talib said the position of A-G was an important appointment to the government and “The A-G must be matured and fair-minded, not emotional”.

Talib said that preferring a charge against a person was a serious matter as it would entirely change their lives.

“People will look at you differently even after you are acquitted,” he added.

Secondly, why is Zahid trying to pull the wool over the people’s eyes when he said that the police’s duty is to carry out investigations when there is a police report, and that it is for the Attorney-General’s Chambers to decide whether to prosecute after the police have sent the investigation papers to the AG’s office.

This is because there have been umpteenth cases of many openly and overtly inciting racial and religious ill-will, hatred and conflict but who enjoy both immunity and impunity from any sanction from the law and the law-enforcement authorities despite the lodging of police reports.

The miscarriage of have infected all levels of the administration of justice from selective and malicious police investigations to selective and malicious prosecution by the Attorney-General.

Presiding over such miscarriage of justice is a judiciary which is still a long way from regaining its earlier internationally-acclaimed  independence, impartiality and professionalism after over  a decade of assaults and subversion of  judicial independence and impartiality during the Mahathir “Dark Age”.

All the Cabinet Ministers should end the farce and fallacy that they have nothing to do with the unleashing of the sedition dragnet in the past month, which has brought odium and opprobrium to the country’s international image and standing – that it is the responsibility of the Attorney-General and the Police.

They cannot be more wrong and they must not forget the principle of collective Ministerial responsibility.

Let the  Cabinet meeting on Wednesday, a day after the 51st Malaysia Day celebrations, be remembered as an important day where all Ministers  decide whether they want a new Attorney-General who is committed to the goal of making Malaysia the “best democracy in the world” or they support the current sedition dragnet and “white terror” to turn Malaysia into the world’s worst democracy.

                This entry was posted on Monday, 15 September 2014, 1:31 pm and is filed under
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How broadband prices can be lowered

Broadband Issues (5)

G. Sharmila

KiniBiz

September 12, 2014

A perennial problem is that relative to income, broadband prices are still high in Malaysia. With industry experts and analysts saying that prices are not going to come off anytime soon, can measures be taken to remedy the current situation?

“I like the dreams of the future better than the history of the past.”- Thomas Jefferson

Human beings like the idea of the future because it brings fresh starts and the possibility of righting past wrongs. In the context of broadband pricing, all Malaysians are doubtlessly looking forward to the day when broadband prices become more affordable. In an utopian world, this would mean broadband would become more affordable, as affordable as water and electricity is to us today.

While we’re in an utopian frame of mind, let’s think about what today’s broadband landscape would be like if our government had used Singapore or South Korea as benchmarks on how to rollout a national broadband initiative.

It is indisputable that the National Broadband Plan has resulted in higher broadband penetration in the country, compared to pre-HSBB (High Speed Broadband). And while Telekom Malaysia (TM – the company that owns and operates the HSBB infrastructure) has played a key role in this achievement, the fact remains that the burden of fulfilling the NBP goals rests on one company.

The result of having a single, dominant player as opposed to multiple players building and operating broadband infrastructure is that the market is not as competitive as it could have been.

What should have been done

One may argue that Singapore and South Korea also started out with single broadband players. In the case of Singapore it was SingTel and for South Korea, the dominant player was the then-named Korea Telecom.

However, the respective governments wanted to make broadband available to all their citizens, hence they encouraged other players to come in and build broadband infrastructure and offer broadband services. With more industry players in these markets, competition soon drove prices down, spurring more people to subscribe to broadband services.

“Perhaps a better strategy (for HSBB) would have been for a single, unbiased entity to build and operate broadband infrastructure and then for service providers to lease infrastructure from this entity. But this leads to another issue: who would run the entity?” a telco analyst highlights to KiniBiz.

“If the government had wanted to promote real competition, it would have adopted a model similar to that of Singapore,” says a regional telco analyst who declined to be named. He pointed out that what Singapore did was liberalise its telecommunications sector early on to allow more players into the broadband space.

To the uninitiated, what Singapore did was to liberalise the telco sector in 2000 and wean off the support it had been giving to state-owned SingTel as well as new entrant StarHub. The structure of Singapore’s National Broadband Network (NBN) was such that a private consortium partially funded by the government laid the all-fibre network.

This was labelled NetCo. and on top of this network, a service provider operating company (OpCo) was set up to provide wholesale and backbone services. This was also a private consortium with government funding. Finally, a fully competitive retail service provider layer was added with many operators providing retail broadband services to the end user.

This open access policy by the Singaporean government has resulted in competition, leading to more than 20 service providers today providing various broadband services nationwide.

“The problem in Malaysia is that today equal access is not there, service providers have to commercially negotiate pricing with TM,” the analyst adds.

For now, there is no reprieve for Internet users in Malaysia as mobile Internet prices are still fairly high. “The telcos are pretty comfortable and are not prepared to sacrifice their profit margins as data margins are still low. Hence it will take time for mobile Internet prices to come down,” says the analyst.

To drive down the prices of fixed broadband, the government has to encourage more competition, the analyst says. However, this will be a gradual process and it is hard to say when prices will start coming off and what the catalysts for this will be, he adds.

The government has to encourage more competition

Malaysia should have done something along these lines to encourage competition and drive prices down. Instead of only providing subsidies to Telekom Malaysia or TM to provide HSBB services, it could have opened it to others as well, providing them with similar subsidies.

Critics charge that TM’s cost of rolling out HSBB was way too high. According to sources, TM’s cost of rolling out HSBB was RM7,000 per premise for 1.1 million premises or RM8.7 billion. Compare this to South Korea, which spent some US$50 billion on 44 million users, which brought the cost per user to about US$1300 (RM4,167) per user. However, it is difficult to obtain exact numbers as TM declined to share its pre- and post HSBB subscriber numbers in its email responses to KiniBiz.

Malaysia could have also adopted something similar to Singapore’s NBN model, whereby an infrastructure company can be set up to build and operate broadband infrastructure. All telcos will have a stake in this company, which will be partially funded by the government but have an independent board.

What can be done now

These measures should have been taken four years ago but they were not. So what can be done now? Perhaps for HSBB phase two, more competition can be introduced.

Another, more controversial, option is for the government to sell its stake in TM to a consortium of telcos, who will then be able to get fairer wholesale prices from TM and in turn be able to afford to lower their costs of providing broadband as well. (Note: as of September 9th, Khazanah Nasional Bhd owns a 28.9% stake in TM, the Employees Provident Fund 14.1% and Skim Amanah Saham 11.7%).

The government can chose to directly subsidise this infrastructure company if it wants to bring the price of broadband down but the difference is that all those who ride on the infrastructure will be equally subsidised instead of just TM which uses subsidies to push its own profitability up.

What either strategy will accomplish is a more open marketplace for all levels of broadband players and achieve the broadband goals of the nation at the same time. One hopes that this will be done soon for the target is to achieve 95% broadband penetration by 2020 and it is going to be tough to attain that if broadband prices don’t drop drastically.

Malaysia simply cannot afford to have broadband rates that are several times higher than in those countries such as South Korea and Singapore whose per capita income is already several times Malaysia’s.

Cheap broadband provides an impetus to overall economic growth and therefore incomes by enabling higher productivity, better business processes and more knowledge-intensive operations.

Malaysia had better make this available to its citizens as quickly as possible as part of its strategy to climb up the income ladder quickly and become a globally competitive nation. It is no time to delay this due to lack of political will and considerations of patronage and protection.

                This entry was posted on Monday, 15 September 2014, 11:18 pm and is filed under
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How many more will be charged with sedition?

 – Ramon Navaratnam

The Malaysian Insider

15 September 2014

Most thinking Malaysians are getting increasingly concerned with the rapid pace of sedition charges levelled at well-known and well-meaning Malaysian personalities and intellectuals.

At the same time, there is considerable anxiety over the relative indifference and excessive tolerance shown to some obvious violators of the very open and loosely worded Sedition Act, which deeds urgent revision or replacement.

We therefore hope that the Attorney-General and the police will exercise more care to ensure that the growing public perception of practising double standards and selective justice will be addressed as a matter of high priority.

If honest opinions expressed in the interests of public debate and intellectual discussion on national policies and their proper implementation can be discouraged and even curtailed so harshly, then where and how is democracy to grow and mature in Malaysia?

We have been urged to think out of the box, innovate and give feedback to government and to help transform the economy and indeed our beloved country.

But how will this structural change be possible if honest dialogue is apparently stifled by the heavy-handed use of the powerful Sedition Act?

We may actually be using a hammer to hurt a fly. Judging from the Internet discourse, the public reaction to these rising cases of sedition charges are becoming very critical and caustic.

This is not healthy for the peaceful, harmonious and socio economic development of our nation.

The international community – particularly our real friends and foreign investors will not be encouraged by this wide and strong restrain on our basic needs and human rights.

It is therefore comforting that the A-G is reviewing all these sedition cases.

In the meantime, I have the following proposals to make:

1.Can there be a moratarium on sedition charging?

2. Could the National Unity Consultative Council’s proposed Harmony Bills be given greater priority for tabling in Parliament?

3. Would the A-G please review rapidly the present sedition cases, with a view to withdrawing the charges which appear to be weak?

This new sedition charging spree will have to be better managed. Otherwise I can envisage a large number of Malaysians ,who may want to test the system with spurious seditious statements and allegations that will make it very difficult for the hard working authorities to keep up with charging many more Malaysians with sedition.

If this kind of silent protest is posed by the silent majority, the credibility and confidence in good governance can be jeopardised and we will all become uncertain and unhappy.

On the contrary, we all want to be happy, peaceful, progressive and united Malaysians.

Let’s resolve to be more democratic and to celebrate. A very Happy 51st Malaysia Day! – September 15, 2014.

                This entry was posted on Monday, 15 September 2014, 10:40 am and is filed under
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What were the roles played by the races during and after the Japanese occupation?

 — K. Siladass

The Malay Mail Online

SEPTEMBER 16, 2014

SEPTEMBER 16 — Nowadays, it seems, race bashings, accusing, and abusing other races and religions, especially the Chinese and Indians and non-Islamic religions have become a norm; yet, the authorities seem not to be concerned at this blatant violation of the law, and lack of respect for constitutional safeguards.

In the midst of all the provocative allegations, some have started to add, as if fueling the flames of racial and religious hatred, that it is only the Malays who fought against the Malayan Union and that the non-Malays opposed it only when they realised benefit would accrue to them. We can understand if this suggestion had emanated from those whose knowledge in history is suspect.

But, what must irk us is that such allegations come from those who are supposed to be well-endowed with education. Unless, they, for some reasons of their own, which cannot be wise, have chosen to turn a blind eye to history; or have no inclination to recognise the avert and covert acts of non-Malays during the Japanese occupation; with the co-operation of our Malay brethren.

Writing about Malayan Union, Barbara Watson Andaya and Leonard Y. Andaya, the authors of A History of Malaysia have this to say: (at page 267)

“Although the Chinese and Indian Communities could see that the Malayan Union promised certain advantages, they also did not give it unqualified approval. When the Malayan Indian Congress (MIC) was formed in August 1946, its leadership initially supported the Malay position.”

AJ Stockwell in his meticulous monograph: British Policy and Malay Politics During the Malayan Union Experiment 1942-1948 (at p. 62) says that the “Malay press gave the October announcement [about the creation of Malayan Union] a cautious approach, the most radical Malay group welcomed it enthusiastically.”

Stockwell adds: (at p.62) “… the majority of the people were at this time pre-occupied with the problems of survival; ‘rice riots’, shortages of food and clothing, industrial conflict and general hardship rather than the constitutional future of the country were their immediate concerned. Until early 1946 the Malayan Communist Party (the political arm of the MPAJA) was able to take advantage of these problems to dominate what political activities there were in the peninsula.”

Subsequently, when the full impact of the Malayan Union was realised, the Malayan

National Party, which had initially supported the Malayan Union, withdrew its support. (See Stockwell at p. 76). So much for the position initially adopted by the Malays and non-Malays. Taking the political situation of that era into consideration and the British attitude to negotiate only with the Sultans and subsequently with UMNO, the views of the non-Malays were totally ignored. Besides, with Britain’s single-minded concern to preserve its military bases in this region and to wipe out Communist influences, the British were prepared to sacrifice the interest of the non-Malays.

Despite all the dangers that were faced by the non-Malays, whether they were communists or otherwise; they did everything within their means to resist the Japanese. Anti-Japanese activities were not confined to armed struggle but they were others eg. taking care of the people without racial and religious prejudice when food was scarce and protecting innocent people from the sword-wielding Japanese. It may sound like a trivial affair today but it is worth noting it today for they exposed themselves to severe reprisals from the Japanese.

When the Supreme Court of the Malayan Union was opened on 1st June, 1948 by the Chief Justice Willan, he pointed out:

“As regard the records of the various Courts I am happy to say, that apart from Penang, the losses might have been more serious. In this Court our thanks are due to the members of the Court staff, particularly to Mr. Mahadevan my secretary, and to Mr. Samuel, now acting as Assistant Registrar, for their devotion and loyalty under difficult circumstances in preserving the major portion of the records in the Registry and also the Court libraries.”

The speech by Willan CJ can be found in 1946 [MLJ] at page xlvi.

The Mahadevan referred to by the Chief Justice is none other than the father of Dato Mahadev Shankar, a former Court of Appeal Judge in modern day Malaysia.

What should irk us here is that while there is so much reference made to Malayan Union and the struggle against it, the exemplary role of the Chinese and Indians during the Second World War is glossed over and made to look as insignificant and irrelevant.

The truth is that when the Japanese invaded Malaya, the British who were unprepared for this sudden assault had to retreat and prepare to retaliate against the Japanese. They believed that Singapore, the proud citadel, as they claimed would be sufficient to resist the Japanese advance. At last everything fell. British supremacy had been dealt with a serious blow. At that point of time there was not any political party to galvanise the people’s support to resist the Japanese occupation.

The only party that had operated, albeit illegally, was the Malayan Communist Party (MCP). It was well organised and seemingly had an effective network. The MCP offered to work with the British against the Japanese but this was spurned by Sir Shenton Thomas, the governor of Singapore. Subsequently, there was a change of mind and the British agreed to work with the MCP.

This collaboration saw the British supplying arms and training members to the MCP. And the vehicle which helped this venture was the Malayan Peoples’ Anti-Japanese Association (MPAJA). It is true that the MCP was dominated by the Chinese, but there were also Malays and Indians deeply involved in it. Rashid Maidin and CD Abdullah are well known communists for their role in resisting the Japanese.

The British, in their grand effort to contain Communism spreading in Malaya, decided to take harsh measures against their wartime ally, the MCP.

If we look at the history of the Second World War, and the problems Malaya and the people faced, it cannot be denied that the Chinese-dominated MCP played a very important role and had always been a thorn in the flesh of the Japanese. The Malays and Indians who cherished freedom fought against the Japanese and many perished. However, some historians have chosen to give measured credit or completely blacked out of the MCP’s role; the destruction of human lives, largely Chinese, followed by the Indians and lastly the Malays is a historical fact that cannot be erased. Thus, to say that the non-Malays have not contributed towards the general struggle against British Colonialism and Japan’s expansionism is but a convoluted representation of history.

There may be a grain of truth that the non-Malays saw the benefit that could be derived from emigrating to this country, but that thought did not gestate during the Malayan Union epoch. That thought must have germinated when Sri Francis Light founded Penang Island and established a factory there on behalf of the East India Company. Since the Malay Archipelago was not richly populated and lacked the human capital for industries, such a state would not ensure the success that Francis Light had envisaged.

He had to rely on a foreign workforce. That pioneer workforce must have seen the benefit that could be harvested from this region and they would have dreamt that this region could be turned into a viable place to work, live, raise families and settle down. They worked for the future, but whether the future that was controlled by the British colonialists treated them fairly and in a dignified manner is a moot point. The pain they suffered did not end, and their descendants have yet to be freed from such a pin. When will this end?

The accusation that the non-Malays only opposed the Malayan Union when they discovered the benefit is against history and cannot be supported.

It is made to antagonise the non-Malays and to create hatred in the minds of the Malays, a method Adolf Hitler adopted to promote and instill German nationalism, that is Nazism a propaganda pregnant with lies and distortions condemning the minorities for the failures and pitiable state of the majority.

It is patently mischievous and contemptible to sideline the contributions by the Chinese and Indians on the overall struggle against the British and the Japanese. The minority communities are aware that those who are embarking on this dangerous trend are a minority themselves as the majority of Malays have distanced themselves from this sordid dissemination of falsehood.

                This entry was posted on Tuesday, 16 September 2014, 12:39 pm and is filed under
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Pak Lah’s inaugural blog most welcome but is he prepared to consistently take up the cudgel to champion moderation against baneful developments like the upsurge of intolerance and extremism and the sedition dragnet which have created a climate of fear

Former Prime Minister Tun Abdullah Ahmad Badawi’s inaugural blog on Malaysia Day yesterday is most welcome, especially as it addressed the biggest issue haunting Malaysia since his premiership – the rearing of the ugly head of intolerance and extremism among a raucous few preaching the politics of hatred and falsehoods, causing the worst racial and religious polarization in the history of plural Malaysia.

As a result, we have the sad spectacle yesterday of the former Higher Education Minister, Datuk Saifuddin Abdullah, who as Chief Executive Officer of the Global Movement of Moderates Foundation (GMM), which is one of the initiatives of Prime Minister, Datuk Seri Najib Razak, who have to  ask for no media coverage of a forum on the country’s future co-organised by GMM because of the climate of fear engendered by the recent selective and malicious sedition dragnet.

Although the “no media coverage” was to protect the participants at the GMM forum from falling victim to the current sedition spree, there is the feeling that even Saifuddin himself may not be safe from the sedition dragnet, although he was former Deputy Minister and hand-picked  by the Prime Minister himself to be the CEO of GMM!

It would appear that the only persons who need not fear the sedition dragnet are those who had since Abdullah’s premiership and who have become more blatant in the Najib premiership been inciting racial and religious hatred and conflict through lies and falsehoods, the very people who had  succeeded in forcing Abdullah’s early retirement as the fifth Prime Minister of Malaysia in the first place.

In his inaugural blog themed “The meaning of Independence and Unity”, Abdullah rightly said that Malaysians cannot only be united when celebrating something or in facing tragedy or disaster and warned against using the disastrous politics of fear to foster unity.

He said that the May 13, 1969 racial riots should be a lesson to all but not something to be brought up all the time.

He said: “Stop bringing it up. We should look ahead towards the future.”

It is sad and tragic, and an ominous  sign of the recent  times,  that no top government leader, from the current Prime Minister to  key Ministers, had spoken up against the irresponsible and  unscrupulous exploitation of the May 13 tragedy, spinning a whole tissue of lies and  falsehoods in furtherance of the politics of fear, utterly reckless of their adverse consequences on nation-building and promoting national unity out the diverse races and religions in the country.

Public funds were even expended to demonise the Opposition in the film Tanda Putera.

Abdullah lamented that  the focus now is no longer on the nation’s diversity but differences in the form of political thinking, race, religion, social status, which have resulted in quarrels.

He blogged: “Tolerance and respect have declined. The freedom to express which we have now is used to express hatred in the social media and internet.

“I am saddened by what is happening in our beloved country although there are efforts to foster unity among the races.”

The former Prime Minister’s concerns are most valid and justified.

But is  he prepared, through his blogs,  to consistently take up the cudgel to champion moderation against baneful developments like the upsurge of intolerance and extremism and the sedition dragnet which have created a climate of fear in country, as if we are in the midst of a “white terror” in a prelude to Ops Lalang 2?

                This entry was posted on Wednesday, 17 September 2014, 3:53 pm and is filed under
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Scotland Chooses: 10 Factors for Independence Referendum Voters

By Dara Doyle, Ben Sills and Svenja O’Donnell

Bloomberg

Sep 17, 2014

Here are some of the fault lines in tomorrow’s referendum on Scottish independence.

The Currency

“Yes” side: Scottish National Party leader Alex Salmond says the pound is just as much as Scotland’s currency as the rest of the U.K. Retaining the pound as part of a formal currency union is the best option for the nation after independence, a panel of advisers has told him.

The “yes” side argues that Scotland is the second-biggest market for the rest of the U.K., which would be damaged if the pound was taken away from the Scots. The currency would also continue to benefit from being backed by North Sea oil.

Salmond said the Bank of England will continue to decide monetary policy day to day, with Scotland seeking input in the bank’s remit and governance.

“No” side: the Better Together campaign, led by former Chancellor of the Exchequer Alistair Darling and backed by the three biggest U.K. political parties, says that if Scotland leaves the U.K. it loses the pound. It says Salmond can’t guarantee what money Scots would use, and it’s not clear if an independent Scotland would seek to adopt the euro, set up an unproven national currency or use sterling unilaterally without any input into monetary policy making.

They say uncertainty will push up Scottish interest rates, meaning consumers and companies face higher borrowing costs.

The Economy

“Yes:” Salmond says that Scotland is constrained by the economic policies of the U.K. government at Westminster. Had Scotland matched the growth rates of comparable independent nations in the 30 years through 2007, gross domestic product per head would be 3.8 percent higher and Scots would be 900 pounds each ($1,460) better off, he says.

Giving Scotland power over fiscal and economic matters will unlock growth. So, for example, the nationalists plan to cut company tax rates after independence from the current U.K. rate of 21 percent. That will help it compete with Ireland, which has a 12.5 percent corporate tax rate, acting as a magnet for U.S. companies like Google Inc. (GOOG) and Facebook Inc. (FB)

“No:” Opponents lampooned Salmond’s 2008 speech at Harvard University when he has asked why Scotland couldn’t be a “Celtic Lion” and part of a “new arc of prosperity” including Ireland and Iceland. Opponents have turned Salmond’s words against him, describing Ireland as part of the “arc of insolvency” along with Iceland, after both countries needed international bailouts because of banking crises.

Better Together points out that when Scotland’s banks came close to collapse in 2008, taxpayers across the U.K. helped bail them out. In addition, they say that being part of the union gives Scottish companies access to 60 million people across the U.K. without having to worry about border controls.

North Sea Oil

“Yes:”: Since the 1970s, the oil and gas in the North Sea has contributed 300 billion pounds in tax receipts to the U.K. Treasury. The industry will produce jobs and revenue until “well after 2055,” the campaign says, citing a U.K. government assessment, and half of oil and gas reserves by value are still to be extracted.

An independent Scotland means that oil and gas will be brought ashore for the benefit of the Scots. A new regulator would be set up in Aberdeen. There would also be enough money left over to set up a Norwegian-style oil fund.

“No:” Even with oil, Scotland has run a deficit in 20 of the last 21 years, so every penny is already spent on public services like schools, hospitals and pensions, according to Better Together. Nobody knows exactly how much oil is left in the North Sea, but reserves are dropping and relying so much on oil would leave Scottish finances at the mercy of market prices.

The independence campaign has consistently been over-estimating oil revenue, Better Together says.

Better or Worse Off?

“Yes:” The nationalists say independence would mean Scots would ultimately be better off by 1,000 pounds a year after 15 years as the economy strengthens in the wake of independence.

“No:” According to Treasury research published in May, every person in Scotland will be 1,400 pounds worse off if the country breaks away from the U.K. because of an aging population, higher borrowing costs, a decline in North Sea oil revenue and the cost of establishing new institutions such as a welfare system, tax office and diplomatic service.

Taxation

“Yes:” Supporters of independence say that in the tax year ending in 2012, Scots paid 10,700 pounds per person to the Treasury, compared with 9,000 pounds in the whole of the U.K. The nationalists say they will reduce air passenger charges and company taxes to boost the economy, and for the first time ever, a government picked by the Scottish people will set tax rates.

“No:” The Better Together camp says leaving the U.K. would cost Scottish basic-rate taxpayers an extra 1,000 pounds a year. In addition, they say that the U.K. government has already agreed to cede more tax-setting powers to the Scots, regardless of the outcome of the referendum.

Nuclear Weapons and Defense

“Yes:” The U.K. government has based nuclear weapons in Scotland for almost 50 years. Salmond says that following a vote for independence, he would make agreement on the “speediest safe removal of nuclear weapons a priority” as he seeks to get rid of Trident from Scotland within the first term of the Scottish parliament following independence.

He says that independence means the nation won’t have to contribute to the 100 billion-pound cost of replacing Trident, freeing up money for health and education. The existing base in the west of Scotland would be turned into the new headquarters for the Scottish navy, securing jobs.

“No:” U.K. Defence Secretary Philip Hammond reiterated on May 8 that relocation of Trident would cost “billions of pounds, perhaps tens of billions of pounds” and take at least a decade. Better Together says that walking away from the U.K. armed forces makes Scotland less secure and damages the economy through base closures and ending contracts to build warships.

NATO Membership

“Yes:” Scotland will apply to join NATO and its position within the alliance will be similar to the majority of members that don’t possess or host nuclear weapons. The plan changed after the SNP ditched its policy of opposing membership in the alliance in 2012.

“No:” Scotland will be more vulnerable to terrorist attacks in a “very dangerous and insecure world” if it votes for independence, Cameron said last month, citing NATO membership as one of the reasons. An independent Scotland would have to re-apply to join NATO, and it would have to join with the caveat of refusing to have a nuclear deterrent.

Pensions

“Yes:” There will be no change for Scottish pensioners or members of existing retirement funds. The Scottish government will take on its “fair share” of the liabilities of U.K.-wide pension schemes to pay Scottish pensioners. Independence simply means that future decisions about changes to pensions will be taken in Scotland, not Westminster, including the speed at which the pension age is raised.

“No:” Scotland faces a demographic time bomb and there would be cuts to pensions if it became independent. The pensions of 1 million Scots are guaranteed by the U.K. welfare system. Spending on pensions is higher in Scotland — 1,400 pounds per head, compared with 1,300 pounds per head in the rest of the U.K. The U.K. Pensions Protection Fund backstops people whose pensions were put at risk when the company they worked for becomes insolvent. There are no credible plans to replicate this in an independent Scotland, the campaign says.

European Union Membership

“Yes:” Scotland will be able to win recognition as an independent EU member state by March 2016 because it’s already part of the bloc, its people are already EU citizens and it already complies with EU laws.

Besides, with Cameron promising an in-or-out vote on Britain’s place in the EU should his Conservatives win re-election then the only way to guarantee Scotland’s continuing membership is to vote for independence, according to the nationalists.

“No:” Former President of the European Commission Jose Manuel Barroso has said an independent Scotland would not be able to simply remain an EU member. If the country had to reapply, it would lose the U.K. rebate worth 135 pounds a year to every family in Scotland, according to Better Together.

There’s also the question of Spain objecting to Scotland joining given its concerns over Catalonia’s aspirations toward becoming an independent sovereign state. Spanish Industry Minister Jose Manuel Soria said yesterday an independent Scotland would be excluded from EU institutions.

The National Health Service

“Yes:” Salmond says that independence would be the best route for Scotland to preserve the NHS, accusing anti-independence campaign leader Darling in an Aug. 25 televised debate of being “in bed” with the U.K.’s Conservative-led government, which is paving the way for “creeping privatization” of the NHS.

The nationalists also say independence would not stop current cross-border health provision arrangements. Those views found support with Allyson Pollock, a professor of public health research and policy at Queen Mary University in London.

Pollock told Scotland’s independence-supporting Sunday Herald newspaper that NHS reforms in England could result in reduced funding in Scotland and that independence was the “clearest” way of protecting that.

“No:” Better Together says NHS spending is protected anyway, with Cameron saying on Aug. 18 that “health is a devolved issue so the only person who could, if they wanted to, introduce more private provision into the NHS is Scotland is Alex Salmond.” Better Together says that Scotland receives about 200 pounds a year per head more in health spending than the rest of the U.K., and taxpayers across the U.K. finance that cost rather the Scots alone.

                This entry was posted on Wednesday, 17 September 2014, 1:26 pm and is filed under
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Scotland Independence Vote Raises Specter of ‘Ununited’ Kingdom

By JON WILLIAMS

ABC News

17th September 2014

Of all the many crises this summer — from ISIS, to Ukraine, Ebola to Libya — who’d have thought jolly old England would be on that list?

Technically, it’s the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland. But for how much longer? On Thursday, after 307 years, Scotland may vote for independence and with it, potentially change the world order that has lasted since the end of the Second World War. Decisions taken across the highlands and lowlands of Scotland will echo far beyond the shores of a disunited kingdom.

Fifty years ago, U.S. Secretary of State Dean Acheson declared that Britain had “lost an empire but not yet found a role.” He may have been premature. During two decades of war — in Iraq (twice), Afghanistan and elsewhere, Britain chose the role as America’s “ally-in-chief.” British and US troops fought and died together, from Basra to Helmand and beyond. Half a century after he dismissed “Great” Britain, on September 18, the Britain Acheson spoke of, may cease to exist.

A Kingdom of England, Wales and Northern Ireland would continue. But Britain would be partitioned – not for the first time. In 122 AD, the Roman Emperor Hadrian built a wall, stretching 75 miles to keep “barbarians” of Scotland out of England. Two millennia on, a vote for independence would consign Great Britain to the same history books as Hadrian.

The implications would be profound -– not just for the rump of the United Kingdom, but for the United States and the Western Alliance.

While Scotland makes up just 8 percent of the UK population –- its GDP of $235 million puts it just behind Connecticut ($240 million) -– it is also home to the 58 Trident nuclear missiles leased by Britain from the United States and the four nuclear submarines that carry them.

Scotland’s First Minister Alex Salmond –- the man who has led the march to independence –- has promised to remove the missiles and the submarines from their current base on the west coast of Scotland during the first term of parliament following independence. The consequences for Britain and NATO would be grave.

No other port in the U.K. is equipped to house the missiles, raising the potential prospect of Britain’s “independent” nuclear deterrent being based in France, or at the US naval base at King’s Bay in Georgia, home to America’s own Trident submarines.

And then there’s the flag. The Union Jack is made up of the flags of the UK’s constituent parts -– the red St George’s Cross for England, the red diagonal Irish cross of St Patrick, and Scotland’s blue white and blue Saltire. Officially, it’s even called the Union Flag -– so without a Union, what to do? It’s not just the U.K. that will need a rethink. Four other countries also have the Union Jack in their flag (Australia, New Zealand, Fiji and Tuvalu) as well as Britain’s overseas territories like Bermuda and the Cayman Islands. Even the state of Hawaii has the Union Jack in its design, as do the Canadian provinces of British Columbia, Manitoba and Ontario.

Next year the United Nations marks its 70th birthday. Across seven decades — for all of Acheson’s doubts -– the U.K. has been one of just five “great powers” to be permanent members of the U.N. Security Council, alongside the United States, Russia, China and France. But there are many who covet Britain’s UN chair. India and Brazil have been pushing for Security Council reform.

This week, even the former British Prime Minister, Sir John Major, warned that should Scotland vote for independence, the U.K.’s place as a member of the permanent five of the United Nations “would no longer be viable.” Others warn that it could lose its place in the G7 group of Nations. The IMF ranks the UK as the world’s sixth biggest economy. Without Scotland, the U.K. would be overtaken by Brazil.

Many of Britain’s nearest neighbors are also watching closely. The European Union says an independent Scotland would leave the E.U. and need to reapply for membership. Each of the E.U.’s 28 member nations has a veto on new members. Many have their own separatist movements. Spain would be unlikely to encourage Scottish independence for fear that Catalonia might be next.

While warning of the risks to the U.K.’s place in the U.N., former Prime Minister Major also warns independence would enhance the risk of Britain’s exit from the E.U. As if one in/out referendum isn’t enough, David Cameron has promised another — in 2017 -– on whether the U.K. should leave the European Union. But that would follow Scotland’s exit. And with more voters in Scotland pro-EU than in the rest of the UK, those fighting to keep Britain in Europe fear it could tip the balance towards the rump of the UK leaving the EU – the United States’ largest trading partner.

Five million Americans can claim Scottish ancestry, almost as many people as live in Scotland today. This time next year -– on September 11, 2015 — Queen Elizabeth will become Britain’s longest reigning monarch, passing Victoria’s record of 63 years and 216 days, an anniversary she will spend at Balmoral, the Scottish Castle where she is said to feel most at home. Through her mother, the Queen is a direct descendant of the legendary Scottish warrior Robert the Bruce. It would be a bitter irony if it was Britain’s most Scottish monarch ever who presided over the break-up of her United Kingdom.

                This entry was posted on Wednesday, 17 September 2014, 2:03 pm and is filed under
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Scottish independence: Final day of campaigning ahead of vote

Robert Pigott reports on the last hours of the campaigns

BBC

17 September 2014

Both sides in the Scottish referendum debate are making their final pitch to voters on the last day of campaigning.

It comes as the latest polls suggested the result remained too close to call, with a slender lead for a “No” vote.

Scotland’s First Minister Alex Salmond has written to voters appealing to them to vote “Yes”, saying “let’s do this”.

Key figures from the pro-Union Better Together campaign were out meeting nightworkers into Wednesday, ahead of a Love Scotland, Vote No rally.

Three new polls, one by Opinium for the Daily Telegraph, another by ICM for the Scotsman and a third by Survation for the Daily Mail, were published on Tuesday evening.

With undecided voters excluded, they all suggested a lead for “No” of 52% to 48%.

In other developments:

*Former US President Bill Clinton stepped into the debate urging Scots to vote No. He said: “Unity with maximum self-determination sends a powerful message to a world torn by identity conflicts that it is possible to respect our differences while living and working together.”

*About 1,500 Yes supporters bearing Saltire flags, badges and blue campaign T-shirts gathered for a rally in Glasgow’s George Square on Tuesday evening.

*The Scottish Sun’s front page on Wednesday morning features a picture of Alistair Darling and Alex Salmond and the headline is “Britain’s Got Talent V The Eks Factor” The paper says: “Your voice, your choice, your vote.”

*Fourteen former British armed forces chiefs warned in an open letter that a “Yes” vote would make the whole of Britain more vulnerable to attack.

On the final day of campaigning, in a letter to the people of Scotland, Mr Salmond told them they will hold power in their hands as they vote to determine their country’s future on Thursday.

He asked voters to step back from the political arguments and statistics that have defined the two-year campaign and trust in themselves as they go into the polling booth.

Mr Salmond said: “The talking is nearly done. The campaigns will have had their say. What’s left is just us – the people who live and work here. The only people with a vote. The people who matter.

“The people who for a few precious hours during polling day hold sovereignty, power, authority in their hands. It’s the greatest most empowering moment any of us will ever have. Scotland’s future – our country in our hands.

“What to do? Only each of us knows that. For my part, I ask only this. Make this decision with a clear head and a clear conscience.”

The first minister told BBC Radio 4’s Today programme that the referendum campaign had been one of the most exhilarating in Western Europe, and said he was “assuming absolutely nothing” about the result.

Watching people queuing to register to vote had been a “humbling” sight, he added, and pledged to honour Clause 30 of the Edinburgh agreement by which both sides agreed to honour the result and work in the best interests of Scotland and the UK regardless of the result.

On Spain’s potential opposition to Scotland’s membership of the EU, the first minister said Scotland had 1% of the EU’s population, but 20% of its fish stocks, 25% of its renewable energy and 60% of its oil resources.

He argued that anybody who believed the country would not be welcome in the EU did not understand that Europe “accepts democratic results” and that Scotland “has a huge amount to contribute”.

Better Together leader Alistair Darling and former Prime Minister Gordon Brown will front a Love Scotland, Vote No rally in Glasgow later.

Mr Darling told the Today programme that he thought there would be a “No” vote but even if there were not he would play his part in doing “the best I possibly can” for Scotland.

“I’m not going. This is my country. I’m staying,” said Mr Darling. But he said that did not mean he would sign up to the “nonsense” in the Scottish government’s White Paper and insisted that “Alex Salmond is not Team Scotland”.

Mr Darling also warned that, whichever way the vote went, there would be hard work healing divisions in Scottish society which had emerged during the campaign.

He cited some internet comments and Sunday’s demonstration at the BBC in Glasgow, which he said some people found “frightening”.

“We all have to say we live in a democratic country; there are some people who have stepped over the line… but we’ve got to calm things down because we’ve got to live together.”

‘Working tirelessly’

Scottish Labour leader Johann Lamont and leader of the Scottish Conservatives Ruth Davidson have been out campaigning overnight.

Ms Lamont, along with her deputy Anas Sarwar, met print workers on the night-shift at Trinity Mirror Print Works. The politicians promised “better, faster, safer change” with a “No” vote.

Ms Davidson and Chief Secretary to the Treasury Danny Alexander met warehouse workers at Malcolm Distribution in Linwood.

Blair McDougall, campaign director of Better Together, said: “Unlike Alex Salmond who is on a helicopter victory tour, Better Together is campaigning through the night for a No vote.

“Better Together campaigners are working tirelessly to spread the message that there will be better, faster, safer change with a No vote for a stronger Scotland, while Alex Salmond’s political project for separation risks jobs, pensions and the NHS.”

Responding to the latest polls, Mr McDougall, from Better Together, added: “This vote will go right down to the wire. There is no room for a protest vote. If we vote to leave the UK there would be no going back, no matter what it costs us in terms of bigger cuts, higher prices and fewer jobs.”

                This entry was posted on Wednesday, 17 September 2014, 5:01 pm and is filed under
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Scottish referendum splits families, beer drinkers

By Mark Phillips/CBS News

September 16, 2014

EDINBURGH, Scotland – In the lead up to Thursday’s high-stakes referendum in Scotland, everything is political — even drinking.

A bar in Scotland is holding its own independence opinion poll.

At the Twa Dugs pub, you can order a “Yes” beer if you’re for independence. A “No” beer if you’re against it. It’s pub owner Bob Shields’ private opinion poll.

“I am calling it vote with your throat,” Shields laughed.

At the bar, the yes vote is ahead. But across Scotland polls show the vote is too close to call.

Alex Salmond, the Yes campaign leader, feels history is on his side.

“This is an example of a country which has been progressing on a road to full self-government for a hundred years,” Salmond told CBS News.

But it’s a potentially bumpy road.

“I am very, very, very, very concerned,” said Mike Younger, the finance director at the distillery, who fears the uncertainty of a separate Scotland that can’t even say what currency it would use.

“I think the optimism is utterly misplaced.”

Not just business is doubtfull. Several foreign leaders including President Obama have said they’d prefer the UK to stay whole.

In an uncertain world, the U.S. may have a lot of reasons for wanting to see its most consistent ally stay united and strong. But there’s no greater reason than the HM Naval Base Clyde, also known as Faslane, where Britain’s nuclear missile fleet is based. And in an independent Scotland, it would be gone.

Former NATO Secretary General, George Robertson, has called independence a calamity.

“We move into very uncharted and dangerous waters if we go down this route,” Robertson said.

The debate has split Scotland and split families. Maureen McCormick is a No. Daughter Catherine is Yes.

“The United Kingdom is a big happy family and I don’t think we should break it up,” said McCormick.

“I don’t think we are such a happy family at all, no,” Catherine rebutted. “I think absolutely we could stand on our own two feet.”

They have one more day to convince each other who’s right.

                This entry was posted on Wednesday, 17 September 2014, 12:48 pm and is filed under
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Congratulations Najib for the Democracy Setback of the Decade and making moderation sedition and his brainchild the Global Movement of Moderates virtually a seditious organisation

The Cabinet meeting yesterday has come and gone and there are no signs that it has achieved any historic distinction when Cabinet Ministers drew the line in the sand to declare their repudiation of the sedition dragnet in the past month and their commitment to  move forward to be among the world’s best democracies and not going backwards to be among the world’s worst democracies.

There are no inklings that the Minister in the Prime Minister’s Department, Dato Sri Idris Jala had raised serious objection, led alone led the charge of conscientious and conviction Ministers in their opposition to the obnoxious dragnet of the draconian sedition law to stifle dissent and criticism to crate a climate of fear in the country reminiscent of the Internal Security Act (ISA) days especially during the th 22-year Mahathir premirrship.

On the contrary, congratulations are in order to the Primer Minister, Datuk Seri Najib Razak on three grounds:

Firstly, achieving the Democacy Setback of the Decade since Mahathir’s  stepping down as Prime Minister in October 2013, when for the first time in a decade, the country has been enveloped in a climate of fear as a result of the sedition spree in the past month with a whole spectrum of victims, from Pakatan Rakyat MPs and SAs to social activists including members of the legal profession and the press, student leaders, preachers and simply laymen.

Secondly, for the worldwide feat in making moderation an offence of sedition to the extent that Malaysians are beginning to feel that the fundamental right of freedom of speech is cursed by the  burden of unfreedom after speech.

Thirdly, in virtually making his brainchild, the Global Movement of Moderates  (GMM) into virtually a seditious organisation. As a result, the media were asked not to report the proceedings of the GMM forum  on the “Future of Malaysia” with NGOs, because the GMM cannot  ensure the freedom of the participants and protect them from the sedition dragnet even when advocating moderation!

Najib will go down in history as the Prime Minister who turned the colonial Sedition Act into a repressive and draconian instrument to stifle criticism and dissent although he had promised to repeal it as part of the country “political transformation” to become the world’s best democracy.

The Sedition Act is an arcane law of a bygone colonial era to  protect the white colonial masters from the freedom struggle of subject peoples in colonies when freedom of speech was not seen as the right it is today, and has no place in a modern age where freedom of speech is now seen as a touchstone of democracy, and the ability of individuals to criticise the state are crucial to maintaining freedom and human rights.

Najib cannot continue to equivocate but must decide one way or another whether he is still committed to the goal to make Malaysia the world’s best democracy, in which case he should halt the sedition blitz, drop all sedition charges and repeal the Sedition Act, or he should unashamedly announce the end of whatever political transformation and democratisation under his administration and a new Najib phase of a counter-revolution where the Sedition Act replaces the ISA of earlier decades as the weapon of choice in a reign of “white terror” to suppress criticism and dissent in the country.

                This entry was posted on Thursday, 18 September 2014, 2:58 pm and is filed under
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Saying one thing but doing another

Terence Fernandez

The Malaysian Insider

17 September 2014

“Sedition and seditious and defamatory libel are arcane offences – from a bygone era when freedom of expression wasn’t seen as the right it is today.

“Freedom of speech is now seen as the touchstone of democracy, and the ability of individuals to criticise the state is crucial to maintaining freedom.

“The existence of these obsolete offences in this country had been used by other countries as justification for the retention of similar laws which have been actively used to suppress political dissent and restrict press freedom.”

The above statement is the words of UK justice minister Claire Ward in 2009 when she announced that the government was doing away with sedition offences.

The UK government had remarked that it was troubled by the fact that other countries used components of this archaic 1661 British enactment to justify quelling political dissent and differences opinion.

Malaysia, Thailand, Singapore and Zimbabwe were named among countries which have used the iron-clad interpretation of sedition as a blank cheque to go after anyone who criticises the authorities and bring the government of the day into disrepute.

Sedition laws after all, said Ward, have no place in a society that emphasises the freedom of the individual and a nation which aims to be a leader in the fight for equality and civil liberties.

Following pressure from its own society, the UK government moved for the repeal of laws governing sedition and criminal defamation.

However, this was not something that was done overnight.

The idea for the abolition of UK’s sedition laws was first mooted in 1977 by the Law Commission and working papers were only drafted in 1985, with the actual repeal coming into fruition in 2009.

Hopefully it will not take us 32 years as it did the English to junk sedition rules.

While our Sedition Act is a 1948 enactment that was focused on national security during the emergency, as we have seen and experienced, the Sedition Act is a brush with wide bristles – depending on who is using it and what it is used for.

But it will be nice to know that Malaysia – or at least our leaders – are not alone in this dilemma of doing away with an act that in effect helps in self-preservation.

India, for instance, is debating doing away with its own 1870 Act and introducing components for the protection of national security in its Penal Code.

The National Harmony Act and the National Unity Act which are being drafted are Malaysia’s feeble attempts at demonstrating to the international community that it is serious about the respect of civil liberties and freedom of expression – a cosmetic measure that parallels its ambitions for a seat on the UN Security Council.

The new act allows racist statements as long as they do not incite harm. Fears are its wide interpretation will be used as a “get out of jail” free card for extremist groups with ties to the ruling party while minorities who speak out and scholarly opinions will be reigned in.

It could end up being worse than the Sedition Act that we have now.

Two years ago on Malaysia Day, the prime minister made this promise:

“The Sedition Act represents a bygone era in our country and with today’s announcement we mark another step forward in Malaysia’s development.

“The new National Harmony Act will balance the right of freedom of expression as enshrined in the Constitution, while at the same time ensuring that all races and religions are protected.

“Our country’s strength lies in its diversity. The new Act underlines my commitment to nurturing the spirit of harmony and mutual respect that has been the foundation of our stability and success.”

Since then, the prime minister has reiterated the “government’s commitment” to repeal the Sedition Act. Unfortunately all we have heard from the prime minister is lip service. Actions speak louder than words.

The dragnet over the last month flies in the face of the “reforms” this administration has promised.

First they came for the politicians, and then they came for the lawyers. Next they came for the NGOs, following which they came for the academicians. Then they came for the press.

That many voices of differing opinions are spending their Malaysia Day week at police stations only goes towards underscoring the “cakap tak serupa bikin” syndrome which seems to define the Najib administration. – September 17, 2014.

* Terence is a veteran at giving police statements. He hopes this article will not make him a guest of the Royal Malaysian Police yet again. He is investigations editor at The Edge and can be reached at
[email protected]
.

                This entry was posted on Thursday, 18 September 2014, 5:09 am and is filed under
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Entering DAP’s second phase with semi-urban constituencies

I thank the DAP Policy Forum, an informal grouping of elected reps who are interested in policy matters, for organising the DAP Semi-urban Caucus meeting. DAP Policy Forum is a reflection of DAP’s maturity with more and more elected reps and party leaders getting involved in working out the policy alternatives of a different Malaysia under a new government. It is also a manifestation that DAP understands the expectations of the Malaysian voting public who wants more from their political leaders.

Semi-urban constituencies are indeed a new experience for the DAP. In many ways, it is an advent of a second phase for the DAP.

Previously, DAP was mostly confined to urban constituencies with high concentration of working class non-Malay voters. It is not that the DAP did not attempt to represent semi-urban constituencies but the previously prevailing circumstances worked against such efforts.

But since the political tsunami in 2008 and followed by the last elections in May 2013, DAP made substantial gains in multi-ethnic semi-urban constituencies, both at the parliamentary and at the state levels.

Generally, semi-urban constituencies have the following characteristics:

*Agriculture, fishery and plantation based;

*and if it is ever industrialised, it is mostly low-end manufacturing with substantial number of foreign unskilled labour as workers;

*multi-ethnic;

*older demographic profile as young people work and live in urban centres (but may still vote in the semi-urban constituencies).

In the 2013 election, many near-misses of seats come from semi-urban constituencies. On the peninsula, had the Pakatan Rakyat succeeded in the following clusters of seats, Barisan National would have sat on the opposition bench now, namely,

*Southern Kedah / Northern Penang belt e.g. Kulim Bandar Baru and Kepala Batas

*Southern Perak/Northern Selangor belt e.g. Tanjung Malim and Sabak Bernam

*Northern Johor belt e.g. Segamat and Sekijang

*West Pahang belt e.g. Bentong

For the DAP which was formerly concentrating in urban areas, understand and imagining a new future for agriculture, fishery and plantation are now an urgent task for this effort to propel a second phase of growth for DAP.

It is also important to note that UMNO survives on fanning anxieties and fears among Malays and Bumiputra in the semi-urban constituencies. It is here that the DAP must represent hopes against fears, to offer new political and economic dreams for all and to reassure Malays and Bumiputra voters that a new Malaysia is one that is only against the cronies and not the Malays and Bumiputra.

Malaysia is a rich country for all to live a decent living and only with a new future outside UMNO’s race-based politics that we can have a new Malaysia.

Representing semi-urban constituencies also requires us to rethink our position on meritocracy. We are confronted with very serious and widespread poverty which requires us to complement meritocracy with solidarity, which is a social democratic value anyway.

We must be able to articulate the aspirations of semi-urban constituencies so that we provide Malaysians a future that is beyond UMNO-Barisan Nasional.

In GE2013, Pakatan dominated the urban seats by winning 46 out of 53 (87%). We came close to winning almost half of the semi-urban seats (33 out of 69 or 48%). We only managed to win 10% of rural seats. (Table 1 below)

Table 1: Number of Urban, Semi-Urban and Rural Seats won by BN and PR in GE2013

BN

PR

TOTAL

BN%

PR%

URBAN

7

46

53

13%

87%

SEMI-URBAN

36

33

69

52%

48%

RURAL

90

10

100

90%

10%

TOTAL

133

89

222

60%

40%

If Pakatan is to win Putrajaya in GE14, we must set the target of 90/70/20 or winning 90% of urban, 70% of semi-urban and 20% of rural seats. This means that Pakatan has to win an additional 2 urban, 16 semi-urban and 10 rural seats in order to win 116 or 52% of parliament seats, assuming the number of seats stay the same. (Table 2 below)

Table 2: 90% Urban, 70% Semi-Urban and 20% Rural target for GE14

Target

# Seats (Target)

# Seats (Current)

Difference

90% Urban

48

46

2

70% Semi-Urban

48

32*

16

20% Rural

20

10

10

TOTAL

116

88*

27

(*) After losing the Teluk Intan by-election

For the DAP, this means winning semi-urban seats such as Bentong, Cameron Highlands, Alor Gajah, Labis and Tanjong Piai in Peninsular Malaysia, Bintulu in Sarawak and Sepanggar and Putatan in Sabah.

The semi-urban constituencies hold the keys to unlocking the way to Putrajaya. I wish the participants of the Semi-Urban Caucus in the DAP Policy Forum all the success as they brainstorm and plan new ideas in order for DAP and Pakatan to make further headway in the semi-urban constituencies.

(Speech at DAP Semi-urban caucus meeting on 19th September 2014 at 10 am at Merdeka Hotel, Kluang)

                This entry was posted on Friday, 19 September 2014, 11:26 am and is filed under
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