1. The Star Online (http://thestar.com.my)
Christmas open house joy, 25 December 2009
KUALA LUMPUR: Christians held open houses Friday to celebrate Christmas, carrying on the Malaysian tradition of sharing festive occasions with family and friends.
In the federal capital, thousands of followers of the Mar Thoma Syrian Church packed the St Thomas Church in Jalan Ipoh here to celebrate Christmas with a special guest.
They were joined by international head of the church, The Most Reverend Dr Joseph Mar Thoma, for the morning service and he was later presented the Asia Pacific Brand Laureate award, the first religious leader to receive the recognition.
He received the award from Tan Sri Dr M. Mahadevan, governor of the Asia Pacific Brand Laureate Foundation.
Asked about his Christmas wish, he urged the international community, especially leaders, to seriously come up with concrete and effective plans to address climate change and environmental issues.
"It is high time they started to do something concrete and effective to address the climatic change and environment issues facing the world to prevent catastrophes in future," he told Bernama after receiving the award.
He said he was also impressed with Malaysia's commitment at the Copenhagen climate change summit to reduce the green gas emission by 40 per cent by 2020.
As much of the environmental destruction could not be undone, world leaders, especially, should commit to minimising the adversity, he said, urging Mar Thoma Church parishers worldwide to start taking environmental issues more seriously and play a role to protect the earth for future generations.
Asia-Pacific Brand Laureate chief executive officer Dr KK Johan said Dr Joseph was chosen as the recipient for his advocacy in peace and unity.
"His Grace is a very influential and respectable personality even outside the spectrum of the Mar Thoma Church. This occasion is made more significant in the spirit of Christmas today," he said.
The Mar Thomas Syrian Church is a following that began in Kerala in India with 10 million followers and 2,000 parishers worldwide and the head of the church is referred to as "Mar Thoma".
Meanwhile, in KOTA KINABALU, the celebration was in full swing although many of the Christians had returned to their hometowns.
Among the leaders who held open houses was Sabah deputy Chief Minister Datuk Seri Joseph Pairin Kitingan, at Dewan Hongkod Koisaan, Penampang, near here.
Deputy Chief Minister Datuk Yahya Hussin, who represented the chief minister, several state ministers and Barisan National component party leaders were among the 2,000-odd people, including foreign toruists, who turned up to greet him.
Yahya also attended the open house of Plantation Industries and Commodities Minister Tan Sri Bernard Dompok at the Sabah Cultural Centre, Penampang.
In KUCHING, Sarawak Social Development and Urbanisation Minister Datuk Sri William Mawan Ikom, who is also Sarawak Progressive Democratic Party president, and his wife, Julia Mawan, entertained local political leaders and state and federal government officers at their residence in Jalan Stapok Kuching.
"The Christmas open house tradition shows that the 1Malaysia practice is thriving in the country as we celebrate this day with people of other races and religions," he told reporters.
Deputy Chief Minister Tan Sri Alfred Jabu and senator Datuk Sri Empiang Jabu also held open house at the Tan Sri Datuk Amar Stephen Kalong Ningkan Betong Hall, about 250km from here.
In MALACCA, Chief Minister Datuk Seri Mohd Ali Rustam and his wife, Datin Seri Asmah Abdul Rahman, attended the Christmas open house of the Portuguese community at the Portuguese Settlement in Ujong Pasir.
The 11.2ha settlement has 118 houses and a population 1,200 people of Portuguese descent.（Bernama）
・1995-2009 Star Publications (Malaysia) Bhd (Co No 10894-D)
2．Malaysiakini.com（http://www.malaysiakini.com）
(1) Christmas: A time to share, 24 December 2009
by Dr Chris Anthony
As Malaysians of the Christian faith celebrate Christmas, it may be time to reflect of its significance in multiracial and multi-religious Malaysia. Like all other major festivals in the country, Malaysians of all ethnicity and religions must join in the celebrations of Christmas to make it a very unique practice in our multiracial nation. Let us use this occasion to share our goodwill and fellowship with those of different faiths and ethnicity.
Like all festivals, today it is rather unfortunate that, Christmas too has become so commercialised to the extent that it seems to be losing its true meaning and essence. It is being portrayed as a season of mammoth celebrations, extravagant shopping, feasts and merrymaking. Unreasonably huge amounts of money are channeled into these celebrations to promote sales and attract tourists.
While it may be a day of joy but there is much more than merrymaking and feasting to Christmas. It should be also a day to share our joy with others particularly the less fortunate in our midst regardless of race or creed.
It is also the time to seek forgiveness from those we hurt and grant forgiveness to those who hurt us. It is a time to bring some cheer to those who need it most; the lonely, the sick and the hungry.
Our nation is undergoing some tumultuous times politically and socio-economically. It is also undergoing some difficult and trying times with regards to inter-racial and inter-religious relations among its people of diverse ethnicity.
While there is more maturity and awareness among the people for the need for racial integration, there is still much more to be done to foster that unity. We must work to create a mindset among our people, especially the young, to accept each other as equal citizens despite our differences in color, creed and culture.
As we celebrate this Christmas in peace, let us not forget the millions who are suffering due to religious and racial conflicts all over the world. As Christians, let us advocate the common brotherhood of the human race in our own little way in our own little world around us in our community. Each of us may be just a tiny drop in the ocean but together we form the ocean itself.
Like all other festivals, Malaysians must use Christmas to promote better understanding and goodwill among the various communities. It is a time to put aside our differences and come together to celebrate the day with mutual respect for one another's traditions and culture.
We may be a nation of diverse cultures but we are all Malaysians sharing a common destiny, good or bad.
(2) Najib wants generosity, compassion during Christmas, 25 December 2009
Prime Minister Najib Abdul Razak hopes that Malaysians, regardless of faith, can demonstrate their sense of generosity and compassion by extending aid to those who needed it most.
In conjunction with Christmas today, the prime minister in his blog said that those who needed the aid most included those who were infirm and those who were poor who depended on the country's ever-present emergency services.
"In this spirit of generosity, we ought also to demonstrate kindness towards our natural environment. A greener Christmas can be had.
"For example, by passing on unwanted gifts, packaging presents in recycled wrapping paper and using Christmas lights sparingly.
"This festive season, as enjoyable as it is, can produce excesses, even in these financially less liberating times," Najib said.
However, he believed that for the Christians, this season marked a time to spread goodwill and cheer, particularly among the less fortunate.
The prime minister said Christmas also offered the people yet another opportunity to unwind amidst the comfort of family, friends and neighbours.
Najib also pointed out that Christmas gave an opportunity to the people to reach out to other members of the community.
"Like the Hari Raya before it, why not use the occasion to bring together guests from different backgrounds under one roof?
"On this note, I wish all celebrating this most special day a joyous, peaceful and harmonious Christmas," he said.
(Bernama)
(3) Malaysia's Santa Claws, 23 December 2009
by Dean Johns
The majority of them may not be Christians, but you have to hand it to the boys and girls of BN. They're so generous with gifts for themselves, their cronies and supporters that they seem to celebrate Christmas every day of the year.
For decades they've been giving themselves all the goodies they could get their claws on, feasting on the fat of the land and generally having a merry old time at the expense of the very people they treat like turkeys, the long-suffering rakyat.
It's always Christmas in the tree trade for the BN's clique of timber tycoons; the cash never stops jingling into the coffers of BN's favourite builders of concrete jungles; it's forever ho, ho, ho for BN in the judiciary and civil service. And, though there's not a reindeer in sight, BN's so-called law enforcement agencies keep routinely slaying 'suspects'.
Given Malaysia's hot and humid climate, even BN, with all the rakyat's cash at its command, can't dream of a classic white Christmas.
But it does do a massive snow-job on itself by means of monopolistic mainstream media all dedicated to blanketing awareness, criticism and opposition with blizzards of disinformation - so that most of BN's gifts to themselves remain a total mystery to the actual givers, the ever-generous Malaysian people, and news of others manages to escape only years later.
Take the news that just emerged of the 'disappearance' of a RM50 million F-5E fighter jet engine from the Matra 1 warehouse at Sungei Besi Airbase back in 2007. The story goes, apparently, that Royal Malaysia Air Force investigators and police probed the matter at the time, and, despite the unaccountable loss of the engine, declared the RMAF's logistics system to be “foolproof”.
Foolproof or otherwise, however, Defence Minister Ahmad Zahid Hamidi claims that the armed forces have reorganised their systems since the loss, and that more frequent monitoring of procedures, inventory and control of assets has been put in place.
Despite the subsequent claim by Prime Minister Najib Abdul Razak, who was defence minister at the time of the engine disappearance, that “there was no cover-up at all”, the story in the mainstream media suspiciously keeps changing.
Ahmad Zahid at first conjectured that “the shady activity might have been carried out by staff in the lower rungs in cahoots with outsiders”, and the BN newspapers reported that police had arrested four individuals, including RMAF officers.
Then, on the same day that Najib declared that “the ministry will wait for relevant authorities to wrap up their investigations before any action is taken against the wrongdoers”, the mainstream press reported that a brigadier-general and 40 other armed forces personnel were sacked last year over their involvement in the theft, but that the brigadier-general had retained his pension.
Of course the RMAF jet engine is just a trinket, and the confusion surrounding its cover-up a mere trifle, compared with the lavishness of the gifts and the massive efforts, allegedly including the C4 murder of Altantuya Shaariibuu, involved in Scorpene submarine, Sorkoi fighters and other deals done while Najib was defence minister.
Environmental atrocities
And now, not satisfied with his performance as Santa Claws on the domestic scene, Najib's gone global in a bid to make Christmas 2009 BN's biggest bonanza yet.
Having never previously paid any more than lip-service to environmental concerns, he seized on the UN Climate Change Conference in Copenhagen as a golden opportunity to turn carbon into cash.
Making the utterly unfounded commitment that Malaysia would reduce its carbon dioxide emissions to 40 percent of 2005 levels by 2020, he immediately homed-in on the cash with the disclaimer that his government's climate-control efforts would be “conditional upon receiving transfer of technology and adequate financing from the developed world”.
Rejecting the US$10 billion (RM34 billion) fast-track funding for developing nations as “too small”, he “suggested a US$200 billion (RM680 billion) fund be set up first before it later goes above US$800 billion (RM2.7 trillion).
What a Christmas bonus a cut of that sort of cash would be for the robber-barons of BN!
And what a windfall on top of the estimated RM100 billion squandered going by Barry Wain's calculation - or US$100 billion if you go with Morgan Stanley in Singapore - courtesy of the rakyat.
Now BN's Malaysia has the perfect rationale for failing in its long-stated aim to be a developed nation by 2020. In fact it can keep going backwards and be paid for its lack of progress.
No plan for cutting exhaust emissions - and increasingly horrific traffic jams - by investing public money into proper public transportation systems instead of using it to line BN pockets. No interest in stopping BN-connected timber tycoons from raping and pillaging rainforests everywhere from Malaysia to Indonesia, Papua New Guinea and the Pacific Islands.
In fact the more environmental atrocities BN and its cronies continue to permit and commit, as Najib must reason, the more the 'devloped world' will pay.
If I was Najib, however, I wouldn't break out the streamers and tinsel and start celebrating this windfall just yet.
There are dozens of countries competing for carbon-reduction cash that are far, far poorer than Malaysia. And even more poorly-governed, as hard as it is to imagine a regime even ghastlier and more grasping than BN.
Najib's new best friend communist China, for example, is clearly counting on grabbing the lion's share of an goodies on offer for greenhouse gas reduction. Then, in competition for the rest of the spoils, there's India, the whole of Africa, most of South America and a good many of Malaysia's fellow members of Asean.
So if I was a member of BN I wouldn't order my new Mercedes, or draw up plans for my new mansion, or open a new Swiss bank account on the strength of Najib's pre-Christmas jaunt to Copenhagen.
He might have made a bit of a hero of himself out in the BN land, where there are still people who believe what they see on BN TV and what they read - or don't get to read - in the BN press.
But every Christmas that goes by, more and more Malaysians are sick of BN's posing as the nation's Santa Claus, and increasingly determined to escape the grip of this greedy coalition's grasping claws.
・DEAN JOHNS, after many years in Asia, currently lives with his Malaysian-born wife and daughter in Sydney, where he mentors creative writing groups. Soon to be published in Kuala Lumpur is a third book of his columns for Malaysiakini, following earlier collections 'Mad about Malaysia' and 'Even Madder about Malaysia'.
(4) Christmas story: A case of misplaced giving, 23 December 2009
by Josie M Fernandez
It is snowing in Malaysia's shopping malls. Gigantic plastic bauble-strung Christmas trees, sounds of jingle bells, santas and santarinas and a multitude of shoppers add to the festive spirit in December.
Giving and receiving are in the minds of many, the Scrooges and Oliver Twists of our society alike. Receiving party invitations, gifts and new clothes are very much on the minds of the staff and children at some shelter homes for children.
This is the time of the year they are feted at luxury hotels and presents galore arrive at the homes, which struggle to meet their day-to-day needs. Some staff have recently raised concerns about what they term as the “ excessive generosity” of corporations and individuals, particularly during festivals.
“Malaysians are very good….The kids often get sponsored for meals at (five-star hotels). But how often can they eat at (fast-food outlets)? Sometimes two or three times a week, until they get fed up of it,” says Alex, who works in a shelter home.
Misplaced patterns of charitable giving to children during festivals are raising alarm bells. Some incidents indicate that they may not be able to appreciate what they have and receive, due to excesses.
“There was an interesting incident in 2007. At Christmas, the kids got so many presents that we actually found some in the garbage bin. They threw out things they did not like, the ordinary things,” observes Alex.
This happened at the height of the global financial crisis. A different Christmas tale unfolded in the US, the world's largest economy, which was experiencing job losses, bank collapses and home foreclosures then.
Santa Claus asked a child in a department store: “What would you like for Christmas?”
The reply: “Please give my daddy back his job.”
This tugged at many hearts globally when it was captured on TV.
Is there something fundamentally wrong with how corporations exercise their corporate social responsibility (CSR) in Malaysia? Most non-governmental homes for children and women depend on CSR contributions to meet the cost of managing the shelters, and face challenges in raising the money.
The children who threw away their Christmas gifts are in a non-governmental shelter home that depends primarily on philanthropic resources. Government grants for NGO-run homes are based on about RM8 per child per day.
The annual government grant only lasts a few months. It is an endless struggle for these shelters to raise funds to meet the basic needs of those in their care. Government welfare homes are fully funded.
Deal with root causes
Do givers, particularly corporations, question why there are so many shelters and welfare homes for children in this country? We are not a nation at war, a situation that can increase the number of orphans. Traditionally, orphans were sent to shelters.
The role of children's homes have evolved. Today, shelter homes accept children who are victims of neglect, abuse or whose parents are in prison. Sometimes children may be taken to shelters by local authorities who conduct operations to rid the streets of vagrants and loiterers.
Child abuse and neglect have occurred throughout human history. 'Oliver Twist' , the great 19th century English classic by Charles Dickens, graphically relates the situation of child abuse 200 ago. Sadly, the tragedy continues .
But we need not place children who are victims of child abuse in institutions. The Malaysian government and corporations are in a position to address the root causes of child abuse.
The clinical psychologist LA Fontes points out that the problem of child neglect and abuse cannot be separated from issues of child poverty and hunger, inadequate housing and healthcare, family dysfunction, overcrowded and underfunded schools, social stress and child prostitution ('Child Abuse and Culture', 2008).
Corporations must go beyond the surface notion of merely contributing back to the community. They should not see CSR as a public relations exercise that provides photo opportunities during disasters or festivals.
The European Commission defines CSR as 'a concept whereby companies integrate social and environmental concerns in their business operations', and child abuse is a social concern.
Corporations can support effective and comprehensive long-term programmes, such as reducing poverty by improving working conditions and salaries of parents; provide for training of caregivers; and helping to increase family-support intervention activities such as parenting skills. After all, stable families create sustainable consumers who support businesses.
Support for research for effective CSR investments is a neglected area of corporate funding. Corporate Malaysia must move away from charity to more strategic philanthropic giving, while Malaysia should put in place a comprehensive set of CSR standards.
Season's Greetings to All!
・JOSIE M FERNANDEZ is currently an Asian Public Intellectual Fellow, director of Philanthropy Asia, and a researcher. She engages with Transparency International Malaysia in anti-corruption measures. An educationist, Josie moved on to citizen's advocacy as founder president of ERA Consumers and regional director (Asia Pacific) of Consumers International. She holds a masters degree in development management from the Asian Institute of Management, Philippines. Working on sustainability, philanthropy and anti-corruption actions are some of her current passions, in addition to writing. She was also a consultant editor for a book on child abuse based on three university studies and published by the Health Ministry this year.
(5) A Christmas tribute to the La Salle Brothers!, 24 December 2009
My brush with Christianity marked me for life: I was taught by the La Salle Brothers throughout my secondary education, a life-changing experience that only fellow former La Sallian students can appreciate.
I was a scraggy boy growing up on the mean streets of Kuching, very vulnerable to the street gangs that roamed my poor neighbourhood.
I had just finished by six years of Chinese primary education and a year of transition class in English, when my late mother decided to send me to the famed St Joseph's Secondary School run by the La Salle Brothers.
The first day in the English lesson was undertaken by Brother Adrian, one of those Irishmen who came across the oceans to teach us poor Sarawakian kids from their "Island of saints and scholars".
He wrote out the poem The Brooke by Lord Tennyson on the board and taught us to recite it. I still remember this poem to this day.
I had never liked English much before that, but that first English lesson made me fall in love with the language and English literature, a subject I took right up to the Cambridge School Certificate (Form Five) level. It is a love affair that stays until my old age to-day.
We used to have morning assembly before class every morning. It would start with the singing of a hymn led by the late Brother Hilary who had a particularly melodious voice, followed by prayers.
Indisciplined students assigned to wash toilets
Non-Catholic Chinese students and the Malay Muslim boys had only to stand erect at attention.
This would then be followed by the principal's announcements, and lectures on the need to study hard and excel on the sports field.
Students who came late to school did so at their own peril. The usual punishment for this and other acts of indiscipline was to be sent to wash toilets.
The La Salle Brothers were famous for their disciplinarian approach to education of course.
Corporeal punishment was the shadow that lurked waiting for the naughty boys in our midst.
The sight of the principal Brother Albinus in his long white robe with his long rotan cane sauntering through the corridor was enough to rein in the hundreds of schoolboys throughout the whole school ground.
The parents then did not mind the occasional canning of their children by the Brothers and the teachers.
In fact, parents of very problematic children would try every means to squeeze their children into SJS, especially into the boarding house, precisely with the hope of whipping their spoiled babies into shape.
I had seen with my very eyes how street gangsters had been so transformed into good students and useful citizens later.
But fear of punishment was not what motivated us to study.
The Brothers created a community spirit among teachers and students and challenged us to our task at hand with the same kind of their single-mindedness with which they dedicated themselves to their vocation.
It was a challenge to which we could only respond with enthusiasm.
The challenge to excel was not limited to academic performance only; we were expected to do well in all extra-curricular activities, especially in sports and games.
As the principal Brother Albinus would harangue us, day in and day out, we were expected to return to school in the early afternoon, to take the various free extra classes, or spend the hours reading and studying in the school library.
After that, at about four thirty, we all had to turn out on the school field, to play one game or other.
Naturally, our school team emerged champion in all inter-school competitions in athletics and games, except in basketball and table-tennis, which were often won by Chinese schools.
The La Salle Brothers treated students of all races equally, and they had never made any attempt to convert anybody to their religion.
They were dedicated to their cause: to provide education to poor students, without regard to creed or colour.
All the students instinctively knew it, and followed their leadership to the hilt.
Naturally, all the students studied in the classroom and played on the fields together without the kind of racial or religious polarisation and compartmentalisation so cancerous in Malaysian society to-day.
Later on in my years in Form Six, I too checked into the boarding house, and it was then I truly realised the austerity of the Brothers' daily life.
They lived in very spartan rooms, and ate very simple meals. They rose long before sunrise, and spent hours praying, before they went to church for the morning mass.
Then they spent the whole day, teaching in the morning, and supervising student activities in the afternoon, before retiring to prepare lessons and mark papers.
Fading away of the Brotherhood
They did this day in and day out, for decades on end.
I was to learn from them that before they entered the Brotherhood, they had to take the vows of chastity, poverty and absolute obedience.
Only with very strong religious faith can you become a La Salle Brother indeed.
Then some time in the early 1980s, the Brothers decided to hand over the management of St. Joseph's Secondary School to lay teachers.
The school was increasingly coming under the thumb of the education ministry.
In any case, the La Salle order was established some 300 years ago to provide education for the poor, and Malaysia by that time was not considered poor anymore.
Every Christmas, my thoughts always turn to the La Salle Brothers who had shaped my character and infected my love for literature and learning in my most formative years.
Those were the happiest most care-free years of my life. I had learned much more than knowledge from them; I had learned about giving something of myself to others and to causes much larger than myself.
I had learned about the Goodness of God.
So Merry Christmas and may God bless you, Brother Albinus in Sarawak, Brother Columba in Ireland, Brother Adrian, Brother Mark and Brother Hyacinth wherever you are!
As for Brother Henry and Brother Hilary who had passed away, may your soul rest in eternal peace in God's loving embrace!
(Sim Kwang Yang can be reached at kenyalang578@hotmail.com )
(End)
