Indonesia's latest fatwas

For your information : Fatwa (edicts) issued by the Indonesian Religious Council (MUI) : 1. A ban on aspects of Yoga that contain Hindu elements. 2. A ban on vote abstention if ' qualified' candidates exist. 3. A ban on smoking by children and pregnant women, and in public places. 4. A ban on abortion unless the mother is a rape victim, the pregnancy endangers her life, or the foetus is aged less than five weeks. 5. A ban on vasectomy because the process is ' irreversible'. 6. A ban on marriage with minors, based on a 1974 law that forbids men under 19 and women under 16 years old from marrying. Justification for fatwa No.2 : Islam obliges Muslims to elect their leaders if the latter meet certain criteria. The criteria include - being Muslim, honest, briliant and ready to fight for the people. Nahdatul Ulama (the biggest Islamic organisation in Indonesia) disagreed that : Yoga as practised in Indonesia, was a pastime and must not be seen in a religious context. To discourage smoking, the MUI should not use ' Islamic law' as a tool. What's important is to inform the public of of the bad effects of smoking and urge the govt to enforce policies to discourage smoking. The MUI should not force people to vote, it was their democratic right to vote or not. A religious body should not dictate political behavior.

Happy Year of the Ox

To all my friends and readers I wish you a happy, prosperous and peaceful Year of the Ox. Thanks for the oranges. By the way, President Obama was born in the year of the Ox 1961. My brother , former Star reporter Adyll, was born in the Ox Year of 1949. Gong Xi Fa Chai !!!

Gitmo to be closed

US President Obama ordered the closure of the notorious Guatanemo Prison within one year. He also ordered other secret prisons to be closed. What has ex-president George W Bush gotta say about that ?

44th US President

Barack Hussein Obama was sworn in as the 44th president of the USA at 11.00 am 20/1/09 US time (our time 1.00 am 21/1/09). I watched the event on the Internet. RTM was broadcasting live, but there were too much chatter from the RTM presenter and his guests. The Internet broadcast was slower by 5 minutes, I think. Great speech by Obama, and lots of promises which we hope he can keep.

KT voters reject BN

The voters of Kuala Terengganu gave the parliament seat to PAS man A.Wahid Endut. Even though the BN with DPM Najib had dished out lots of goodies to the KT folks, they still rejected BN's man Wan Farid, by more than 2,000 votes. Najib and other federal BN leaders left town early as if they had known they were going to lose. Syabas YB Wahid and PAS.

Lina is 18 today.

Lina Masturah turns 18 today. She's one of the lucky teenagers who did not have to go to PLKN ( National service training camps). I'm quite happy with that. To pay for her driving lessons, she took a part time job in the office where brother Fahmie works. She passed her Undang-undang (highway code) test today. She's grown up now, and sooner or later I would have to give her some kind of freedom, which I hope she will use wisely and with responsibility. Remember, your mum and dad and brothers love you. Make us proud, whatever you do.

Seat belt dilemma

On New Year's Day, we drove to Alor Star to spend some time with my eldest son Firdaus and family. This is the day that the govt enforces the compulsory wearing of seat belts for back seat passengers. Initially there were five of us going. As our car, a Toyota Avanza can seat seven people, that should not be a problem. But we had to bring along Fadzlil's wheel chair. The back row seat had to be folded to carry the wheel chair, that leaves only three seats in the second row. The seating arrangement was me and Shahman, in front. Fadzlil, Milah and Lina in the second row with Shafiq, bouncing in between them (unbelted). Then, Lina decided not to go. She said it was too cramped up. Shafiq is not so little anymore and gets excited when travelling. We sent her to her friend's house to spend the day. Fahmie was working overtime, so there was no one at home. Imagine, another family with four or five kids, wanting to travel together in a Kancil or Proton Saga/Wira . Because of the heartless 'seat belt ruling', somebody got to be left behind. They wanted us Malaysians to support the local car industry. They sold us cars that are affordable for the average wage earners. Then they make this unreasonable ruling, that keeps the family separated. Now Proton will be producing MPVs to force Malaysians to buy. Is this the reason for introducing this rule ?

New Year 2009

Happy New Year 2009. 2008 is now History. Did we learn anything ? Make this year and years after this better and safer for our children and grand-children.