As You Sow, So Will You Reap

Singapore used to be a Chinese educational bastion for Southeast Asia with the most comprehensive Chinese-language educational system. But the deviation of its educational policy had changed everything in just two to three decades. Nanyang University, a leading Chinese university in Southeast Asia for 25 years, became part of the history in 1980. As nearly 100% of students were enrolled in English stream primary schools, English became the first language for all primary and secondary schools in Singapore. Since then, Chinese education had basically disappeared from Singapore, leaving only Chinese language teaching.
Under such a circumstances, the Chinese language standard of the new generation of Chinese Singaporeans is low, it is not surprising even to hear some of them saying: “I hate Chinese.”
However, the Singapore government has carried out many reforms in Chinese language teaching over the past 40 years. A Chinese speaking campaign has also been carried out with the hope to change the habit of speaking dialects in Chinese families and make Chinese a common language for them.

"Standing on the opposite shore, we are watching the decline of Chinese education in Singapore."

However, just as Singaporean scholar Lee Guan Kin said: “The closures of Chinese primary and secondary schools, as well as the Nanyang University, together with the deviations of the bilingual educational system had rapidly deteriorated the soil quality of Chinese language and culture in Singapore, causing a significant cultural gap phenomenon.”
Therefore, a few decades after the Chinese speaking campaign was launched, even though the country is now having fewer Chinese Singaporeans who speak dialects, Chinese is still unable to replace dialects as the communication language in Chinese families. Instead, there is a rapid increase in the number of Chinese students speaking English at home. The latest data shows that the number of students who speak English at home has increased to the current 60% from 10% in 1980.
What are the far-reaching impact when Chinese families are no longer the mainstream? An editorial from Zaobao said that Singapore may someday become a single English society.
Singapore's Minister Mentor Lee Kuan Yew is aware of the seriousness of the crisis, he said that they should start from the actual situation of the students, including to teach Chinese in English and having more creative Chinese teaching methods to enhance student's interest in Chinese language.
Standing on the opposite shore, we are watching the decline of Chinese education in Singapore. We always think that the fundamental factor that causes the problem is the status of Chinese language in the country. Although the rapid rise of China has made the Singapore government to encourage its people to learn Chinese and improve their Chinese teaching methods, it is worth pondering whether it is correct to learn Chinese based on the motive of economic interests instead of emphasising the language's cultural value and meaning.
The Singapore government had neglected Chinese while the Malaysia government had neglected English over the past few decades and clearly, they had paid a heavy price for their educational policies. This is what we called “it is easy to damage but it is hard to build” and “as you sow, so will you reap”! (By LIM MUN FAH/Translated by SOONG PHUI JEE/Sin Chew Daily)

Mukhriz's Marshall Dream

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Dark cloud looms over the sky of Kota Siputeh in Kedah. An election war is imminent.
On the one side, UMNO vows to keep its fortress intact, and consolidate its position to recapture the state.
On the other side, PAS is all set to take the enemy's bridgehead, and keep its prize safely in hand.
Both sides are rubbing their fists, ready to wage an all-out war against the other.
The UMNO camp has the advantages of unbeatable ammunition, supplies and manpower as well as superfluous confidence, but is unfortunately plagued by the presence of a multitude of minor warlords who have been fighting one another for so long without a competent general to lead the pack.
Mohd Shafie Apdal, the vice general of the UMNO camp, indeed has done an excellent job retaining Sabah and gets rewarded with the mandate to lead the troops in Kedah. But he does not seem to fit in so well in the state, and has problems giving out his commands.
The warlords in the state are going on their businesses separately, each having his own plans while trying to bog down on the rest of the pack.
The chief has run out of ideas, and does not have the least clue as to whom he should send to the battleground.
A lesser admiral comes out of the blue, yelling, "With the situation getting intensely critical, who else should you send if not me? Please let me go to the war front so that I can slay the enemy for the party!"
At a closer look, the lesser admiral is none other than Mukhriz himself. A member of the notable Mahathir clan, this young admiral is eyeing to parallel his father's achievements with the ambitious hope of subjugating the entire nation one day.
That said, in the battle for the Youth chair, he lost to another powerful admiral Khairy Jamaluddin.
But given his pre-eminent birth and his father's lofty status, the party has nonetheless offered him a deputy ministerial post in spite of his defeat.
That offering has not allowed him to play a more significant role, as he has a superior that makes all the key decisions while his subordinates are few and distanced. This, coupled with the absence of a party post, has slowly shut him out of the mainstream and obscured his future outlook.
The by-election in Kota Siputeh indeed provides a much awaited opportunity for him.
Even if he gets elected, he is nothing more than just a state assemblyman without much administrative authority. And to trade his deputy ministerial post for the new position is proven to be a sacrifice too large to make.
Looking from another perspective, his potentials are restricted in the central government, and to get promoted to a full-fledged minister remains a distant wish. Moreover, to get tied down to the central government may set him apart from the grassroots and quash his effort of flexing his muscles in his very own home ground.
If he turns to his home state of Kedah, he has all it takes to maximise his influences. Once the war in Kota Siputeh is won, he can look forward to a more sustainable operation despite the lowly prize he will bag.
Although Kedah has a fair share of warlords, it lacks a discernible general. This is where the young admiral can put his potentials into play.
As if that is not enough, if BN recaptures Kedah some day, with not many rivals of comparable strength around him, Mukhriz can very safely claim the state administrative helm.
Why not? Take a look at the current BN chief marshal Najib. He started with a minor post in the central government before returning to his home state and establishing his career just to pave the way for his ascension up the corporate ladder in the central government later.
Mukhriz has got his plan formulated, and is all the more eager to put it into implementation.
Deputy marshal Muhyiddin has seen through Mukhriz's desire. He has his own set of plans and has turned down Mukhriz's offer.
A bucket of cold water gets poured onto the head of Mukhriz, splattering all his fantasies of ascending to the throne. (By TAY TIAN YAN/Translated by DOMINIC LOH/Sin Chew Daily)

Barack Obama In Asia

The Pacific (and pussyfooting) president

Nov 19th 2009
From The Economist print edition

America’s president shows an alarming lack of self-confidence. So does China’s

AP

FOR some critics of Barack Obama, America’s dependence on China as the holder of some $800 billion of its government debt is to blame for what they see as a humiliating visit there this week. He preferred heaping praise on China’s achievements to hectoring its leaders about its shortcomings. Other critics went further and saw this emollient approach as in keeping with similar embarrassments elsewhere on his Asian tour. In Japan, he bowed deeply to Japan’s Emperor Akihito. In Singapore he attended a meeting with South-East Asian leaders including the prime minister of the repellent Burmese dictatorship.

Over Japan and Myanmar, the sniping was misplaced. Japan, an important ally, deserves present-day courtesy whatever its past crimes. Isolating Myanmar has benefited no one.

On China, too, Mr Obama is surely right to try to build a relationship whose premise is the need for co-operation and partnership rather than the inevitability of discord and rivalry. Rebalancing the global economy, stemming climate change and containing the nuclear ambitions of Iran and North Korea all require China-America teamwork and are in the interests of both countries and the rest of the world.
 
Mr Obama’s critics, however, are right that he could and should have spoken out more loudly for America’s principles and resisted more strongly the choreography of a visit designed to shield China’s people from his persuasive powers (see article). The president said that, although America does not seek to impose its system on other countries, it believes fundamental human freedoms are universal. Yet he refrained from more than implicit criticism of China for its refusal to respect these. And, although he urged his hosts to talk to the Dalai Lama, his refusal to meet the Tibetan spiritual leader before his trip lest it sour the atmosphere sent a dangerous signal: that America’s support for Tibetans’ rights and for human rights more generally is, as China’s leaders have always suspected, just a bargaining counter.

In China, Mr Obama’s handlers connived at a programme which saw his “town-hall meeting” in Shanghai open only to handpicked young Communists and his joint “press conference” with Hu Jintao, his Chinese counterpart, confined to statements from the leaders with no questions allowed. For observers in China, as in America, this conformity with Chinese norms seemed to confirm the relative shift of power between the two countries. It was in glaring contrast to the comparative free-for-all of the visit in 1998 by Bill Clinton, who took on President Jiang Zemin on live television.

Fear of freedom

Yet perhaps the most surprising aspect of this is not Mr Obama’s attempt to charm a potential adversary. That is what he does, from Iran to Myanmar. Rather it is China’s nervousness that is baffling. In 1998 Mr Clinton’s visit was still in the long shadow of the 1989 Tiananmen killings. Since then, China has emerged as a great global power. Its political system, it claims, has been vindicated, and it likes to talk to America as an equal, or indeed as creditor to debtor. Yet its leaders seem more petrified than ever of what might happen if its people were given unfettered access to the thoughts of an American president. This may partly reflect the paranoid style of Mr Hu. But it also reflects how much the system as a whole fears those freedoms Mr Obama should have defended more boldly.

China Holds Firm on Major Issues in Obama's Visit

Stephen Crowley/The New York Times

President Obama toured the historic Forbidden City in Beijing on Tuesday during a break from meetings with Chinese leaders.

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By HELENE COOPER

Published: November 17, 2009

BEIJING — In six hours of meetings, at two dinners and during a stilted 30-minute news conference in which President Hu Jintao did not allow questions, President Obama was confronted, on his first visit, with a fast-rising China more willing to say no to the United States.

Stephen Crowley/The New York Times

President Obama signed a guest book during his tour of the Forbidden City in Beijing on Tuesday. He has taken a conciliatory tone on his first visit to China.

On topics like Iran (Mr. Hu did not publicly discuss the possibility of sanctions), China’s currency (he made no nod toward changing its value) and human rights (a joint statement bluntly acknowledged that the two countries “have differences”), China held firm against most American demands.
With China’s micro-management of Mr. Obama’s appearances in the country, the trip did more to showcase China’s ability to push back against outside pressure than it did to advance the main issues on Mr. Obama’s agenda, analysts said.

“China effectively stage-managed President Obama’s public appearances, got him to make statements endorsing Chinese positions of political importance to them and effectively squelched discussions of contentious issues such as human rights and China’s currency policy,” said Eswar S. Prasad, a China specialist at Cornell University. “In a masterstroke, they shifted the public discussion from the global risks posed by Chinese currency policy to the dangers of loose monetary policy and protectionist tendencies in the U.S.”

White House officials maintained they got what they came for — the beginning of a needed give-and-take with a surging economic giant. With a civilization as ancient as China’s, they argued, it would be counterproductive — and reminiscent of President George W. Bush’s style — for Mr. Obama to confront Beijing with loud chest-beating that might alienate the Chinese. Mr. Obama, the officials insisted, had made his points during private meetings and one-on-one sessions.

“I do not expect, and I can speak authoritatively for the president on this, that we thought the waters would part and everything would change over the course of our almost two-and-a-half-day trip to China,” said Robert Gibbs, the White House spokesman. “We understand there’s a lot of work to do and that we’ll continue to work hard at making more progress.”

Several China experts noted that Mr. Obama was not leaving Beijing empty-handed. The two countries put out a five-point joint statement pledging to work together on a variety of issues. The statement calls for regular exchanges between Mr. Obama and Mr. Hu, and asks that each side pay more attention to the strategic concerns of the other. The statement also pledges that they will work as partners on economic issues, Iran and climate change.

But despite a conciliatory tone that began weeks ago when Mr. Obama declined to meet the Tibetan spiritual leader, the Dalai Lama, before visiting China to avoid offending China’s leaders, it remains unclear whether Mr. Obama made progress on the most pressing policy matters on the American agenda in China or elsewhere in Asia.

The president has had to fend off criticism from American conservatives that he appeared to soften the American stance on the positioning of troops on the Japanese island of Okinawa, and for bowing to Japan’s emperor.

At a regional conference in Singapore, Mr. Obama announced a setback on another top foreign policy priority, climate change, acknowledging that comprehensive agreement to fight global warming was no longer within reach this year.

Past American presidents have usually insisted in advance on some concrete achievements from their trips overseas. President Bush received vigorous endorsements of his top foreign policy priority, the global war on terrorism, during his visits to Beijing, and President Bill Clinton guided China toward joining the World Trade Organization after prolonged negotiations. When either of those presidents visited the country, China often made a modest concession on human rights as well.

This time, Mr. Hu declined to follow the lead of President Dmitri A. Medvedev of Russia, who, after months of massaging by the Obama administration, now says that he is open to tougher sanctions against Iran if negotiations fail to curb Iran’s nuclear program. The administration needs China’s support if tougher sanctions are to be approved by the United Nations Security Council. But during the joint appearance in Beijing on Tuesday, Mr. Hu made no mention of sanctions.

Rather, he said, it was “very important” to “appropriately resolve the Iranian nuclear regime through dialogue and negotiations.” And then, as if to drive home that point, Mr. Hu added, “During the talks, I underlined to President Obama that given our differences in national conditions, it is only normal that our two sides may disagree on some issues.”

White House officials acknowledged that they did not get what they wanted from Mr. Hu on Iran but said that Mr. Obama’s method would yield more in the long term. “We’re not looking for them to lead or change course, we’re looking for them to not be obstructionist,” one administration official said.

In a meeting in Beijing with a senior Chinese official on Wednesday morning, Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton again pressed China on Iran. She told the official, Dai Bingguo, that even if China had not decided what sanctions on Iran it would accept, “you need to send a signal,” said a senior American official, who spoke on condition of anonymity so he could describe the exchange.

Mr. Obama did not appear to move the Chinese on currency issues, either. China has come under heavy pressure, not only from the United States but also from Europe and several Asian countries, to revise its policy of keeping its currency, the renminbi, pegged at an artificially low value against the dollar to help promote its exports. Some economists say China must take that step to prevent the return of large trade and financial imbalances that may have contributed to the recent financial crisis.

Mr. Obama on Tuesday could only cite China’s “past statements” in support of shifting toward market-oriented exchange rates, implying that he had not extracted a fresh commitment from Beijing to move in that direction soon.

There are many reasons the White House may have heeded China’s clear desire for a visit free of the polemics that often accompany meetings between leaders of the two countries. Mr. Obama’s foreign policy is rooted in recasting the United States as a thoughtful listener to friends and rivals alike. “No we haven’t made China a democracy in three days — maybe if we pounded our chest a lot that would work,” Mr. Gibbs said in an e-mail message on Tuesday night. “But it hasn’t in the last 16 years.”

Kenneth Lieberthal, a Brookings Institution scholar who oversaw China issues in President Clinton’s White House, agreed. “The United States actually has enormous influence on popular thinking in China, but it is primarily by example,” he said. “If you go to the next step and say, ‘You guys ought to be like us,’ you lose the impact of who you are.”

The National Security Council’s spokesman, Michael A. Hammer, added, “What we did come to do is speak bluntly about the issues which are important to us, not in an unnecessarily offensive manner, but rather in the Obama style of showing respect.”

Mr. Obama, even as he projected a softer image, did nudge the Chinese on some delicate issues.
On Tuesday, standing next to Mr. Hu, Mr. Obama brought up Tibet, where Beijing-backed authorities have clamped down on religious freedom. “While we recognize that Tibet is part of the People’s Republic of China, the United States supports the early resumption of dialogue between the Chinese government and representatives of the Dalai Lama to resolve any concerns and differences that the two sides may have,” he said.

Congratulations Mr Ambassador

My cousin Dato Paduka Yusof Abdul Hamid after presenting his credentials as Ambassador of Negara Brunei Darussalam to the President of the United States of America. In the photo above he is with President Barrack Obama.

Bukti Pemilikan Saham Dan Wang Azmin-isteri : Bekas Setiausaha Sulit Anwar "pecah lubang"

Jika selama ini ia hanya cakap-cakap, pagi Selasa bekas Setiausaha Sulit (SUS) Datuk Seri Anwar Ibrahim di Kementerian Kewangan (1996-1998), Anuar Shaari tampil mengemukakan salinan asal dokumen pemilikan saham dan penyata akaun bank Azmin Ali dan isterinya Shamsidar Tahrin.

Dengan dokumen itu, beliau kemudiannya membuat laporan polis kepada Bahagian Jenayah Perdagangan PDRM di Bukit Persekutuan, Kuala Lumpur.

Pada sidang media sebelum membuat laporan polis, Anuar berkata, dokumen yang mengandungi bukti pemilikan saham sebanyak RM2 juta milik Azmin dan Shamsidar serta penyata akaun bank Shamsidar sebanyak RM8 juta akan diserahkan kepada polis untuk menentukan kesahihan dokumen terseut dan seterusnya melakukan siasatan.

“Saya datang pada hari ini untuk mencari kebenaran bukannya hendak menghukum. Masyarakat hendak tahu kebenaran isu yang kini hangat diperkatakan termasuk para penyokong Anwar, Datin Seri Dr Wan Azizah dan Azmin.

“Wan Azizah sendiri mesti hendak tahu kenapa Shamsidar boleh mempunyai saham dan wang sebanyak itu,” katanya.

Anuar tampil membuat laporan polis berkenaan ekoran isu pemilikan saham yang didakwa melibatkan Azmin dan Shamsidar heboh diperkatakan kebelakangan ini. Anwar dan Azmin sebelum ini telah tampil menafikan ada memiliki saham seperti yang didakwa.

Anuar selain pernah menjadi SUS bagi tempoh 1996 hingga 1998, juga pernah menjadi Setiausaha Politik kepada Presiden PKR, Wan Azizah dan Ketua Bahagian PKR Permatang Pauh sebelum keluar meninggalkan parti itu pada tahun 2007.

Menurut Anuar beliau membuat pendedahan ini kerana ia juga ada kaitan dengan Anwar memandangkan semasa perolehan saham dan wang tersebut yang berlaku pada tahun 1992 hingga 1994, Azmin bertugas sebagai Setiausaha Sulit Kanan kepada Anwar yang pada ketika itu Menteri Kewangan dan Timbalan Perdana Menteri.

“Saya minta kepada nama-nama yang disebut ini jangan panik kerana kita hendak mencari kebenaran. Jangan nanti timbul pula dakwaan wujudnya konspirasi atau saya dibayar untuk membuat pendedahan ini,” ujar beliau.

Mengenai pendedahan itu, Anuar berkata, jumlah yang dinyatakannya itu adalah selari dengan apa yang diperkatakan sekarang.

Ditanya kenapa setelah sekian lama baru pendedahan ini hendak dibuat, Anuar berkata, beliau hanya akan membuat penjelasan itu kepada pihak polis. –  Agendadaily (17/11/2009)

Sifat Kasih Sayang Dan Saling Menghormati Sesama Insan

Didalam kehidupan kita sehari-hari kita harus mempunyai sifat sayang menyayangi dan hormat menghormati sesama kita.

Sifat kasih sayang ini termasuklah menghormati sesama insan. Kita hormati orang-orang yang lebih tua dari kita. Kita muliakan orang yang berilmu dan kita hendaklah menyayangi kanak-kanak.

Segala keperluan sahabat dan rakan, kita cuba penuhi yang termampu oleh kita. Apa-apa pertolongan yang mereka minta yang munasabah dan terdaya kita cubalah beri bantuan.

Kalau ada saudara-mara atau rakan taulan yang sakit kita hendaklah cepat-cepat menziarahi mereka. Bawalah hadiah atau buah tangan untuk diberikan supaya mereka merasa terhibur denganan kedatangan kita menziarahi mereka yang tidak sihat itu.

Adalah dikatakan bahawa rahmat Allah akan turun kepada orang-orang yang menziarahi orang sakit.

Begitu juga jika kita bersama-sama menjaga orang yang sakit itu, rahmat Allah akan menyelubungi kehidupan kita. Alangkah bertuahnya orang yang bersifat kasih sayang yang diselubongi oleh rahmat Allah seperti ini.

Jiwa kita akan tenang. Tidak ada kerisauan. Kerisauan inilah punca 'stress' dan tekanan kehidupan dunia moden ini.

Stress adalah punca banyak penyakit seperti penyakit jantung, angin akmar dan barah.

Bila seseorang itu mengasihi dan senantiasa memaafkan kesilapan saudara mara dan rakan taulannya tentulah hidupnya akan jadi tenang dan tiada apa-apa yang menggangu fikirannya.

Ia bersangka baik kepada semua orang. Ia merasa dia yang bersalah bukan orang lain. Ia merasa dialah yang penuh kekurangan bukan orang lain. Orang lain semuanya baik-baik dan sempurna. Dia yang perlu memperbaiki akhlaknya yang masih serba kekurangan.

Dia banyak diam dari bercakap. Dia senantiasa cuba mengislah dirinya. Memperbetulkan dirinya.

The dilemmas of PAS and DAP and the problems in PKR

The dilemma of PAS is that there are two factions in the party. Kelantan PAS leaders want Anwar Ibrahim to be Prime Minister if Pakatan were to win the next General Elections schedule for year 2013.

Whereas PAS leaders from outside Kelantan want their own President, Hadi Awang ,and not Anwar, to be the PM of the Pakatan Rakyat government.

So the talks on unity government between PAS and UMNO was not really the issue. The real issue is whether Anwar Ibrahim or Hadi Awang should be the PM if Pakatan wins majority in Parliament.

In the case DAP it is more than willing, for obvious reasons, to accept Anwar as PM. But Anwar is facing charges of homosexuality in the courts and the case is coming up. If Anwar is convicted there will be serious political implications to Pakatan. There is no other leader as charismatic in PKR like Anwar. Wan Azizah is known to be a weak leader. Azmin is still considered too young unless tomorrow suddenly Anwar makes him the MB of Selangor. Then he will have some track record to speak of.

The big question facing DAP is that will they accept Hadi Awang as PM? Logically they should because any goverment in Malaysia should be Malay based in order to be legitimate and stable. This is because Malays make up 60% of the population.

Meanwhile in PKR there are many problems facing the party. A lot of peoples who have contributed one way or another since during the Reformasi days were sidelined. People Ezam, Nallakarupan, Zainab in Penang , Christina Liew in Sabah were pushed aside in favour of certain Anwar's blue-eyed boys.

During reformasi days Ezam and Nallakaruppan had been arrested under ISA and had to suffer a lot both physically and pychologically due to their association and loyalty to Anwar. But once Anwar was released they felt the indignity of being pushed away from centre positions. Only certain people are being taken care of by Anwar and remain in his inner circles.

The latest bombshells were the resignation of Jeffrey Kitingan as Vice President of PKR and Christina Liew as PKR Supreme Council member. Christina was quoted as saying that her past contributions to PKR were not appreciated by current leaders in PKR. This was also the contention of Ezam, Nallakaruppan and Zainab from Penang.

This says much about the Machiavellian nature of the top leadership in PKR.

Then Badrul Hisham left PKR and becomes a BN friendly State Assemblyman of Pelabuhan Kelang in the Selangor State Assembly. What more is to come? Wait and see. The drama is not over yet.

Should the Malays be given more scholarships under 1Malaysia?

I would be writing more details on this later but at this stage I want to state this. My understanding of Article 153 of The Federal Constitution is that when a Malay student gets admitted to a university he is automatically entitle to a scholarship.

The Constitution clearly enshrine this under its Article 153.

My humble opinion is that under the 1Malaysia this is the best time for the Government to reintroduce back to the Malays the educational facilities that are provided to them under the Federal Constitution.

Malaysia's chameleon

The Economist in its issue dated 30 July 2009 described Anwar as a chameleon. There are many implications facing him and his party with the upcoming homosexual court charges that he faced.


BANYAN

Malaysia's chameleon

The rise, fall and rise of Anwar Ibrahim, South-East Asia’s most extraordinary politician

ONE evening in mid-July Anwar Ibrahim was deep in the rubber-tapping state of Kelantan in northern Malaysia, urging a crowd of rural folk to vote for a devout fishmonger. The candidate was from the conservative Islamic Party (PAS). A tiny by-election for the state assembly PAS already dominates is ordinarily small beer (or would be, if PAS allowed such a beverage, which it does not). But Mr Anwar needs PAS. For the paradox is that without the Islamists, the alliance he leads of Malay modernisers, Indians and secular Chinese has little chance of driving the ruling United Malays National Organisation (UMNO) from power. The coalition that UMNO dominates has ruled Malaysia since independence in 1957. Mr Anwar longs for UMNO’s destruction. The feeling is mutual.

That morning, Mr Anwar had been in Perth where he had met Australia’s foreign minister. What had he been doing with Stephen Smith? “Plotting,” replies Mr Anwar, with a conspiratorial wink. Mr Anwar spends a lot of time abroad with national and religious leaders whose names he drops slightly too easily into an engaging conversational style. He moves like quicksilver from one intriguing subject to the next, but you get the uncanny sense that he is speaking to what interests you.

Mr Anwar thinks he will soon need international support. Two days after stumping in Kelantan, pre-trial hearings began in a case in which Mr Anwar stands accused of sodomising a political aide “against the order of nature”. Mr Anwar vigorously denies the charges. He says he is the victim of a political stitch-up. International outrage might help him. Much is fishy about the case. Photographs of the former aide who brought the accusations show him with UMNO members, including people close to the current prime minister, Najib Razak. The charge has been changed from sexual assault to “consensual sex”, yet his accuser has not been charged. (All homosexuality is illegal in Malaysia.)

Mr Anwar has been here before. In 1998 he was charged with corruption and homosexual acts. In custody, he was beaten up by the chief of police. He spent six years in jail, mostly in solitary confinement, until his conviction was overturned. Upon release, his political career seemed over.

It is easy to forget now but for many years Mr Anwar led a charmed life. He made his name as an Islamist student leader in the 1970s and was even jailed under the draconian Internal Security Act. Then he shocked his former colleagues by joining UMNO, where his rise was spectacular. By 1993 he was deputy prime minister and heir to Mahathir Mohamad, the country’s long-serving leader. Malaysia seemed about to fall into his lap. “Ah,” says Mr Anwar, “the good old days.”

But during the Asian financial crisis of 1997-98, Mr Anwar moved too soon against his mentor, who after 16 years in power was not ready to bow out. Mr Anwar railed against the UMNO cronyism from which he had benefited. Livid, Dr Mahathir threw him out of the cabinet and launched Mr Anwar’s persecution. Mr Anwar’s reformasi movement sputtered out with his jailing.

Yet the hopes which that movement represented surged again after the general election of March 2008, and especially after August 2008 when Mr Anwar won a seat in Penang. In the election the ruling coalition lost its precious two-thirds majority which gave it power to change the constitution. It has since lost five out of six by-elections to Mr Anwar’s forces, which also control four of 13 states. In getting out its message, the opposition has been helped by an explosion of internet opinion that has undermined the influence of the UMNO-controlled mainstream media.

UMNO’s back is against the wall. Even its own officials admit to its arrogance, with corruption bound into the fabric of its power. The New Economic Policy (NEP, introduced in 1971) instituted racial preferences for majority Malays, when ethnic Chinese and Indians owned much of business. But instead of helping the poor, the NEP has enriched rent-seekers around the ruling party, while dragging down economic growth. Resentment has spread from Chinese and Indians to poor or pious Malays.

This has made possible Mr Anwar’s strange alliance. In calling for the end to the NEP, he says poor Chinese and Indians need help as much as Malays—but because there are more poor Malays than other races, they will still get the lion’s share of government help. It is a possible way out from the baneful influence of race on Malaysian politics. But the real strength of this alliance is that Mr Anwar’s charisma and political nous holds it together. Alas, that it is potential weakness, too.

Trials and tribulations

The challenges for Mr Anwar and his alliance will now multiply. For a start, Mr Najib, prime minister since April, has said the NEP must adapt, stealing some of his opponent’s thunder.

Then there is the time-consuming trial. Mr Anwar says he will win whatever the verdict. If he is acquitted, the government which brought the case will be discredited. If found guilty, tens of thousands of supporters will take to the streets. Mr Anwar hints tantalisingly at new information in a murder case that has gripped the country partly because of its links to Mr Najib. This, he suggests, gives him ammunition to fight back.

Intriguing, but it is unlikely to be enough. If Mr Anwar does go to jail, the alliance may not survive the loss of its leader. If he calls out his supporters—for something of the martyr lurks in him—he may be blamed for the ensuing chaos. And if he appeals to international opinion, his local supporters may question that.

This points to a trap waiting to catch the silver-tongued Mr Anwar, who deftly tells different audiences—religious or secular—what they like to hear. The same blogosphere that helped his meteoric rise may one day pay more attention to his chameleon qualities. Malaysians would then come to ask more closely: who and what exactly does Anwar stand for?