Rudyard Kipling"
“When you're left wounded on Afganistan's plains and
the women come out to cut up what remains, Just roll to your rifle
and blow out your brains,
And go to your God like a soldier”
General Douglas MacArthur"
“We are not retreating. We are advancing in another direction.”
“It is fatal to enter any war without the will to win it.” “Old soldiers never die; they just fade away.
“The soldier, above all other people, prays for peace, for he must suffer and be the deepest wounds and scars of war.”
“May God have mercy upon my enemies, because I won't .” “The object of war is not to die for your country but to make the other bastard die for his.
“Nobody ever defended, there is only attack and attack and attack some more.
“It is foolish and wrong to mourn the men who died. Rather we should thank God that such men lived.
The Soldier stood and faced God
Which must always come to pass
He hoped his shoes were shining
Just as bright as his brass
"Step forward you Soldier,
How shall I deal with you?
Have you always turned the other cheek?
To My Church have you been true?"
"No, Lord, I guess I ain't
Because those of us who carry guns
Can't always be a saint."
I've had to work on Sundays
And at times my talk was tough,
And sometimes I've been violent,
Because the world is awfully rough.
But, I never took a penny
That wasn't mine to keep.
Though I worked a lot of overtime
When the bills got just too steep,
The Soldier squared his shoulders and said
And I never passed a cry for help
Though at times I shook with fear,
And sometimes, God forgive me,
I've wept unmanly tears.
I know I don't deserve a place
Among the people here.
They never wanted me around
Except to calm their fears.
If you've a place for me here,
Lord, It needn't be so grand,
I never expected or had too much,
But if you don't, I'll understand."
There was silence all around the throne
Where the saints had often trod
As the Soldier waited quietly,
For the judgment of his God.
"Step forward now, you Soldier,
You've borne your burden well.
Walk peacefully on Heaven's streets,
You've done your time in Hell."
Ex-CJ's 'other view' and our compromised public institutions - Commander S THAYAPARAN (Retired) Royal Malaysian Navy
Monday, May 09, 2022
Malaysiakini : I will give you an example. He invites readers to ponder this
question: “Had judge Nazlan acquitted Najib, would the Bar Council issue
a similar statement?”
Now this question is part of the problem.
It is a good rhetorical trick because it implies that the Bar Council is
invested in seeing former prime minister Najib Abdul Razak in an orange
jumpsuit and that certain bodies wage their battles on partisan grounds
and align with political groups with the same agenda.
And the
question would be a legitimate one if our public institutions were truly
independent and public officials are known for their integrity. This is
not the case here.
Forget about the reality of the allegations made by former Court of Appeal judge Hamid Sultan Abu Backer about the compromised nature of the judiciary that was never investigated by the relevant authorities.
Court of Appeal judge Mohd Nazlan Mohd Ghazali
Instead,
the relevant authorities are interested in the allegations of a blogger
who has made all sorts of allegations against various political
operatives throughout his career.
So my question is, why choose to
“investigate” these particular allegations when Raja Petra Kamaruddin
has made more sensational claims before?
Not to mention that in
any functional democracy, the claims made by Hamid Sultan would be a
priority because the independence and integrity of the judiciary would
be paramount – but more importantly, the rakyat’s faith in the judiciary
needs to be safeguarded.
P Ramasamy sums it up perfectly when he wrote:
“Why are we paying so much attention to this fugitive in the UK (Raja
Petra) apart from the fact that he has links with some disgraced public
officials in the country?”
Judiciary and investigative bodies
Let us take another case when it comes to the independence and integrity of our public institutions.
When
former inspector-general of police Abdul Hamid Bador made his
allegations about a police cartel and the fact that a political
operative was using the Special Branch for political purposes, what was
the outcome of that compromised investigation?
The EAIC investigation discovered that there was nothing to see in this sorry episode.
The
landscape of the Malaysian judiciary and investigative bodies is
littered with the bloated fetid corpses of past scandals, corruption and
political malfeasances, which is why anybody making the argument that
the system should be trusted is at a disadvantage.
Honestly, it is
not as if someone like Zaid would be ignorant of the compromised nature
of the judicial, political and investigative system of this country.
Even
more so, Hamid, whose other side argument rests on the public’s beliefs
that any investigation carried out by the state is free of the taint of
political interference.
Former law minister Zaid Ibrahim
Claiming
that the free speech of people who are attempting to defend the
judiciary – however compromised they are – in the grander narrative is
simply gaslighting the rakyat
And for heaven’s sake, we had a
former law minister, Umno potentate and all-around provocateur who
claimed in 2019 that the attorney-general, chief justice and the finance
minister posts should be reserved for Malays. Anything else would mean
that the government is weak.
He said: "It is the duty of every prime minister and the government to defend the (Malay) privilege. However, the government is weak.
"Many
things that never happened before are happening now - (look at the
appointments of the) attorney-general, chief justice and finance
minister.”
And if you think that Nazri Abdul Aziz is an outlier, remember the Malay dignity congress where one of the five resolutions presented at the Malay dignity congress was:
“This
includes positions such as chief justice, attorney-general, chief
secretary, inspector-general of police, chief of defence forces and
other strategic positions such as the prime minister, deputy prime
minister, chief ministers and menteri besar, finance minister, defence
minister and education minister"
The same way that the Immigration Department ignores
an interim court order and the establishment does not consider this as
contempt of court. However, when five anonymous netizens do a drive-by
in the comments section, a news organisation is fined half a million ringgit.
This should tell us something about the compromised nature of our public institutions.
Some
folks think that gaslighting the rakyat will ameliorate the situation.
All it does is confirm our slow progress to tinpot status.
