Tag: The Malaysian Insider

Categories
Liberty Society

[1957] Of should we pay income tax?

Why do some people refuse to pay income tax?

Perhaps the word ”˜some’ understates the gravity of the matter. The Ministry of Finance just recently shared that out of approximately two million Malaysians within taxable income bracket, only just over about half of them paid their due last year. This has prompted the Internal Revenue Board to hunt down those who have not paid their income tax yet.

It is likely that a majority of them do not actually explicitly refuse to pay their taxes. It could be a simple oversight, for instance. Indeed, there are multiple possible reasons contributing to non-payment but I am only interested in those who actually explicitly refuse to pay income tax. It is so because this question is crucial in understanding how much trust citizens have for the State, the direct benefactor of such taxes.

Before we explore the original question together further, it is imperative to understand the reasons for taxation.

From classical liberal perspective, there is no doubt that the biggest reason of all is to support the State for rendering services which in effect protect citizens and those within the jurisdiction of the State. That protection at minimum means protection of individual rights.

If the State fails to do so, the obligation to pay taxes evaporates. In fact, failure on behalf of the State to protect these rights eliminates a reason for such a State. This later calls for the creation of a new State capable of discharging its duties better, lest the dissolution of the previous incompetent or tyrannical State leads to an unstable state of anarchy.

This is part of a social contact between citizens and the State as embraced by classical liberals, henceforth libertarians.

Within Malaysian context, the State or the Barisan Nasional-led federal government in many cases has failed to protect various individual rights. Worse, the State itself has in the past threatened and actually infringed on the rights of its citizens.

To be fair, the current administration has so far refrained from doing so and seems to have given some commitment to continue the trend of restraint. How long will that restraint persists is anybody’s guess. We are after all still too early in the days of Najib administration to be confident of anything.

Notwithstanding the question of fairness, the Najib administration is still a BN-led government and the BN-led government has developed a very bad reputation among various groups in Malaysia.

That bad reputation affects classical liberals’ willingness to contribute to the State’s coffer in no little way. Why should libertarians contribute to the State which has the reputation of infringing on private citizens’ rights? To contribute is idiotic and libertarians are not so idiotic.

The unwillingness of libertarians to pay taxes is enhanced further on the economic front. This tax money will in one way or another financed State’s enterprises which will inevitably compete against private enterprises. Why should business owners support their competitors? I will not pursue this point further in hope that I do not digress from the main point and that I do not complicate the flow of thought here unnecessarily. I believe a focus on civil liberty will be sufficient to demonstrate my point clearly.

Admittedly, there are not so many libertarians in Malaysia and therefore, a libertarian explanation does not come even near in explaining comprehensively why so many people refuse to pay their income tax.

The more all encompassing answer probably relates to trust citizens — or more specifically individual taxpayers — maintain for the BN-led government. When seen from this angle, the libertarian answer forms as a subset to a larger explanation.

The trust is associated with the manner which BN-led government manages the tax money. Here, again, the reputation of the BN-led government does not shine and sucks in unsavory adjectives.

Corruption is seen as rampart. Observe the Auditor-General reports highlighting multiple suspicious dealings which include a screwdriver with an astronomical price tag. Has any action been taken to allay such suspicion? Have any culprits been taken to task?

The answer is a resounding no.

More recently, three prominent UMNO members were convicted of corruption by their own political party. Surprisingly, they were allowed to contest for party positions. One of them even went on to win an important party post. Another continues to hold a Chief Minister post.

If the party that leads the state government is seen as corrupted, there is no reason to expect the state government is clean. The same logic goes for the federal government. Does this encourage trust?

The answer is yet again a resounding no.

And then there is the abuse of power, characterized by the slogan ”Satu lagi projek Kerajaan Barisan Nasional”. There is a tendency among BN politicians to obfuscate the difference between the State or the government and political party. This tendency can be seen during by-elections when the BN unabashedly spends millions of ringgit of public money as part of its campaigns, be it in form of direct cash handouts or newly paved road.

BN has no qualms in using state machineries for its benefits. They without guilt consider government machineries as their own private property.

During the last UMNO General Assembly, a delegate made parallel the Malaysian Anti-Corruption Commission to a dog turning around to bite its master’s hand. That is a highly inappropriate statement and yet, it is hard to imagine if UMNO members attending the assembly saw any problem with that statement.

The best example of obfuscation yet is the nature of Radio Televisyen Malaysia. Despite being a public institution, it is woefully a mouthpiece of BN. To understand further how badly the function of RTM has been abused by BN, a comparison with the National Public Radio in the United States of America and the British Broadcasting Corporation in the United Kingdom is necessary.

Both the NPR and the BBC are public institutions like RTM. Unlike RTM however, both the NPR and the BBC serve public interest, not the interest of the ruling political party. This can be proven by its independence and largely neutral reporting as far as local politics are concerned.

RTM lamentably is just one institution which has been abused by BN. There are others like KEMAS, the police and the civil service. Many times whenever I listen to members of these institutions speak, I wonder if I were listening to the government or to BN.

So, given the corruption, the abuse of power and disrespect for individual rights, why should taxes be paid? These money are paid to fund wrongdoings.

When a group of people believe that the government does not belong to them and instead belong to someone else which they do not identify with, the group of people will hold that they do not have a stake in the government or the State. When they do not believe that they have a stake in the State, then they will have no moral obligation to support the State, i.e. pay taxes.

Even if this group paid their taxes, it is only akin to paying protection money to some parasitic thugs.

The antidote for this is simple: convince a majority of taxpayers that they do have a stake in the State. This can be done by making public institutions independent and free of political bias. Make these institutions accountable to them and not to political parties. Such setup is working in the US and the UK and there is no reason for it not to work in Malaysia.

Trust me, income tax collection will go up leap and bound if people feel they do have a stake in the State. More so if they actually feel proud about their State.

Mohd Hafiz Noor Shams. Some rights reserved Mohd Hafiz Noor Shams. Some rights reserved Mohd Hafiz Noor Shams. Some rights reserved

First published in The Malaysian Insider on April 20 2009.

Mohd Hafiz Noor Shams. Some rights reserved Mohd Hafiz Noor Shams. Some rights reserved Mohd Hafiz Noor Shams. Some rights reserved

nb — a lot of people at The Malaysian Insider failed to differentiate between positive (descriptive) and normative (prescriptive) statements. This article is a positive article, not a normative article.

Many thought that I was advocating for all to not to pay income tax (normative). On the contrary, I am only offering a reason why nearly a million people do not pay their income tax (positive).

A person try to imply that I am against the idea of taxation. No, I said not such thing. This article is not an opposition to the idea of taxation in general. Again, it is only an effort at suggesting several reasons why many individuals do not pay their income tax. It is not an advocate of shirking from responsibility of every citizens.

Remember the positive-normative dichotomy. If you failed to comprehend the positive-normative dichotomy, then you might misunderstand the message.

Categories
ASEAN Conflict & disaster Politics & government Society

[1951] Of we do not want to go down the path Thailand is on

Thailand has been a popular role model for monarchists in Malaysia, who believe that the monarchy has the potential to be the umpire for an increasingly competitive Malaysian democracy. Now that Thailand again finding itself in shambles, the same Malaysian monarchists are no longer quite as willing to cite our neighbor up north. For others like me, who have always been uncomfortable with the idea of an activist monarchy, this reaffirms our commitment to organic politics.

Thailand finds itself in a quagmire because its government refuses to return to the Thai people to earn mandate to govern. Rather than appealing to the electorates, the ruling class preferred a top-down approach to legitimize their grip to power.

In a society that stresses great respect for the monarch, appealing to the monarchy may be the best way to obtain the mandate to rule. It is hard to ignore the influence of the Thai King over the Thai people. In discussing the politics of Thailand, various publications inevitably work extra hard to remind all of that fact.

Slowly however after a series of unending political conflicts, the reverence for the King may be slowly becoming irrelevant. The latest episode of uprising may finally force a rethink of that reverence as the red-shirted Thai people — Thaksin supporters — organize themselves to confront the yellow-shirted royalists, who are Abhisit’s supporters.

There were multiple opportunities for those holding power to return to the Thai people ever since the military coup d’etat against the Thaksin administration in 2006. Each time the opportunity arrived, however, the yellow shirts — he People’s Alliance for Democracy (PAD) and supporters of the current Thai Prime Minister Abhisit Vejjajiva — misused that opportunity. They either appealed to the monarchy — at the expense of democracy — or pressured the government that they disliked to step down without returning to the ballot boxes fairly.

PAD did this because they know they cannot win a general election fairly.The rural population makes up the majority in Thailand and the ousted Thai Prime Minister Thaksin Shinawatra, together with his allies, are popular in the rural areas.

The politics of Thailand is more or less defined by this rural-urban divide, with allowance for those in the south who aligned themselves to the urban elites. The urban elites — almost synonymous to the educated class — align themselves with the royalists. Tyranny of the majority is a real concern when the majority is bent on threatening the rights of the minority. Such majoritarianism is distasteful.

To address such majoritarianism, a liberal democracy where individual rights are secured is required.

But distaste for crass majoritarianism is one thing. Distaste for democracy is another.

What is happening in Thailand, however, is not distaste for majoritarianism but, rather, distaste for organic politics in favour of a top-down approach. The royalist elites’ low opinion of organic politics is visible when PAD proposed what they called ”a new politics”. They wanted a Parliament whose membership is not earned through the ballot boxes but granted by the King.

Such a political maneuver can only certainly disenfranchise the majority while it unduly strengthens the minority, making democracy redundant. Clearly, the word ”democracy” in PAD’s acronym is not worth much. Democracy is only a convenient empty rhetoric to PAD as well as to the Abhisit-led Democrat Party.

When the military executed the coup d’etat with blessings from the monarchy in 2006, the action was presented as an effort to save Thai democracy. At that time, this appeared to be the case and the military and the yellow-shirted masses deserved the benefit of doubt, given the issues associated with the Thaksin administration.

The involvement of the monarchy in breaking the deadlock then was immediately hailed as a wise move, even in Malaysia. Seizing the moment, Malaysian royalists argued that without the monarchy, Thailand would have descended into further chaos.

Never mind that the ones who caused the chaos, the ones who became the judge and the ones who benefited from the involvement of the monarchy were, suspiciously, from the same side — the Thai royalists and their allies, the yellow shirts.

Approximately three years have passed since that royal intervention. And as time progressed, the real effect of that coup d’tat and royal intervention has become clear.

At this juncture, neither has Thai democracy been saved nor does royal intervention appear wise. Instead, in retrospect, the intervention has worsened the situation, from protest by the elites to protest by the masses.

What is visible now as Bangkok falls into a state of emergency once again is the failure of the top-down approach. This is a direct rebuke to monarchists in Malaysia who opined earlier that the monarchy has a greater role to play in Malaysian politics.

The top-down approach and, specifically, the act of deferring to the monarchy, does not work because it does not address real organic differences that exist among the masses. These real differences can only be addressed through the will of the people and not through the will of the monarchy. The answer for Thailand is the ballot boxes and not further royal intervention.

The Thai monarchy — as well as the military, which has shown royalist tendencies — has to be taken out of the equation.

Only a free and fair election can truly break the deadlock. The losers, at the same time, must accept that result of such an election and stop trying to bring down a government that earned its mandate from the people.

Refusal to do so will prolong the chaos.

And if the losers continue to return to the monarchy to subvert the will of the majority, sooner or later that respect the majority has for the monarchy will suffer erosion. The majority will become tired of witnessing their rights being abused again and again by the royalists and the monarchy.

If that abuse happens once too often, Thailand will become a republic.

Already the majority has decided to openly challenge a side that always hides behind the Thai throne. In the past, the Thai royalists’ association with the monarchy is enough to discourage opposition, for fear of being seen to be disrespecting the King. That fear appears to be diminishing now.

For the Thai King’s own sake, he should disengage himself from Thai politics before it is too late.

In a more democratic Malaysia where the monarchy enjoys much less reverence from the people compared to our neighbor to the north, deferring to the monarchy on various issues such as languages and selection of Prime Minister is undesirable.

Unless we dream to subvert our problematic but maturing competitive democracy, and unless we want to risk the status quo for our monarchy, our country must continue to be driven by wisdom of the people.

We should not tread the path the Thais are on if we ourselves do not wish to progress — or regress — further along the evolutionary line of forms of government.

Mohd Hafiz Noor Shams. Some rights reserved Mohd Hafiz Noor Shams. Some rights reserved Mohd Hafiz Noor Shams. Some rights reserved

First published in The Malaysian Insider on April 14 2009.

Categories
Politics & government

[1948] Of the next big step is a small Cabinet

Skepticism comes naturally with broken promises. Due to disillusionment among far too many individuals under the previous administration, the words of a Barisan Nasional-led administration are close to worthless nowadays. It is, therefore, not hard to prove that the window for sloganeering for the new Prime Minister is extremely narrow. What really matters now is action, and the first step in breaking that skepticism is by assembling a Cabinet worthy of trust.

The window for sloganeering should have been shut completely if not for the role of slogans in clarifying any agenda. While catchy slogans still have a place, the agenda must first be set straight and right. In this era of extreme skepticism, doing otherwise invites disaster.

Questions on the slogan will be raised and convincing answers will not be forthcoming exactly because the slogan lacks substance. That will create disappointment, reinforcing pre-existing skepticism. Mixing skepticism with further disappointment is a surefire recipe for cynicism.

Being a skeptic, it is not hard at all to turn myself into a cynic, especially with the mainstream media acting the way they do at the moment. The mainstream media — the major printed and broadcast media — are obviously oblivious to the reason why they lost their credibility in the first place. Their coverage of the three just-concluded by-elections continue to prove that they are nothing more than individuals typically found in the dark back alleys with scant ersatz clothing soliciting for clients of dubious taste.

So early in days of the new administration, there are little clues to the actual agenda of the new Prime Minister, save an unclear slogan with no concrete definition.

”One Malaysia”, for instance, is amazingly opaque despite the untrustworthy mainstream media parading the slogan as a sign of change. Change is not about slogans but the mainstream media would have all of us believed otherwise.

There appears to be some effort by the Prime Minister to elaborate on that slogan on a piecemeal basis but, so far, it is all wishy washy. It is there in the air, warm and fuzzy but nobody can really see it. The new Prime Minister clearly has not communicated his message well.

This has made his slogans open for a gamut of interpretations, making blowback a real possibility. Already ”One Malaysia” is seen by some as a repackaged Malaysian Malaysia, striking fear in the hearts of conservative Malays. On the other side, ”One Malaysia” suggests intolerance for civil dissents and a return to Asian values where unity is promoted at the expense of liberty.

In absence of clear message, one has to look somewhere else to ascertain the agenda of the new administration. The opportunity to do just that is coming with the expected formation of a new Cabinet. The size and the membership of Cabinet will shed light on some of the new prime minister’s agenda.

The size of the new Cabinet will indicate whether the same path of big, ineffective and wasteful government is the order of the day. Under the Abdullah administration, there were 33 individuals with a seat in the Cabinet by virtue of being ministers; there were 27 ministries of various kinds.

It is easy to digest how the number of the ministries translates into a big government. The greater the quantity of ministries is, the greater the requirement for civil servants. Tremendous resources are required just to keep a bloated government running.

A large number of ministries not only suggests the large size of government. It also suggests that the role of government is wide; wide enough to smother the life of private citizens, not only with respect to civil liberty, but also in the areas of business where multiple permits and licenses are required by different ministries, as each ministry tries to justify its existence.

At the back of my head, there is a nagging feeling that these ministries were created to satisfy political demand for positions and power rather than accommodating national needs.

At the very top, having 33 decision makers in the Cabinet makes the decision-making process cumbersome. In a country with limited empowerment as evident through the lack of local elections and in effect unresponsive local government, far too many decisions eventually go back to the top. When such top-down statist set-up is coupled with a cumbersome Cabinet, it is little wonder that the government is ineffective.

Adoption of organic — or bottom-up — approach can solve that problem. One example of that is by returning the power of local government to the people through reintroduction of local government.

With active local government, many functions of the Ministry of Housing and Local Government can be made irrelevant as the decision-making path length is shortened. Greater democratization itself can eliminate the need for the Ministry of Federal Territories completely.

Regardless of democratization, what exactly does the Ministry of Federal Territories do that the local authority, like the City Hall of Kuala Lumpur, cannot?

A new Cabinet must address the problem of big government that has been strongly identified with the past administration. The new administration has to forcefully break from the past. Or else.

Inevitably, that means embracing a limited but effective government led by a small but capable Cabinet.

Functions of ministries need to be streamlined to address the problem of overlapping turfs, ministries have to be merged to reduce the scope of government, and excess positions within the government need to be removed to address more than a decade-old fiscal deficit; the deficit is an indicator of the size of government.

These actions, to me, will produce a very strong signal indicating a change from the malaise Malaysia suffers. That will help in convincing me — and probably others, too — to cut down on my skepticism and to give the new administration a fighting chance.

Unfortunately, elimination of excess positions within an already bloated government might not happen. The mini-budget specifically called for absorption of the unemployed into the government. Past promises are tying the new Prime Minister’s hand.

Nevertheless, reducing the size of government cannot be done in a day. It has to be done in a gradual manner. Yet, gradualism is not a luxury the new administration can afford. Given the urgency and the gravity of the need for change, the only quick big punch to the prevailing skepticism relates back to the size of Cabinet and eventually, the size of government.

Size however is not the only consideration. The composition of the Cabinet is as important as the size. Still, even the question of composition necessarily leads back to the question of size.

The reason is that the pool of Members of Parliament available to the new Prime Minister contains a limited number of qualified individuals with intact credibility. A large Cabinet will more likely than not absorb individuals who do not command confidence from the public in times when confidence is exactly what the new administration needs badly.

If the new administration wants to earn confidence from the masses, a large Cabinet is not an option.

Having said that, it must also be stressed that a small Cabinet does not guarantee a smooth ride for the new administration. The size is a mere symptom of the agenda and a lean Cabinet only suggests that the agenda is on the right track. It says nothing of the agenda itself.

A failure to form a small cabinet will, however, make the years of the Najib administration a hell for Barisan Nasional.

Mohd Hafiz Noor Shams. Some rights reserved Mohd Hafiz Noor Shams. Some rights reserved Mohd Hafiz Noor Shams. Some rights reserved

First published in The Malaysian Insider on April 8 2009.

Categories
Liberty Politics & government

[1941] Of Dear No. 6…

Dear Sir,

I pray that this letter finds you in good health. With that good health, I do hope you will find in your good self some appetite and some time to read these words of mine.

On the last day of UMNO General Assembly held recently, I was in the Merdeka Hall listening to your speech as the new President of your party. Though perhaps I was the least enthusiastic and probably the most skeptical among the members of the floor, I did pay attention to what you said from behind a rostrum on a podium.

Save a black cat crossing your path, there are enough indications that you will be the next Prime Minister of Malaysia. Nothing is certain in this world, of course, but I would like to take the risk of congratulating your early. Congratulations, sir, on assuming the greatest office of this land.

It is the greatest office for no small reason. With that office, it is not too much to say that you will probably have more power than any other Malaysian has to affect the fate of our home, for better or for worse. I pray that it is for the better and I pray that you will have the strength to do so.

I am sure in the past months and even more so in the previous weeks, you have read and listened to aspirations of many Malaysians from all over. I am also sure many of these aspirations do not coincide with each other and some even contradict with each other. I appreciate this fact and I can imagine your exasperation of the word better amid a sea of competing ideals. Everybody has his or her own context when using that superlative that if it is to stand on its own, it will be ultimately vague.

Perhaps you do understand why there are contradictory dreams. But if you do not, this is the reason of why I am writing this humble letter to you. I would like to assure you that those contradictions are not signs of confusion or a sign of danger. Rather, very positively, it is only a sign of how diverse our society is.

Those are voices of the common people, be they are supportive of you, unsupportive of you, have yet to decide where to stand or simply could not care less of what is happening in the country as long as they are happy. Those voices are your sounding board.

Their opinions are your barometer. When they are uncomfortable with the direction you are leading them, many of them will find the courage to rise up to speak up. Many will even have the audacity to say it to your face. It can be harsh and sometimes, it can be unfair.

Though some might seem rude, trust me, for many of them, for many of us, this is not done out of spite. In many cases, those are honest opinions that we hold. Those opinions are about our joys, our fears, our hope and our disappointment.

There is no need to fear the diversity of opinions even when those opinions challenge norms so openly. In these days when international borders are coming down slowly but surely, challenges will be aplenty. It is only through that diversity will we be able to overcome those challenges.

It is worth noting that this diversity can only be sustained if there is openness to discuss legacy issues bedeviling us all. As we move forward and I believe you can agree with me, a rethinking of Malaysia is inevitable.

If there are those who came up to you expressing their fear that that openness will erode what they consider as pillars of this country, then be mindful that nothing last forever. To survive, we must evolve even if that comes at the price of making those pillars irrelevant. Those that refuse to evolve will be pushed to the margin and suffer the fate of so many species that roam this fair Earth today no more.

Sir,

It will be a mistake to silent others who disagree with you or those that challenge norms. Do that, and you will soon find yourself with court jesters with dangerous grupthink affliction. They are incapable of adapting to new environments that always seemingly conspire to bring down tall towers for which we have built.

Many in UMNO, as I have discovered, frighteningly, wanted you to return to old ways. They want change but in their minds, they want a return to the past, thinking that they could roll back the clock as if time would roll back with the small and big hands of the clock.

Unfortunately for many in UMNO, as evident during your party’s recently concluded general assembly, they have yet to grasp the lesson. Indeed, they are in danger of learning the wrong lesson.

The answer is not in the past as Prime Minister Abdullah Ahmad Badawi, your former President, has made clear earlier. I kindly urge you to agree with the Prime Minister. He has made major mistakes along the way but at the end of the day, although it is too late for him, he finally recognizes the zeitgeist.

More importantly, it is not too late for you, sir. You have the opportunity to learn from his mistakes and make good out of it.

I am writing this not because I care for UMNO. The fate of UMNO or for any party for that matter is of little concern to me. If your party chooses extinction over survival, then it is extinction that your party will meet. What I am concerned with is the future of our country and ultimately, my future.

Selfish as I may seem to be, I believe deep in the heart of each and every one of us, the worry is the same. What will happen to me tomorrow?

I cannot get that question and many more out of my mind.

Be well aware, sir, that we can only find the answers if we continue to search for it. We can only find the answers if we do not shy away from asking tough questions even if these questions bring upon uncomfortable answers.

To ignore or suppress these questions is most unhelpful in prodding our country forward. To do so is to create a culture of fear in times when what we need is a kind of boldness to right our wrongs while rebuilding our foundation for new towers.

At risk here is more than the future of your political party. At risk here is the future of our country. A true statesman has the faculty to comprehend that implication and I trust that you are the statesman that you can be.

While you have possibly more power than any Malaysian to affect this country, you alone cannot move this country forward. This country can only move forward if all of us are engaged with each other. And in order for that engagement to happen, there has to be freedom.

So, I beg you to not take that liberty away. I plead to you not to take it away, even as others urge you to do so, so forcefully.

Thank you and congratulations, once again.

Sincerely,

A concerned citizen.

Mohd Hafiz Noor Shams. Some rights reserved Mohd Hafiz Noor Shams. Some rights reserved Mohd Hafiz Noor Shams. Some rights reserved

First published in The Malaysian Insider on April 1 2009.

Categories
Environment

[1934] Of quite possibly, a DAP’s PGCC if mishandled

The mantra of ecotourism is take only photographs and leave only footprints. Due to far too frequent violations of that principle, I maintain the position that the term ecotourism in Malaysia has been perversely interpreted. While in other countries ecotourism means divulging oneself in nature without damaging it, on the contrary in Malaysia it means building a multimillion-ringgit resort on a remote island while damaging its prized coral reef, constructing a posh hotel in the middle of jungle complex while cutting down the trees and having a tiger park in the middle of the city with no history of tiger population.

When the Chief Minister of Penang Lim Guan Eng announced in the name of ecotourism a proposal to set up a 40-hectare tiger park on Penang Island, I found myself putting my face in my hands saying, “here we go again.”

Here we are with yet another politician with a brilliant idea, proving the point that brilliance — or lack of it — is no monopoly of any side.

I can only be thankful for whatever free speech and backbone to not succumb to blind partisanship we have left in this seemingly forsaken country. I am thankful because this is exactly one of those times when it is required of us to raise sensible objections to insensible ideas. And I will not waste that opportunity.

In light of other options, the tiger park is an insensible idea. George Town has already been granted the status of World Heritage by the UNESCO. As far as tourism is concerned, that is the unchallenged comparative advantage of Penang. Resources should be channeled to that aspect instead of into area of questionable potential.

If Penang really wants to promote ecotourism in the state, perhaps Penang should preserve and rehabilitate its degraded mangrove swamp. Prof. Gong Wooi Khoon of Universiti Sains Malaysia in 2003 estimated that Penang may lose its mangrove swamp by 2020. Do something about that instead of bringing mammals foreign to the local environment into Penang. Or cleanup those dirty rivers of Penang, like what the Selangor state government valiantly plans to do with its rivers.

More than being insensible, Mr. Lim really went on to stretch an already twisted green washing definition of ecotourism as applied in Malaysia. Whereas in the past in this country, at least the so-called ecotourism happened in natural settings albeit the destruction it brought, the Chief Minister seeks to artificially import tigers to entertain children like how a distasteful circus would present freaks to entertain the public while treating them inhumanely.

He dares call such gross pretension as ecotourism. It is an insult to one’s intelligence as well as to those who truly care for the environment. Such green washing is despicable.

The act of promoting ecotourism should not be so twisted and flawed as currently utilized with respect to the tiger park or in Malaysia generally. Ecotourism should be — as it was defined originally and used in developed countries with heightened sense of responsibility to the world we live in — about conserving and enhancing the environment while using it responsibly. That includes the protection of the habitat of various endangered species, like tigers.

The truth is that the tiger park is merely about conventional tourism. While perhaps the experience of the tiger park could be packaged as an educational experience to raise awareness, the tiger park does not help in conservation.

A proper ecotourism project revolving around tigers should be about large tiger sanctuary with tigers living in their natural habitat, not in some small enclosure in the middle of a developed island full of household cats that fight endlessly in the middle of the night.

Even the idea of a 40-hectare tiger park sounds exceedingly cruel to the tigers. How could such cruel move be part of ecotourism?

If any of us have not notice, tigers are large mammals. It needs large area to live in and to put them in small enclosure is similar to imprisoning any one of us in a cell.

For those unfamiliar with the unit hectare, 1 Ha is 0.01 km2. To put it into perspective, 40 Ha is only 0.40 km2, slightly smaller than Zoo Negara located in Ulu Klang, Selangor. Not to forget, facilities for both administrators and visitors would require erection. That would further reduce space for the large mammals. It is unclear if the tigers would live in cages but given the size of the park, that is likely the case.

I am not advocating for equal rights for animals but at least have a heart. Tigers are living beings and that much is for sure. Be humane and do not put these tigers in small enclosure. Please, and pretty please, Mr. Lim.

The only serious benefit that I could think of is potential the park might have in alleviating acute tigers overcrowding problem in Zoo Melaka, which is operated by the Department of Wildlife and National Parks (PERHILITAN). That particular zoological park is the place where PERHILITAN keeps all captured tigers due to tiger-human conflicts in Peninsular Malaysia.

If you want an emotional experience when it comes to tigers, then visit to Zoo Melaka. Ask the administrators to show you where they keep all the captured tigers and you will fast discover how sad the situation there is.

PERHILITAN of course is not to be blamed because they are operating the best they could with limited resources. They are, at least, trying to save the tigers from death sentences.

But is there a guarantee that the proposed tiger park in Penang would help Zoo Melaka address that problem? What guarantee there is that it would not end up like Zoo Melaka?

The best bet to the problem comes back to the establishment of tiger sanctuary in their natural habitat, not a small park. Before anybody gets any funny idea, that sanctuary should not be in Penang. It should be located within the large jungle complexes on the mainland, in Perak, Kelantan, Terengganu, Pahang and Johor, capable of naturally sustaining tiger population.

Nevertheless, despite my opposition to the idea and multiple criticisms mounted against the DAP-led Penang state government by local and international influential environmental groups, the state government should be commended for its effort to solicit public opinion.

Yet, soliciting does not automatically mean listening and that much is clear from the dreadful process of Draft Kuala Lumpur 2020 City Plan. The meaningless solicitation process of the KL 2020 City Plan appeared merely a public relations act. The KL City Hall was roundly criticized because of that. The whole process, without any overemphasis, was a failure.

That mistake must be taken to heart: the Penang state government should not repeat the same mistake done in KL by unelected officials. Why?

The wrong move could quite possibly turn the small tiger park into DAP’s PGCC.

Mohd Hafiz Noor Shams. Some rights reserved Mohd Hafiz Noor Shams. Some rights reserved Mohd Hafiz Noor Shams. Some rights reserved

First published in The Malaysian Insider on March 23 2009.