Categories
Society

[2824] The good, the bad and the ugly of the LRT extension line

Kuala Lumpur opened the extension to its light rail transit lines late last month and I was pretty excited about it. After years of delay, the system is finally here.

I am excited because I can now hop on a train to Subang with ease. Previously, I would either have to drive, get on a cab or take the KTM Commuter trains. The Commuters are not as convenient as the LRT. Frequency is low and it connects places which I have little reasons to go to. In contrast, the LRT extension also means I now have easy access to the Subang airport too.

Another reason for my excitement is that I really love trains. I try to ride on the train everywhere I go to observe the city and the people. Even in Jakarta when the city rail system is not as mature as those in Singapore, Kuala Lumpur or Bangkok. I also regularly read on the read, that is to say I have time for myself in contrast to, for instance, driving.

I rode on the train yesterday and made a loop from the Masjid Jamek Station to the new Putra Heights Station via Kelana Jaya, and back through the Sri Petaling Line. That took me close to 5 hours and I started at about 5PM, running for 40km-50km. The total extension length itself is about 35km.[1][2]

I could not see the outside half of the ride as it was getting dark by the time I reached Putra Heights. I think I will have to make another loop and this time, probably earlier in the day during the weekends to fully appreciate the view.

So, this is a review by a regular LRT user (yes, I am a libertarian who loves public transport. Sue me).

Bad finishing

While the trains themselves are great, so far, I feel the construction of the stations has not been done properly. I got off at several stations and I noticed mediocre finishing. There is a feeling the stations were completed in haste despite long construction delays.

I remember two particular stations with noticeable defects. The escalator at the Lembah Subang Station was creaking, making a loud noise of grinding metals. Mind you, this is a new system and it is already showing sign of stress. With all the escalator incidents elsewhere — some of it deadly — I was not fully sure it was entirely safe.

The escalator at SS15 station was also creaking albeit less loudly. I could feel it straining as I rode down. The descent speed was less than optimum and uneven at times, which possibly has something to do with the straining.

More disappointingly are the washrooms and I am writing specifically about the SS15 station. The faucets open too close to the wall of the basin, making it awkward for me and for anybody with non-midget sized hands to wash up. My fingers would hit the wall easily. I feel the pipes should have extended farther to the center of the sink instead of stopping at the edge, barely.

Several faucets were leaking too, leaving a pool of water on the floor, which turned the whole place disgusting. The dryer also did not work. This might be just a teething problem, but the history of KLIA2 (and the East Coast Highway too?) for instance, it does not inspire confidence. The extension just opened for heaven’s sake. These problems should not exist.

I did not get out of the stations because I did not want to spend too much money. It cost me less than three ringgit to make the ride, because the stations I entered and exited were close by. Neither did I get off at every station. That would the time consuming for a layperson. If I had, I am sure I could find more defects. After all, I randomly got off two stations and the hit rate of finding noticeable defects is 100%. There is a prima facie case to suspect there is a systemic problem with the line.

Who were the contractors of these stations? Given the previous controversies involving contract awards, that question will be important in running a post-mortem on the project. An audit should be carried out and its findings be made public. These contractors should be forced and fined to remedy those defects.

Interchange done right, and wrong

But there is nice stuff to say about the overall system.

The interchange at Putra Heights is done marvelously. If there is an ideal interchange in the whole wide world, this is it. It reminds me of the MRT interchange to Changi Airport in Singapore. You would just have to get out of the train, stay on the same island platform and wait from the next train to arrive on the other side, possibly 10 meters away only. No unnecessary 5 minutes walking is through a mall like in KL Sentral is required.

But I also have to comment about the interchange at Sri Petaling. I do not like it. I had to switch trains and platforms. Sri Petaling has side platforms, which means I had to get on a crossing to get to the other side. More annoyingly, the Putra Heights-Sri Petaling segment is not integrated seamlessly with the Sri Petaling Line, unlike the whole Gombak-Kelana Jaya-Putra Heights segment. I understand why I need to switch trains Putra Heights (Mahathir’s legacy), but less so at Sri Petaling.

Refreshing station designs

I short, I like the design. It feels sleek just like the Kelana Jaya trains.

More importantly, the platforms are huge compared to the old ones. It is just less claustrophobic during rush hour. The situation at stations like KLCC and Masjid Jamek can be extremely unpleasantly and packed with people. Worse, they are underground although air-conditioned stations. But things are not that much better at above ground stations like Setiawangsa, Jelatek, Pasar Seni and even KL Sentral. There just is not much platform space to accommodate massive crowd.

The large platform space at the new stations comes with large envelope cover, which is essential to a rail system in a tropical country like Malaysia. At the old above ground stations, rainstorm would make everything wet and since the flooring are marble-like, dangerously slippery too. The new stations, with the way the platforms are designed and covered, are unlikely to have the same problem, although I would think it would get hot and humid quick. I do not remember whether there was an air-conditioning system moderating the temperature but for the old above ground platforms, a simple cheap fan would work.

But the cover also means the glorious view of KL as seen from Wangsa Maju, Setiawangsa, Jelatek, Keramat, Damai, Pasar Seni, Asia Jaya and Universiti among others is not available at the new stations. That is a downer for me.

But I suppose the envelope cover is a blessing for Puchong stations, which are surrounded with ugly landscape.

Perhaps, if the LRT lines are to be improved further in the future, it should involve the expansion of platform space at popular stations.

Politics of credit and blame

With respect to the old station design, I do not blame the old architects and engineers. The earlier LRT system was put in place at a time when KL population was smaller. Najib Razak when launching the LRT extension line blamed Mahathir Mohamad for not investing more in public transport.[3]

This is off the mark by a mile because Najib ignored the reality of the 1990s when Subang was just expanding and Puchong was a wilderness instead of the industrial town it is now. The Klang Valley population size just did not warrant a further train investment then.

It is arguably only now that we have such population to justify further investment into the city rail system, with suburbs sprawling to the west and the south.

Najib happily takes the credits for the completion of the LRT extension project and further expansion of the KL rail network. But of course, what he did not mention is the fact that the project was supposed to be completed in 2014. Furthermore, Najib takes credits more than the completion of the project. He bashed Mahathir for not providing a comprehensive public transport system but the closer integration of the system really happened during Abdullah Badawi’s time. Indeed, the reorganization of the line management occurred post-1997 crisis under Mahathir. These integrations were the foundation Najib built on.

For a system that takes more than a generation to mature, it is hard to take credit and assign blame cleanly. Politicians should realize that.

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

[1] — The Kelana Jaya Line Extension will begin from Kelana Jaya station and pass through 13 new stations, including Ara Damansara, Subang Jaya and USJ before ending at Putra Heights Integrated Station, covering a distance of 17.4km. Total length of the Kelana Jaya Line upon completion of the LRT will be 46.4km. [MyRapid. Kelana Jaya Line. Accessed July 12 2016.

[2] — The Ampang Line Extension starts from Sri Petaling Station and passes through Kinrara, Puchong, and ends at Putra Heights. The extension is 17.4km long with 12 new stations. Combined with the existing line, the total length of Ampang Line after the completion of the LRT Line Extension Project will be 45.1km. [MyRapid. Ampang Line. Accessed July 12 2016.

[3] — Prime Minister Datuk Seri Najib Razak took a swipe at Tun Dr Mahathir Mohamad today, blaming him for the underdeveloped state of the country’s public transportation network. At the launch of the Kelana Jaya and Ampang LRT Line Extension today, Najib said he made improving public transportation a priority when he became prime minister as the issue had become “increasingly serious.”

“This is because my predecessor who ruled for 22 years did not pay much attention to public transportation,” he said at the launch ceremony here.

“Therefore it created a vacuum, it caused underinvestment, it created a poorly integrated system owned by multiple people that cannot accommodate the needs of a modern city, and the traffic congestion has gotten more serious.” [Aizyl Azlee. Malay Mail Online. Najib blames ”˜predecessor’ for current public transport woes. June 30 2016.

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

p/s — I have also read that there is a problem of access for all the new stations. Pedestrians face barriers to entry either in the form of fence, road or unrealistic walkway. One criticism I have frequently so far is that the stations are designed for cars to drop off passengers. Sigh…

The old stations do not suffer too much of this problem and I think they are quite pedestrian-friendly in terms of access, except, maybe the Abdullah Hukum station. For the longest time and still is, that particular station stops in the middle of nowhere. Hardly anybody uses it. One hopes that would change when the KL Eco City development is completed, linking the station to the Garden and Mid Valley.

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

p/s — MP Ong Kian Ming has a wider review of the train system in KL.

Categories
Conflict & disaster Society

[2823] It is wrong to say ISIS has nothing to do with Islam

As an individualist, I do not condemn a whole community for wrongs of the few. I do not subscribe to collective blaming for individual crimes. Each person is responsible for his or her action. In the context of terror acts frequently committed by Islamic extremists these days, I would not ask a random Muslim to apologize for killings done by his coreligionists located thousands of miles away. To make such demand is just dumb.

It is dumb because Islam as practiced all over is diverse and its interpretation varies from group to group. The interpretations range from puritan to liberal, from medieval to modern, from mystical to logical. One interpretation can even be hostile to the other, making the act of blaming one side for the other’s violence as nonsensical.

The same diversity makes it wrong to claim ISIS and all of its terror acts done in the name of the Islamic god has nothing to do with the religion. As if there is one true Islam and only those Muslims subscribe to it. On the contrary, ISIS has everything to do with the religion.

There is no one Islam anymore. However strongly many Muslims would want to stress on the unity of the religion, the truth is that the successful proliferation of Islam beyond Arabia is due to its ability to absorb local beliefs, among other things. Its syncretic nature gives rise to its diversity.

All Muslims share several core tenets but that does not make all Islams as the same. The nature, the nuance, the outlook and the way of life of a Malaysian Muslim is very different from that living in the Middle East. Even within Malaysia, the general Islam experienced in Kuala Lumpur is very different from that in Kota Bahru.

War did advance Islam but war alone could not guarantee lasting belief. The religion had to be tolerant of some local practices to entice and keep people to its side. You could observe the result of the syncretism among the Malays in Malaysia. Traditional Malay wedding ceremony for instance has hints of Hindu influence. The Malays after all, were largely Hindus, Buddhists and animists before the arrival of Islam in the 1100s-1400s to Southeast Asia. Archipelagic Islam developed based on that old Malay (and others like the Javanese) foundation. Post-independence nation state context further influences the interpretation and practice of Islam in Malaysia and elsewhere in the region, that the state used religion to promote nationalism. Brunei is the other example where religion is a subservient tool of nationalism.

The idea that there is one Islam is not only untrue across geography. It is also untrue across time. Karen Armstrong in her book A History of God shows that early Muslims believed they were part of the Christian community. While mainstream Muslims today accept all of the Christian prophets, they do not consider themselves as Christians. Early Muslims did not share such a strong distinction. A separate Islamic identity developed only after the hijra. Indeed, before meeting the Medina Jews, Muhammad thought Christians and Jews were of the same belief and Islam was merely renewing the two religions that came from the same god. The conflation between Christianity and Judaism would not have been a mistake if Muhammad had lived centuries earlier when Jesus was preaching. Armstrong demonstrated that early Christians thought they were Jewish in religious terms and that they themselves thought they were renewing the religion of Moses.

Gerard Russell’s Heirs to Forgotten Kingdoms chronicling the old communities of the Middle East shows how minor religions like the Mandaenism sprung out of the Abrahamic beliefs by holding on to dogmas modern Judaism, Christianity and Islam now reject. Apart from the rejected beliefs, these minor religions are or were similar in so many ways to the major three faiths. These minorities are fossils from the days when the three world’s religions were rapidly evaluating their creeds and figuring out what worked and what did not. They are the living proofs that religion evolves over time, just as dinosaur fossils are proof that the Earth is older than 4,000 years.

All religions evolve and adapt to time, geography and culture and whatever other secular forces.

The one Islam may exist as a Platonic idealism but that model is irrelevant to the material world. The Islam that matters are the practical ones: the interpreted ones.

And so I do disagree with the claim that ISIS has nothing to do with Islam. ISIS’s is a disagreeable brand of Islam but it is a brand of Islam nonetheless. It is a brutal brand as a reaction to the disastrous 2000s war against Iraq and Saddam Hussein.

There is a parallel to this. A harsh puritan form of Islam appeared after the massacre and the razing of Baghdad in the 1200s-1300s by the Mongols. That Islam sought to return the religion to the early Meccan and Medinan days, rejecting intellectual progress achieved in the previous 700 years that made Cairo, Baghdad and Damascus the great capitals of the world during its times.

There is a Muslim tradition that leads to ISIS. That post-Mongol puritan Islam as rationalized by Ibn Taymiyyah informed modern day wahabbism and the salafism, which in turned influenced ISIS.

We should go further and explain why ISIS’s interpretation is so problematic. Their interpretation is that theirs is the true form and everybody else’s is false. ISIS believes theirs is the one true Islam while rejecting the diversity that exists in the religion.

That similarity, between ISIS and those who claim ISIS has nothing to do with Islam, amuses me. Both sides build their argument that their version is the one true Islam.

That logic shared by the two parties is not merely a source of amusing coincidence unfortunately. There is something more sinister about it.

Because there is only one true interpretation, then there is only one way of doing things and everything else is wrong. The religious diversity is rejected altogether. The magic word here is puralism. The corrupt Malaysian state is also guilty of this by politicizing Islam to legitimize its increasingly undemocratic hold to power, that the state is the guardian of the supposedly Platonic Islam. To add to the sense that the religion is being manipulated, I should write, the guardian of Platonic Malaysian Islam.

From where I stand, I feel the difference between the two sides is only a matter of degrees of intolerance and coercive force. I would not be shocked if it really about the ability to exert coercion for a large minority in Malaysia. After all, did a survey last year not show 11% of Malaysian Muslims sympathize with ISIS?[1]

And this is a problem. When you want to fight ISIS yet you share the same intolerance however different the degree is, your fight is logically unconvincing and turns out into choosing the lesser of the two evils.

Sometimes, we can reject all evils.

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

[1] — See In nations with significant Muslim populations, much disdain for ISIS. November 17 2015.

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

p/s — Tolerance to diversity itself does not make ISIS okay. There are other values more important that blind diversity, like individual rights.

Categories
Economics WDYT

[2822] Guess Malaysia’s 1Q16 GDP growth

I have been slacking off a little bit. My models have not been updated as frequently as it should. Reason is, one fine March day, something wiped the models out. Electrons arranged neatly disintegrated into disorder, destroying the microfoundations (heh!) of my models.

I have backup files, but updating them is a tedious exercise.

So, my projections, especially on quarterly basis might be off for now.

Nonetheless, it does not take much effort to look into the latest data.

And I cannot find much stuff to celebrate.

The full industrial production index for the first quarter is not out yet but for February, production grew only 3.9% YoY. Remember, 2016 is a leap year and in essence, people produced more this year compared to the last just because of the extra day. So normalized growth will be lower than that. At the same time, with all the heatwave going on, I think we also need to discount electricity production spike. It is very likely the electricity generated mostly went into cooling purposes instead of for manufacturing. My electricity bill spiked by about 100% in March. Some of my friends had it worse.

February 2016

I am unsure how much the electricity generation surge is due to mining growth recovery (is it a recovery?) however. I can run a regression model I suppose, but meh. Looking at the lines alone can tell you much about the correlation.

The new core inflation published by the Department of Statistics appears stable, suggesting consumption growth might be stable too. But who knows. With the way economy is going, there might be enough slack that increased economic activities would not affect inflation much. Import expansion for the quarter was uninspiring as well, pointing to the possibility that the economy did not go far enough toward fulfilling its potential. Stable (and low?) inflation and weak import growth mean weak consumption growth.

Export growth is also not convincing by the way.

Government spending growth might be hurting. For most of the first quarter, Brent prices were below $40 per barrel and the government really wanted to cut its deficit still. Things might be better in 2Q16, but not before as far as public expenditure is concerned.

In the end, I think growth might be about the same as the last one. Might be slightly slower too for all I know. In 4Q15, the Malaysian RGDP grew 4.5% YoY.

Maybe you know better?

The Department of Statistics will release Malaysia’s GDP figures on Friday, May 13.

How fast do you think did the Malaysian economy grow in 1Q16 from a year ago?

  • 3.0% or slower (8%, 1 Votes)
  • 3.1%-3.5% (8%, 1 Votes)
  • 3.6%-4.0% (23%, 3 Votes)
  • 4.1%-4.5% (54%, 7 Votes)
  • 4.6%-5.0% (8%, 1 Votes)
  • 5.1%-5.5% (0%, 0 Votes)
  • Faster than 5.5% (0%, 0 Votes)

Total Voters: 13

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Categories
Politics & government

[2821] Who are we to condemn Sarawakians?

I was in Sarawak during the 2011 election. I campaigned for the opposition in Kuching and its surrounding. I helped run a group of volunteers; run is probably an exaggeration but I will use run nonetheless. We were active in several seats but spent most of our time in Batu Kawa, about 10 miles to the south of Kuching. It was and still is a marginal seat. The young Christina Chiew won there. We as a team won.

About five years later, I am utterly disengaged from the campaign. I have no role in it. But that does not mean I feel nothing. When I read up the latest Sarawak election results from across the sea in Kuala Lumpur, I felt sad upon learning the Batu Kawa seat had changed hands, along with a handful of others.

Though expected, the results are still horrible for many who think Malaysia needs change badly. Tony Pua wrote “”¦on hindsight, our Sarawak battle was one of limiting the damage rather than one of consolidating our hold on these seats won in the last elections, or making gains in the rural districts.”[1]

But if I am experiencing melancholy, imagine the sense of devastation of those involved on the ground. Postings on social media say as much. They feel frustrated by the results, especially by the role of money and electoral corruption.

Even in 2011, pressure for corruption was evident. I witnessed it personally. There were several instances outside of town where potential voters explicitly wanted money in exchange for their votes. We — as far as I know — did not pay for it. I certainly would not pay straight from my wallet. There was no RM2.6 billion in my bank account, much less my pocket. Instead, we smiled, shrugged and moved on knowing we lost the battle in those instances. I was really too shocked to reply anyway.

What mattered we won the bigger battle because people were angry at Taib Mahmud so much that money would not matter enough.

But 2016 was different. There was more money it seems, and there was no Taib Mahmud. Furthermore, several friends from Kuching said residents were ambivalent about Chiew, citing her inexperience and track record. But whatever the complaints against her, the opposition, either DAP or PKR — I would put Pakatan Harapan, but there is no such thing in Sarawak — faced the Adenan Satem effect and the renewed vigor of money politics.

I can accept the popularity of Adenan. It was the same for Abdullah Badawi when the people was tired of Mahathir Mohamad. What worries me more and more is the role of money in Malaysian politics. The case of Sarawak is one where money for votes is the norm.

The obvious danger is that a wrong would never be wrong again. It is the snowball effect transforming the nature of elections. Democracy loses its meaning. Both elections and democracy as concepts risk becoming one-in-a-while cash transfer program, much like an ersatz BR1M.

It would be no mere pork-barreling anymore. It will be just bribery.

I am not condemning Sarawakian voters for participating however. In many ways, I understand why people take the money. It is a combination of desperation and power. Voters there have not much of a choice.

While in the peninsula, the people are not scared of the sticks and carrots of development politics, the case is different for rural Sarawak. They are at the mercy of the state — at Barisan Nasional’s generosity. If your place in the rural area gets an opposition representative, you would be marginalized. If you had no power and clean water supplies, there is a guarantee you will never get it from the state. The government will use the state to punish you, much more than they use it in the peninsula.

Would you condemn Jean Valjean in prison for 19 years for stealing a loaf of bread in order to avoid starvation? I would not and I would cut him some slack.

But for how long and how far a slack?

And if the whole of population engages in such corruption, would you prosecute all of them?

It becomes an outrageously impossible notion. I feel in the end, either you too participate in the corruption because it is the way of life now, or all of us stop and grant amnesty to everybody.

But the real life is rarely the latter option. Life is a snowball. At the national level, the snowball is rolling unmelted under the hot sun into 1MDB and Najib Razak. Nobody has been able to stop Najib or Barisan Nasional.

The snowball continues rolling on unabated, becoming our way of life just as money for votes is part of Sarawak’s politics.

It is in this sense that I am not condemning Sarawakian voters. Just as many of us in Kuala Lumpur feel powerless in the 1MDB case, so too Sarawakians feel, I think, in their local context. Who are we in the peninsula, then, to condemn Sarawakians?

We feel powerless about national politics. Why should we in the peninsula blame many Sarawakians for being powerless in their own state? There is no blame game to play here if we are honest and consistent to ourselves.

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

[1] — In addition to the pressing issues surrounding GST and Najib’s scandal, we emphasized repeatedly on the need for check and balance via a strong opposition to ensure that Adenan didn’t become the next “pek moh”.

Despite the seeming strength of the message, it obviously did not have sufficient traction even among the urban voters. People were sufficiently happy with the few apparent concessions Adenan gave. They were more than happy to overlook the continued corruption in the BN regime and the implications on the people via higher taxes. The rampant and blatant abuse of power by Adenan, such as banning Members of Parliament from entering the state also didn’t matter too much to them.

However, perhaps, had we not campaigned that hard, we might have lost even more seats. Therefore we must thank those tens of thousands of supporters who continued to stick to us under such trying circumstances. Hence on hindsight, our Sarawak battle was one of limiting the damage rather than one of consolidating our hold on these seats won in the last elections, or making gains in the rural districts. [Tony Pua. Paying the price for not ”˜paying up’. May 8 2016]

Categories
Society

[2820] A god to justify us

Yet a personal God can become a grave liability. He can be a mere idol carved in our own image, a projection of our limited needs, fears and desires. We can assume that he loves what we love and hates what we hate, endorsing our prejudices instead of compelling us to transcend them. When he seems to fail to prevent a catastrophe or seems even desire a tragedy, he can seem callous and cruel. A facile belief that a disaster is the will of God can make us accept things that are fundamentally unacceptable. The very fact that, as a person, God has a gender is also limiting: it means that the sexuality of half the human race is sacralized at the expense of the female and can lead to a neurotic and inadequate imbalance in the human sexual mores. A personal God can be dangerous, therefore. Instead of pulling us beyond our limitations, “he” can encourage us to remain complacently within them; “he” can make us as cruel, callous, self-satisfied and partial as “he” seems to be. Instead of inspiring the compassion that should characterize all advanced religion, “he” can encourage us to judge, condemn and marginalize. It seems, therefore, that the idea of a personal God can only be a stage in our religious development. The world religions all seem to have recognized this danger and have sought to transcend the personal conception of supreme reality. [Page 209-210. A History of God: The 4,000-Year Quest of Judaism, Christianity and Islam. Karen Armstrong. 1993]