MCMC, Government vs Us

Update: The site (mt.harapanmalaysia.com) has been blocked too. Malaysia Today now can be accessed at a new URL – http://mt.m2day.org/2008/

(The next time, when the Government “guarantees” something, just remember it is not for real! Image source: http://www.doyleinteractive.com)

When idiots is running the show, amazing things certainly happens!

As we all aware, Malaysia Today was blocked for obvious reasons but little the Government realised that blocking the site was only temporary “win”. Were they ignorant of the working of the internet & technology? Or were they continued to be arrogant so much so they have lost touch with reality?

Raja Petra Still Rocks!

Raja Petra come back with another hard hitting post on a new site – what he calls as the son of Malaysia Today (and of course, many are using proxy and other means to bypass the blockage).

Raja Petra said:-

Raja Petra Kamarudin no longer owns Malaysia Today. Raja Petra may have started the original Malaysia Today. But he does not own it any more. Malaysia Today has been replaced by the son of Malaysia Today. And the son of Malaysia Today is owned by the people of Malaysia.

The people of Malaysia are keeping the son of Malaysia Today going. It is now called MT Harapan Malaysia and you can access it at mt.harapanmalaysia.com

Spread this message far and wide. Tell all your friends and family that Malaysia Today has died. It died at 6.00pm on 26 August 2008, the time and day that Anwar Ibrahim won the Permatang Pauh by-election with historic results and which has now triggered his march to Putrajaya.

But also tell your friends and family that the son of Malaysia Today has taken over the fight of its father. And this son is called mt.harapanmalaysia.com. Also tell them that the fight is going to get fiercer. The son wants to avenge the death of its father. And don’t forget to also gloat to your friends and family: yeh, yeh, kita menang!

No matter what and why the politicians from BN and MCMC justify the blocking of access to Malaysia Today, at end of the day, they have failed miserably.

As far as the online community is concerned, little has changed between them and the website known as Malaysia Today. The only change is the URL and perhaps the determination of RPK to blow more holes in the Government’s actions.

Cracked Bill of Guarantee

No damage to RPK, Malaysia Today and the online community but in doing the silly thing of blocking the website, the Government have scored another (of many) own goals. They have rescinded their promise on their Bill of Guarantee! And certainly this did not go well with the ex-PM, the man who was at the helm of the country when the Bill came in force.

He says:-

1. When a Government makes a promise to the country and then reneges on its promise, then not only will the Government lose credibility but also any respect that the public may have for it.

2. I do not often agree with Malaysia-Today.net and Raja Petra Kamaruddin. He had been sometimes quite irresponsible. But court action had already been taken against him. He is not above the law and if he is found guilty there are already adequate punishment that can be passed against.

3. But to break a promise and to openly show that you can meddle with the security of the internet is to expose a degree of oppressive arrogance worthy of a totalitarian state.

That’s right, whatever little respect that the Government had before this has been flushed down the toilet when they decided to silent (without real success) dissent voices in the cyber world. It’s obvious that the Government have not learned from the recent elections.

MCMC who?

YB Jeff Ooi calls MCMC idiots and from what they have done, certainly MCMC are acting as one. Jeff Ooi who wrote about MCMC lack of enforcement on the scam SMS offenders has all the right to call MCMC idiots. MCMC have certainly placed the priorities on the wrong issues at the wrong time.

Their very actions, independence and professionalism are in serious doubt now. What they intend to achieve by blocking the website? Why they went ahead with Government’s calls to block the site, knowing technologically it is quite impossible to do so? If they did it to just satisfy the Government – did they know that what they did were illegal under the law?

Aisehman said:-

You cannot invoke Section 263 to legalise censorship because Section 3 says that you cannot construe any provision in the Act as permitting censorship. In other words, as far as censoring the Internet is concerned, no provision of the Act is open to such interpretation. Therefore, MCMC has acted outside of the law in instructing ISPs to block access to Malaysia Today.

The instructions themselves are illegal.

Illegal! If the instruction is illegal, who is going to take action against MCMC?

It does not look like the regulator is going to punish themselves for breaking the law. The Bill of Guarantee has been “sodomised” when we least expected but Raja Petra is still online and everyone is able to read and comment on his posts without much sweat.

We are waiting for another own goal and this is why we need a new Government.

Malaysia Today blocked but…

Update: The site (mt.harapanmalaysia.com) has been blocked too. Malaysia Today now can be accessed at a new URL – http://mt.m2day.org/2008/

(RPK’s MT is blocked. Image source: Malaysianunplug)

It was expected to happen for sometime now…

It looks look like someone could not stand the heat that RPK throws out with hard hitting & raw posts.

I was reading Malaysia Today and there was this notice:-

Malaysia Today is being blocked by TMNet. To access Malaysia Today please go here http://mt.harapanmalaysia.com/2008

Posts simply blocked instead of countering it with hard cold facts – so typical of a Government that you and I have heard of. When blocked, even “out of this world” posts sounds so real – don’t they?

Of course, in this “Internet” age, there is little they can do to block a site. All one need to do is to search over Google and find many ways to access the site.

Is it the start of the end of the Multimedia Super Corridor Bill of Guarantees – “Ensure no Internet censorship”?

Read Also

Looks like Malaysia Today! Reads like Malaysia Today! Is it Malaysia Today?

3 Ways to Access Blocked Malaysia Today

Anwar: I am Back!

(BN in distress, Anwar is back! Image source: The People’s Parliament)

What a win!

From Anilnetto

The final official majority is 15,671 votes. Anwar secured 31,195 votes; Ariff 15,524 votes and Akim’s Hanafi Mamat 92 votes (deposit lost).

And interestingly this is despite:-

BN pushing its whole election machinery to fight against one man (the TV, the newsprint, the money, the swearing, prominent spokesmen including top government officials – in the case of swearing);

Khairy making the arrogant remarks that they will bury Anwar’s political ambitions in this by election;

The sodomy accusations against Anwar;

The swearing on the Quran against Anwar;

There is a discrepancy between the Election Commission’s figure for the voter turnout of 65 per cent turnout and the actual turnout, which was 80 per cent;

Anwar still made with a bigger majority than his wife did in the last general election. Read his press statement after the win here.

As mentioned by Anwar, “this may be one small step for Permatang Pauh but one giant leap for the people of Malaysia”. True and right on the point.

Not forgetting bloggers (in particular Haris Ibrahim & Anil Netto) who kept us informed on what was happening on the ground (we know the mainstream is not going to report anyway). This marked a new era on onsite reporting by bloggers – a minute by minute update and analysis.

Bloggers are still making history in Malaysian media landscape.

What & Where is Merdeka?

(There are things that even some leaders of this country have forgotten. Still want to celebrate Merdeka ah? Image source: http://sivinkit.net)

There is about 5 days before we celebrate our Independence Day but yet there is no “scent” of any Hari Merdeka celebrations seen in the open.

The usual Petronas ads is missing from the telly (perhaps they are not happy with the calls to check on Petronas books) and there is no flags on the car (maybe it is because the flag on the car causes drag and it will cause more wastage of fuel).

Even the ex-PM sensed something as not being right – read more here. Yup, something is indeed missing in the month of August. But instead we have this:-

It is sad to see our beloved Jalur Gemilang, the symbol of our Nation and its sovereignty flying upside down. I had anticipated the anger by my fellow countrymen watching our flag being raised upside down. It is internationally accepted that raising the flag upside down is a mark of state of distress. It is never a mark of disrespect.

A nation in distress…!

Yes, flying a flag upside down is a sign of distress, not a mark of disrespect – something that the learned PM failed to understand. He just calls it “evil”.

What is Merdeka or Independence in the first place? A quote from the Declaration of Independence rightfully put things in a better perspective:-

We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness.

With draconian laws such as ISA, high handed response by the police & the Government in some recent events, inequality in law, financial status and rights among Malaysians and blatant abuse of power and public funds, are we truly independent? Are we in pursuit of life, liberty and happiness?

Just hope that by September, we will have a more robust ”footing” that truly “liberates” us and puts us back on the right path. Until then, the founders of this nation must be turning in their graves.

D-Day for Anwar

(For a mighty Malaysia – Image source: http://www.twocircles.net)

Tomorrow is D-Day for not only Anwar but the whole of Malaysia as well. Nothing said it better than this comment in Anilnetto:-

A stall-holder next to the Masjid Jamek told me: “Harap-harap kita dapat undi majoiriti 10-14,000 bang, 27 juta rakyat malaysia sedang menanti ini…(Hope to get a majority of 10-14,000, 27 million Malaysians are waiting…)

We need a brand new Malaysia, we been living in the “dark ages” for a long time now.