As I’m writing this column on St Valentine’s Day, I’m somewhat disappointed that it will appear on the Malaysiakini site tomorrow (today), too late to wish my loved-ones in good time.

But no matter. Most of the people I truly care for know very well who they are and how fondly I feel for them, but would doubtless be highly embarrassed by my proclaiming their names in public.

I’m also highly aware of the fact that the majority of Malaysians are forbidden the celebration of St Valentine’s Day on the dubious grounds that it is dangerously Christian and, even worse, carnal.

Never mind that the Christian and Muslim deities are similar if not one and the same - albeit with different names according to some alleged authorities - and that St Valentine’s Day celebrates romantic, not venereal love.

But in any event, as my wife so truly remarked yesterday, for all those of us whose mutual feelings are both heartfelt and enduring, every day is Valentine’s Day.

A sentiment that has since inspired me to the realisation that what applies to loving must similarly hold true for its binary opposite, loathing.

In other words, if every day is Valentine’s Day for us and those we love, then it follows that every day is Villaintine’s Day for those we love to loathe.

The only trouble is, it would take all day, every day just to identify them all, let alone send them appropriate personal messages, cards and tokens of vilification.

In fact it would be outright impossible. So instead of sending individual Villaintines even to those currently on the top of my hit- or hate-list, the members and supporters of Syria’s mass-murderous al-Assad regime and its allies in the repressive, corrupt and otherwise evil governments of Russian and China, I regretfully have to settle for reviling them all collectively.

Collective Villaintines

And because I don’t even know the names of the scores of similarly people-repressing regimes around the world, I’m going to have to content myself with sending them and their multifarious members, cronies, and supporters collective Villaintines too.

The same goes, unfortunately, even for those parts of the world in which I’m more familiar with the villains. Firstly by virtue of the sheer volume of them, and secondly because they love to conceal their villainies if possible, as Malaysia’s BN regime strives to do with its Official Secrets Act (OSA), or to avoid vilification for those it fails to conceal by perverting the purported protectors of the people, the forces of law-and-order, and the press.

So just as I have to their evil equivalents in the wider world, I have no choice but to send a bulk Villaintine to the endlessly venal and vicious Royal Malaysian Police (PDRM); to those judges and fellow legal eagles - or rather vultures - who’ve sold their souls in the service of BN; and of course to all those ‘mainstream’ media editors and so-called ‘journalists’ who help keep the regime’s vile secrets and disseminate its venomous lies.

But, thank goodness, there are some I can send Villaintines to personally. Publicly, too, as most of those I have in mind for personal greetings are clearly so unashamed of their villainies, and so pathologically vain despite the public revulsion they excite, that they actually invite as much attention as possible.

In this regard, it will come as no surprise to most readers that my sentimental favourite for a personal Villaintine is former prime minister Dr Mahathir Mohamad.

Mahathir not only seems to loathe everyone but himself - and at least some of his offspring - yet similarly thrives on being loathed in return.

He’s devoted his entire ‘retirement’ to indulging his undying lust for visibility by simultaneously denying the countless villainies he visited on Malaysia during his 22 years in office, and continuing to revile and wreak vengeance on his enemies.

Just days ago he was displaying this combination of revisionism and venom as vividly as ever in a typically vituperative statement against his former partner in vice, opposition leader Anwar Ibrahim, that “a person who does not respect the law has no right to be a leader”.

Avoiding the always evident fact that he himself so deeply disrespected the law during his premiership as to deliberately devastate the nation’s judiciary, he continued to vent his spleen by observing that “the country will be destroyed if we have - as a leader - someone who does not respect the law.”

'The most deserving recipients'

Speaking of which, the most deserving Malaysian recipient of a Villaintine today after Mahathir has to be his current successor as Prime - or more accurately Crime - Minister, Najib Abdul Razak.

Though he has been unusually quiet of late, perhaps spending some quality time with himself as he recovers from the blow to his egomania in the form of public scorn at his infamous ‘kangkung’ speech a few weeks ago, Najib himself - along with the entire BN gang - is the very personification of contempt for the law.

In fact, the sole reason he and his accomplices are still in their accustomed positions of power and plunder is that they broke every letter and spirit of the relevant laws in ‘winning’ last year’s general election, despite losing the popular vote.

So here’s wishing a heartfelt Happy Villaintine’s Day to Najib, and another to perhaps the most currently vocal of his villainous henchpersons, Home Minister Ahmad Zahid Hamidi ( left ).

Already infamous as one of the principal incompetents in BN’s bungled response to last year’s armed incursion into Sabah, and since then for his “shoot first” policy for the police, he further disgraced himself and his office last week by denying that there was anything wrong with the Muslim Consumers Association of Malaysia’s (PPIM) offer of a monetary incentive for someone to slap opposition parliamentarian Teresa Kok.

So along with a Villaintine to the unlovely Zahid, here’s wishing a whole lot of others to the members of the verminous NGOs who falsely alleged that Kok’s politically satirical ‘Onederful Malaysia CNY 2014’ video was insulting to Malays and Islam and thus, deserving of a slap.

And Villaintines also to the rabble that sacrificed chickens and smeared blood on posters bearing Kok’s picture, and to all the slappers who backed Penang Umno Wanita chief Senator Norliza Abdul Rahim in her public statement of support for such outrages.

It is highly evident that countless other members, supporters, and cronies of the BN regime are deserving of Villaintines, too, but unfortunately I’ve reached my word limit for this week. So for now all I can do is hand it over to you to compile your own personal list of them. Including, of course, those BN-loving ‘religious’ voyeurs who are hell-bent on vetoing people’s right to celebrate St Valentine’s Day.

DEAN JOHNS, after many years in Asia, currently lives with his Malaysian-born wife and daughter in Sydney, where he coaches and mentors writers and authors and practises as a writing therapist. Published books of his columns for Malaysiakini include ‘Mad about Malaysia', ‘Even Madder about Malaysia', ‘Missing Malaysia', ‘1Malaysia.con’ and ‘Malaysia Mania’.