With all the complaints that had been hurled against the National Service programme, one wonders if these are actually true. The problem here is that the media in Malaysia is purely pro-government and it is very hard for the man on the street to actually be informed of anything negative that is happening in this country.

With this government, everything seems to be going well even if someone dies in the NS (you see, for the government one person dead out of a hundred of thousand is relatively a good statistic ... it could be worse if you were in police custody).

Now let us take a step back and see why this NS programme was started in such a hurried manner in the first place. If I recall, it was supposed to integrate the different races better, create a love for the country, install discipline, sort out the problems of Mat-motor/bohsia/kaki-lepak etc.'

Has anyone in the planning committee made any findings at this stage if all these objectives of the NS are on the right track? Instead of figuring out who will get a bite of the RM500 million cake they should get off their behinds and really turun padang (minus the ties and Armani suits.) They will then see that things have going horribly wrong!

The idea that was initiated by the our very own Dr M (well, normally all the mega ideas are from him, specially the ones where the government has to spend loads of money!) and blindly mooted by the defense minister, Najib, is actually like a time-bomb waiting to explode.

The 'brilliant' minds within Najib's team have not realised that this whole thing, not planned properly, actually might be going against all the objectives of the government. Imagine turning off 18-year-olds at their young, tender age which in turn might reflect badly when they actually become 21. Yes, when they have the power to vote.

The government is actually placing itself in harm's way by not getting the right programme setup for such a huge activity.

Firstly, what was the big rush in getting this programme underway in less then a year's time? Why did the government not do a proper study before implementing the programme? Did our government consult other governments, such as Singapore who have had NS for a long time, for input?

If the BN government does not stop retract to the drawing board this entire mayhem, they will be facing many scared youths during the next coming election.

Oh yes ... I forget that the man behind this programme is now the No 2 man of Malaysia Inc and admitting that the government did not plan this properly would just not reflect well on his ability would it?