I refer to malaysiakini report Stupid! Stupid! Stupid!

In the report, Minister in the Prime Minister's Department Mohd Nazri Abdul Aziz claimed that Singapore, being a small island, is not a country in a real sense. I tried to justify his new definition by referring to all dictionaries available to me.

But to my disappointment, all definitions of a country point to the fact that Singapore is indeed a country. It satisfies all the conditions qualifying herself as a country. Now that it has been proven that Singapore is a country, the joke is now on Nazri.

He then went on to say that with a population of four million, it is easy for Singapore to check corruption. Maybe he is correct. On this score, Singapore could outdo us just because of its advantage in having a small population.

But would Nazri use the same factor to explain how we lost out to Singapore in other fields?

SIA and MAS started on the same footing. The former is progressing by leaps and bounds and winning praises from all corners of the earth. MAS is struggling to break even.

Changi airport has been topping the world airports rating year in and year out. KLIA is trying to cope with delayed and lost luggage.

In education we are left far, far behind. I need not have to dwell on this for it is well known that our universities are nowhere near the top in the global universities' rating.

Singapore's per capita income will put us to shame, even though she started off as a poorer nation than Malaysia.

Now Nazri, how would you explain the above? For a start, just admit that Malaysia will never develop as long as we have people like you.