YOURSAY ‘A developed nation might have been possible once. A civilised nation was never possible.’

Dummies guide to Pekida, in 14 questions

David Dass : Knowing this is to despair. How can we become a developed nation when gangsters are formed, encouraged or supported by political parties? Where is the line to be drawn?

These secret societies are there to protect race and religion, but where is the threat to race and religion?

Is this why the rhetoric of politicians always give the impression that Malays and Muslims are always under threat? And this way, the reason for the existence of these gangs remains valid for all times as long as the Malays can never trust non-Malays. Non-Malays must be afraid that these gangs exist.

How sad is it that Malaysia will always be on the brink. I cannot imagine our former prime ministers - Tunku Abdul Rahman, Abdul Razak Hussein, Hussein Onn and Dr Mahathir Mohamad - supporting such gangs.

What kind of vision do our leaders have for Malaysia? What does “developed” mean? Can we ever be a peaceful nation? Should non-Malays look for a home elsewhere? But not all of them can go though? How do the police co-exist with such gangs?

The Analyser : David Dass, a developed nation might have been possible once. A civilised nation was never possible. Why else would Mahathir be obsessed with development?

Don't fool yourself that similar secret societies don't already exist among the Chinese, the Indians - and possibly the Indonesians, the Bengalis and the Nepalese.

Basically : Talk about double standards. Here were have an admission that sections of Pekida are gangsters, and yet they walk free among the Umno elite and the government.

Meanwhile in Penang, just because one or two members of a volunteer corp were involved in an altercation - and has not even been proven guilty yet - they arrested the whole lot of them.

Put that together with Home Minister Ahmad Zahid Hamidi's letter pleading for the return of BN's good buddy in regard to our national security - who just happened to be caught with his pants down in Las Vegas - and the answer is...

Sleepy : Gangsterism and secret societies exist in all races, we know that. The issue about Pekida as far as I understand, is their relationship concerning 1) the race/racial component; 2) political influence; and 3) funding.

I was made aware that Italy (maybe 30-40 years ago) had once been controlled by organised criminal groups like the mafia, and that even now is shaking with the effects of that era. I hope this is nothing similar to that.

Headhunter : Pekida sounds like one of those quirky gun-totting outfits in the US that like to pile up tons of weapons to fight enemies who exist only in their imagination.

Supercession : No wonder the inspector-general of police has not sent even one - let alone 20 - police officers to arrest a single Pekida gangster.

Do we really need to increase Parliament seats?

Anonymous_3f4b : We do not need an increase in parliamentary seats. Most parliamentarians are there only to keep their seats warm and to safeguard the interests of their respective parties, which hoisted them there under the party placard.

They earn a ‘gaji buta’, get allowances for attending meetings, as well as hotel stay, entertainment, transport, utilities, maid and even handphone allowances. Their job is to make their party happy by following the dictates of their party whips even if it goes against their conscience and sentiments.

Instead, we should reduce the number of parliamentarians - considering the fact that this is a small country with a population of only about 30 million at the last count.

Only a handful of parliamentarians do their jobs and are intelligent and diligent enough to be present at all parliamentary meetings and debate bills with facts and figures. The rest are passengers, absent more than present, and are bidding their time for more lucrative positions and the enviable pensions.

DontPlayGod : A more important task for the EC is to re-allocate the number of seats by the number of voters in each constituency.

In other words, narrow the number of registered voters in each constituency as per what is already stated in the constitution - a 10 to 15 percent difference - instead of the extensive gerrymandering practised by the EC and their political paymasters.

This is the more urgent task compared to increasing the number of seats. The US congress has only slightly more than 300 seats, and India's slightly more than 400. So by this, the number of seats for our Parliament should be around 20 to 30 only. We have more ministers than what the US and Britain have.

Bystander : If we go by the logic that parliamentary seats are to be allocated based on population, then shouldn't we have at least five to eight seats for Kapar alone, and four seats each for Batu and Bukit Bintang?

Senior : I agree, we need better MPs than more MPs. The growth of MPs is partly due to certain parties wanting to retain their majority anyway.

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