Two Tigers and Two Leopards

It was reported today that Thai cops seize carcasses of 2 tigers and 2 leopards from Malaysia. Of all places, it was not seized at the Malaysia-Thai border but in Bangkok! So how can such huge wildlife slipped through the many Malaysian border checks - police, custom, immigration and army? If you ever go to Thailand entering around Sadao, Thailand you will be irritated with so many border checks. But how these carcasses in ice boxes could passed through the border? You tell me.

According to the report, the suspects were a local Thai and a Vietnamese caught at Kannayao area. Initial investigations by Thai cops revealed that the carcasses were destined for the China market, via Thailand, Laos and Vietnam. The Thai cop said the carcasses were smuggled from Malaysia through Sadao in Songkhla and each tiger could fetch RM70,000.

Big money involved big players. So long as corrupt officers are in the take there will be more poaching in the jungle of Malaysia. Today, the jungle transversing Ulu Muda Forest Reserve and Belum-Temengor complex has 2 tigers and 2 leopards lesser. Who cares!

Illegal logging could cost M'sia RM800-900mil yearly

February 1, 2012
By ISABELLE LAI
Star

PETALING JAYA: Malaysia stands to lose between RM800mil to RM900mil annually if illegal logging is not controlled, Transparency-International (TI) Malaysia president Datuk Paul Low Seng Kuan said Wednesday.

However, he believed illegal logging was "pretty much under control" in Peninsular Malaysia, although more attention needed to be paid to east Malaysian states.

He urged state governments to quickly move to designate and gazette selected areas for forest conservation to prevent them from being allocated for forestry activities.

"We are concerned about ensuring areas designated for conservation are quickly marked off and gazetted," he said after the launching of the Forest Watch and Public Awareness Campaign on Forest Conservation here.

He added that it was vital to determine in policy how much forest was allowed for either plantation or development.

"Yes, there are sporadic areas where legal loggers may extend beyond their boundaries. But I think that the issue of forestry conservation also has to be tackled at the policy side," he said, adding that he believed the state governments were carrying out their enforcement responsibilities against illegal logging in their respective states.

The Forest Watch project allows anyone to monitor the forest and track illegal logging activities at will, through simple, easy-to-use Google techniques.

"The Forest Watch Project is developed to engage the public as the eyes and ears of the forest through the use of Google Earth Geospatial Technology (satellite, imagery, aerial photography and GIS 3D globe)," he said.

"The public can then assess and report irregularities through the new website," he said.

Meanwhile, Malaysian Anti-Corruption Commission (MACC) investigations director Datuk Mustafar Ali said the commission took the issue of corruption in forestry activities very seriously.

He added that MACC had received around 88 complaints last year from various parties including non-governmental organisations and the public.

Peninsular Malaysia Forestry Department director-general Datuk Dr Abdul Rahman Abdul Rahim said the Natural Resources and Environment (NRE) Ministry was in the final stages of revising the National Forestry Act to include new provisions for higher penalties, imprisonment and strict liability.

"The ministry has also established the 1NRE Enforcement team comprising various enforcement departments within NRE to conduct integrated enforcement operations," he read in a speech text on behalf of NRE Minister Datuk Seri Douglas Uggah Embas.

Dr M, in India we have bad roads but true democracy

An interesting comment by an Indian national to Mamakkuty. There is a few paragraphs on the unsustainable development of our natural environment destroyed by Mamakkuty. Read on....

December 21, 2011http://www.blogger.com/img/blank.gif
freemalaysiatoday.com

Last week, Dr Mahathir gave a speech in India which stirred one Indian activist to retort in an open letter to the doctor.


By Siddharthya Swapan Roy

Dear Dr Mahathir,

A couple of days back I woke up to newspaper reports which quoted you as saying that India’s democracy is a hindrance to its development and, if we did away with the nuisance of democracy, we will become developed.

Well, sir, it is heartening to see your concern about India’s future, especially now that our own elected government has orphaned us. To read that someone from the outside cares about our development sounds so very nice.

But you see, sir, your (apparently) good intentions notwithstanding, your advice to Indians is, well how should I put it… ill-advised.

I’m not really sure if you know much about the history of our nation. Don’t get me wrong.

Going by facts like the general absence of news from Malaysian newspapers; the absence of anything but song and dance in your electronic media; the absence of bookstores that sell knowledgeable books (for example, ones from which you can learn about history and not how to get rich in six steps); the abundance of malls and the stark absence of libraries; the abundance of coaching centres that can make masseurs, air hostesses and a host of quick-fix technicians and the relative absence of centres of higher learning especially in the social sciences; and, above all, the fact that this insanely consumerist and hedonist Malaysia was made under your tutelage, makes me doubt your knowledge of the history of India or any nation for that matter.

So allow me to apprise you of the story of our independence.

We won independence from colonial rulers waging a long and tortuous battle. A battle that sought to replace a discriminatory, unjust and violent regime that had enslaved huge populations with one which was based on the principles of liberty, equality and fraternity.

India was home then, as is now and as will always be, to an immense diversity of people who spoke different tongues, prayed to different Gods, wore different clothes and had different political beliefs. These diverse people said to each other that – we, despite our differences, will strive to live and flourish together and make a sovereign nation which will be democratic, socialist and secular.

We did not anywhere say that we want to be Malaysia or for that matter China or the US.

In India, no one is above the law

We want to become a nation with a system that treats all its citizens as equal unlike your country that officially accords special rights to Malay Muslims calling them first-class citizens while relegating thousands of people of Tamil, Chinese and other ethnic origins.

Despite the fact that they have known no other land than Malaysia as their own, you denigrate them with the tag of being second-class citizens.

We try to work towards having a system wherein a person will grow according to his merit and hard work earning what she or he has rightfully earned.

You may be surprised to know that here in India making cartels based on identity, even if under the name of a holy cow called “Bumiputra” or son of the soil is looked down upon by most of us.

Here, promoting the selective interests of one’s self or that of his kin is called corruption and nepotism and not, as you call it, development.

We are in fact fighting tooth and nail to arrest the scourge of corruption and (you’ll be shocked to know) get the guilty punished.

Here in India no one is above the law and many a times powerful public figures go to jail for being corrupt or subverting the law.

Now that we are at it, sir, I’m sure it would be interesting to know what the minorities of your country have to say – especially the jailed and beaten ones – about the development-democracy debate.

In fact, sir, your idea of development is largely at odds with many of us here.

Development is no substitute for values

What you did to the tropical forests and water bodies of Malaysia (that is, raze vast acres of them into oblivion to make way for big-buck oil palm plantations and piggeries and so on) would cause huge outrage among many of us who are looking for sustainable development.

We are yet to be unanimously convinced that making cemented roads – however broad, lining them with buildings, even if glass-covered and glossy, and putting cars on them, however fast – is a substitute for our valued bio-diversity.

Many of us are very convinced that displacing huge populations of native people for useless things like racing tracks is a blot on the word “development”.

There are many of us who find it a shameful and cruel hypocrisy that while your country has abundant and openly advertised sex tourism, it still whips women for being licentious!

Thanks to the culture of reading here, many of us know of your penchant for cruelty in your personal career.

A career during which you enacted despotic and violent acts at times in the name (your contorted version of) Islam and at times in the name of security and national interest.

We could recount how you rose to power annihilating huge numbers of your opponents and stayed there for over two decades, continuing your devious rule using tactics and schemes which are far beyond Machiavelli.

Many of us know about your vile Internal Security Act, which you used to crush political opposition – jailing them and putting in place a frail and near-sham democracy and placing the entire nation under a one-man rule of Umno for over two decades.

You will note that I have used words like “most of us”, “many of us” and have tried to stay away from absolute claims.

Misconstrued understanding of ‘development’

Besides the age-old Indian practice of accommodating different opinions, it is meant to recognise that there are people in this country, too, who think like you and will have applauded you for saying what you did.

They, too, think that roads are all that important and not the humans who walk on them or the ones who sleep beside them.

They have misconstrued the word development as development of personal wealth and that this “development” is a holy cow and everything including the rights and lives of fellow humans is of lesser priority.

Their money power helps them buy a lot of print space and electronic bandwidth so they may appear like the majority, but thankfully the truth is they aren’t.

The majority of us recognise and are willing to admit – and even discuss at length – that there are problems in our nation – including bad roads.

But they’ll quickly add that we intend to solve those not by lessening democracy but by ncreasing it.

The author is a freelance writer and activist based in Maharashtra.

Malaysia a heaven for transit of Ivory

Actually it is quite easy to detect this type of smuggling. Any shipment from Africa continent that has elephant population should be inspected thoroughly. The frequency of successful seizures indicate there could be more undetected shipments. Is our customs so incompetent that they need public tip-off?

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Tuesday December 13, 2011

S’gor customs seize elephant tusks, ivory handicraft worth RM4mil

PORT KLANG: The Selangor Customs Department busted an attempt by an international ivory syndicate to smuggle 15 tonnes of elephant tusks and suspected ivory-made handicraft worth RM4mil at Westport near here on Tuesday.

Department director Datuk Azis Yacub said the tusks originated from Kenya and the handicraft were found in a 20-foot container that was detained in Westport on Thursday and inspected thoroughly Monday.

"The seizure followed a public tip-off. Upon full inspection, the enforcement officers discovered the elephant tusks in brown boxes tucked behind the container, together with several other boxes containing handicraft," he said at a press conference on Tuesday.

He said initial investigations showed that the tusks, declared as "soapstone-made handicraft," were heading for transshipment to Tanjong Pelepas port from the port of Mombasa, Kenya, before reaching their final destination at Sihanoukville, Cambodia.

"We managed to intercept the goods at Westport," he said.

Azis said Customs would send some of the handicraft, believed to be made from ivory, to the Chemistry Department soon to ascertain their true material.

He also said that no arrests had been made so far, and the case is being investigated under Section 133 (1) (a) of the Customs Act 1967 for wrongful declaration of goods.

If convicted, the parties involved can be fined up to RM500,000 or imprisoned for up to five years, or both. This was the fourth attempt to smuggle elephant tusks into the country this year.

In September, the Customs Department foiled an attempt to smuggle two tonnes of elephant tusks worth RM3mil into Westport.

It was also reported that more than 1,000 elephant tusks were seized by local authorities when they smashed two attempts to smuggle them through the Pasir Gudang and Butterworth ports over the past two months. - Bernama

Act now to lessen impact of climate change, Govt urged

Stories by RAHIMY RAHIM, EMBUN MAJID, LEE YEN MUN and JOSEPH KAOS
Oct 28, 2011
Star

--------------------------------------------------------------------------
PETALING JAYA: An environmentalist wants the Government to take steps to lessen the impact of unusual rainfall due to climate change.

Centre for Environment, Tech­nology and Development Malaysia (Cetdem) chairman Gurmit Singh said it should prohibit development in flood-prone areas.

He said some developers build their infrastructure in low-lying deltas and coastal areas where floods occur.

“They must realise that a change in climate is already taking place and policies must be implemented so Malaysia will not end up like Thailand.”

Thailand is facing its worst floods and people and businesses are forced to build water barriers around their homes and workplaces.

Drainage and Irrigation Depart­ment (DID) national hydrology and water resources division director Datuk Lim Chow Hock said Malaysia was receiving higher-than-average rainfall even when it wasn’t the monsoon season.

“In terms of national average, we received some 2,400mm per year in the peninsula alone,” he said.

“We estimate that the figures will be much higher this year.

“Given the current outlook, the level will spiral to at least 2,700mm while Sabah and Sarawak can go up to 3,000mm of rain this year,” he told The Star.

He said this year’s rainfall was exceptionally higher.

“Prolonged light rain in a few days followed by at least twice heavy rain in a month from November until March could lead to flooding.”

Malaysia identified as a major transit point for elephant tusk smugglers

Saturday September 3, 2011
By ISABELLE LAI
Star

PETALING JAYA: More than 20 tonnes of illegal ivory have passed through at least two Malaysian ports since 2003, earning the country an unsavoury reputation as a transhipment hub for the multi-million ringgit trade and the figure involves only those seized.

Wildlife monitoring trade network Traffic regional director Dr William Schaedla said Malaysia had become a major hub for illegal ivory trade in the last few years.

This could have been caused by stricter enforcement measures in neighbouring countries, leading smugglers to venture through Malaysian ports, he said.

“Smugglers tend to move to an easier' place. If enforcement in other countries heats up, then they will find a soft spot elsewhere,” he said.

It was reported that 794 African ivory tusks were confiscated by Hong Kong authorities on Monday after they arrived by sea from Malaysia. The tusks, weighing 1.9 tonnes and estimated to be worth around HK$13mil (RM4.97mil), was concealed in a consignment declared as non-ferrous products for factory use.

The seizure came after last week's report that more than 1,000 elephant tusks were seized by Tanzanian authorities. The tusks were hidden in a strong-smelling container of anchovies destined for Malaysia.

The huge amount of ivory being shipped accounts for thousands of elephants killed in the past few decades. Some tusks come from freshly-killed animals while others are from stockpiles.

Dr Schaedla said it was vital that Malaysia increased its regional cooperation and exchange of information with Asean countries via the Asean Wildlife Enforcement Network.

He also suggested that customs officers improve their communication mechanisms by using the Ecomessage system set up by Interpol. (Ecomessage is a database to coordinate international efforts to combat environmental crime, including illegal trafficking of wildlife.)

Local enforcement agencies should gather intelligence or information and bring it to the National Central Bureau (NCB) located at the federal police headquarters in Bukit Aman.

Dr Schaedla said Malaysian customs officers should also work with the World Customs Organisation's regional intelligence liaison offices to exchange information and intelligence effectively.

However, Dr Schaedla commended the Customs Department for heightening its enforcement measures of late, saying: “Malaysia is now quite serious about wildlife crime but still has a long way to go.”

Traffic has identified Malaysia as “a country of concern” in its latest Elephant Trade Information System (ETIS) report.

Records of confiscated ivory shipments showed several seizures in other countries had transited through Penang and Pasir Gudang, which were considered “high-volume” ports.

Among the countries that seized ivory shipments after transiting through Malaysian ports were Hong Kong, Taiwan, Japan, Vietnam and Thailand.

The latter two are themselves known transit hubs for the illegal ivory trade, according to Traffic reports.

A general manager of a shipping company said there were around 50,000 to 100,000 containers which entered ports for transit in a month, adding that the containers were allowed to be stored free in the container yard for 28 days.

He claimed that Customs officers would only conduct an X-ray inspection on containers if they had a tip-off.

According to the World Wildlife Fund Global website, there could have been as many as three to five million African elephants in the 1930s and 1940s.

However, today, only some 300,000 elephants roam southern Africa and considerably fewer in West Africa.

Malaysia Truly Boleh

August 26, 2011
Country exposed as major transit point after seizure of 1,000 elephant tusks
Star

PETALING JAYA: A container of anchovies headed for Malaysia from Africa turned out to be no small fry. Hidden within the strong smelling anchovies were more than 1,000 elephant tusks.

The killing of more than 500 elephants for the tusks has now turned the spotlight on Malaysia as a significant transit point for the illegal elephant ivory trade.

Wildlife Trade Monitoring Network (Traffic) South-East Asia senior programme officer Kanitha Krishnasamy said Malaysia had been named in the latest Elephant Trade Information System (ETIS) report as “a country of concern”.

“Malaysia has progressively gained prominence in successive ETIS analyses as a transit point for African ivory because of a growing number of illegal shipments passing through its ports,” she said in a statement.

Foreign wires reported yesterday that more than 1,000 elephant tusks destined for Malaysia were seized by Tanzanian authorities on Tuesday.

AFP reported that 1,041 elephant tusks were hidden in a container of anchovies, in the hope that the smell would discourage closer inspection by the authorities.

Krishnasamy said the latest seizure “represented the death of at least 500 elephants”.

She said it was doubtful Malaysia was the end destination of these illegal shipments based on previous seizures in Thailand and Vietnam.

She urged the Wildlife and National Parks Department, Natural Resources and Environment Ministry and the Customs Department to document all ivory stockpiles seized and report the matter to the Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species of Wild Fauna and Flora.

Krishnasamy urged the Govern­ment to work with African nations to put a stop to the trade.

“If we do not act now, we will be contributing to the demise of the wild elephant population,” she added.

How Corrupt Can Malaysia Be?

No action on international wildlife trafficking syndicate
Posted on 6 July 2011 - 06:14pm
Alyaa Alhadjri
thesundaily.com

KUALA LUMPUR (July 6, 2011): PKR vice president N. Surendran today claimed that no action has been taken by the authorities to investigate "crucial evidence" which may lead to the crippling of an international wildlife trafficking syndicate allegedly operating in Malaysia.

Surendran, who is also the Malaysian Animal Rights Society (Roar) president, said the information could be obtained from Emilienne Justine Sarah – a Madagascar native who was arrested at KLIA in July last year for attempting to smuggle tortoises out of her country.

Emilliene was subsequently charged and detained for eight months at Kajang prison, where she gave birth to a baby boy and was transferred to Lenggeng detention camp before being deported to Madagascar last month.

At a press conference at PKR's headquarters, Surendran said Emilienne, while under detention in Lenggeng, had with the help of an animal rights activist lodged a police report which shed light on the "kingpins" involved in illegal wildlife trafficking.

"She was already under detention but the police did not make any effort to obtain the information from her, so she had to lodge an official report," he said.

In Emilienne's police report which Surendran distributed to the media, she named the notorious "Lizard King" Anson Wong who is now also behind bars as the person who had allegedly paid her US$600 (RM1,801) to smuggle in the tortoises from Madagascar.

Emilienne, who formerly worked as a waitress, said she needed the extra money to help support her family and was reassured that it would be a foolproof operation as custom officers in Madagascar and KLIA had allegedly been paid off.

"I first went to Penang in April last year and was told to contact a man named Vijay who owned a shop that sold tortoises, chameleons and snakes.

"When I met him (Vijay), he ordered me to transport various species of animals from Madagascar to Penang in July last year," she wrote in her police report which was lodged on June 23 at the Lenggeng station.

She said that two days prior to her departure for Malaysia from Madagascar, she was introduced to a man named Ong and his girlfriend who were responsible for packing the tortoises to be trafficked.

"While I was detained at Kajang prison, I found out that Ong's real name was Anson Wong. I was shown his picture and I can confirm that he was the man who hired me," said Emilienne.

Surendran, together with Lawyers for Liberty campaign director Fadiah Nadwa Fikri, called on the relevant authorities to investigate all claims made by Emillienne in her report and identify the man named "Vijay" who is purportedly operating in Penang.

"Wong is now behind bars, but his 'tentacles' are still spreading to as far as Madagascar. The authorities should take measures to use all information provided by Emilienne and crack down on these notorius characters," said Fadiah Nadwa.

Rampant Food Wastages in Malaysia

June 10, 2011
930 tonnes of food being thrown away every day
By P. ARUNA
Star

KUALA LUMPUR: Malaysians can afford to eat less because they are either overeating or wasting food, throwing away up to 930 tonnes of unconsumed food daily, say experts.

This is equivalent to us throwing away 93,000 10kg bags of rice each day.

The experts warn that people must change or adapt their eating habits in the light of rising prices and a looming food shortage, adding that the country was already experiencing a food crisis.

Universiti Malaya Prof Dr P. Agamuthu said wastage was a growing trend, adding that almost 50% of the 31,000 tonnes of waste produced daily by Malaysians comprised organic kitchen waste such as leftover food.

“Malaysians discard about 930 tonnes of unconsumed food daily. Wastage of unconsumed food alone in Malaysia has doubled over the past three years. This does not even include leftover food,” he said, adding that the unconsumed waste mostly consisted of expired bread, eggs and old or rotten fruit.

Dr Agamuthu, who specialises in solid and hazardous waste management, said Malaysia was close to developed country status in terms of waste generated compared to developing nations like India and Bangladesh, which had almost zero unconsumed food.

He said food wastage was higher in urban areas due to the difference in income levels over rural areas.

Nutrition Society of Malaysia president Dr Tee Ee Siong said many Malaysians tended to overeat, usually taking more food than they should.

He said it was a common sight to see Malaysians pile too much food on their plates, especially during meals at restaurants and buffets.

“It could be because they don't want the hassle of going back for a second helping or they are worried that the food will finish before they can return.

“When we have too much food on our plates, we tend to overeat,” he said, adding that overeating was also the main reason for obesity among Malaysians.

According to Health Ministry statistics, 30% of Malaysians are obese while another 30% are overweight.

Dr Tee said those preparing food in households should be more accurate in their estimations on how much they needed to cook to avoid wastage.

“Parents need to be more sensitive about the wastage of food and teach their children by example,” he said.

Marditech Corporation Sdn Bhd group CEO Anas Ahmad Nasarudin said non-alcoholic foodstuff had registered an average of 4.7% increase in prices from last year.

He said an investigation by the body showed that the price of meat had increased by 7.6%, milk and eggs by 7.9%, vegetables by 11.4%, jam and sweetened products by 10.9%, fruits by 6.8% and fish by 3.8%.

Marditech consultant Ahmad Zamzam Mohamed said the country was already in a food crisis and Malaysians would have to change their eating habits to lessen its impact.

“The Government has been shielding Malaysians from the real impact of the crisis with various subsidies,” he said, adding that they would soon face reality as subsidies were slowly removed.

“We should learn to eat accordingly and not over-indulge,” he said during a press conference on the 7th Malaysia International Agro-Bio Business Conference here yesterday.

The two-day conference, which will gather experts to discuss the challenges of the emerging global food crisis, begins on July 13.

Panda Diplomacy - a stupid idea!

Sunday May 1, 2011
Bring back panda diplomacy, China urged
Star

KUALA LUMPUR: A community leader hopes that China will loan its most famous icon – the panda bear – as a recognition of the long-standing relationship between the two countries.

Malaysia was among the first countries to establish diplomatic ties with China and both countries have enjoyed a long history of diplomatic relations as well as trade exchanges, said president of the Federation of Chinese Asso­ciations Malaysia Tan Sri Pheng Yin Huah.

“It will be of great significance if China can loan a pair of pandas to Malaysia as a symbolic gesture of the strong relationship between the two countries.

“Many countries have enjoyed this ‘panda diplomacy’,” he said in an interview.

Panda diplomacy, a practice which existed as far back as the Tang Dynasty, was revived in the 1950s and had been wildly popular.

Between 1958 to 1982, China gave 23 pandas to nine different countries.

One highlight of panda diplomacy was the Chinese government’s gift of two of the animals – named Ling-Ling and Hsing-Hsing – to the United States in 1972 after President Richard Nixon’s historic visit to China.

Nixon reciprocated by sending a pair of musk oxen.

By 1984, however, pandas were no longer used as agents of diplomacy, as China began to offer the animals to other nations on 10-year loans, with standard loan terms including a fee of up to US$1mil (RM3mil) per year and a provision that any cub born during the loan would be the property of China.

Previously, there was an attempt to bring pandas to Ma­­laysia but it did not materialise because it involved high maintenance costs as well as the need for an agreement between leaders of both countries. — Bernama

Malaysia Deforestation Is Three Times Faster Than Rest Of Asia Combined

(AP) - New satellite imagery shows Malaysia is destroying forests more than three times faster than all of Asia combined, and its carbon-rich peat soils of the Sarawak coast are being stripped even faster, according to a study released Tuesday.

The report commissioned by the Netherlands-based Wetlands International says Malaysia is uprooting an average 2 percent of the rain forest a year on Sarawak, its largest state on the island of Borneo, or nearly 10 percent over the last five years. Most of it is being converted to palm oil plantations, it said.

The deforestation rate for all of Asia during the same period was 2.8 percent, it said.

In the last five years, 353,000 hectares (872,263 acres) of Malaysia's peatlands were deforested, or one-third of the swamps which have stored carbon from decomposed plants for millions of years.

"We never knew exactly what was happening in Malaysia and Borneo," said Wetlands spokesman Alex Kaat. "Now we see there is a huge expansion (of deforestation) with annual rates that are beyond imagination."

The study was carried out by SarVision, a satellite monitoring and mapping company that originated with scientists at Wageningen University in the Netherlands.

"Total deforestation in Sarawak is 3.5 times as much as that for entire Asia, while deforestation of peat swamp forest is 11.7 times as much," the report said.

Malaysia's peatland forests are home to several endangered animals, including the Borneo Pygmy elephant and the Sumatran rhino, as well as rare timber species and unique vegetation

Kaat said the study showed deforestation was progressing far faster than the Malaysian government has acknowledged.

Scientists say the destruction of the Amazon, the rain forests of central Africa and in Southeast Asia accounts for more than 15 percent of human-caused carbon emissions blamed for global warming.

Live forests soak up carbon from the atmosphere, while burning trees release that stored carbon – contributing to climate change in two ways at once. But emissions effect is amplified when trees are felled from the peatlands and the swamps are drained for commercial plantations.

Malaysia and Indonesia produce about 85 percent of the world's palm oil, an ingredient in cooking oil, cosmetics, soaps, bread, and chocolate. It also is used as an industrial lubricant and was once considered an ideal biofuel alternative to fossil fuel, but it has fallen out of favor because of earlier reports of widespread rainforest destruction for the expansion of plantations.

Indonesia has pledged to slow deforestation in its territory, and last year Norway pledged to give Jakarta $1 billion a year to help finance an independent system of monitoring and quantifying greenhouse gas emissions.

Another smuggling of exotic wildlife

If you read the article below, you will notice that the seizure was with the help of a tip-off. So competent? Several questions need some answers.

How does the driver so easily vanish?

How come the lorry can pass the Msia's check point?

If it has been a tip-off, enforcers would have ample time to catch the smuggler even before entering the check point!

The driver could be informed by officer on the take?

Where do you think the wildlife will be released? As usual we won't know. Perhaps these wildlife could be sent back to the smuggler. Everything is just doubtful.

Money is king ok!

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December 22, 2010
Saved from fate as exotic meat
Story and photos by G.C. TAN
thestar

OVER 1,800 endangered reptiles meant for the cooking pot were rescued by the Customs Department at Bukit Kayu Hitam.

Acting on a tip-off, the department personnel seized 475 hill tortoises, 437 freshwater tortoises, 710 monitor lizards and 196 cobras and king cobras from a lorry that was parked near the Malaysia-Thai duty free zone at about 6.40am on Monday.

The reptiles were kept inside blue sacks, plastic bags and plastic baskets that were hidden in between heaps of empty fruit baskets and 20 boxes of sawn logs meant for carving.

State customs director Ishak Ahmad said the lorry had passed through the Malaysian Immigration checkpoint and had queued to enter the Thai checkpoint that opened at 7am.

“We believe the reptiles which weighed 4,300kg would end up in restaurants selling exotic dishes in a neighbouring country.

“The smugglers thought they can fool us by hiding the reptiles in the front part of the lorry and the empty fruit baskets and logs behind,” he said to reporters at the Customs store yesterday.

Ishak said the department laid an ambush for the lorry which was left unattended.

“We moved in after two hours when there was no sight of the driver or conductor,” he said.

He said this was the biggest seizure of wildlife by the department this year.

He said the reptiles worth RM24,000, lorry and the 20 boxes worth RM6,000 would be handed over to the state Wildlife and National Parks Department for further action.

Dictators love nuclear power

December 19, 2010
Malaysian Insider

I am not at all surprised that the Barisan Nasional government has decided to build a nuclear power plant. After all, despite what environmentalists might like to think, the primary case against nuclear power has always been its economics.

When you take into account the lifecycle cost of nuclear power — from feasibility to construction to operation and, finally, decommissioning — it is the most expensive conventional method of producing electricity.

Add to that the inherent risks of nuclear reactors, plus the still unresolved question of what to do with spent fuel, and it is no surprise that the nuclear power industry has seen some very tough times in the past three decades.

Over the past few years, however, high prices of oil, gas and coal, coupled with concerns with carbon dioxide and global warming, have given nuclear advocates a new lease of life. Under current conditions, provided we are prepared to ignore the safety and environmental contamination issues, it is possible to make a conceivable economic argument for nuclear power.

Nuclear power requires tremendous up-front investment followed by relatively low operating costs. Thus all you have to do is assume an unrealistically low interest rate and continually high prices for fossil fuels. Project these assumptions over decades and you can show that nuclear energy is less expensive than using fossil fuels. However, you must carefully avoid all comparisons of nuclear with renewable energy — hydro, wind, solar and biomass — which are undoubtedly superior in terms of economics, safety and environmental protection.

Paradoxically, the characteristics of nuclear power so feared by its critics — enormous capital cost, open-ended escalation clauses and the oligopolistic nature of the industry — makes it a very attractive proposition for corrupt practices, provided you can ride roughshod over the opposition. This is exactly what happened in the Philippines, more than three decades ago.

Bataan Nuclear Power Plant (BNPP)

The story of BNPP, Southeast Asia’s first and only nuclear power plant, illustrates some of the points above perfectly. In 1971, Ferdinand Marcos decided to build a nuclear power plant for the Philippines. However, at that time he was still the democratically-elected president and was unable to convince his people of the need to go nuclear.

By 1973, conditions were in place for him to push through his choice. The opposition had been eliminated by his declaration of martial law in 1972 and the quadrupling of oil prices because of the Arab oil embargo during the Yom Kippur war of 1973, made nuclear easier to sell to the public.

The tragic tale of BNPP has been carefully and comprehensively documented by the conservative business magazine, Fortune, in a remarkable 1986 article entitled “The $2.2 billion Nuclear Fiasco”. Initially Marcos delegated the responsibility for the plant to the National Power Co, the government-owned electric utility, which began negotiating for the supply of two 600MW nuclear plants from General Electric. By 1974 negotiations were more or less complete, with GE offering to supply two 620 megawatt reactors for US$650 million (RM2 billion at prevailing rates).

Westinghouse was late to the game and decided to leapfrog GE by dealing personally with Marcos. Westinghouse appointed Herminio Disini, a golfing buddy of Marcos whose wife was a cousin of Imelda Marcos, as its agent and he was able to arrange for the latecomer to present its pitch directly to Marcos and his cabinet at Malacanang Palace. After the meeting Marcos directed National Power to stop negotiating with GE and deal only with Westinghouse.

In 1976, after many rounds of fruitless negotiations and interference from Marcos, National Power announced that Westinghouse would build the BNPP, with one 626MW reactor, for US$722 million. The intervention of Marcos meant that the Philippine people had to pay a higher price for half the power! In addition, Disini, although he had no prior experience in construction, formed a new company which was awarded major BNPP subcontracts by Westinghouse.


Volcano and earthquake zone

Although the site was contentious, work began quickly, even before seismic and other on-site tests by the government regulator, the Philippines Atomic Energy Commission (PAEC), were completed. Just 100km from Manila, BNPP sits on Mount Natib, a dormant volcano and within 40km of three geologic faults.

Alarmed by these facts PAEC called the International Atomic Energy Commission (IAEA) for help. In 1978, two years after construction had commenced, the IAEA concluded that the volcanic and earthquake risks were “improperly addressed” and recommended that construction be stopped until more tests were done.

The PAEC chairman, Librado Ibe, was under tremendous pressure to ignore the IAEA report and issue a construction permit for work on the reactor itself to commence. Unable to resist any further, Ibe signed the permit in April 1979 and, four days later, emigrated with his family to the United States. Ibe explained to Fortune Magazine that he felt it was unsafe to resist Marcos’s lieutenants any longer.

A few months later Marcos himself halted construction because Filipino opposition to BNPP has grown substantially after the Three Mile Island accident in Pennsylvania, US. Marcos appointed a new ad hoc commission to study the plant and they concluded that it was unsafe and would have to be modified to meet new US safety standards.

After two further years of haggling, Westinghouse agreed to upgrade the design, at an additional cost of US$700 million. By then the total cost of BNPP had risen to USD$1.8 billion.

Westinghouse rushed to complete BNPP amid growing opposition from Filipino activists. Construction was completed in January 1985 and BNPP was handed over to National Power. Westinghouse collected its money and the last construction worker left in May 1985.


Not a single watt

However, the plant was in no state to be fuelled. Inspections found more than 4,000 faults arising from poor quality control by the main sub-contractors, Disini’s company, and another controlled by a brother of Imelda Marcos. The main problems were attributed to poor welding, faulty pipe support brackets, substandard valve installations and leaking underground conduits and vaults.

In 1986, Marcos was overthrown in the People Power Revolution. Marcos and his family fled to Hawaii while Disini bolted to his villa in Vienna, where he apparently still stays.

Subsequent investigations by Corazon Aquino’s government found evidence of massive commissions paid by Westinghouse to Disini, which he shared with Marcos. The new government attempted to sue Westinghouse for corruption and restitution for faulty construction. In 1996 Westinghouse agreed to pay the Philippines government US$100 million in an out-of-court settlement.

Further studies have indicated it would cost an additional US$1 billion to correct all the defects in design and construction. Rather than throw good money after bad, the Philippines government decided to mothball the plant.

BNPP has been scrupulously maintained for more than 25 years, costing millions of dollars per year. It has not produced a single watt of electricity. The final price rose to US$2.2 billion, three times higher than the original estimate, and the final instalment was paid by the Filipino people in 2007, thirty-two years after construction commenced.

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December 19, 2010
Malaysia to rollout two nuclear power plants by 2012

KUALA LUMPUR — Malaysia plans to build two nuclear power plants that will generate 1,000MW each with the first plant ready for operation in 2021 and the second plant a year later, as part of the overall long-term plan to balance energy supply.

Energy, Green Technology and Water Minister Datuk Seri Peter Chin said the government would engage an international consultant to evaluate the location and requirement for such plants to be built.

Meanwhile, more awareness and education programmes will be carried out to inform people on such a need.

“Hopefully, by 2013 or 2014, we will able to finish evaluating this. As for calling of tenders, we hope it will be done by 2016,” he told Bernama in an interview.

He said Malaysia was heavily reliant on gas and coal for its electricity supply and it was government policy to reduce reliance on fossil fuel. Gas accounted for 64 per cent of the country’s energy generation while the remainder came from coal.

“We must get away from this. (It is) very much imbalance. Most countries have a good balance. We want hydro to assume a prominent role as it is clean but this can only be achieved in Sabah and Sarawak where there is much potential but not in Peninsular Malaysia,” he said.

Besides, Chin said, other sources of energy such as biomass and wind were too minimal while solar was a good potential but the technology was still very expensive.

“Biomass and wind, there is nothing to shout about. Unless and until solar renewable becomes big enough, this type of energy just compliments (what you already have) as you can’t generate much due to its high cost,” he added.

Chin also said the government needed a balanced approach when it comes to renewal energy as it would not want tariffs to go up due to higher cost.

“Everyone wants to say that we want renewables but what about cost? Can we force the people to accept high tariffs? We have to look at a balanced way, that’s why we can’t depend on fossil fuel only,” he said.

Chin added nuclear has become a more prominent choice in balancing the energy source due to lower maintenance cost and lower tariffs in the long-run.

“For example, in Abu Dhabi, they are building huge solar energy plants but [were] at the same time balancing it up with a nuclear plant. They are not just concentrating on fossil fuel,” he said.

Malaysia began operating a 1MW Triga research reactor since 1982 and has an international nuclear safeguards agreement in place since 1972.

Recently, Malaysia also tightened export control laws to thwart the possibility of nuclear technology smuggling. — Bernama

Elderly Malaysian rhino enlisted in breeding attempt

Thu, 23 Sep 2010 13:43

freemalaysiatoday.com
Source here

KUALA LUMPUR: Malaysian wildlife officials on Borneo island said today they will try to artificially inseminate an elderly female rhinoceros in a bid to revive one of the world's most endangered species.

Gelegub, a Sumatran rhino who at 28-years-old is equivalent to a 70-something grandmother in human terms, will be impregnated with sperm from a virile young male rhino.

"Gelegub is too old to mate normally and the mating ritual of rhinos is quite violent so this would be one of the best ways to try and get her pregnant and give birth to a rhino in captivity," said Sen Nathan, coordinator of the Borneo Rhino Sanctuary where the procedure will be carried out.

Sen said the only breeding facility in the world that has had any success in producing Sumatran rhino calves in captivity is the Cincinnati Zoo in the United States, which has produced three calves over the last decade.

"Our priority of course is to have natural mating in the first place but at the moment we only have one male rhino in captivity and Gelegub is the only other viable female that we have," he said.

"It is critical that we try and get the rhinos to reproduce as there are only 50 such rhinos in the region and without reproduction, they face imminent extinction."

Nathan said Gelegub will be injected with hormones in November to stimulate the production of eggs, which will be removed and fertilised, hopefully producing viable embryos for implantation.

Spare embryos will be frozen for implantation in surrogates at a later date.

Between 30 to 50 of the Borneo sub-species of the Sumatran rhinos are known to remain in the wild in Borneo -- a vast island shared by Malaysia, Indonesia and Brunei.

It is distinguished from other Sumatran rhinos by its relatively small size, small teeth and distinctively shaped head.

Only 150 to 300 Sumatran rhino are known to exist in the wild, making it one of the world's most endangered species, with only small groups left on Indonesia's Sumatra island, the north of Borneo and peninsular Malaysia.

- AFP

United Borneo natives demand justice and respect

Fri, 09 Jul 2010 10:46
By Roselind Jarrow
freemalaysiatoday.com

BAU: The Malaysian and Indonesian governments have been urged to ‘review all existing laws and regulations’ that undermine rights of Borneo’s indigenous peoples.

They were also asked to respect and recognise their rights to ensure the ‘full and effective participation’ of indigenous peoples in the respective countries' decision making process.

These were among the resolutions in the inaugural Krokong Declaration following a three-day Borneo Forests Conference attended by representatives from Sabah, Sarawak, West and East Kalimantan.

The conference was jointly organised by the Sarawak Dayak Iban Association, Borneo Resource Institute Malaysia, Building Initiative in Indigenous Heritage, Pascos Trust, Aliansi Masyarakat Adat Nusantara, Indonesia, and Jaringan Orang Asal SeMalaysia.

The Krokong Declaration remindedto the two governments, who endorsed and adopted the UN Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples (UNDRIP), of their obligation to uphold the rights of the indigenous peoples.

It calls on the these two governments to:

Ensure the full and effective participation of indigenous peoples in all development policies, plans, assessments and implementation related to indigenous peoples subject to our Free, Prior and Informed Consent (FPIC).

Impose a moratorium on development projects that have been identified to be implemented and planned in our territories that have violated our rights and do not have our FPIC.

Review all existing laws and regulations that undermine our rights as indigenous peoples.

Urge the governments of Malaysia and Indonesia to stop and investigate all forms of violence against our people, arising from all the common issues below.
What's the Krokong Declaration says:

“We, the indigenous peoples of Borneo, have very distinct cultures and relations to our land, territories and resources.

“We strive to maintain these distinct values through our Adat and norms that have been passed down to us from our ancestors for generations.

“We have lived and nurtured our traditional knowledge, innovations and practices since time immemorial, making us the true custodians of our land, territories and resources.

“We, the indigenous peoples of Borneo have suffered social injustices resulting from the imposition of development aggression on our lands, territories and resources. All these have been done without our free, prior and informed consent (FPIC).

“We have not been included in the decision making processes, thus we continue to be marginalised and discriminated regardless of our basic human and customary rights to land, territories and resources, as stated in state, national and international laws.

“We call upon our governments, Malaysia and Indonesia, who adopted the UN Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples, to fully uphold the rights contained in the declaration.

“We, the indigenous peoples of Borneo declare our solidarity and unity in declaring the Krokong Declaration to be respected and recognised towards its implementation in Malaysia and Indonesia.

“We are further united by the common threats that face us; mega dam projects, mining and other extractive industries, oil palm plantations, deforestation and forest degradation, and climate change on our island of Borneo. We recognise that these threats are faced by indigenous peoples in Malaysia and Indonesia as well as around the world.

“In Borneo, the development of mega dams has displaced and resulted in involuntary forced resettlement of indigenous peoples, causing losses of our customary land and source of livelihood, identity and culture.

“It will also contribute to climate change because of the emission of methane and carbon dioxide from forest clearing and from flooding of reservoir. Water-borne diseases like Malaria and Chikungunya happen more often in areas that surrounds the dam.

“The expansion of oil palm plantations is escalating in alarming and unprecedented proportions that destroy our customary land, territories and resources. This trend brings grave concern to us because it has adversely affected our social culture and livelihoods and unjustly deprived us of the very source of sustenance.

“Additionally, extractive industries such as mining and logging continue to encroach into our ancestral domains which have resulted in land and environmental quality degradation that further impoverish our people. All the extractive industries have contributed to climate change by emitting green house gases (GHGs).

“We are also adversely affected by climate change. Our rivers and land are drying, frequent occurrences of flash floods, unpredictable weather patterns and seasons that threaten our food security.

“Climate change mitigation schemes such as REDD can create potential threats to the ownership of our forests and our rights.

“All of the common issues above have increased the violation of our human rights in the form of intimidation, wrongful detention, criminalisation, killings, deployment of gangsters and the use of para-military force against Indigenous Peoples.

“Likewise, our traditional values, institutions, governance system and knowledge as well as cultural heritage are being eroded as a result of these,” the declaration says.
It also pledges that they work together as one people and one Borneo to respond to these threats in a united and systematic manner that will ensure the survival and dignity of the indigenous peoples.

“We therefore, will work for the establishment of the Borneo Indigenous Peoples Alliance (BIPA) as the expression of our united stand for life and dignity.”
The Krokong Declaration will be submitted to Malaysia and Indonesia as well as to the state and provisional governments. A copy will also be handed to the United Nations.

Subsidising destruction

Tue, 06 Jul 2010
By Hilary Chiew
Source: freemalaysiatoday.com

COMMENT Last week I raised the issue about perverse incentives in the form of government subsidies to the power sector. This absurd policy direction is not unique to Malaysia though.

It is being played out amply in the battle against climate change, arguably humanity’s biggest threat.

In the global fight against rising earth temperature, the cap and trade system was introduced into the legally-binding emission reduction agreement called Kyoto Protocol in an effort to reduce the release of global warming greenhouse gases (GHG) from economic activities.

(Under the first phase of the protocol, which takes effect from 2008 to 2012, industrialised economies [collectively referred to as Annex I members] are obliged to cut their emission by 5% from the 1990 baseline year. Currently, the United Nations climate talks is supposed to agree on the emission targets by Annex I parties for the second phase in continuing the protocol as mandated by the main treaty, the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change [UNFCCC].)

It is essentially a compromise between developed and developing countries which is typical of international treaty negotiation. The former which is historically responsible for the climate crisis needed in a way, some tangible incentives to convince its key emitters such as power generators to agree to emission reduction strategies. The latter conceded that without some sweetener, there will be no deal.

What we get was the built-in flexible mechanism called Clean Development Mechanism (CDM) that lessens the pain of developed countries’ polluting industries to cap their emission in contributing to the overall reduction commitment of industrialised nations.

The paramount objective of CDM allows industrialised countries to invest in emission reduction wherever it is cheapest globally. At the heart of CDM is “offsets” where emitters in rich countries achieved compliance by outsourcing part of their reduction targets outside their sector (for example, power generation) and usually in a developing country.

Along the way, developing countries are supposed to obtain technologies that help them to avoid emitting carbon while they continue developing their economies, eradicate poverty and lead their countries towards the desired developed status, albeit, through a low-carbon development model

These technologies and projects are paid with money that comes from the trading of carbon credits generated from the avoided emissions. These credits called Certified Emission Reductions (CER) are verified by a third party and approved by the CDM executive board. Each unit of CER is equivalent to one metric tonne of carbon dioxide equivalent. Hence, the creation of a new commodity -- carbon.

Friends of the Earth International, a grassroots-based environmental advocacy group, defines the commodity as the right to emit carbon and then governments, which are responsible to resolve the climate crisis, limit the availability of this right in order to create scarcity and therefore a market for it.

Free to emit

How does this internationally-agreed involuntary exchange of “goods” work at the national level?

As a group, the European Union (EU) was the first off the block in introducing carbon trading into its collective emission reduction programme. It did so by setting mandatory cap on different sectors of its EU-wide economy and active participation in the UNFCCC’s CDM mandatory offset scheme. It launched the EU-Emission Trading Scheme (ETS) in 2005 when the Kyoto Protocol was enforced.

The EU-ETS has emerged as the world’s largest carbon trading scheme. The global carbon market has roughly doubled in size every year since 2005 with an estimated worth of US$63 billion in 2008.

(Carbon emission trading is less developed in the United States largely because the country has not signed up to the Kyoto Protocol and has no obligation to reduce its emission despite being responsible for persuading the UNFCCC to adopt the cap and trade model as a policy tool when the pact was agreed in 1997.)

The EU-ETS covers approximately 11,500 power stations, factories and refineries in 30 countries which include the 27 EU members states, plus Norway, Iceland and Lichtenstein. Together, these sectors account for almost half of the EU’s GHG emissions but excluding direct emission from road transport, aviation, shipping, agriculture and forestry.

In Europe, polluting industries such as power generation from coal, are given permit for an allocated allowance of emissions which they are not allowed to exceed. The permits are distributed to the emitters covered by the scheme either at a cost – through auctioning – or for free.

Yes, for free and at the expense of taxpayers' money, power consumers and the health of the climate.

Under Phase One of the EU-ETS which ends in 2007, polluting industries were allocated free permits and allowed to sell any surplus to those who exceeded their ceilings.

Critics said as allocation of these allowances is based on historical emissions, it has the negative effect of favouring less efficient facilities. In other words, the largest allocations have gone to what have historically been the worst polluters.

Subsequently, it was discovered that the polluters had also inflated their reduction baseline. Industries had been found to over-claim their emission levels and when they stayed below their limits, they profited by selling their excess allowances to others.

As a result, the power sector was enjoying windfall profits of some 20 billion euro (RM81 billion) a year in the EU-ETS first phase. The costs of meeting emission target were translated into higher utilities prices to consumers, creating public uproar particularly in Netherlands and Germany.

Acknowledging the mistake, ceilings for emission under Phase Two which runs from 2008 to 2012, have been reduced with a small percentage to be auctioned but yet a vast majority will still be handed free.

The European Commission was contemplating an average of 60% of permits to be auctioned from 2013 (the third phase), rising to 100% in 2020.

However, its reform plan was met with fierce criticism from the business communities. Oil majors like Shell and BP were lobbying to have oil refineries excluded from the sectors that will have to buy emissions permits at auction.

Needless to say, economic interests trumped climate ambition as illustrated in EU climate change packages that are rolled out in the last few years from Brussels, and we continue to see an EU that is losing its climate leadership position.

Pioneer status

Another form of perverse incentive is in the many developing countries race to outdo each other in attracting foreign investments.

They compete to offer tax exemption pioneer status to any investments with little thoughts given to the adverse impact from such investments.

I am reminded of the copper mine venture in Mamut, Sabah. The country’s first open-cast mine began churning out copper ore in 1975. Throughout its peak production years, and up until 1994, the annual production of copper concentrate was 100,000 tonnes or 25,000 pure copper. Over its lifespan, the mine earned an export revenue of about RM3.4 billion.

Notwithstanding accidents while the mine was in operation including a burst tailing pipeline that contaminated 800ha of rice fields and the dust pollution from the tailing dam, residents continue to suffer from the lack of clean water from the polluted rivers and risk of diseases as they come into contact with the contaminated water and air.

The attractiveness of country like Malaysia, Vietnam and Indonesia extends beyond tax-exemption. Many developed countries were exporting their polluting industries to the developing world where environmental legislations either do not exist or are extremely lenient.

Such was the case of Mamut where the Japanese-Malaysia joint venture exploited the lax environmental regulation.

A new federal law that provides for the rehabilitation of mining land did not come into effect until 1994 and was only adopted by Sabah in 1999 after the closure of the mine, negating any responsibilities of the polluters (a succession of them as the venture was sold and resold).

Have we learnt from this mistake? Just look around you for the so-called “pioneering” development projects and you will be able to answer that question.

Hilary Chiew is a socio-environmental researcher and freelance writer based in Kuala Lumpur.

Survival urges Malaysia to uphold tribes’ rights

Survival’s director Stephen Corry has written to the Malaysian government, urging it to uphold the rights of the Penan and other tribes of Sarawak.

Malaysia’s Plantation Industries and Commodities Minister Tan Sri Bernard Dompok said last month that the Malaysian federal and Sarawak state governments were, ‘in the process of finalising a mechanism on how to solve the issue of native customary rights land in the state,’ according to the government news agency Bernama. The minister made his statement during the run-up to a hotly contested by-election in the Sarawak town of Sibu.

The Sarawak government does not uphold indigenous peoples’ rights to their land, and allows logging and plantation companies to operate on it without the tribes’ consent. The Penan tribe rely heavily on the forests, and have repeatedly mounted blockades to keep the logging companies out.

In letters to the Prime Minister of Malaysia and the Chief Minister of Sarawak, Stephen Corry wrote, ‘The Sarawak government’s failure to uphold the Penan’s rights to their land is in violation of the principles of the UN Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples. The activities of logging and plantation companies have impoverished them, destroying their sources of food and clean water. We are also concerned that Penan and other indigenous people are threatened with displacement for the construction of the Murum dam and other hydroelectric dams across the state, again without their consent.

‘I urge you to ensure that the rights of the Penan and other indigenous peoples of Sarawak are respected, and that all logging, plantations and other developments on their land without their consent are halted.’

Link to Survival International here

Bolehland into Nuclear Energy?

This is my biggest worry when Bolehland wanted to follow every dicks in this region to have a nuclear power plant. When government officials are half-past-six, built building that collapsed, with roof that leaks, poor maintainance cultures, corruptions, and whatnot. Answer me, can you trust them to do a good job of safe keeping the nuclear plant?


May 5, 2010 MYT 4:21:28 PM
Govt's nuclear energy plan draws flak
Star

KUALA LUMPUR: Malaysian environmentalists and Opposition leaders on Wednesday slammed the Government's plan to build a nuclear power plant, calling it a risky venture and saying the country has sufficient energy output to meet future needs.

Energy Minister Peter Chin announced Tuesday that the Government had approved, in principle, a nuclear plant which would start operating from 2021, as an efficient and cost-effective means to fuel economic growth.

Malaysia will join neighbouring Thailand and Vietnam, which have unveiled plans to operate their first nuclear power plants by 2020, while Indonesia plans to build its own on Java island by 2015.

The opposition DAP said there was no need for nuclear power because Malaysia has a 40% energy reserve margin, double the Government's target of 20% reserves. Malaysia's power usage now stands at 14,000 megawatts, out of a total capacity of 23,000 megawatts.

In addition, it said, several large hydroelectric dams are being built on Borneo island to cater to future demands.

"Clearly, Malaysia has more energy than it needs ... why then does Malaysia need a nuclear power plant?" DAP secretary-general Lim Guan Eng said in a statement.

He also expressed concerns for safety and the environment, citing the 1986 Chernobyl reactor explosion that sent a cloud of radiation over much of Europe and left some two million people ill.

Malaysian officials maintain the plan is crucial for the country's long-term energy security in view of a growing population and future economic expansion, but say they will conduct feasibility studies before deciding whether to proceed.

Malaysia uses coal and natural gas to generate most of its electricity supply, and the Government has repeatedly warned the cost of relying on both commodities is expected to spiral in the decades ahead.

The Centre for Environment, Technology and Development, a local think-tank, warned that nuclear power was capital intensive and risky because it generated radioactive waste that has to be discarded.

Centre chairman Gurmit Singh said there was a lot of energy wastage in the country because gasoline, diesel and electricity were subsidised. He urged the Government to instead bolster energy efficiency and turn to other renewable sources like wind and solar power.

According to the International Atomic Energy Agency, there are more than 430 nuclear power plants operating in some 30 countries worldwide, accounting for about 15% of global electricity output. - AP

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We Are Dead!
by Simon Templar
Wednesday, May 05, 2010

Wow! We are going to have a nuclear plant.

If we were still in school, this will be 'like super cool, man!'. It's 'like so futuristic'. And so advance.

But we are no longer in school. And we know the ugly truth about Malaysia. Verdict: We Are Dead!

We are talking about the very realistic Malaysia that you and me know. The Malaysia that cannot even efficiently maintain the mini Tenaga sub-stations at our housing areas. We are talking about the Malaysia who cannot provide clean water to the people even when easy and efficient technology is in use. The Malaysia who cannot even dispose off our garbage in a manner that is not harmful to the environment. The Malaysia who even with computers and technology assistance cannot get trains to arrive and depart on time.

And yet we are going to have a matha-farking nuclear plant!

I hope that the plant is built far away. Maybe Sabah or Sarawak. Sorry folks, I need the South China Sea to act as a barrier.

Hmmm... Maybe they can build it in Sabah near the coal-fired plant. If we are talking about environmental damage and loss of human life, we might as well reduce the area and bring down the headcount. Better that than everyone dying, ain't it? (I was told that it is human nature to be selfish. I was also told that I can't beat the government.)

A nuclear plant? What the...?

What the hell to we need a nuclear plant for? We are a kuchi-rat country with 28 million jokers leaving in it. How much efficient energy do we consume? How desperate is our need for such enormous amount of energy? How many energy zapping factories do we have in this country? Dude, this is no Command & Conquer. This is real life death-threatening technology we are talking about. Plus, to be managed by some dumb-wits.

I tell you, this has all got to do with blardie money again. I think UMNO has gone too far this time. The thing with UMNO is they are getting extremely greedy. They are no longer satisfied with reaping money on the smaller scale by the millions and tens of millions per project. Everything nowadays has got to benefit them in terms of hundreds of millions or billions. But to put the life of every Malaysian at risk just to satisfy their lust for money?

Eh come on lah, stop fucking around with people's lives.

Even that they want to do it on a larger scale. Previously, the Malaysian government is happy killing the people (mostly Indians it would seem) on a small scale of a couple of thousand per year. Nowadays, they are talking about killing the mass population. What's with this apa nama UMNO? They got possessed by the Satan is it? Have they gone fucking nuts?

Allow me to frighten you a little with some Chernobyl stats. Did you know that the Chernobyl disaster released 400 times more radioactive material than the Hiroshima atomic bombing? Did you know that the contamination of the Chernobyl accident was felt up to more than 1,000 km away?

Let's put that to perspective. Peninsular Malaysia from the tip of Perlis to the bottom end of Johor is approximately 750 km. Simply put it, wherever this nuclear thing is built in Peninsular Malaysia, you are fried the moment a very likely Malaysian style disaster takes place at the said plant.

You may not die if you are further away. But you will quite likely die of some kind of cancer. That's if you don't already decide to kill yourself when your nervous system involuntarily makes you shout out Rosmah's name every exact 38 seconds. And of course, be assured that your newborn baby will look very adorable with her 3 eyes and a limb sticking out of her chest.

This is so brilliant. By the way, I wage 50 bucks that by the time the plant is in operation, 20,000 folks leaving nearby would have already have taugehs growing from the top of their heads. And another 1,000 may have grown a second dick. Failed tests. Drums of radioactives 'accidentally' falling into the nearby river. Accidents of trucks ferrying radioactive materials on their way to the plant. The usual stuffs. But of course you won't read these in the papers. Shhhhh...

Malaysia is so boleh! Damn I love this country.


Note to Singaporeans: Hey, you guys are pretty nearby I last checked.

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Be afraid. Be very afraid
Wed, 26 May 2010

Imagine that Umno is still in power a dozen years from now, with a nuclear power plant under its control. That’s scary even if you delete the words following the comma. We’ll still have the ISA and other satanic laws. The police, judiciary and mainstream media will still operate as Umno bureaus. Lucrative government contracts will still go to the Umno-connected. Things will remain the same because Umno is stubbornly — and sometimes militantly — resistant to change. If an Umno apologist disputes this, then he must give an alternative explanation of why Abdullah Ahmad Badawi was kicked out.

Now restore the words we deleted. And then recall that under Umno’s watch the country lost two warplane engines to thieves and bought a submarine that couldn’t dive. Especially remember that when we were choking in the haze blown in from Sumatra and Kalimantan, the government forbade the media from publishing readings from the air pollutant index for fear of scaring away potential investors in the Malaysian economy, as if any investor would be foolish enough not to make his own measurements.

Can we expect this same government to announce a radiation leak if it happens?

Perhaps Vincent Tan would like to bet his millions on this. Many of us did not know about the radioactive waste dumps in Perak until about two weeks ago, when Tan’s good buddy spoke about it — decades after the dumping. “The place is still not safe, and we have almost one square mile that is dangerous,” said Dr Mahathir Mahathir.

It would have been distressing enough if Peter Chin, the allegedly Green Minister, had said the government was merely considering the nuclear option. But he said the government had “decided” to go nuclear. With his next breath, he rubbed radioactive plutonium into our cancer wounds. He indicated that the government was not willing to debate the matter.

But let us try to be fair to the Najib administration. It has at least chosen not to keep the decision secret. Never mind that it promised to put people — and presumably not the government — first. We shall assume that it plainly and honestly forgot that promise.

Let us stretch our fairness further and thank the government for making the announcement 11 years before activating the nuclear plant. We shall assume that it did this in order to gauge public reaction before reaching a “final decision”. Indeed, Chin has written about the decision in his blog and is entertaining comments. That’s encouraging. Or maybe that’s entertainment.

Remember the contract junkies we mentioned in the intro? They are probably already scrambling for nuclear-related businesses. Even if Najib Tun Razak decides that the critics are right and the nuclear idea is dumb and should be dumped, will he have the political will to go against those who can already see a windfall coming?

Animal cruelty laws need more bite

"When people are cruel to animals they will be cruel to one another"- Herbert N. Casson

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April 19, 2010
Stories by BAVANI M
Star

LAWS governing animal welfare in Malaysia have no bite. Take Section 44 of the Animal Act 1953 (2006 Amendment) which says that anyone guilty of an offence of cruelty to animals shall be liable to a fine of RM200 or imprisonment for a term of six months or both.

The sentence is too light and those found guilty hardly get the maximum sentence.

The governing authority with the statutory right to take legal action against animal abusers is the Veterinary Services Department (VSD). The VSD, however, has been accused of taking a lackadaisical approach to enimal cruelty cases.

Lack of enforcement by the department has been blamed for the rise in cruelty cases in the city.

Even municipal councils have been branded as toothless because of a lack of enforcement of the by-laws.

Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals (SPCA) Selangor marketing and communications manager Jacinta Johnson-Chan said a total of 657 cruelty cases were reported last year with 90% of it involving dogs but none were prosecuted.

The rare abuse cases that went to court resulted in the owners getting off with just a paltry fine.

However, the case of seven-year-old German Sheperd Sheena, who had to be put down after suffering abuse at the hands of her owner, sparked nationwide protests from animal activists pushing for a change in legislation.

Animal lovers got together to sign a petition calling for, among others:

·An increase in the fine from RM200 to RM10,000;

· Increase the jail term from six months to two years;

· A lifetime ban on animal ownership for those charged charged with abuse; and

· Urging the public to be responsible pet owners.

A total of 83,032 signatures were collected and the petition was submitted to the Prime Minister’s Department in January, 2007.

There has been no news since then and, despite all the efforts of animal welfare groups, nothing has changed in terms of enforcement.

SPCA chairman Christine Chin blames it on the lack of enforcement by the authorities concerned and the lack of willpower to change things.

“Such paltry sentences send out the wrong message to the public that it’s alright to abuse animals.

“Despite having these laws, no one really gets punished for cruelty and that’s why it keeps happening again and again,” she said.

“Municipal councils also don’t seem to address cruelty cases despite having provisions to do so.

“In fact, the councils are contravening their own by-laws,” she said, adding that local authorities seemed to be only interested in catching strays and putting them down.

Animal rights lawyer N. Surendran said that municipal council by-laws come under the Local Government Act 1976 and there were sections dealing with cruelty to animals.

However, Surendran said he had never heard of anyone being taken to court under these by-laws.

Surendran, who is also the president of the Malaysian Animal Rights and Welfare Association (ROAR), cited the Petaling Jaya City Council (MBPJ) by-laws as an example.

He said that Section 10 of the 2007 by-laws stated that any person who ill-treats a dog can be fined not more than RM2,000 or be put in prison for not more than a year or both.

He said the council’s enforcement officers could take action on cruelty cases but, for some reason, they refuse to do so despite having clear proof.

Surendran cited the recent KTM dog abuse case as an example.

“Despite identifying the perpetrators, the authority concerned chose to do nothing.

“This is not the first time though, there have been numerous cases with proof of animal abuse and the governing authorities always seem to turn a blind eye,” he said, adding that in the KTM dog abuse case the governing authority was the VSD.

“Malaysian animal laws are one of the worst (see chart) in the world and the situation has certainly put a dent in the image of the country as a developed nation.

“It sends out the wrong perception to foreigners when they see and hear about animal abuse cases,” he said.

Tiger year and the tiger story

Star’s headline read, “Shock over poaching clip”. The Sun’s, “Groups shocked over tiger video on British TV”. And this “shocking news” has poor coverage in the main propaganda newsprints.

Everybody seems to be in a “shock”....syok sendiri maybe. Its a joke that after all these while, after so many incidents of poaching, after so many news related to killing of wildlife in Malaysia....and these people still claim to be in a “shock”. “Syok sendiri” should be more appropriate. I have seen how the army shot a wildlife at night in the jungle – without knowing what they were shooting. They just aimed at the reflective eyes when shone with the spotlight. Tell signs and leftover of poaching have been seen everywhere in the jungles.

There was one case, when we were not allow into the Temengor area by the Forestry. However, the next day we saw a group of men on 4WD coming out from that jungle. There was double standard. So tell me how can poachers get into the jungles if the Forestry were so strict to layman like me. I think it is more of the “pagar makan the paddy”. I would brand those as “Traitors to our natural heritage”.

First, we must know that the video clip was first shown in Britian. Why was it not shown here? Simple answer. It will be brushed aside. Whistleblower will be picked up harassed instead. People who reported or submitted the video will be sued...it is just that simple. Don’t you see that this is Bolehland? The criminals always get off the hook.....correct, correct, correct! Remember that? And if they were to be found guilty (once in awhile just to show some work done), then the fines and penalties can easily be covered by the illegal sale of wildlife.

Why the hu-ha about these man-eaters? Some people I met just shuddered off by saying, “what so special of tigers?”. They killed people? Right? Well, for those who have this misconcept, lets go through some education. Infact tigers are part of the larger ecosystem. Researchs have shown that without predators, other animals will be over populated. Take for example, deers will start eating up the every new seedlings and causing the extinction of valuable trees, erosion to river banks, stray deers into populated areas, diseases and grobbing up everything – the herbs etc in the forests. Wouldn’t that be scary?

See the video clip by the British’s Channel 4 TV.