Thursday, August 21, 2008

Debate on Land Issues

Picture by The Star

After watching the extraordinary debate between the past and present Chief Minister of Pulau Pinang last night, I must say that it is outright clear that, the losing side is YAB LGE.

His insistence on punishment should be leashed out by the past BN on the erronous official spoilt his show. In fact, this gave his opponent many chances to clarify on the issue, of which Tan Sri KTK elegantly did. LGE keep on harping that there is elements of corruption(rasuah) in the so-called 'land scam', yet he is unable put forward concrete description of the crime committed.

On the other hand, KTK had ample of opportunities and space, courtesy of the un-wise tactics of his opponent, to explain the whole picture of the issue, right from historical background more than 40 years ago, up until the actions he took personally which include investigations by the ACA at least twice, which found no elements of crime and the past state government on-going litigation with the parties concerned.One thing KTK made very clear that his government never conceded defeat in the on-going court case, whilst his successor seem to harbour the idea of dishing out the RM 40 million compensation.

KTK later took charge on LGE's attitude of 'Semak Sebelum Tembak' and the latter inclination of sensationalsing every issue that crop up and not putting focused attention in solving the issues at hand. What a good lesson a past CM gave to the present CM.

He also lamented about the 'half true' approach by the present government in the those so-called exposes. I think KTK fell short of calling LGE a liar.

Overall, I think KTK did put up a good show, despite the language flow that at time crampy. He did took this opportunities to make clear a few issues that bugging the BN, putting up by the PR government.

On LGE, he is so stick to his prepared strategy on criminalsing the whole issue, abeit some clever maneuvres by KTK to dodge his attack, that make him a joker at end stage of the debate, he fails to hit the home base despite numerous futile attacks. He failed to categorically listed out the criminal elements of its, although he alleged time over time of 'rasuah'. This gave KTK a chance of fighting back by explaining that it is merely documentation mistakes that happened more than 40 years ago coupled with some careless clerical mistakes 40 years later.

Frankly speaking, I don't know who should be blamed for all this mistakes, but surely I don't see nobody deserved to thrown into jail.

I think LGE should start put his effort in managing the state, and show results to Penangites, what he had done in 'memajukan Pulau Pinang'?

As KTK put it in the beginning of the debate, LGE seem to be more fond of being the 'Pembangkang'.

I start to miss the old days when KTK is helming the state.

Maybe it can never take a Malaccan to appreciate the flavours of Penang.

Can a Malaccan truly loves Penang? Or Penang is just part of the bounties of his war-chest?

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