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By Ooi Kee Beng For The Edge Review [www.theedgereview.com]; 26 April – 2 May 2013 How best to frame Malaysia’s coming general elections for a better understanding of where the country is at? We certainly can’t compare it to a summer’s day. It would be more correct to liken it to a monsoon storm where … Continue reading
By Ooi Kee Beng; in The Edge Kuala Lumpur, 22 April 2013 BN at the brink In early April 2009, top leaders of the United Malays National Organisation (UMNO) succeeded in dismissing Abdullah Badawi as president of the party and thus, also as prime minister of Malaysia. This was exactly one year after Abdullah had … Continue reading
By OOI KEE BENG Editorial for Penang Monthly, April 2013 It’s April now, the month at the end of which the Malaysian Parliament has to be dissolved to make way for general elections to be held, and within 60 days of that dissolution. Technically, elections must be held by 28 June. But in any case, … Continue reading
By Ooi Kee Beng For The Straits Times, 16 April 2013. MOST analysts think the Malaysian general elections will be close. Although Prime Minister Najib Razak is expected to retain a slight edge over his nemesis, opposition leader Anwar Ibrahim, the social tide, even if significantly weaker, is still with the latter. How then to … Continue reading
By Ooi Kee Beng, For The Straits Times, 13 April 2013 WHEN an army becomes restless, the general must fly into decisive action to signal that the waiting is over, and that battle plans are in place. Wearied by months, if not years, of waiting for Malaysian Prime Minister Najib Razak to dissolve Parliament and … Continue reading
By Ooi Kee Beng For THE EDGE, Malaysia, 1-7 April 2013 ABOUT 2,500 years ago, the great Greek Heraclitus famously noted in one of philosophy’s greatest truisms that “no man ever steps in the same river twice, for it is not the same river and he is not the same man”. (No doubt, several Chinese … Continue reading
[Malaysia’s Changing Political Landscape] By OOI KEE BENG for The Straits Times, 29 March 2013 While waiting for the 13th general elections to be declared, campaigned and decided, one should step back and consider how much Malaysia’s political culture has actually changed over the last five years. In fact, the palpable mood of apprehension and … Continue reading
By Ooi Kee Beng For THE EDGE REVIEW, 22 March 2013 A serious prediction of anything important is a throw of the dice. If a correct forecast is made based on secret information about factors that are decisive to an outcome, then that is not really predicting; that’s more like a staged magic act. And … Continue reading
By OOI KEE BENG A review of The Peranakan Chinese Home: Art and Culture in Daily Life, by Ronald G. Knapp. Photography by A. Chester Ong. Tokyo, Rutland (Vermont) and Singapore: Tuttle Publishing. 2012. Hybridity is the essence of cultural development, and it is largely for political and economic reasons that the process of cultural … Continue reading
A two-party system is now in place, thanks to the spectacular results of the 12th general election five years ago which brought opposition parties to power at the state level. Of the many reasons ventured for this shift, the one that cannot be ignored is the impressive rise in social activism. A strong sense of … Continue reading
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