Inter-Research And Studies (IRAS)

When the date of the 13th general elections is approaching, we are certain that many of us has already received some messages or notifications informing the general public that the incumbent federal government in Putrajaya is doing whatever it can to destroy as much records and documents of the administration as it can prior to 5th May 2013, that is this coming weekend. On the previous 12th general elections held on 8 March 2008, we had heard of and seen it happening in the states of Penang, Kedah, Perak and Selangor, when the then incumbent state government executive councillors and their henchmen went to their respective offices over the middle of the night to retrieved as much documentations and records as possible from their office building in order to have them destroyed, deleted or shredded in order to wipe out whatever evidence they had on their past wrongdoings and corrupt practices. The question here is, will it happened again this time, after the 13th general elections...

The 13th general elections (GE13) is approaching, approximately ten more days to go from today. And both side of the political divide, Barisan Nasional (BN) and Pakatan Rakyat (PR) are campaigning hard in order to gain support from the voters. In this year's GE13, it also saw a significant rise on the number of independent candidates. Well, the backgrounds of these independent candidates are of many kinds, majority are political party dissidents from both BN and PR, incumbents who are not being selected to recontest in their respective seats, and of course, for the first time, there are also a lots of serious contenders who are contesting as independents to offer what they said, "they would only serve the people in particular because they would not be tied up to the interests of the political parties". Then, on the voters' side. What do the voters of today actually want? The voters of today are very much different from the voters decades ago. Voters of today co...

Many of us are not aware the need and importance of the separation of powers between the party and the government. To the general political understanding of today, the chairman, president or secretary-general of the ruling party shall be automatically be appointed as prime minister or the head of the government. So does the members of the party central committee or executives, they all will automatically gain ministerial positions in the government by virtue of their leadership positions in the party. Very simple and straight forward, isn't so? Well, not many of us would know if the mixture of powers between the party and the government were to continue. Somehow, the government machinery would eventually become the party's organ. It would not happen directly but rather in an indirect manner as the machinery of the government of the day would eventually answers to the ruling party's call. The question here is, does the party own the government and does government belo...

In this upcoming 13th general elections (GE13), we will see most top leaders of the Barisan Nasional (BN) major component parties will not be contesting. Their only excuse is to give way to the younger ones to contest. BN component parties leaders who will not be contesting are MCA president Chua Soi Lek, MIC president G.Palanivel, Gerakan president Koh Tsu Koon and PPP president M.Kayveas. All of them are either keeping very quiet about their status or had announced that they would not seek for any candidacy in this GE13. Of the MCA, MIC, Gerakan and PPP party presidents, only the Umno president, of course the prime minister as well, Najib Razak announced his own candidacy by saying that he would defend his Pekan parliamentary seat in this GE13. MCA president Chua Soi Lek did not contest in the previous general elections (GE12) and he us currently the Selangor BN chief coordinator while his only government position is as chairman of the Penang Port Commission (PPC) which over...