Chow Kon Yeow: 曹观友

This morning, a NST story with this heading “Poll in daily leads to minister’s downfall” captured my attention.

Readers of this blog would have noticed that I have several postings on results of opinion polls and their messages.

There is nothing new about opinion polls or market surveys to find out how consumers feel about certain products or messages. However lately there have been quite a number of polls about socio-political issues in the country. Merdeka Centre is one local outfit that does quite a bit of polling. Newspapers, TV and radio stations and websites used IT to gather feedbacks from the people.

Back to the above story, “India’s Telecommunications and Information Technology Minister Dayanidhi Maran, the grandson of Tamil Nadu CM M. Karunanidhi, has resigned from his ministerial post following fallout with his grandfather.

A family feud had been simmering over the last few days after Maran’s family-owned newspaper Dinakaran published an opinion poll showing Karunanidhi’s possible successor, his elder son M.K.Azhagiri, being unpopular when compared with his younger son, M.K. Stalin.

The poll rated Azhagiri poorly, with only about two percent support while 70 per cent of the people surveyed supported Stalin, who is the DMK deputy general secretary, as the political heir of Karunanidhi.

But the poll did not go down well with party supporters. Last Wednesday, Azhagari’s supporters burnt the newspaper’s office.

Three people—a guard and two computer staff – were killed during riots in Madurai in southern India.”

We do not expect such incidents to happen in Malaysia although there are opinion polls that gave negative impact to certain political parties or politicians.

For instance, SOS Ong Boon Keong announced recently the results of an opinion poll he conducted in one of his website. He said poll results indicated that Dr Teng Hock Nan is the most popular choice as new Chief Minister of Penang. Other Gerakan leaders scored lower in the polls.

Some of them are unhappy with Ong Boon Keong. They accused him of trying to cause a rift among Gerakan leaders.

Executive Councillor Teng Chang Yeow had the most wonderful response. He said he would only read such poll results in the toilet. I hope the most it hurts Teng Chang Yeow is some constipation.

Surely we do not want to see something like the above news item from India happening in our very own shore.

Much ado about polling.

The leak at Parliament House is being fixed by the JKR. The problem should not have surfaced especially almost RM100 million was spent on renovation works just three years ago.

But what about the other “leak” inside the august chamber of Parliament’s Lower House.

I am overwhelmed by the public responses to the “Po Kuan leaks every month” fiasco. There must be hundreds of articles, commentaries, messages, blogs, SMS and even radio and TV talk shows on the issue the last few days.

I believe Po Kuan must appreciate the support, sympathy and solidarity from all corners.
At such times, her spirit must be uplifted. Thank you all the people out there.

But will Cabinet fix the leak? The responses among the government leaders are quite varied.

First of all, PM Abdullah Ahmad Badawi said before the BN retreat in Pangkor Island that he is satisfied with the performance of BN elected representatives. Satisfied?
At the end of the 3-day retreat, the PM did not give his comment on the fiasco and there is no way to know how he felt about the sexist remarks against Po Kuan.

His deputy, Najib offered no comfort. He said the remark should not be taken too seriously and the opposition is merely looking for publicity gains. Nazri and Shahrir comments went against the grain of public opinion.

On the other spectrum, Women Affairs Minister Sharizat said she was not happy at all about the misconduct of Jasin and Kinabatangan. She wanted the Cabinet to deal with the two recalcitrant MPs. At the Senate, Deputy Minister Wong Kam Hoong said his ministry would bring the matter to Cabinet.

Cabinet is meeting tomorrow but will they summon enough courage to fix the leak that has brought shame to Parliament and women at large.

I expect Pak Lah to send out a loud message tomorrow that the days when MPs or other elected representatives were almost uncensored when they make sexist remarks and innuendos are over. Only then can BN can redeem their sins against women in the country.