UK ‘Tis :: October :: 2007
UncategorizedOctober 30, 2007 3:13 pm

Hak sama rata

park street 

I recently attended a course of Islamic Financial Products held by BNM.

One of the speakers, taking the easy way (at least I think) of answering questions from the audience on the concept of Islamic products simply responded by saying;

‘Alaa..basically all of these products are not different from other conventional products, except for the name we put for it and the concept used. In terms of its cost and reward, it would not be so much in different with the conventional products’

I don’t really know where did he get this idea in tackling the question, especially he is currently working with one of the biggest Islamic banks in the country.

What make thing worse was the fact that his statement might make others, especially non muslim to perceive that Islamic products are no different than other conventional products, except for the arabic names, and some little twist in the concept. Although this is basically true in our current profit-maximising-confined-context of Islamic Banking system, I would dare to say that his approach was rather not wise.

Instead of putting Islamic Banking products in the same bucket as conventional banking products, wouldn’t it be better for the speaker  to talk on the superiority of Islamic products instead?

This is one example of our typical mistakes. As we live in a multi religions and races community, undeniably we will have to tolerate with each others and give equally unequivocal freedom in practicing religious obligation. However, sometimes in the dire needs to achieve this, we tend to equalise Islam with others by putting other religion at par with Islam, when in fact the latter is far more superior than the former.

We have to be able to differentiate these two approaches. Giving freedom in practicing whatever religion embraced by the citizen is required by Islamic teaching, while equalising Islam with others is completely not right, and in fact it can nullify one’s shahadah.

Remember, Islam is the highest above all, and no other religion above it.

 

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UncategorizedOctober 27, 2007 12:14 am

4-isme

Yesterday was BNM Hari Raya Open House. It was a great open house in fact, as the food is nice, and the venue is well planned and organised, at least I gather.

And what make my day yesterday, was the face to face encounter with our beloved Tan Sri Governor, and had a 5-seconds-little chat with her. 

Congratulation Tan Sri, for being awarded A class governor for the fifth time in a row. What struck me is the fact that she won it for the fifth time in a row, which is far more difficult than getting the A class in the first place. Tahniah.

Many thanks as well for granting us salary increment, although understandably some people were quite unhappy with this salary revision. Terima Kaseh.

Congratulation again… 

 

 

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UncategorizedOctober 21, 2007 6:12 am

Grand slap

It is amazing to read in The Star yesterday on the news regarding ex-ISA detainee being awarded RM 2.5million by court.

It is indeed a great slap to the government of Malaysia and PDRM.

ABUSE OF POWER & ISA

By far, as a person with open eyes can see, we and Myanmar are not so much different in nature, except for the fact that we successfully concealed it from the world’s eye.

And Allah indeed does not give any guidance to oppressor(zalimin). And no help will be offered to them on the day of judgement.

Kesian mereka….

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UncategorizedOctober 17, 2007 5:18 am

AngkaSawan

Some questions to test IQ:

1) Why do we have to form a panel of highly intelectual and honorable people just for the sake of verifying the authenticity of a video clip? Wouldn’t it be more appropriate for them to discuss on the status of our legal system instead?

2) Looking at newspaper today, most of them touch on the issue of the stern actions taken on SeaGull ferry company. The ferry was already unfit for service even prior to the accident, yet the company still utilised it. Where is the enforcement PRIOR to the accident?

Why most of the time we see enforcements as ex-post tools, where in fact it is more effective to enforce rules and regulation in a proactive motion?

I remember last week, during the night of hari raya, a group of teenagers in my village played mercun until 3 a.m. Feeling annoyed and angry, I called 999 in the hope of seeking help from Jeniang Police Station.

But unfortunately, after 5 attempts of 2 minutes unanswered ring tone each, I realised that my calls will not be entertained and I gave up calling 999.

Later, I called Sungai Petani Police Station, as their phone number is quite easy to remember, 422 2222. At last someone answered my phone, and below is the conversation of mine and the police officer.

A: Myself     PO:Police officer

A: Hello, is this Sungai Petani police station?

PO: Selamat malam encik, yes indeed this is Sungai Petani Police Station. Can I help you sir?

A: Yeah, thanks. I am living in Jeniang, and as you can hear, some teenagers here are still playing mercun. Therefore I would like to ask Jeniang policemen to come here, and ask this budak-budak to stop playing mercun. Can you provide me with Jeniang police station phone number?

PO: Ok, no problem. Just bear with me for a sec yeah?

A: Ok, no problem.

2 minutes of lagu raya through phone, perhaps from the radio played in the SP police station.

PO: Hello, encik, mmm…Jeniang tu kat mana ye encik? (Hello sir, do you know where is the Jeniang?)

Hohoho……

A: Mmmm…Jeniang. It is a lovely village just before Sik.

PO: Okay..okay, here’s the number, 4644 sebelas 2 (4644112)

A: Ok terima kaseh.

Later, the mercun sounds stop for a while when the police came. 10 minutes later, the mercun gala continued…hoho.

And I slept throughout the khutbah raya the following morning.

I do realise that I am being too pessimistic lately. But what can we do anyway.

Well, living in Malaysia, by being pessimistic, compared to having a grandeur optimistic realm, the chance of that pessimistic expectation to be fulfilled is greater. To the least, in the end we wouldn’t be greatly engraved in despair.

Someone said to me,"Do you really think our lives in Malaysia are just like Petronas advertisement?"

Well, I don’t think so.

What’s your point of view?

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UncategorizedOctober 11, 2007 7:52 am

Agusta

In December 2004, Proton purchased a majority share in MV Agusta of Italy at 70 million Euro. MV Agusta is the manufacturer of MV Agusta, Husqvarna, and Cagiva motorcycles.
A year later, Proton sold all its stake in that company to GEVI Spa at an absurd price of 1 Euro. Reason being:
1)      Insurmountable debt problem. In order to make financial statement looks better, they decided to write the debt off its book by selling the MV Agusta.

2)      They said that they is no direct benefit Proton can get from Agusta, as the product produced by the latter is motorcycle, while Proton is manufacturing car.

In August this year, the same company that bought MV Agusta for 1 Euro sold one brand, I repeat, only ONE BRAND of MV Agusta (Husqvarna) to BMW for the whopping price of  93 million Euros. Let me rephrase the price if readers do not catch up, the price that BMW pay for one brand of Agusta is 93,000,000 Euros.

To make the figures more interesting, let me write it in another way. Assuming that each of the three brands are equal in value, GEVI in fact sold one brand of Agusta at a mark-up of 9,300,000,000%/0.333= 27,900,000,000%

So seeing this amount of arbitrage of 92,999,999 Euros made by GEVI, and considering that Proton is Malaysian property make me wonder and question on some issues:

1)      Has the board of directors really study this disposal thoroughly?

2)      Was the decision made, based solely on Credit Suisse assessment alone?

3)      Before the disposal, the founder of Proton, Tun Dr Mahathir has raised up his hesitant if the board of directors were to dispose Agusta. Did the board ever respond to Tun?4)      Looking at the way GEVI manage the company and be able to sell it at 93million Euros, why don’t Proton in the first place hire consultant to do management restructuring and later sell it at a higher price rather than hiring consultant to give advice on the ad-hoc disposal decision and sell it at a shameful price of 1 Euro?

What make me sad is no national media has broadcasted and published this fact. If any, only small tiny winy little space allocated for this news, that no one will ever be bothered to read it anyway.

And the famous saying of “Someones’ losses will make someone’s else richer” seems to have its evidence.

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UncategorizedOctober 6, 2007 4:29 am

Nikmat after nikmat

Alhamdulillah

So many nikmats that I indulge lately.

May Allah put barakah on the nikmat.

I can still remember, during one of my soul searching journeys to North Africa, almost all the hawkers who have only small little stall selling ful bread (bread+ful nuts) and delicacies, put a noticable poster on top of the table stating, "haza min fadli rabbi", or can loosely be translated to "this is part of the nikmat from my Lord"…subhanallah.

Looking at the stalls alone, exacerbated by the fact that Egyptian Pound currency is so small in value, I can hardly think of the profit that they would make in a day. Subhanallah. A question to ponder, given all the nikmats that Allah has given and continuously giving me without any difficulties and default, has my level of gratefulness up to these hawkers mark?

There are always some nikmats that we as a human being, always tend to forget. Take this little story.

A friend of a friend of mine told me a story of his father who wanted to hire an Indonesian maid to work in his family house in London. So the agent in Kuala Lumpur took the maid to KLIA for the 13 hours flight to London Heathrow.

Throughout the flight, whenever the stewardess pass her in-flight meal and drinks, she declined.

Then she arrived at Heathrow international Airport.

Upon meeting her employer’s family at the arrival lounge, she asked from her employer’s wife for some drink.

Bemused by the way she drink, the wife asked, ‘Didn’t the stewardess offer you any meals during the flight?’

Her answer made the whole family almost cried.

Being familiar with highly inflated price of food on train, she replied ‘I would rather not take the food as I don’t think I can pay for the food’

The moral of the story: Don’t take for granted for any nikmat, regardless of how small it is, as some other people might not have and possess it…

HAZA MIN FADHLI RABBI….

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