Dirtiest election to come: Sex scandals will entertain Malaysians

Controversial businessman Deepak Jaikishan has turned the heat on Prime Minister Najib Razak. Stripping off the gloves, the 40-year-old former confidante of Najib's wife Rosmah Mansor has just unleashed a fresh barrage of allegations that could submerge the political fortunes of the Malaysian PM and his Umno party.

Flora Ong is now the name on the lips of many followers of the Altantuya Shaaribuu-Scorpene submarines saga, even though she is not directly linked to the murder and corruption case that Deepak has accused the first couple of having a hand in.

Orang Asal, Native and Bumiputera are not one and the same thing

By Joe Fernandez

Reader Chong Tet Loi claims in “Never let extremists have their way” (Sunday Forum 24 Feb, 2013 Daily Express) that MANY (people?) were amused by my take in “Both These Sultans Never Owned Sabah” (Sunday Forum 17 Feb, 2013).

No doubt he conducted an instant Sabah-wide survey after my letter to conclude that “MANY” were “amused” by it and probably he would have liked to add that quite a few even died from laughter.
 

Who Is Laughing? Silly Suspicious Sabah Sulu Standoff!

By Ramon Tulfo
Philippine Daily Inquirer

If Malaysia is clumsy about handling the Sabah standoff, it will have the same problem the Philippine government had when it fought a Muslim rebellion in the South in the 1970s up to the 1980s.

Malaysia is in a no-win situation as a result of the standoff in Sabah.

If it uses deadly force on a small group of armed Filipino Muslims now holed up in the village of Tanduo in Lahad Datu town in Sabah, members of the fiercest of Philippine Moro tribe, the Tausogs of Sulu and Tawi-Tawi, will retaliate.

If, on the other hand, Malaysia compromises with the armed group purportedly belonging to the Sultanate of Sulu, it will be perceived as a weakling by its neighbors.

163 SPF members join STAR, 18,400 to follow suit

Sabah STAR Chairman with former SPF leaders and members

KOTA KINABALU:  State Reform Party (STAR) reaped a bounty yesterday (Sunday) when 163 leaders and members of the now defunct Sabah People’s Front (SPF) at a luncheon at Mayflower restaurant along Jalan Bundusan here.

In welcoming their entry, Sabah STAR Chairman, Datuk Dr. Jeffrey Kitingan, said that the members of SPF were very disappointed for having been played out to the point that they lost their political platform when it was taken over by other people. SPF was somehow taken over by a Sarawak group and its name was changed to Sarawak Workers’ Party.
 

WHAT WENT BEFORE: Sultan of Sulu’s 9 principal heirs

MANILA, Philippines—In 1939, a decision issued by the high court of North Borneo named the nine principal heirs of the last sultan of Sulu, whose descendants had been pressing their claim to Sabah.

Known as the 1939 Macaskie Judgment, the nine principal heirs of Sultan Jamalul Kiram II were Datu Punjungan Kiram, Datu Esmail Kiram, Dayang Dayang Piandao Kiram, Dayang Dayang Sitti Rada Kiram, Princess Tarhata Kiram, Princess Sakinur-In Kiram, Dayang Dayang Putli Jahara Kiram, Dayang Dayang Sitti Mariam Kiram and Mora Napsa.

Jamalul II’s father, Sultan Jamalul Ahlam, leased Sabah in 1878 to British North Borneo Co. Under the agreement, the company would pay 5,300 Mexican gold pieces a year to the Kingdom of Sulu. It continued to do so until 1936, when Jamalul II died.