Raya round-up 2022.

 Mon 30.5.2022

You know this is round-up week for Raya 2022 when your niece invites you to attend her tahlil before leaving for the hajj. Syawal in fact has only a few days left. But that has not stopped the ex FMC 1961 intake group from organizing its Raya gathering on 5.6.22, which would be on 5th of Zulkaedah, the month before the hajj month of Zulhijjah. Incidently the niece and husband are both around 32. I told them they have roundly beaten me to the hajj. I was 3 months short of 39 when I did mine. But that was before they were even born!. 

After a hurried meal, I left them to go to another Raya gathering in Seremban. This was the Bersatu Seremban Division's Raya at their Seremban hq. I thought it'd be in the office meeting room. Instead they had cordonned off the parking space in front of the office entrance. Traffic would have to avoid this route out of the office block, but this was Sunday. Anyway our Bersatu office is at the end of the block and traffic need not go there at all.

I didn't stay till the end, because Din Pendek wanted to come to the house with the Sarawak pengantin. But I stayed long enough to meet several members of the Seremban Division. The Disional Head, Fazly was there to greet me, and we sat together and part-take the sumptous food and drinks prepared. "Gotong-royong preparing the lemang last night" Fazly said. I took leave when our PAS guests arrived. Fazly had intimated even before Covid 19 lockdown that he's courting PAS support for GE 15. I'd told the Division Secretary my reservations about PAS, but have not mentioned it to Fazly. His keeness is more personal than anything else. Of course this cannot be dismissed in GE 15. I predict no single party would win power alone.

It has been a busy fortnight, what with Raya, and that Sarawak wedding. The world hasn't stopped because of Eid. We in Malaysia, of course, took full advantage of this Raya this time, after 2 years of confinement. The financial assisstance and the release of 10 K from EPF helped make this Raya really fully celebrated. The pasar Ramadans were choked. The roads were choked. The prayer halls were choked. The "open houses" and organized Raya parties were fully attended. Everybody seemed to want to make up for the 2-year absence.

The politics, international and domestic, too, didn't pause because of Ramadan and Eid. If anything, there has been palpable intensity. UMNO and PKR had to go through their RoC dictated AGM's. UMNO was threatened a second disqualification (1987 the first one) if the 18-month postponement is further extended, and that put paid to the oft-repeated threat of pull-out from government and early GE 15. PKR saw a new Deputy President, the mecurial Rafizi, who has all along belittled Mahathir, and talks of going it solo for GE 15. If PKR does this, my guess is PKR will lose out.

I spoke to Fazly about the need for Bersatu to get to the voters right away. We have at most 1 year before we go to the polls. I follow the recent state elections and the numerous arguments on whatsapp, and my own figures and experience say Bersatu has to get the message that the voters want, and not be distracted by internal organizational friction. Bersatu has to hit Najib. Zahid, Isa and the other UMNO national figures hard, now! The real implication from the 1MDB disaster must be painted clear to the Malays in the kampongs. 

The Russo-Ukraine war drags on. The dominanting rethoric, unfortunately, is American. I've read several different versions of the war, and have passed them on to my various whatsapp groups. Some have responded positively. A few have done the opposite. One unlikely source even asked me to cease and desist. I mean the smartphone as a means of messaging the world at your fingertips has revolutionised information, fake or otherwise. The intelligent guy at the end of the line is supposed to do his homework and decide for himself. But to stop messaging entirely ? You might as well chuck your gadget and watch cartoons!.

The one point I'd like to make here is, get to the history of Russia and the rest of the West, this including USA. Look at the Middle East and South East Asia and the role of USA in  Palestine, its illegal wars in that region, in Afghanistan and Vietnam.  Definitely Russia cannot take the sole position of the accused in illegal warfare and crimes of war.

Puny Malaysia has for many years defiantly called USA out with regard to Palestine, and the world knows it. Mahathir is the indentified voice of condemnation the USA hates, thus the secret funding for all his Malaysian political opponents. (As they say now, do the forensic accounting and prove me wrong!) And I'm proud that we have at least one voice objecting to the anti-China role of the new group Biden had summarily cast for the Asian region to swallow hook-line-and-sinker!. All the  Asian nations have apparently put their signatures to that Biden proposal. I know what China can do. I hope China remembers Mahathir's call in Japan.

Let's not spoil the few days of Syawal remaining. Let's pray that next year, Eid would not be less merry.

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