Another newspaper item, both reported in NST & The Star today, caught my eyes. According to the report, the government launched yesterday a couple of options for the public to “have your own say” via specially set-up public opinion polls addressed to the Public Compaints Bureau. Read it here.

The public is presented with a few options to respond to the polls. First you can sms your answers to this number, 36367; second you can surf to bpapoll.org or rtm.net.my and register your choices.

I went to the bpapoll.org and was greeted by a very ugly website. Currently the poll is “Government subsidy is best used for?” and your are presented with 5 different choices, and there’s no option for “all of the above” as pointed by a letter by Usmang Bawang (read below).

Before you can join the fray, you have to register yourself to the site, and the forms you have to fill are: your email, password, age, sex, race, district and state. The one I have the most beef with is the inclusion of “race”, WTF, why do you need that? Yeah, it may be good for “statistical” studies but I have this feeling that it will be used discriminately. The fact that the webpage is only in Bahasa is already dodgy. I mean, by right, there should be a choice of different languages! Lets have Tamil, Mandarin, Cantonese, English etc. It’s not that hard to programme all that in!

Anyway, our irregular contributor Usmang Bawang has a few words to say about it:

A Poll
by Usmang Bawang

Why is the government wasting money and resources on a really ugly website and subsidizing SMSs to conduct opinion polls? ( nst.com.my)

I bet some well connected UMNOputra made an instant profit by setting up the “SMS service”.

And look at this piece of purile looking high-school designed website:
here

Here’s the poll of the day:

Subsidi Kerajaan paling sesuai digunakan untuk:

A     Tambah Baik Kemudahan Persekolahan
B     Tambah Baik Kemudahan Kesihatan
C     Tambah Baik Perkhidmatan Pengangkutan Awam
D     Tambah Baik Kualiti Bekalan Air
E     Kegunaan Kebajikan Awam

What the?? Of course I’ll tick all, if you provide the option “semua”. How about providing the option of dipulangkan kepada rakyat dalam bentuk wang tunai, or dikurangkan cukai-cukai lain? What does kebajikan awam mean???

And please, if the government hasn’t achieved A, B, C, D and E yet we are just like any fucked up third-world failed state. Isn’t having potable drinkable water a fundamental right, not a bloody priviledge?

If Badawi wants to really listen to what people really think, he should just ask the mainstream newspaper editors to publish every single “letter to the Editor” so that he can read them. Or how about spending half an hour every morning reading blogs, and another half hour reading Malaysiakini?

Ong Ka Ting riding the LRT in his suit, Badawi saying that he understands the people’s anger. Cheap stunts for bimbotic Malaysians.

Aiyoh. But if Mr. Nice Badawi goes, then we’ll have Marie Antoinette for PM. Susah.

Usman