Screenshots

Goh Chok Tong must have seen a previous post on this blog (see below) before coming to the conclusion he made..he certainly has a point..

PM Lee Hsien Loong
Cambridge University - First Class Honours (1974)
Harvard University - Masters (1980)

SM Goh Chok Tong
University of Singapore - First Class Honours (1964)
Williams College, USA - Masters (1967)

MM Lee Kuan Yew
Cambridge University - First Class Honours (1949)

Minister for Law S Jayakumar
University of Singapore - Bachelor of Law Honours (1963)
Yale Univerity - Masters (1966)

Minister for Home Affairs Wong Kan Seng
University of Singapore - Bachelor of Arts & Business Admin (1977)
London Business School - Masters (1979)

Minister for Foreign Affairs George Yeo
Cambridge University - Double First Class Honours (1976)
Harvard Business School - MBA w/ Distinction (1985)

Minister for Trade and Industry Lim Hng Kiang
Cambridge University - First Class Honours w/ Distinction (1976)
Harvard University - Masters (1986)

Minister for Defence Teo Chee Hean
University of Manchester - First Class Honours (1976)
Imperial College, London - Masters w/ Distinction (1977)

Minister for Education Tharman Shanmugaratnam
London School of Economics - Bachelor of Arts
Cambridge University - Masters
Harvard University - Masters

___________________________________________________
PM Abdullah bin Haji Ahmad Badawi
University of Malaya - Bachelor of Arts Honours (1964)

Tun Dr. Mahathir bin Mohamad
King Edward VII College of Medicine, Singapore - Bachelor of Medicine (1952)

Minister of Defence Dato' Sri Najib Razak
University of Nottingham - Bachelor of Arts Honours (1974)

Minister of Defence Najib Razak
University of Nottingham - Bachelors of Arts Honours (1974)

Minister of Foregn Affairs Syed Hamid Albar
(can someone tell me his univeristy? )- Bachelor of Arts

Ministry of International Trade & Industry Rafidah binti Aziz
Universiti Malaya - Bachelor of Arts Honours

Minister of Agriculture Muhyiddin Yassin
(Education Unknown)

Ministry of Domestic Trade Shafie Apdal
(Education Unknown)

Minister of Education Hishammuddin Hussein
(Education Unknown)

Minister of Home Affairs Radzi bin Sheikh Ahmad
(Education Unknown)

Syed Hamid Albar...should have been history long ago..Why he is kept in the cabinet is anybody's guess.

I thought Najib left Nottingham before he completed his study. But maybe I'm wrong. Radzi was a prominent lawyer before he joined cabinet prior to the UMNO split in 1987. I don't know about Hishamuddin - but the trend now is not academic credentials but who are your parents. I know quite a number of Ministers and Dy Ministers who are academically below par.

Back to what Goh Chock Tong said (or what was reported) - there might be some truth in it. We are not equal to Singapore in many things, foremost in my mind is the standard of living. So no big deal.

as to your comment why the umnoputras are silent..simple answer..they know nothing..nothing at all....

Dear Chan,

If you go through old parliamentary proceedings when LKY was an MP for a constituency in Singapore you would come across this allegation by LKY - that Syed Albar (Hamid's father) (constitutionally) was not a Malay. He migrated to Malaya when he was in the 30s.

We are not comparing education here but when negotiating with Singapore we need to be very firm and not give in to their demands based on short term benefits but longer term ones!
This is where politics comes in between !
We need to hit them hard on their wants and needs to get what we want as I believe S'pore needs Malaysia more than anything else while acting like its the reverse.
They don't teach this in Unerversities unfortunately it has to come with verve and cunning which is acquired over time dealing with these arrogant people south of the channel!

Finally i understand why this government is like a modern painting.....
a splat here a splat there...
Great to be governed by artists... and that what they are, look at Rafidah a real artist

The qualifications of the repective Cabinet members of Malaysia and S'pore speak volumes where we stand in negotiations etec Same goes for our civil service.For the future , please, I mean our Government refer to the issue of The Hedge dated 29th April Mr Gunasegaran's advice on the way to negotiate with S'pore! My adice is we have people to more than match S'pore's, recruit them and use them for our countr's sake.

Actually i dont see whats the fuss about maruah bangsa ...any idiot can talk abotu any shit to get support for their country election ...we do it in this country anyway ...

Mahathir's remarks of we selling our soverignity & this topic of conversation in this blog to me is just inciting ppl that there are problems of maruah!!! If we really have intelligence, we do whats right for us, regardless of this maruah shit!

If we're mature, we'll not give a shit to both Mahathir's incitement or singapores childish talk!! There is other silent ways of proving, by taking more business away from SG!

Calling our HC back isnt a mature way of handling this! It's election politics! We should do bigger damage to SG, in terms of Economy!!! ofcourse without bragging about it!

We've just proven through the water talks book, that Malaysia cannto make a decent and proper stand on anything with SG! So ..what should they be any better towards us? We've insulted them before..obviously they dont start calling their HC back ...they give us blow after blow by making themselves stringer economically!

Our bloody mentality is to get fame onlyw ith little substance! How stupid!

mahathir should just shut up..the more he speaks ..the more he looks like a moron!

JEFF OOI says: It's so easy to get one's thoughts clouded with hate-Mahathir emotions. But that's not the key issue of this blog topic. Chiam talked about economic union, hence this blog's main context. On the other hand, GCT talked about the impossibility of an economic union if the partner countries are not equals. We have a case model, i.e. the European Union (EU). Are the EU partner countries all equals? Are Greece, Latvia or Lithuania equal to UK, Germany and France or Sweden - comparing apple to apple, oranges to oranges? You may start your understanding on this subject from Wiki, or the EU website such as this. Don't let your hate-Mahathir emotions cloud your rationality so ever easily. Or Singapore will grin wider st our expense through its many Goh Chok Tongs out there. And that will be baruah maruah wholesale if we can't even discern what the real issue was and is.

Can we blame the arrogant S'porean for making us laughing stocks?

While it's ok not to earn respects from them, we end up at another extreme losing end, being intimidated like nobody business.

Well, we asked for it!

albert:
pls don't you insult my brothers like picasso, van gogh and monet! Their paintings fetch $millions.
But I'll forgive thee if you add the prefix: CON?:)

Desirata, your' right i should have added the CON.
Con artists they are all of them

[ DELETED - Rumours mongering ]

Malaysia was formed in 1963 with four equal partners - the Federation of Malaya States, Singapore, North Borneo (Sabah) and Sarawak to consolidate British economic interests and defence against the domino theory of Communism expansion. Today only Umno is first among equals - Singapore kicked out (expected to come begging back but did not so far on Umno's terms, Sabah and Sarawak were made obesient to Umno's Unitary (not federalism) hegemony now mere district of Malaya in Borneo. When the Israeli President visited Singapore, it was not okay. But when the Israeli President visited Thailand, we did not demonstrated and read the riot act. Abang never want to be equal with the infidel adik. Today the Islamization of Sabah is completed and only Muslims are allowed to helm Sarawak. Look at Brunei which declined to join Malaysia, they considered themselves lucky or today will be waiting for federal handouts over the 9MP.

After the failure of T Mathathir and Goh Chock Tong to solve any outstanding bilateral issue between the two nations, Singapore decided to give up on any future negotiation due to flip-flop in agreed positions. SIngapore prefers to let third party do the arbitration especially after they have won the ruling to continue Paulau Tekong land reclaimation via the Internation Court in Holland. In thier opinion, the best approach is through 3rd party to avoid any mud throwing in the event that negotiation fails.

When Abdullah became PM, he offered to restart all negotiations under new approach, to "pluck the low hanging fruits" i.e to solve easier issue first. Singapore was very reluctant as they know it would not be successful , instead suggested third party abitration as a better option.

The above remarks of "unequal" by Goh Chock Tong refers to "big brother-small brother" mentality of Malaysian leadership in previous negotiations.

Ever since the two countries split in 1965, Malaysia has tended to regard Singapore as the little brother which needs to show big brother more respect and deference. These were widely perceived by SIngapore leadership as well as it people that any negotiation with Malaysia will get no where because "big brother-small brother" treatment instead of negotiation as equals.

This is how i read the meaning of "unequal".

mithos knowledge of singapore minister's educational merits is uncanny and surpasses his knowledge of malaysian counterparts. the ministers list are drawns not only along national lines but betwen malays and others. What is he implying? and why is art chan making assumptions about umnoputra? dtsv is correct to say that the country is being islamised, but the problem of sabah was the sabah people's own doing and sarawak has a melanau chief minister.Both states has authority over their own immigraton requirement.They can deny if they wish anybody from the peninsular from coming in. While most of us are complaining that malaysia is becoming too muslim in nature, not many of you realise that singapore is at the helm of chinese christian overlord, with majority of minister and senior civil servants being in this rank.To furher complicate the issue, harry Lee still has many friends in the legal circles in UK including the lawyer that represented malaysia in the latest maritime border reclamation in johore straits, and possibly the arbitrator himself.

Jeff, would you mind posting the news article, where the Tong used M'sia as the lame duck for our information?

Why are we not equal to Singapore, some hurtful truths:-

When thousand of Malaysian motorists have to brace the jam, the carbon monoxide, the fume, and at the expense of the quality family time to crawl through the causeway everyday to "cari makan".

When SGD1= MYR 2.28

When thousand of kids from Johor wake up in the wee hours of the morning to catch their school bus to Singapore for their quality education

When Singapore is ranked so highly in the transparency index as compared to Malaysia.

When as a tiny nation their forex reserve is manifold of Malaysia

When as a wee nation they are expanding their external economy at breakneck speed by strategic acquisitions.

When the biggest shopping complex in Johor, City Square is majority owned by Temasek, an investment arm of Singapore

When their per capita spending power is 5X per capita of an average Malaysian

When their crime rates are negligible when compared to Johor Bahru

When they have one of the highest property ownership in the world

When Malaysia stop the crux mentality and be more tranparent with the award of the CIQ,bridge, other projects etc without the due process of tender.

When Singapore is ranked as the most business friendly place.

When as a backward backyard with no natural resources, Singapore has made it to be one of the most developed nation in one generation.

When Singapore have the most eficient and world class airport,port and MRT system.

When we have to pay MYR100mil for an abandoned bridge project.

When there is a railway line from Tg Pelepas to Senai in Johor built at a cost of many millions but have never been used for at least the last four years.

When our professionals are attracted to Singapore in droves.

When our best brains in Malaysia are offered scholarship and subsequent citizenship to be Singaporeans.

When they are so many abandoned shopping complexes in Johor eg. Sun City, Lot 1, Pacific Mall, Kemayan City etc.

When our MB sits comfortably and not bringing in the much needed foreign investment to spur growth

When our public transportation is a real poor cousin of SBS and MRT

When Singapore says Cheap, Cheap,Cheap (like a bird) shopping in Johor.

Whn their politicians are ex-Malaysians eg. Khaw Boon Wan (Minister of Health), Irene Ng (ex journalist) and Lee Bee Wah (ex rubber tapper daughter from Rumbai, Melaka)

The list goes on and I weep for Malaysia, not meant as a sarcasm but really as a matter of reality.

Jeff,

I take your feedback in good stride. But i beleive we have been historically setting a precendence on NOT being able to make a stand on any issue with SG.

On one side, you have a partner that always wants his goalposts shift to continously benefit him, while in economic cooperation, you give some, you take some! The precedence set in our country is that WE MUST ALWAYS win over SG on everything, resorting to bully tactics!

On GCT comments, he's just being a politician! In a way, he's right. To cooperate you need equal dreams for synergies! Not one that SPELLS I MUST WIN ALWAYS, and i dont care a damn about you Singapore mentality that "someone" likes to potray!

We have to give in once in a while but SOMEONE will divert this and SAY.. Malaysia sold their maruah to singapore or we're being scared of SG, aka Malaysia has no Guts!!!

My applogies for bringing in Hate Mahathir emotions, but i cant stand statemens such as

"Mahathir says there's a limit when it comes to safeguarding our sovereignty."

This is pure hypocracy, he must read this article:

http://www.malaysiakini.com/letters/50494

I would like to see if Malaysia has a respond to GCT, and if they have...would be an intelligent and thoughfull one?

My take is always simple, hit them where it hurts...for that we need to use brains!!
So..how can we even start cooperating when we dont have equal mindset?

JEFF OOI says: Many thanks for your kind thoughts, goks.

The man is simply calling a spade an spade. It doesn't take a Phd to tell you on almost every level, Singapores economy is better then Malaysia.

If anything, such a plan to link the 2 economies would be more like the merging of loss making banks/broking firms with profitable ones during the recession to save the loss making banks/broking firms.

I don't know why we always get worked up when we hear the truth. Malaysia and Singapore are NOT equals, in many ways.

The case of the EU brings forth the price to pay for union of differing levels of economy. The more advanced economies has to foot a considerable economic price for accepting the new members. West germany had to do the same on unification with East Germany.

Do you think Singapore will be willing to make ther necessary economic sacrifice to have economic union with Malaysia?

JEFF OOI says: I get a strong sense that Screenshots readers who debated on "economic union" DO NOT have a basic understanding of what "wconomic union" means as an economic concept and operational options for market effeciency. The readers' modus operandi is just to rant and whine from the oft-used point of political rhetorics.

The most realistic economic union I forsee is for M'sia to become a factory for S'porean designed goods, similar to what China is for Taiwan and Japanese electronic firms. This is one way for S'pore to keep it's prices competitive while retaining higher paid jobs in design and management roles. The difference is that the Chinese have an urge to learn and are moving up the value chain, while we M'sians are still stuck in the manufacturing era with very little going on in the R&D stage...due to poor education standards and mass-produced spoonfed graduates with little or no market value. All we have going for us are our natural resources which will be depleted one day...

To add to Gozie’s list:-

The military power of Singapore, according to a report by a British military strategist is many times of that of ours. Ever since the release of the report, the Umnoputras have been silent a lot.

Remember those days whenever there was a dispute between Singapore and Malaysia, the Umnoputra crowns would gather at the causeway, electing banners and keris wielding however, they are much tamed now even when people are asking for sand and airspace from us because we know that our helicopters and our jet fighters could not even survive flying training let alone the air combat and our national service is such a crap that the discipline is so bad that rape, fighting among trainers and trainees is no longer news and the camp is too filthy to even survive the sickness. Well, modern warfare is talking about technology, brains and discipline which we are totally lack of.

That of course will make us psychologically defeated ( inferior complex ) on the negotiation table let alone we also do not have much brains to negotiate with people; judging from Mithos’s list of impressive qualifications of their people who are in charge.

TDM in his 22 years of ruling only taught his apprentices to nod heads without using much of their brains. So when our people went to the negotiation table, they could just nod heads as their boss was not around; a tragedy of a one man show without a comprehensive system in running the country. It is no use for TDM to cry foul now as they were all your apprentices.

Sad and hurtful reality, I weep for Malaysia too!

Err, just a disclaimer: The list of qualifications conferred to the people in my earlier posting was obtained from a previous blog topic (Rashomon Effect: The NST, theSun, newspapers) on this website courtesy of the blogger knows as "
a malaysian hero". I have not and will not attempt to verify the accuracy of the list. Readers are urged to use their own discretion to determine the validity of the list. Personally I have no reason not to believe it, looking at the way our MP's behave in parliment.

Its sad there's so much criticism about Gov of Malaysia about how incompetent they are. Looks like screenshots readers are no diff by looking at the postings on this topic.

I'll keep this short.My 2sen. Economic union can work. Pls don't confuse economic union with merger between the two countries, think of it as a strategic alliance between the 2 countries exploring ways where comparative advantage of each country is maximised. It should start as a very high level or strategic cooperation, monetary union and single currency should only be explored later, heck it took EU four decades to realised this.

But before any of this can happen historical and political baggage between the two must disapppear.

well,
S'pore is essentially Ah Beng-dominated English world, just like white USA.

But down here, it's truly, wide-spread multi-racial societies of ahmad, samy, Wong.

We should only ask one question that Jeff mentioned:

What made Badawi to decide in between 19 January 2006 (date of reviving bridge project) and on 12 April 2006 to cancel the bridge project, thereby only to compensate RM100million to Gerbang Perdana.

Could Singaporean demanded for air space and sand use in between 19 January 2006 and 12 April 2006?

If so, please tell or show proof...

There is a popular saying in Singapore:

In Singapore, the government is clever but the people are stupid. But in Malaysia...

Of course Singapore don't want an economic union with us.

1. They are doing quite well for themselves, with US contracts and foreign investment many times more than us.

2. More importantly, they're doing better than us. I'm not too sure what an economic union is, but if we're using the EU as a model, then I cannot see Singapore wanting to join us in one. If you look at the EU, it is the bigger (more prosperous) countries who have to subsidise the smaller ones. This is because of their policy of non-discrimination in goods, services and labour. This means that Britain has to pay to keep French farmers' prices low, so that they can then enter the market in, Portugal say. Moreover, an economic union means free exchange of goods, services and labour. Ie Singapore would be swamped by Malaysians wanting jobs (as the situation is here in UK).

3. Does that mean that we have to share a common currency, like the euro in the EU? Why would Singapore want to devalue their currency, and support ours which is weak? To put it simply, an economic union would benefit us more than Singaporeans.

Frankly, the two countries can't even handle bilateral agreements, let alone a full scale economic union. Malaysian ministers cannot handle the brainpower of the Singaporeans on the negotiating table. They have ministers from Oxbridge lawyers, doctors, economists etc. Our prime minister has a BA in Islamic studies from UM, and failed to meet the standards while trying to do Economics http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Abdullah_Ahmad_Badawi
We were slaughtered over the water agreement, and I really can't see us negotiating anything proper for ourselves.

Moreover, all this pahlawan spirit and maruah crap means that we'll never be able to get to the negotiating table. When you have idiots like Mahathir yelling "menjual negara" we'll never achieve it. Like someone said above, we have to give and take in an economic agreement. We give, people yell. We take, we're taking the easy way.

Stick to the bilateral agreements, at least it can't get worse than that.

Also as a bit of addition,

In an economic union, the members must have roughly the same economic policy, and better still, if possible, a common political stance. My question is, Singapore has ties, economic and industrial, with Israel (http://www.siirdf.com/index.shtml) and the US. Can we put our pahlawan spirit aside for a while? Can we handle the fact that we have to open to all avenues of income, no matter what we think of them? Can we tahan our patriotism, when they give us advice on how to improve our efficiency? Like someone above said, our mindsets are differents, but worse still, we don't even have common goals. We want to be head of the OIC, and be the big brother, be the face of a modern Islamic country. Singapore just wants to make money, and make sure they are not swamped by Malaysia and Indonesia. Maruah doesnt come into the equation at all.

Jeff, I do not know what to make of you comments on my post.

Cryptic remarks aside, as said by hann above, "economic union" ala European Union comes with considerable costs both economic and social, on both big and small economies. It will be foolish not to recognise that.

As to the obvious "superior than thou" attitude demonstrated by Singapore, I think I can understand where that comes from, even if I feel upset with this kind of un-neighbourliness.

The psychic of Singapore is a mixture of fear and disdain. Fear and aprehension carried over from 1965, when as a small island nation, had to learn to survive amongst much bigger neighbours, dependant on external sources for everything, down to water and manpower. Disdain in recent years, when their system of benign dictatorship brought relative peace and prosperity, amongst the bumbling bigger neighbours.

This mixture of fear and disdain spawned Singapore somewhat booring behaviour, perhaps best simplified as the "kiasu" behaviour.

It is funny that many people in Malaysia and singapore don't appreciate their own country.That must be the common ground we can begin with.

Hi there people, please get your facts right before you post anything, here are some of the profiles of our leaders:
http://www.pemudaumno.org.my/modules.php?name=Ketua - hishamudin
http://www.pemudaumno.org.my/modules.php?name=NaibKetua - khairy
click on Prime Minister and also click on profile,awards of PM:
http://www.pmo.gov.my/website/webdb.nsf/pmoenglish?openframeset - pak lah
I'm not interested to find the others anymore because this shows that the comparison is full of bull..
Please don't spread inaccurate information and create confusion on the internet. It is best that you find all of those ministers education background first, then you can compare each of them. Well, Malaysians are still Malaysians.. always like to jump into conclusions before getting the right facts. Thats the REAL shame...