poobalan.com

Only in stance, so don’t go and storm the HQ for membership forms! Samy Vellu says MIC had learnt a lesson from the General Elections:

MIC will adopt a multi-racial stance in dealing with the people’s problems, party president Datuk Seri S. Samy Vellu said here.

He said the problems facing the Indian community could only be resolved through a non-racial approach as was evident after the 2008 general election.

There must be understanding and respect among all races. There must be a give-and-take attitude. Only then can we all survive as a Malaysian race, he said here yesterday.

MIC will still represent Indians, he says and will ask for what is rightful.

We will only ask what is rightfully ours without infringing upon the rights of the other communities.

Question: Is asking for children not to be unilaterally converted by spouse who convert to Islam can be considered as “asking for what is rightfully ours without infringing upon the rights of the other communities”?

Question: Is a convert to Islam who unilaterally convert the children without spouse’ knowledge and involvement is considered an act of “asking for what is rightfully ours without infringing upon the rights of the other communities”?

Off Topic - Manchester United lifts Charity Shield after beating Portsmouth 3-1 in penalties. Full time was 0-0. Game just ended.

Popularity: 1% [?]

Today, Star reported that TEKUN has allocated RM3 million for young Indians (reproduced at the end).

The Government has allocated RM3 mil to provide financial aid to young Indian entrepreneurs, MIC president Datuk Seri S. Samy Vellu said.

He said that assistance would be channelled through Tekun Nasional, a body under the Ministry of Entrepreneur Development and Cooperatives and the MIC-owned Social Strategic Foundation (YSS).

On 4th June this year, Samy Vellu mentioned that TEKUN had allocated RM3 million as well. Is it the same RM3 million? At that time only 10 out of 300 students from INSKEN had applied for it.

If we go back to 3rd March this year, RM3 million is part of a special allocation by Economic Planning Unit, Prime Minister’s department. This RM3 million had been used as a revolving micro loan fund with Yayasan Tekun. I didn’t say that, Samy Vellu did.

In December 2007, Samy says this: “the Government provided business-training programs to Indian youths through the National Entrepreneur Skills institute while RM3mil has been allocated for business loans for Indians through the Tekun foundation”.

The RM3 million was first mentioned in July 2007 - “The government will also provide a special loan fund totalling RM3 million through Yayasan Tekun for 500 Indian youths to obtain micro business loans”. Yup, by Samy Vellu.

Hmmm…that’s quite a number of “RM3 millions”. Hope they are not the same. If not, it is the same RM3 million being rerun for last one year. But if not many applied, then it doesn’t make much difference does it?

According to TEKUN head Abdul Rahim, Tekun, which was set up in 1998, has already disbursed RM90 mil to bumiputras to develop their business and was expanding it to provide assistance to the Indian youths. He said a decision of the applications would be made within 14 days if all the documents were in order, compared to the previous period of three months.

Tekun would request additional allocation from the government if the RM3 mil allocation was inadequate.

The rest of the articles as follows:

Speaking to reporters after a briefing by Tekun managing director Datuk Abdul Rahim Hassan here Thursday, he said loans of RM10,000 each had been approved for three applications to develop their businesses so far.Samy Vellu said Indians below 40 should use the opportunity to seek the financial assistance from Tekun to upgrade their businesses.

“No one should come and say that the government has not done anything for the Indian community. There are opportunities available,” he said.

Samy Vellu said the MIC and YSS would also organise workshops in the respective states to disseminate the information on Tekun to the youths over the next two months.

Popularity: 1% [?]

The report in Nanban, carried by the Star says the Penang Municipal Council retracted the land it once allocated to the SJKT Azad Tamil school in Bagan Jermal, Penang. This retraction was done after the general elections, while the allocation date was not mentioned. We can safely assume that it was before elections.

Here’s the flow of events:

The school, which began operating in 1946, is presently “squatting” at the Penang Indian Association building and had submitted numerous applications to the state government for allocation of land so that new premises with proper facilities could be built. The school does not have enough classrooms. There is also no computer laboratory, science laboratory and library.

Previous government under chief minister Tan Sri Koh Tsu Koon and former state executive councillor P.K. Subbaiyah had approved the land near a Hindu temple in the Waterfall area that was identified by the school parent-teacher association in 2005.

The Penang Municipal Council, which owns the land, had also approved the allocation for the school.

MIC president and former Works minister Datuk Seri S. Samy Vellu had also obtained the necessary funds amounting to RM750,000 from the Federal Government to build the new school.

The Penang Municipal Council cancelled the land allocated to the school after the recent general election.

So, what happened?

Popularity: 1% [?]