I thought today I will be having a good rest at the office (KLGCC), surfing porn (oops) and having my teh ais! Then I opened the Star. Damned! There’s so many things to write! There goes my work! Eh, you got work meh? I hear one of my old friends saying! Yes, I do have work!! What, just because I sit at the club most days, I don’t have work!!! I am an entrepreneur! We work from everywhere! Even in our sleep! Anyway, the front page headline in the Star screamed “Stop the outflow”. What? Our flood is now flowing into Thailand, or Singapore? Nope. They are talking about the huge illicit (illicit ok, not illegal!) outflow of money, reportedly to be US$338 billion between 2000 and 2010, according to the US-based watchdog group Global Financial Integrity (GFI), the watchdog that probably would not be able to pin point on the map where Malaysia is. According to GFI, Malaysia is the fourth highest among developing nations! Wow, Malaysians have that much money meh? So a Task Force has been set up, with representatives from the Central Bank, Attorney-General’s Office and the Inland Revenue Board, being pulled in to catch these “outflowers”. “Outflowers”, that’s a nice word! Ok, Oxford Dictionary, I am claiming the rights to the word! Aiyo, what’s so difficult about catching them? You only need to do two things. First, go to Singapore, and cut a deal with the Monetary Authority of Singapore. Ask them for the list of all private banking accounts of Malaysians. Then investigate these guys or ladies. If they are convicted, MAS gets 10 per cent of the money parked in Singapore. Two, go to London, drive around for one week, trail all the Malaysians that you see and find out where they live. When they come back to Malaysia, stop them at the airport, interrogate them (use MACC, that will frighten the shit out of them!). Easy what??? Duh!!! Of course you cannot interrogate Empress Dowager la! But if you put one or two of these guys in jail, no one will ever do it again. Now, talking about investigation and interrogation, I was called in this week by the Securities Commission as a witness in a case that they have been investigating for two years. It is about insider trading. Now we all know that insider traders never get caught. In the 14 years that the SC has been in existence, how many have been convicted? Two!! And the guys that got convicted, they pay the measly fine of half a million, which is small change for them! In the more than 100 years that the New York Stock Exchange has been in existence, how many cases have gone to court? You can count them with your fingers! Now, this case has been investigated for two years, and no one has been caught, and now they need an expert like me to be a witness. This case is more difficult than investigating the husband of the SC Chairman! How long did they investigate that case? Two weeks, and no one was brought to book! What do you expect? Duh!!! I pity the sweet young thing that had to question me. First I said to her, I have not been in this building for 6 years. The last time I was here was to say goodbye to the former Chairman and Senior Director because I was leaving the industry. Of course she had already known who I am, but she did not know that I know all the big shots there and they know me too! But before that, I was taken to a room for a “body check”. The security guard apologized profusely for having to do it, and he forgot my bag! I had to tell him to check my bag! What did they expect? Me, carrying C4 in my bag? Hello, that’s carried by the guards of Empress Dowager! I don’t have access to C4! I pity the sweet young lady that is tasked with investigating the case. Now , she has to continue for 7 years (statute of limitation, mah!), or shorter if she can catch someone. Chances are, this will not happen! Now the lady is very smart, young and probably ambitious too. After 7 years, if she does not get disillusioned, she is either naïve or she would have visited her psychiatrist many times. What a waste of talent!!! What has the SC really done for the industry? First when they were set up 17 years ago, they got a big grant from the government. Then they took a big chunk of money from the Kuala Lumpur Stock Exchange and the stockbrokers. Then when KLSE was demutualized, they received 150 million shares from Bursa Malaysia, valued at RM450 million. Those shares were valued at more than RM2 billion at one time, and now worth more than RM1 billion! How much have they disbursed (as the shares are parked at the Capital Market Development Fund)? No one knows! When I was still at the exchange I wanted RM10 million to build a bond trading system. They made me sweat like crazy, and I got RM5 million. It’s not even their money!!! And here we are, talking about transparency, corporate governance and whatever else! Talking about corporate governance, a couple of months ago, I saw an ad by the Malaysian Alliance of Corporate Directors looking for people to become members. So I went to their website and I registered my interest. Within a day, I received an e-mail from the COO, and I was asked to pay RM1,500 to become a member. So I ignored it. So he called! He told me that for the membership fee, I will be given a three day seminar on how to be a company director. What!!! I am a board member of 2 companies now, and one of them I am apparently the chairman too! I have been board members of many companies over the years. When I was in the Exchange, I was a member of the CDS Advisory Council. How did I get that? By appointment of the Prime Minister! I was a member of the Labuan Financial Exchange Committee (the board that runs the Exchange). How did I get that? By appointment of the Prime Minister! I was a member of the Securities Commission Licensing and Examination Advisory Panel. How did I get that? Appointment by the SC’s Board of Commissioner! And they want me to pay them RM1,500 and then attend a free seminar on how to become a board member??? PUHLEEEEZE!!! Eat my golf balls! As one of my golfing buddy who is a Chairman of a PLC said to me, “They should pay you to be a member!”. Anyway, enough of my failure to control my anger! Back to the headlines! I know a lot of you have stopped reading the newspapers, and only believe what are in the blogs! Read the papers! Not everything in the paper is government propaganda, and not everything on the blogs are gospel truth (except mine, he he. Damned I am not a blogger!!!). But Malaysians are a gullible lot! And disillusioned, but they don’t do anything about it. Do you know what started the Arab Spring. A man committing self-immolation! To the philistine amongst you, self-immolation means burning oneself to death! For your information, 6 Tibetans have died this year so far through self-immolation! Anyone has done that in Malaysia??? Since so many talked about being unhappy with the country, why don’t you go Merdeka Square, sit in the middle and burn yourself! I will call CNN, BBC, Fox, and Al-Jazeera for you. They will train their cameras on you while you scream in pain, dying slowly! Talk big!!!! Some of my friends said that I am being more and more sceptical! I am not a sceptic! I am a pragmatist! I believe in what is right, but I won’t burn myself to death to prove that I am right! In the meantime, the PM has denied receiving a resignation letter from the “Cow Minister”. Hello, I know the Cow Minister is a very good friend of Empress Dowager! But show some balls la (not just on the golf course), and sack the bitch! And the Deputy Finance Minister has refuted allegations that he took bribes! Tsk, tsk, tsk! On to the opposition parties, “Hassan waging war on PAS, says Mahfuz”, “Nasha: I’m with PAS, never UMNO”, “Hassan: PAS has lost sight of the Malays”, and “DAP mum on PAS debacle”. People are disillusioned and looking at the Opposition Parties, and what do the opposition do? Kill each other!!! Great!!! Who is laughing the loudest now? The ruling parties!!! We all know that the ruling party has messed up (that’s being very kind!), now the opposition too!!! “Much indeed to be regretted, party disputes are now carried to such a length, and truth is so enveloped in mist and false representation, that it is extremely difficult to know through what channel to seek it. This difficulty to one, who is of no party, and whose sole wish is to pursue with undeviating steps a path which would lead this country to respectability, wealth, and happiness, is exceedingly to be lamented. But such, for wise purposes, it is presumed, is the turbulence of human passions in party disputes, when victory more than truth is the palm contended for.” – George Washington Read my views in the “Politics, politics, bloody politics”, on my website. On the corporate world, the central bank has launched the second Financial Sector Masterplan (FSMP). I am always interested in this though there is also another masterplan by the SC. But the SC one is always written by a bunch of consultants who know nuts about the industry! By the way, do you guys know who the husband of the Governor is? I do (though he may have forgotten me), and if you see him on the street, you would not know that he is married to one of the most powerful women in the country, unlike the other powerful woman of the SC, whose husband is doing corporate deals everywhere! Now, when the Governor was asked to return to Malaysia and become the Governor, her husband resigned from the bank that he was working in, and has never accepted any board membership of any company! Now you want to talk about integrity, that is integrity! “It's not what we eat but what we digest that makes us strong; not what we gain but what we save that makes us rich; not what we read but what we remember that makes us learned; and not what we profess but what we practice that gives us integrity.” -  Francis Bacon, Sr. www.fathi-ridzuan.com Ab imo pectore! Fathi (The Unquiet Mind) p/s If you are wondering what on earth is the Latin phrase above is all about? It means, “Sincerity gives wings to strength”. And my sincere apologies for bombarding all of you with e-mails every day this week. a capite ad calcem, sorry! Posted via email from Fazz's pre-posterous