Check out bbc’s report. (Copy and pasted below for ur convenience)

Malaysian plan to oust foreign workers

There is dramatic evidence from one of Asia’s fastest-expanding economies of the downturn’s severity. A senior minister says the government wants to send back 60% of Malaysia’s two million foreign workers, the BBC’s Robin Brant reports. Migrant restaurant workers in Kuala Lumpur (file photo) Mundane jobs undertaken by migrants are unpopular with many Malaysians The machines are noisy, the smell of chemicals and paint pervades the air. Lim Kok Boon’s plastics factory in Selangor churns out tonnes of transparent film and millions of bags. Standing in the shadow of a vast printing machine, he said: “This process is converting printed film into bread bags.” The firm makes about one million a day. What starts out as small resin pellets ends up protecting sliced bread, toilet paper and beer cans on shop shelves from Australia to Singapore. Great Wall Plastic has about 450 staff – of those 100 are foreign workers. All are men from Nepal, mostly in their 20s. The manual labour they perform is not popular with Malaysians. The firm has struggled to hire locals for wrapping and stacking work that takes place during the night shift. So people like 28-year-old Sunil fill the gap. “This is my last contract. I may have another in one or two years,” he says. Sunil earns the equivalent of $160 (£109) a month. His parents, brother and sister rely on the money he sends back from Malaysia. There are some two million workers like him in Malaysia. Another one million or so are here illegally. They are vital to the economy, accounting for about one-fifth of the workforce. Political necessity But as the hard times approach, the government wants them to be the first to go. Given the current fluid political situation in Malaysia it’s quite understandable that the Malaysian government takes these steps Chris Eng Head of finance firm OSK “There are certain sectors where we should be able to have Malaysians working in those sectors,” Home Minister Syed Hamid Albar said. “At present there are 2.1 million foreign workers in this country and I hope when their contract expires in certain sectors – if the industry does not require them – then we will be able to send them back.” He said a reduction of 60% was the government target. The figure is substantial, and means more than one million workers could be sent home over the next few years. Some observers say this is not just economic reality, but political necessity – a government protecting its own. Chris Eng from the financial services firm OSK said: “I think local sentiment will turn against the presence of foreign workers, as is commonplace throughout the world. “Given the current fluid political situation in Malaysia it’s quite understandable that the Malaysian government takes these steps.” But he also thinks this will not save money – that it could cost more. The government wants Malaysians in these jobs but it is likely they will demand better pay. Orders slowing Great Wall Plastic is doing well. There may even be room for growth as people tighten their belts and eat at home more often, requiring more packaged food. But still some machines are switched off because orders are down. Home Minister Syed Hamid Albar (file photo) Malaysians would like to see the easy way out… A very quick fix to get foreign workers – if they can, legally, if they cannot, illegally Home Minister Syed Hamid Albar As Lim Kok Boon gave me a tour of his plant just north of Kuala Lumpur we stopped at one machine that was idle. “This is not running because the orders are slow,” he said. “This is a reflection of the times.” He expects it to be mothballed for three to six months. I asked 29-year-old worker Dipak how he felt about going back to Nepal. He said: “If it’s not better here there’s no point wasting time.” But he added that there were no current plans to send him, or any of the other 99 Nepalese workers, back home. Long term, however, the government wants to break its centuries-old reliance on foreign workers. I asked Home Minister Syed Hamid Albar if Malaysia was “addicted” to foreign workers. With a wry laugh he replied: “That is quite accurate. Malaysians would like to see the easy way out… They think that is the best solution. A very quick fix to get foreign workers. If they can, legally, if they cannot, illegally.” Malaysia has grown rich with the help of foreign workers. The descendents of the Chinese and Indians who came here two centuries ago, and stayed for good, now make up a third of the Malaysian population. But the government is preparing a second stimulus package to try to insulate Malaysians against a recession – it wants to protect the Malaysian workers of today, not tomorrow. That means the Nepalese at the plastics factory and thousands more could be sent packing.

I DON’T THINK SO.

We are a bloody lazy bunch, we don’t scoop dhall and offer pappadams for other ppl for less than RM 1000. Yes, we DEMAND a comparatively high minimum wage because WE KNOW BETTER. And once everybody has a minimum wage, food prices will go up, heck EVERYTHING will be pricier and everybody will suffer. Our economy will crumble because we have been overprotected. Anyway, if my dhall-scooper has a RM 1000 minimum wage, and my engineering fresh graduate salary will be around RM 2500, I’d definitely intentionally go late for work and leave early. Hell, I’ll even do some M.I.A whenever I feel like it, because why the hell you wanna work ass off for that stupid puny paycheck?

And that’s why, my friend, our Malaysian economy will definitely collapse.

… on Lady GaGa….

muahahaha……. I lurv her songs. ALL!!

omg….omg…. i think I have pre-quarter life crisis. OMG!! OMG!!

But her songs are SSSSoooooo CATCHY!!

check out “Just Dance” and “Poker Face”!!

I’m sure this is one phase of my life that I will look back and think ‘Maybe Iz Crazee tats times’

Breakfast is my favourite meal of the day. I would even wake up early for a good breakfast. I miss big breakfasts T_T

The most awesome breakfast would be home-made pancakes with honey and bananas, coffee or milk, and the day’s paper spread out on the floor with the TV showing either spongebob squarepants or MTV Breakfast show. It’s awesome like that, I kid you not, and these are the few times that I actually experience contentment.

I miss flipping pancakes and eating proper meals at home T_T

The food here… I’m bored of them already *sigh*

I feel like shit. I feel like shit. I feel like shit.

There’s so much to do in so little time. My test 1 for Industrial Energy Management scored less than half. I have to do more tests for my Final Year Project and my Renewable Energy project sucks. My groupmates are clueless and they also suck. It sucks when close friends become groupmates, because then I cannot throw fireballs at them or at least kutuk til they busuk… CANNOT.

And then, on Thursday night, I found that someone deliberately scratched my car and cracked my headlight. Don’t ask me if I have offended anybody recently. Just don’t, because I have so few people that I actually talk to moreover to offend. If I had also, must she do something so gangsta on my car? Yes, it’s a ’she’. Trust me when I say that it’s a ’she’ because it happened in the girl’s apartments. Don’t ever mess with women. Anyway, the questions of  ‘WHO’ and ‘WHY’ brought me to the verge of pulling ALL of my hair off.

My car looks like shit now so much so that I hate looking at it. I don’t even know what I want to do with it or what to tell my father when he sees it. It’s one thing if I crashed it or parked haphazardly to get this but being scratched like this? If I ever find out who the bloody hell did this to me, she could kiss her two front teeth and her nose goodbye, I’ll promise her that. I have never physically assaulted anyone in my life before, so please hope and pray she loses them on my first try because otherwise, I WILL inflict more PAIN.

I’m stressing balls right now. I don’t know what I want to do after this, I don’t want to bum at home anymore, I don’t want to be left out from the rat race. I want a job. I want options, the sense of security knowing that I won’t be a useless nobody. With all these bad luck, I wonder if I ever will get used to not having them. Because I now picture everything for the worst and anticipate the one day that the whole sky will crash on me.

Hmm… why isn’t there an article about me? I can speak Bahasa Malaysia too, and better still, my English is not Chinese, Malay or wannabe-gwai lo accented. I read this article with distaste. I know even more languages than this guy. At least 5 including Cantonese and some cukup-makan Hakka. Tell me why I’m not on page 6 already!!

A multi-lingual Malay

By NOORSILA ABD MAJID

KUALA LUMPUR: Jamaluddin Ibrahim, with distinctive Malay features, speaks fluent Mandarin although his Bahasa Malaysia is halting.

Even his English is Chinese-accented.

“Mandarin is my first language, actually,” says the soft-spoken educationist in his thick Beijing accent during an interview at the Swiss Garden Hotel.

Jamaluddin is one of the guests on a Chinese New Year special programme produced by The Star Multimedia to promote inter-racial and inter-faith harmony.

“I may have been back in Malaysia for 15 years, but I still express myself better in Chinese,” he said.

The 47-year-old is the son of Malaysian freedom fighters, Shamsiah Fakeh and Ibrahim Mohammed (Mohamad), who lived in exile in China because of their involvement in the Communist Party of Malaya (CPM).

The youngest of three siblings, Jamaluddin was born in Beijing, but grew up in the remote province of Hunan.

He is one of the few non-Chinese who graduated from the prestigious Beijing University.

Jamaluddin never forgot his Malay/Malaysian roots when living in China.

“My parents made it a point to speak to us in Malay. My mum was a good cook and made the best roti canai ever.

“My brothers and I find it more comfortable to converse in Mandarin, especially if we’d done something naughty,” he laughs, adding: “My parents’ Mandarin wasn’t as good as ours.”

Jamaluddin and his brothers have also been brought up to be Muslims.

“We pray and fast during Ramadan. All of us married Chinese women who converted to Islam.”

Jamaluddin prefers to steer clear of politics, choosing to channel his energy into writing social commentaries for several Chinese publications.

On encouraging Malaysians to learn foreign languages, Jamaluddin said it was needed in multi-racial Malaysia because understanding a different language was the first step in understanding a different culture.

“The fact that I speak, read and write Chinese have allowed me to become closer to the Chinese community. But that doesn’t make me less of a Malay and Muslim.”

As for the education system, Jamaluddin said it needed “serious reinvention.”

“All Malaysians need to study under one system. They need to mix around, learn and understand each other as fellow Malaysians.

“Then we can have unity in the real sense.”

This uncle said that “All Malaysians need to study under one system. They need to mix around, learn and understand each other as fellow Malaysians”, and I agree on that. But I can also tell you why it will never work.

The reason why our country didn’t have a one-language system and why we hold on to vernacular schools is that every race has their own culture, root and pride. Our country is multi-racial, and the many races were not assimilated because the many races are too proud to give up their heritage just for a citizenship here. 50 years back, everybody had the option to head back to greatly beloved motherland after working their ass off for that pot of gold. By the way, it’s not that Malaya didn’t try assimilating these races. To cut it short, the grand plan backfired, resulting in May 13. Anyway, I love how it is now. I keep my Chinese name and laugh at news report like this. You want unity? I’ll give you unity anytime, my friend.

I understand that not everybody can agree on the same thing and until then, I’m proud to have my Chinese roots and don’t mind being called Cina Babi. Better yet, I find it amusing that some narrow-minded politicians play this card whenever they need support for something. But I’m also proud that three generations of my family didn’t rely on any government handouts and still manage to survive better than those who did. So I don’t understand those that complain about the Malays having it easy, about the inequalities, about the fact that NEP is unfair. I’ll tell you what, NEP might be a good thing after all, because what doesn’t kill you makes you stronger.

I can safely tell you that, if you work hard for something, nobody can take success away from you. It’s kinda obvious isn’t it? I have superiority complex after all. What the fuck is the big fuck about him knowing Mandarin? To put it in a good tone, he is smart because he knows an extra language other than his mother tongue and came out from Beijing University. But nobody knows if he might’ve gotten in the university thousands of Chinese nerds die for on foreign students quota. Hell I dunno about you, but it seems to me, he’s just a victim of circumstances. Exile> Communist Party Malaysia> China> Learn Chinese> Beijing University etc. So is it really worth a piece of news?

Yes, I’ve went on for so long just to point out that The Star newspaper DOES NOT HAVE ANY SUBSTANCE. Did he do the country proud? Nobel prize? Booker prize? Pullitzer even? No, he just knows an extra language that 30% of the population here already mastered since the age 2. Sneaky suspicion, this article is trying to stroke some ego.

The terrorist holds himself hostage. Saddam Hussein kills his own kind.

It’s WAR.

Bring it on.