TMI - Najib opens second Penang bridge, naming it after the King
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| Jambatan Sultan Abdul Halim Mu'adzam Shah |
My post today is not so much about the bridge nor about the politicians, past and present on both sides of politics associated with its development, but rather about its naming after the current Yang DiPertuan Agong, the King of Malaysia, who is also the Sultan of Kedah. While I believe it's appropriate to name Malaysia's current iconic landmark after HM the Agong, I believe also the Kedah connection is equally strong.
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| Sultan Abdul Halim Mu'adzam Shah |
Before I get onto my beef re the topic today, a wee historical recollection of the island's foreign visitors may be in order.
In the 15th Century (June 1405) Admiral Zheng He with an armada of 317 ships and a total crew of 28.000 men, probably including some expeditionary marines, sailed from Suzhou and visited SE Asia including Penang.
It may please some Malaysians that Zheng He was a Muslim with the name of Ma He (the 'Zheng' was bestowed upon him by the Ming Yongle Emperor in honour of his distinguished military service).
His great-great-great-grandfather was a Persian by the name of Sayyid Ajjal Shams al-Din Oma. I wonder whether the family were Shiites? If they were, it's fortuitous for them that Zheng He arrived more than 600 years ago because today he might have been harassed if not chased out by one of the JA-organizations we have, wakakaka.
You may also wish to read my BolehTalk postBend the ethnic belief - Bin the 'bin Abdullah'.
His great-great-great-grandfather was a Persian by the name of Sayyid Ajjal Shams al-Din Oma. I wonder whether the family were Shiites? If they were, it's fortuitous for them that Zheng He arrived more than 600 years ago because today he might have been harassed if not chased out by one of the JA-organizations we have, wakakaka.
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| Admiral Zheng He, a Chinese Muslim, visited Malacca during Sultan Mansur Shah's reign. His fleet visited SE Asia, South Asia (India etc), the Middle East, Somalia & the Swahili coast. Naval historian-author, Gavin Menzies, claimed Zheng He reached Americas 70 years before Columbus. He didn't have a bin Abdullah to his name, wakakaka. |
You may also wish to read my BolehTalk postBend the ethnic belief - Bin the 'bin Abdullah'.
Anyway, the only thing Admiral Zheng He did on arrival in the Malay Peninsula was to name Penang island on his maritime chart as Bīnláng Yù (of course long long before it became Penang Island - the local name for it at that time was Pulau Ka-Satu).
In 1592, more than 150 years after Admiral Zheng He's visit, an Englishman by the name of James Lancaster, a soldier and a trader but actually like most English trader-sailors at that time such as Francis Drake and Henry Morgan, just a robbing-plundering pirate, came to Penang.
He used the island as his base for pirating trading ships for around 4 months before he left. I wonder what were the nationality of the ships he plundered? Were they Portuguese, Dutch, French, Chinese, Indian, Thai*, Indons or local Malays? Eventually he became a director of the East India Company, the group that colonized India - perhaps it was his plundering credentials that got him the job.
* Thailand was always known as Meaung Thai to its people but outsiders called it Siam. However, King Mongkut (mid 19th Century) gave the word Siam official legitimacy until 1939 when the nation's official name reverted to Thailand. We shall stick to Thailand here.
Around that time, northern Malaya was on and off under Thai suzerainty, the local power. When they were not under Thai control they were raided and plundered, not only by the Thais but the Burmese as well - what the heck, where were the cousins (Indons) when Kedah needed them - oh dear I see, so the Mataram Sultanate at the end of the 17th Century was itself under threat from the Dutch.
That was when another English trader-adventurer wakakaka arrived in Penang.
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His name was Francis Light. Today he is not a very popular guy in Malaysia wakakaka because it pisses off many Malaysians or rather Malays when Penangites celebrate his landing on the island on 11 August 1786 as the founding of Penang with him as the founder, a preposterous claim-celebration when Malays and even Chinese, Thais and various other SE Asians were already there or had landed there (like Admiral Zheng He) nearly four hundred years prior to him. But it's f**king good for Penang tourism, wakakaka.
But look, those were the days of British imperial power when its trader-adventurers wakakaka, people like Francis Light, went around the world and claimed other peoples' countries as British possessions.
Those Pommie buccaneers would either cheat, threaten and seize such land, or claim them as terra nullius, a Latin term meaning 'land belonging to no one', where 'no one' means those they saw as non-beings, like the Australian aborigines.
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* honorarium means a payment made without the giver recognizing themselves as having any liability or legal obligation
** probably the first international currency at that time
Wikipedia said this of his successor: Lieutenant-Governor Sir George Leith secured* a strip of land across the channel as a buffer against attacks and named it Province Wellesley (today Seberang Prai). The annual payment to Sultan of Kedah was increased to 10,000 Spanish dollars per annum after the acquisition. Today, the Penang state government still pays RM 18,800.00 to the Sultan of Kedah annually.
* no doubt as a result of the Poms screwing the Kedah Sultan again
My point about the above historical recollection has been to inform so as to enable you to pontificate fairly on the connections between HRH Sultan Kedah and Penang, notwithstanding that Penang today is a separate state from Kedah.
Mind you, late last year Kedah MB Mukhriz, anak kepada Dr Mahathir, wakakaka, attempted to demand a larger annual sum from Penang. I wonder whether his demand plus another subsequent one for Penang to pay for river water used (though that'd be illegal) wakakaka, had been coloured by the fact that Penang is under Pakatan rule, wakakaka. Malaysiakini reported on 21 November 2013:
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Kedah Mentri Besar Mukhriz Mahathir out to be ashamed for asking the federal government to raise the RM10,000 annual royalty payment to Kedah for Penang the by using a 227-year old British colonial era treaty, an opposition MP said today.
Calling Mukhriz's move to extract royalty payment for Penang an outdated idea, the DAP's Bukit Mertajam MP Steven Sim criticised Mukhriz as "a bad son".
Sim pointed out that former prime minister Dr Mahathir Mohamad himself had back in 1994 rejected a similar request made by then Kedah menteri besar Osman Aroff.
"Mukhriz should focus on developing Kedah for the sake of the people, instead of trying his luck to get additional funds from the federal government via the backdoor on the pretext of the said treaty.
"Dr Mahathir even termed the treaty and payment as "meaningless". Hence, Mukhriz's action is surely an embarrassment to his own father."
Sim said this in reference to a New Straits Times report in which Mukhriz claimed that money was owed to Kedah on account of the old treaty on Penang, which was made during the British rule, and the amount had therefore to be raised.
Sim noted that the colonial era treaty clashed with independent Malaya, which gave both Kedah and its neighbouring state Penang the same right to exist under the federal constitution, specifically under Article 1(2).
"I urge the federal government to stop this embarrassment once and for all. This colonial legacy should be stopped and the annual payment of RM10,000 to Kedah should be abolished," Sim said, adding that all federal funds for Kedah should be used directly for the people's benefit and not for the state leaders.
But I suspect it's not so much that Penang is administered by Pakatan (though there's that too) but more about him wanting both demands against Pakatan to be on his UMNO credentials, wakakaka.
Leaving aside the honorarium (which incidentally, as mentioned above, is a payment made without the giver recognizing themselves as having any liability or legal obligation), shouldn't we at the very least recognize the historical connection between Kedah and Penang?
That brings us to the naming of Penang's 2nd bridge, Malaysia's latest iconic structure, and why I deem it being named after HRH Sultan of Kedah, who is also the current Agong, as most correct. This action represents a historic recognition of the connection between the two states, appropriately so with a bridge.
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But I was appalled by some of the interactive comments in TMI'sNajib opens second Penang bridge, naming it after the King. Some truly sad remarks are as follows (unedited):
What has Penang to do with Kedah? Give a name that gives pride to the Penangites.
Sorry, just curious. Will you change the name when the Agong changes?
Is this really necessary.....these guys really know how to rub people the wrong way.....if it is really a naming session instead of just opening the bridge should have just named it after someone who had contributed alot to Penang.....
So easy to call it '2nd Penang Bridge' - short and simple and easy to remember.
Change to any name, however, you like it and we still easily remember to call it as 2nd bridge.
In 1592, more than 150 years after Admiral Zheng He's visit, an Englishman by the name of James Lancaster, a soldier and a trader but actually like most English trader-sailors at that time such as Francis Drake and Henry Morgan, just a robbing-plundering pirate, came to Penang.
 |
| James Lancaster |
He used the island as his base for pirating trading ships for around 4 months before he left. I wonder what were the nationality of the ships he plundered? Were they Portuguese, Dutch, French, Chinese, Indian, Thai*, Indons or local Malays? Eventually he became a director of the East India Company, the group that colonized India - perhaps it was his plundering credentials that got him the job.
* Thailand was always known as Meaung Thai to its people but outsiders called it Siam. However, King Mongkut (mid 19th Century) gave the word Siam official legitimacy until 1939 when the nation's official name reverted to Thailand. We shall stick to Thailand here.
Around that time, northern Malaya was on and off under Thai suzerainty, the local power. When they were not under Thai control they were raided and plundered, not only by the Thais but the Burmese as well - what the heck, where were the cousins (Indons) when Kedah needed them - oh dear I see, so the Mataram Sultanate at the end of the 17th Century was itself under threat from the Dutch.
That was when another English trader-adventurer wakakaka arrived in Penang.
His name was Francis Light. Today he is not a very popular guy in Malaysia wakakaka because it pisses off many Malaysians or rather Malays when Penangites celebrate his landing on the island on 11 August 1786 as the founding of Penang with him as the founder, a preposterous claim-celebration when Malays and even Chinese, Thais and various other SE Asians were already there or had landed there (like Admiral Zheng He) nearly four hundred years prior to him. But it's f**king good for Penang tourism, wakakaka.
But look, those were the days of British imperial power when its trader-adventurers wakakaka, people like Francis Light, went around the world and claimed other peoples' countries as British possessions.
 |
| Francis Light |
Those Pommie buccaneers would either cheat, threaten and seize such land, or claim them as terra nullius, a Latin term meaning 'land belonging to no one', where 'no one' means those they saw as non-beings, like the Australian aborigines.
Anyway, Francis Light was working for the East India Company and wanted Penang as a base to keep an eye on French and Dutch colonialism in SE Asia (mateys, it’s all about the lucrative trade, especially in spices), so he leased the island from Sultan Abdullah Mukarram Shah, the 20th ruler of Kedah, in exchange for military protection from the ever threatening Thai and Burmese armies who were eyeing Kedah for the occasional jolly weekend of raping, pillaging and burning, and no doubt boozing as well with over-fermented tapai or toddy, wakakaka.
Light named the island as the Prince of Wales Island in honour of the English Tengku Makhota (crown prince) but the new name didn't strike a chord with most of his contemporaries because almost everyone who knew or lived in Penang called the island either Penang or by its local or Chinese name.
But the poor sultan of Kedah was cheated kau kau because the East India Company had no intention of being involved in the Sultan's problems with other Malay states or Thailand or Burma. Light hid that fact from HRH when he offered military protection for Kedah in return for use of Penang as his base, and he also hid his offer to the Sultan from his own company, wakakaka. In other words, he acted on his own 'initiative' (of devious lies and bullshit), which meant he leased the island from the Sultan Kedah with a bounced English cheque, wakakaka.
Of course on discovering that deceit, HRH wanted the island back but was unsuccessful in his effort as to be expected in a case of keris versus guns. Worse, he was forced to cede Penang to the East India Company for an honorarium* of 6,000 Spanish dollars** per year.
** probably the first international currency at that time
Wikipedia said this of his successor: Lieutenant-Governor Sir George Leith secured* a strip of land across the channel as a buffer against attacks and named it Province Wellesley (today Seberang Prai). The annual payment to Sultan of Kedah was increased to 10,000 Spanish dollars per annum after the acquisition. Today, the Penang state government still pays RM 18,800.00 to the Sultan of Kedah annually.
* no doubt as a result of the Poms screwing the Kedah Sultan again
My point about the above historical recollection has been to inform so as to enable you to pontificate fairly on the connections between HRH Sultan Kedah and Penang, notwithstanding that Penang today is a separate state from Kedah.
Mind you, late last year Kedah MB Mukhriz, anak kepada Dr Mahathir, wakakaka, attempted to demand a larger annual sum from Penang. I wonder whether his demand plus another subsequent one for Penang to pay for river water used (though that'd be illegal) wakakaka, had been coloured by the fact that Penang is under Pakatan rule, wakakaka. Malaysiakini reported on 21 November 2013:
Kedah Mentri Besar Mukhriz Mahathir out to be ashamed for asking the federal government to raise the RM10,000 annual royalty payment to Kedah for Penang the by using a 227-year old British colonial era treaty, an opposition MP said today.
Calling Mukhriz's move to extract royalty payment for Penang an outdated idea, the DAP's Bukit Mertajam MP Steven Sim criticised Mukhriz as "a bad son".
Sim pointed out that former prime minister Dr Mahathir Mohamad himself had back in 1994 rejected a similar request made by then Kedah menteri besar Osman Aroff.
"Mukhriz should focus on developing Kedah for the sake of the people, instead of trying his luck to get additional funds from the federal government via the backdoor on the pretext of the said treaty.
"Dr Mahathir even termed the treaty and payment as "meaningless". Hence, Mukhriz's action is surely an embarrassment to his own father."
Sim said this in reference to a New Straits Times report in which Mukhriz claimed that money was owed to Kedah on account of the old treaty on Penang, which was made during the British rule, and the amount had therefore to be raised.
Sim noted that the colonial era treaty clashed with independent Malaya, which gave both Kedah and its neighbouring state Penang the same right to exist under the federal constitution, specifically under Article 1(2).
"I urge the federal government to stop this embarrassment once and for all. This colonial legacy should be stopped and the annual payment of RM10,000 to Kedah should be abolished," Sim said, adding that all federal funds for Kedah should be used directly for the people's benefit and not for the state leaders.
But I suspect it's not so much that Penang is administered by Pakatan (though there's that too) but more about him wanting both demands against Pakatan to be on his UMNO credentials, wakakaka.
Leaving aside the honorarium (which incidentally, as mentioned above, is a payment made without the giver recognizing themselves as having any liability or legal obligation), shouldn't we at the very least recognize the historical connection between Kedah and Penang?
That brings us to the naming of Penang's 2nd bridge, Malaysia's latest iconic structure, and why I deem it being named after HRH Sultan of Kedah, who is also the current Agong, as most correct. This action represents a historic recognition of the connection between the two states, appropriately so with a bridge.
But I was appalled by some of the interactive comments in TMI'sNajib opens second Penang bridge, naming it after the King. Some truly sad remarks are as follows (unedited):
What has Penang to do with Kedah? Give a name that gives pride to the Penangites.
Sorry, just curious. Will you change the name when the Agong changes?
Is this really necessary.....these guys really know how to rub people the wrong way.....if it is really a naming session instead of just opening the bridge should have just named it after someone who had contributed alot to Penang.....
So easy to call it '2nd Penang Bridge' - short and simple and easy to remember.
Change to any name, however, you like it and we still easily remember to call it as 2nd bridge.
and the most shameful of all,
I don't understand why the King, sultan of Kedah needs to have his name. I think Jabatan Sir Francis Light would be moe appropriate.
He (or she) wants to name the bridge after Francis Light!!?
I don't understand why the King, sultan of Kedah needs to have his name. I think Jabatan Sir Francis Light would be moe appropriate.
He (or she) wants to name the bridge after Francis Light!!?
I can't believe a couple even thanked Lim Guan Eng, wakakaka. Now, even as a DAP supporter I am compelled to ask what had Guan Eng done for the construction of the second bridge, a federal project?
Mind you, Guan Eng himself hasn't even claimed anything. It's only those morons who saw fit to slot in words of thanks to him for the bridge, wakakaka. Either they know something I don't or they are the most idiotic of idiots who must have embarrassed Guan Eng kau kau.
This has been how those idiots got poor innocent Guan Eng (insofar as the naming of the bridge is concerned) on to the bad side of conservative Malays. Utusan Malaysia, always looking for any, the flimsiest, opportunity to demonize DAP in the eyes of the Heartland, claimed that Guan Eng had been unhappy with the bridge being named after the Yang Di-Pertuan Agong, its usual fabrication of course.
Guan Eng retorted: "It is completely untrue that I am unhappy with the bridge being named after the King. It is the federal government's right to name it. There is no unhappiness."
Guan Eng retorted: "It is completely untrue that I am unhappy with the bridge being named after the King. It is the federal government's right to name it. There is no unhappiness."
Guan Eng has had nothing to do with the bridge, but if those morons want to thank Guan Eng, wait until the to-be-constructed tunnel is completed.
But more worrying have been the disrespect for HRH Sultan of Kedah merangkap DYMM YDP Agong who is one of the finest rulers we have. I can understand (though I won't be crude as to commit lèse-majesté) if there are snide sneers, oblique hostilities or quiet disdain for certain ruler or rulers who have not shown exemplary conduct and examples to their subjects.
But why show such disrespect to HRH Sultan of Kedah, a good bloke and one whose lineage has very strong historical connections to the island of Penang?
In Australia, there is a significant republican movement but its members have always accorded respect, civility and cordiality to HM the Queen.
Now, even if there is a republican movement in Malaysia, its members (if not already jailed for lèse-majesté, wakakaka) should behave in a civilized manner and continue to show respect for the offices of the rulers, well at least until Malaysia theoretically succeeds in coming a republic through an official referendum.
In the end, Malaysians must realize that Malaysia is a democracy with a constitutional monarchy. I hope they know what monarchy as per the Constitution means, and if they don't, please learn from our neighbours the Thais or even the Japanese or Poms, Dutch, Danes, Norwegians, Swedes, Belgians and Spaniards.
I ask only because they have appallingly shown that the naming of Penang's 2nd bridge has been for them 'a bridge just too bloody far'.
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| school kids crossing the Banggol Jering river, Pasir Mas I hope this has been sorted out - if not, Najib, what are you doing for it? |