You don’t say?!

Freedom of speech means anything within reason can be said.

(I will leave it to politicians, lawyers, etc, to hair-split over the parameters of what is reasonable till the end of time.)

In the past week or so, a few Malaysians said things that prompted a few “You-don’t-say”s from me.

Like Jho Low, via his lawyers, charging Dr Mahathir Mohamad with hijacking his yacht, Equanimity. The seizure of the yacht is illegal. The judicial process in Indonesia was by-passed.

You don’t say?!

This from a man who has dropped out of sight because several jurisdictions have warrants on him and many questions about the sleight-of-hand movement of 1MDB funds.  

Then there was former prime minister firing a salvo at Finance Minister Lim Guan Eng, saying the abolition of GST favoured the rich.

"Lim needs to prove that he truly wants to help the B40 group and not only help the rich, businesspersons and the black economy to evade taxes or encourage illicit outflow," said a statement from the Pekan MP.

You don’t say?!

This from the man who enriched supporters with five/six-figure monthly salaries and lucrative contracts.

He should change his speech-writer (if he didn’t pen it himself) because it was not a smart move to use the last phrase – “encourage illicit outflow.”

YOU DON’T SAY?!   

Then there were things that shouldn’t be said, but were said.

Like the MP from Kinabatangan with his expletive in parliament.

A subsequent sorry from him got him a warning instead of a suspension.

He, a defender of Malay this and that, should also be sorry that, in expressing his anger, he chose an over five-century-old Germanic/English word, instead of something from the national language.

Bung Moktar Radin has been sorry for years.

In 2007 he referred to the monthly leaks of women. Last year, in rising to the defence of the tudung, he mocked ugly naked women.

In 2008, he told wheelchair-bound Karpal Singh to stand up. He also made an obscene gesture in parliament, and explained it was “not what it meant.”

Who can read the meaning of a reptilian brain that could celebrate Germany winning the World Cup of 2014 with a tweet: Long live Hitler?

Every time Bung’s name comes up, my mind reflexively thinks what his mouth needs is a bung.

Below the belt

Bung was preceded by MPs Abdul Rahman Mohamad and RSN Rayer who hurled body-parts at each other.

Rayer made reference to the father’s head, a symbol of intelligence or lack of.

The MP from Lipis took aim below the belt of the mother. A symbol of where his mind is rooted?

The Malaysian Communications and Multimedia Commission (MCMC) has issued guidelines to discourage words insulting people or political parties.

No more miscegenation of species – a man/woman cannot be a pig, cow or dog, nor can he/she be a ghost or the Devil.

Poor “dedak” – a word that used to appear with no fuss in programmes and writing on agriculture and

the price of poultry – now a dirty word, besmirched by close association with a political party. 

But why frown on “pok gai” (broke)? For many Malaysians, it’s a statement, or a lie to fob off those asking for a loan, but not a political insult.  

To balance things, a bill to abolish the Anti-Fake News Act (AFNA) has been tabled in Parliament.

And the High Court has lifted the gag order preventing the media and public from discussing the criminal charges against Najib Razak.

Just legally acknowledging what has been reality for years in media and social media, dinners and forums.

The end of Najib and Umno’s reign is a consequence of all that slanderous discussion.

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THOR KAH HOONG is a veteran journalist. -Mkini