Singapore made no commitment to Australia's Sun Cable - Albanese's Sun Cable fantasy addressed in Singapore Parliament by Trade Minister Gan Kim Yong

 by Ganesh Sahathevan 

CNA has reported: 

Singapore has not made any commitment to Sun Cable's flagship solar energy project and therefore bears no financial impact from the company's recent decision to enter into voluntary administration, said Trade and Industry Minister Gan Kim Yong on Monday (Feb 6).

In a written parliamentary reply, Mr Gan said there are abundant renewable energy resources in the region and beyond, and "considerable interest" from companies to bring electricity into Singapore.

The Energy Market Authority (EMA) received more than 20 proposals for its ongoing Requests for Proposals exercise, with Sun Cable’s proposal being one of them.

"As part of the tender process, EMA has been clarifying our technical requirements with Sun Cable. However, Singapore has not made any commitment, financial or otherwise, into the Sun Cable project," Mr Gan said.

"Singapore therefore bears no financial impact from the recent actions taken by Sun Cable to enter into voluntary administration."

TO BE READ WITH 

Tuesday, January 17, 2023

PM Albanese of Australia told PM Lee of Singapore that Sun Cable " is the ultimate win-win" just 3 months before Sun Cable collapsed - Australian media has never been shy to investigate and criticise Asian politicians and their fantasy projects, must now do the same to the their own Prime Minister who has misled Australians and Singaporeans

by Ganesh Sahathevan  

    Albanese tweeting a family photo with the Lees

At a press conference in Canberra on 18 October 2022  Anthony Albanese, Prime Minister Of Australia, told Lee Hsien Loong,Prime Minister Of Singapore: 

.............Sun Cable, which has the potential to export clean energy to Singapore, is the ultimate win-win. If this project can be made to work - and I believe it can be - you will see the world's largest solar farm, you will see the export of energy across distances, the production of many jobs here in Australia, including manufacturing jobs. And the prospect of Sun Cable is just one part of what I talk about when I say Australia can be a renewable energy superpower for the world.

Just under three months later the project collapsed, for some very obvious reasons( see story below). 

Australian media has never been shy to investigate and criticise Asian politicians and their fantasy projects. The Bakun Dam project promoted by then Prime Minister Of Malaysia Mahathir Mohamad which was meant to transmit hydropower across the South China Sea is one eerily similar example.

Australian media must now do the same to the their own Prime Minister who has misled Australians and Singaporeans.

TO BE READ WITH 

Tuesday, January 10, 2023

Albanese's Sun Cable fantasy collapses - Albo must now explain why he misled Australians, and Singapore PM Lee Hsien Loong

 by Ganesh Sahathevan 

    

Albanese has used his position to promote Sun Cable, in Australia and overseas, despite Sun Cable having no power supply agreement with the Government Of Singapore.

A dispute between Mike Canon- Brookes  and Twiggy Forrest is said to have been the reason why Sun Cable has been put into administration.  The ABC is reporting that there are " disagreements about the funding and direction of the company......these included the significant amounts of cash that Sun Cable was spending, and its failure to achieve certain milestones".

As reported by this writer Sun Cable, Prime Minister Albanese of Australia, and the Chief Minister of The Northern Territory, Natahsa Fyles, all claimed that Sun Cable would supply Singapore with solar power from a solar bank in the Northern Territory, when in fact no agreement had been reached with the Government Of Singapore.

All three, but in particular Albanese and Fyles, must now explain why they misled Australians, and account for all any government resources provided the project.

Do Australian High Commissioners and other Australian diplomats posted to South East Asia pay their domestic servants local or Australian wages - Foreign Minister Penny Wong's grandmother is but one of very many who have served, and still serve as domestic servants in households in Malaysia, Singapore rest of Asia for less than a dollar an hour

 by Ganesh Sahathevan 

                            The fate of maids in Singapore and the rest of Asia is not a happy one -The Independent,Singapore

Australian Foreign Minister Penny Wong's complaint that British rule of Sabah forced her grandmother into servitude for a European family in Sabah  raises questions about how Australian High Commissioners and other Australian  diplomats posted to  South East Asia their domestic servants.

The use and abuse of domestic servants in Malaysia, Singapore and in the rest of Asia is common. Many household employ maids, who are often expected to work round the clock, and throughout the week. They are paid anything between AUD 200-to AUD 300 per month. 

These are practises that go back to colonial days,and part of the Asian culture of the region. However,  now that Senator Wong has raised the issue, and placed it in the context of the European presence in Southeast Asia,  the obvious question is whether Australian High Commissioners and other Australian  diplomats posted to  South East Asia pay their domestic servants local or Australian wages.

It is very highly unlikely that their excellencies and partners, and colleagues, would be doing their own washing, cleaning and cooking. Living like the British Raj is one the attractions of a South East Asian and Asian posting.

There is also the question of their working conditions.

END 

See Also 

Britain's colonial past includes awarding Chinese clans like the Wongs concessions to operate opium, gambling and prostitution revenue farms - Penny Wong's call to Britain to "better understand" its colonial past omits parts of British-Chinese history in South East Asia that South East Asia's Chinese are proud of, and well documented by the Brits

In 2015 the Malaysian Court Of Appeal determined that National Journalism Laureate Dato Rejal Arbee acted in bad faith, deliberately concealed facts - Obviously not laudable conduct, should not Rejal be stripped of his awards

 by Ganesh Sahathevan 

by Ganesh Sahathevan 

            YBhg Datuk Ahmad Rejal Arbee  has recently questioned the Johor Royal Family's right to rule

The Edge and others reported in 2015: 

A newspaper publisher and its editor had bad intentions when they reported that a PAS lawmaker had misbehaved and created a nuisance during a debate in Parliament 14 years ago by challenging a government backbencher to a fist fight, said the Court of Appeal.

Judge Datuk Hishamudin Mohd Yunus said this was a deliberate act of “pick and choose”, and “blacking out” of facts that were favourable to the plaintiff, Datuk Mahfuz Omar from PAS.

Hishamudin said the court had also rejected the defence of justification and qualified privilege advanced by the defendants — The New Straits Times (M) Bhd (NST) and Berita Harian’s former group editor Datuk Ahmad Rejal Arbee.

The Court Of Appeal judged Rejal, the National Journalism Laureate, on his conduct in his profession as journalist and editor. It is hard to see how one might remain a laureate when one's conduct in his profession is anything but laudable.

END 

The UK confronted its colonial past in Malaysia in 1988 with a USD1.95 Billion arms deal, a contract to construct the Pergau Dam, and other deals which were concluded when Penny Wong was at uni, playing undergraduate politics -The AUKUS scaffolding that Wong is said to be crafting by demanding that the UK confront its colonial history was built on those deals, and others like it built on networks that go back 200 years

 February 06, 2023

 by Ganesh Sahathevan 

                                                                       

                   Sabah, Sarawak, Brunei and Penny Wong family owe much to Shell plc.The oil business has driven the economies of all three states.

In 1981 Mahathir Mohamad became a prime minister of Malaysia for the first time. One of his first decisions was to order that the existing preferential trade arrangements between the UK and Malaysia be terminated, and that Malaysia look to Japan instead for trade, technology, education  and cultural exchanges. That was the beginning of Malaysia's Look East Policy, which remains to this day.  Some described the policy as a "put British last" policy. 

The decision was not an easy to implement given the very deep ties that had developed between Malaysia and the UK, often at a personal level, over a period of 200 or so years on British rule. By 1988 Mahathir softened his anti-UK policies, and marked it with an order for USD 1.95 billion in arms.

The deal followed an official visit to Malaysia by then UK prime minister Margaret Thatcher, and involved Thatcher signing a memorandum of understanding authorizing British aid to the Pergau Dam project near the Malaysia-Thailand border.   Allegation of corruption arose later, in 1993, and Malaysia cancelled the arms deal, adding one more layer of complexity to the relationship between the two countries. 

 The Australian Foreign Minister Penny Wong, who wants the UK to confront its colonial history, was 20 years old at the time, and reported to be an active student politician. 

Meanwhile "Malaysia views the Five Power Defence Agreement  as a “safety net” should events outside the capability of the Malaysian Armed Forces  occur. Besides Malaysia, the other FPDA members are Australia, New Zealand, Singapore and United Kingdom. The FPDA is the only multilateral defence cooperation which Malaysia has been a member of since 1971. Although it remains untested at war or conflict, the FPDA is an effective conflict management tool and has contributed towards MAF’s development and enhancement of its professionalism".

The UK has similar strong defense and trade ties with its other colonies in SouthEast Asia, Singapore and Brunei. It is these ties that enable AUKUS, a fact that should be obvious to anyone with even a limited understanding of China's intrusion into the South China Sea. 

There is no need for any new scaffolding, and certainly not one crafted by a politician playing undergraduate politics (or worse and geopolitical strategists who seem unaware of the history of this region.

END 

Is Australia's Penny Wong working to exclude Japan from AUKUS - Wong's King's College UK address was another not too subtle reminder that she, like many Chinese, have not forgiven Japan for errors of its Imperial Army during World War Two

 by Ganesh Sahathevan 

    Japanese leaders can be expected to be far more shrewd that Wong and Albanese,and will see through their clumsy attempts to exclude Japan from AUKUS

When Australia's Foreign Minister Penny Wong first stood to speak as a member of the Senate in 2003 she made special mention of her grandmother:  

My thoughts this morning were of my late paternal grandmother or Poh Poh, as I called her in her language. She was a diminutive woman with an indomitable spirit. A Chinese woman of the Hakka or guest people, she was my grandfather's second wife. When the war came to Malaysia, she and the rest of the family were in Sandakan, a name that many who fought in Australia's defence will be familiar with. Most of the family died during the war and she was left alone to care for my father and his siblings in unspeakable circumstances, which she did through extraordinary determination and a will to survive. She was barely literate; she was humble and compassionate but the strongest person I have ever known. Her name was Madam Lai Fung Shim and that her grand-daughter is here today would have been a source of pride but also probably some consternation to her. How much the world can change in two generations.

Wong has never failed to recount how hard it was for her grandmother, whenever the opportunity arose.  The latest opportunity to re-tell her  grandmother's story arose last week when speaking at King's College, UK: 

“My father is descended from Hakka and Cantonese Chinese,” she said. “Many from these clans laboured for the British North Borneo company in tin mines and plantations for tobacco and timber. Many worked as domestic servants for British colonists, as did my own grandmother.”

While the  United Kingdom was the focus of Wong's admonishment (or wrath) the mention of her grandmother again raises the issue of "most of the family(dying) during the war and (grandmother)  left alone to care for (Wong's)  father and his siblings in unspeakable circumstances

The experience of the Japanese invasion would have been hard on  Madam Shim Lai Fung, but that was the case for most people in the region.

They and their descendants recovered, rebuilt and relations with Japan are strong at every level. Former Malaysian Prime Minister Mahathir Mohamad's Look East Policy is a good example of how that relationship has developed. However, it must also be said that many Chinese in China and the region still harbour  resentment towards Japan. 

China has attempted to capitalise on that sentiment, and  Penny Wong's constant reminders of that period in South East Asian history sounds too much like China's anti-Japan propaganda. It does seem as if Wong is on a Chinese campaign against Japan.

Wong has demanded that the UK  confront its colonial past (on a false premise), and it also appears that she wants Japan to beg forgiveness for World War 2, to her, her family, and presumably other Chinese. In doing so it does appear as if she is trying to frustrate any attempt to bring Japan into AUKUS.

END 

Albanese has promised "a substantial update of Australia’s counter-terrorism laws" to counter "rightwing extremists", but has not done anything to counter the threat of the Muslim Brotherhood in Australia

 by Ganesh Sahathevan 

The Guardian reported: 

Anthony Albanese has flagged a substantial update of Australia’s counter-terrorism laws as he warned of the dangers posed by rightwing extremists and “so-called sovereign citizens”.

The prime minister said after a national cabinet meeting in Canberra on Friday that the “premeditated, calculated murder” of two police officers and a neighbour in rural Queensland in December showed the need for action to protect community safety.

He also expressed hopes of making progress by the middle of the year on implementing a national firearms register.

Meanwhile Albanese has not done anything about the far right Muslim Brotherhood., which is considered a terrorist threat in even Saudi Arabia. 

To Be Read With 

Even Saudi Arabia considers the Muslim Brotherhood a terrorist threat, but not the Australian Government - Australian Government designates The Base , but not the Muslim Brotherhood, vote chasing seems to have trumped intelligence yet again

 by Ganesh Sahathevan

                               Source: The Australian

The Arab Weekly reported in May 2020:


The Saudi ministry of education is pushing ahead with efforts to roll back Muslim Brotherhood influence in the country’s educational system.

The authorities recently decided to remove teachers who persist in teaching extremist and intolerant ideas which are inherited from the previous school curricula dominated by Muslim Brotherhood thinking.

Such ideas, they point out, run counter the current Saudi choice of cultural and religious values of openness and moderation.

The Brotherhood's leader Shiek Yusof Qaradawi and the Muslim Brotherhood are well represented in Australia. The Grand Mufti Of Australia Dr Abu Ibrahim has been reported to have links to Qaradawi (see story from The Australian above) and is a member of the International Union of Muslim Scholars, which Qaradawi led until vey recently.




The Brotherhood has a history of instigating and organising jihadi attacks. While the Australian Government has designated The Base, it has refused to designate the Muslim Brotherhood despite its history of close to a century of terrorist activity. It appears that the fear of losing the Muslim vote has again trumped intelligence (including intelligence in the public domain).

TO BE READ WITH 

Saturday, March 27, 2021

Ann Aly's reasons for wanting The Base designated a terrorist organisation apply equally to the Muslim Brotherhood-Meanwhile BASE members and all taxpayers are entitled to clarification about her tax payer funded charity PAVE's finances, and why it is of concern to persons in Malaysia

 by Ganesh Sahathevan 

Anne Aly believes the government needs to do more to protect 

Australia's security.(ABC News: Herlyn Kaur)
From Ann Aly, according to the ABC:"What we've seen is that The Base very much operates as a terrorist organisation in the way in which they recruit, in the way in which they communicate, the way in which they circumvent security."
It is surprising that "we've (not) seen that" the Muslim Brotherhood, which is active in Australia; is not also a terrorist organisation and that Aly and friends are not also demanding that the Muslim Brotherhood be banned. 
Meanwhile, Aly has yet to provide answers to these issues revealed in 2017, which concern he charity PAVE's financial management. The charity is funded by taxpayers.Neither has she explained why queries from this writer about PAVE were sent to a person or persons in Malaysia. 
TO BE READ WITH 

Labor MP Anne Aly Cannot Explain Where Money From Her Government Funded NGO Has Gone To 

by Ganesh Sahathevan 

April 9 2017 

Anne Azza Aly

Labor MP Anne Azza Aly is founding chairperson of People Against Violent Extremism (PAVE), a charity registered with the Australian Charities And Not For Profits Commission.

 As of November 2016 PAVE's statutory filing of financial statements for the year ended 30 June 2015  remained overdue.When this was made known to media in November last year by this writer,  she responded via an email demanding to know what this writer could do to help her meet her reporting obligations (I kid you not).

When the accounts were finally lodged, the accounts showed that some AUD 210,000 in government funding was explained away in just two items; "Other Expenses" and a "Surplus",which has presumably been retained by Ms Aly.

INCOME STATEMENT

For the Period 1 July 2014 to 30 June 2015 (if different provide range below)

to

Income/Receipts $ Government Grants 208,732 Donations and bequests 2,200 Other Income/Receipts 7,530 Total Income/Receipts 218,462 Expenses/Payments $ Employee expenses/payments 8,131 Grant and donations made by the registered entity for use in Australia 0 Grants and donations made by the registered entity for use outside Australia 0 Other expenses/payments 118,844 Total expenses/payments 126,975 Net surplus/deficit 91,487

No auditor would pass this set of accounts,yet the AG 's Department seems to have done precisely that,for  PAVE has reporting obligations to the Commonwealth AG. 

As for Aly, silence prevails on all matters raised, including her connections with Malaysia.

END 

INCOME STATEMENT

For the Period 1 July 2014 to 30 June 2015 (if different provide range below)

to

Income/Receipts $ Government Grants 208,732 Donations and bequests 2,200 Other Income/Receipts 7,530 Total Income/Receipts 218,462 Expenses/Payments $ Employee expenses/payments 8,131 Grant and donations made by the registered entity for use in Australia 0 Grants and donations made by the registered entity for use outside Australia 0 Other expenses/payments 118,844 Total expenses/payments 126,975 Net surplus/deficit 91,487 BALANCE SHEET EXTRACT Total assets 0 Total liabilities 0 Net Assets/Liabilities 0

2015 Financial Report

"Other" in accounting terms means miscellaneous and that is how Anne Aly MP explains spending the bulk of a government grant.

Other expenses/payments

118,844

The quantum of the next largest item is only $ 8,131. Consequently, more than 93% of outflows have not been identified.

The ultimate destination of the  surplus of $ 91487,or 42% of the total inflows  is also not  explained.

Therefore only 3.7 % of the total income of the charity (almost all of which is in the form of a  government  grant of about $210,000)  is accounted for.

Posted 9th April 2017 by Ganesh Sahathevan

 

Posted by Ganesh Sahathevan at 4:18 AM 

Posted by Ganesh Sahathevan at 9:25 PM