Monday, March 16, 2009
20 Bodyguards for Sivakumar
A Kadir Jasin

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THE PERAK’S State Assembly Speaker, V Sivakumar, told the Sin Chew Daily that he’s being guarded by up to 20 bodyguards whenever he's in public. The minimum is four.

That’s a lot of bodyguards for the DAP politician who told the Chinese paper that “frankly speaking, until now I have not received any phone threat…….”

I wonder if the DAP chairman Karpal Singh, who received to live bullets recently, is guarded by that many bodyguards. Maybe he is not even guarded.

I had seen him at airports all by himself except for his wife and and/or an assistant who helped pushed his wheelchair.

The DAP supremo, Lim Kit Siang, was not guarded when he came to have teh tarik at Raju where I regularly hang out with fellow "axed" editors.

I am not sure if Sivakumar is under real danger or he feels good being surrounded by bodyguards. It makes you feel very important and look very Hollywood/Bollywood where Presidents, mafia dons and gang leaders are surrounded by bodyguards.

I also wonder who pays the bodyguards – Sivakumar himself, the state government, the DAP, the Pakatan Rakyat or are they vigilantes who work for free?

But what I know from reading The Sun (which quoted the Sin Chew) is that Sivakumar has not received any offer to jump ship.

He’s not sure whether that because “they know I am one who subscribes to the principles of democracy or that they cannot reach me due to the tight security.”

Well, he can always find that one out by not having so many bodyguards or by asking them not to guard him too closely.

Meanwhile the Ipoh City Council had demolished a black marble plaque erected by Pakatan Rakyat to mark the controversial state assembly emergency sitting under the now famous raintree.

Perak Local Government Committee chairman Dr Mah Hang Soon said the marble slab structure contravened the Road, Drainage and Building Act 1974 as it was deemed an obstruction in a public area.

Where I came from (Kedah), the raintree is known as pokok pukul lima because at around five in the evening it folds its leaves. I guess that’s the way it conserve energy and allow rain and dew drops to pass through and reach the ground.

Being a legume it produces nitrogen, which is essential for plant growth. Unless trampled upon, the base of a raintree is always grassy and green.

The tree is also known as monkeypod, albizia saman, raintree, monkeypod, saman, zaman, zamang. Although it’s called monkeypod, I don’t think monkeys like its beans very much. But goats and cows love them.

Incidentally, the best example of raintree cultivation is also to be found in Perak, at the famous Taiping Lake Garden.

If Sivakumar has 20 bodyguards, The Sun reports that the Selangor Mentri Besar, Abdul Khalid Ibrahim, earns an income of RM46,000 a month comprising RM11,715 salary and RM35,507 allowances.

The Mentri Besar and executive councilors (exco) have made their asset declarations public via the Selangor government website, a step that, as a Selangor resident and voter, I applaud.

The second-highest earner is the investment, industries and commerce executive councillor Teresa Kok who earns more than RM32,000 in salary and allowances as state exco, Kinrara state assemblywoman and Seputeh MP.

She is paid RM6,109 as state exco and receives RM13,612 in allowances from the state government while her salary as parliamentarian is RM6,508 with allowances of RM6,600.
Most of the remaining excos earn an average of RM17,000 each.

Last month Sivakumar suspended the Perak Menteri Besar, Zambry Abdul Kadir, for 18 months and his exco members for 12. It seemed okay to a lot of people.

But today Malaysiakini quoted Karpal Singh as saying that the proposed motion to suspend his son, the Puchong MP, Gobind Singh, for a year was as derogatory step and a serious infringement of freedom of speech.

It seemed okay for DAP’s Sivakumar to ban a BN representative for 18 months, but Karpal cried foul and said "the Barisan Nasional should not be trigger-happy in tabling the motion."