Tengku Adnan – “I love women” (choke)

(Updated)

Tengku Adnan exercises his right of reply here.

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Apologia from the Tourism Minister? Of course not.

This isn’t some courteous developed country. This is after all Malaysia; where a deputy Prime Minister can get a black eye from none other than the Inspector-General of Police: allegation-ridden head of the nation’s Anti-Corruption Agency doesn’t need to stand down during his own investigations; and municipal council officers drag people from their workplace to the police station over a (non-existent) parking ticket

Let’s recap the past 7 days:-

March 8
International Women’s Day.
Tourism Minister was reported by Sin Chew to have said, among many things (including racist taunts), that 80% of bloggers are unemployed women; that all bloggers cheat, lie and aren’t for national unity.
He added that he may lose some female voters but did not retract his statement or indicate that he was just joking.

March 12
The Tourism Minister, when asked by Associated Press, was quoted as saying “I have nothing to say right now.”

March 15
Malaysiakini (BM section) quoted the Tourism Minister as saying, “Saya sayang wanita…saya lahir dari emak saya dan kawasan Parlimen saya majoritinya wanita” (Translation: I love women … I was born of my mother and in my Parliamentary constituency, the majority are women.)
Rockybru quoted him as saying, “I am here because of women.”

First up:- That “I love women…” bit, made my skin crawl. That’s super creepy. In other countries, one would lose votes for being such a slimy creep.

The scent of an apology which had threatened to follow the Minister’s disproportionate sappiness, (almost moving this evening’s mee rebus from my stomach to the floor) … never came.

Instead Tengku Adnan went on to heap blame on Nila Tanzil, instead of taking responsibility for his previous outburst and his Ministry’s foibles.

For crying out loud – the poor girl is still in mourning. Don’t you even have a well-mannered bone in your body? Or does this make you all tingly and giddy, attacking a distraught young woman?

Worse still, the Minister was caught by Malaysiakini telling a big fat lie, “Saya tidak marah kepadanya, itu hanya pendapat beliau.” (I’m not angry with her, only her opinion)

Over an opinion in a blog, the Malaysian Tourism Board in Jakarta raised a ruckus about Nila with her TV station, until she was dropped? A tad vengeful, aren’t we? Angry, right?

Her complaints were legit enough to move EIC of The Star, Wong Chun Wai, to dedicate a column to them.

Instead of studying them and rectifying the mistakes, they go all out to vilify and discredit her, while asking Malaysians to ‘smile more to tourists.

A young female journalist lists out what’s wrong and should be corrected to make Visit Malaysia Year 2007 a success. She gets punished.

A Minister calls women who get on the internet – liars, cheats, unemployed, unpatriotic etc. etc. – and he gets to keep his job?

What does this really say about the state of this country and the people who run it?

If Tengku Adnan is here “because of women”, here’s hoping he won’t be ‘there’ in Putrajaya come the next General Elections – “because of women”.

Because it’s really too late for apologies now.