Wednesday, July 2, 2008

Monty Python's Flying Circus ~ The Malaysian Adaptation!

I greatly enjoyed this ebullient essay published in Malaysiakini. For those of you who are too cheap to subscribe and therefore will not be able to access this little gem, I have reproduced it below in full (with sincere apologies to "V for Vernon" and Malaysiakini). Promise I won't do this sort of stuff too often! :-)...

SAD LOCAL ADAPTATION OF MONTY PYTHON'S FLYING CIRCUS

V for Vernon | Jul 2, 08 4:54pm

Dear Malaysians,

Once again we see the same lunatics trying to tar and feather Anwar Ibrahim with the most slanderous and demeaning allegations against his character. Mind you, these are the same clowns from ten years ago who tried to tell us that Anwar apparently sodomized his wife's driver in a bedroom of an apartment complex that wasn't built yet.


These are the same clowns that tried to lead us into believing that Anwar sodomized his wife's driver, when the driver himself admitted under oath three times in open court that Anwar did not sodomize him.

And here we are again, ten years later, and the circus is back in town trying to convince us that an almost six-footer of a 23-year-old man was forcibly sodomized by a relatively small-built 62-year old man with prior back surgery.

And this poor young man was apparently so severely sodomized that he has been rushed to hospital to have his anus probed for damage. Never mind the fact that this young man ‘disappeared’ for two days prior to the allegation and was in police custody.

But in all seriousness, if you believe this allegation against Anwar, then I have a submarine to sell to you (commissions thrown in, of course).

They say that prior to an earthquake, animals are often witnessed to be behaving strangely. So too with this allegation against Anwar. We should take heed of the behavior and related circumstances of some of our very own political animals.

This latest allegation against Anwar smacks of a poorly conceived last-minute strategy by a bunch of desperados. And Exhibit A in the list of desperados is actually a former dictator who now spends most of his time running around the country with his pants on fire.

Scandal after scandal has been surfacing about the misbehavior of this former dictator, starting with the infamous ‘Koreck Kronicles’ of a prominent lawyer who used to moonlight as a match-maker for corrupt judges and positions of power.

Closely following this was the recent bombshell of a disclosure by a present judge that this former dictator supposedly organized boot camps to demean and demoralize the nation's judges so that they may bow to the whims of him and his party apparatchik.

Around the same time, we have received reports from global financial experts that Malaysia has bled close to RM300 billion to corruption since the 1980s, a time period that unfortunately coincides with the two decades long rule of this former dictator.

And now, they say they want to have Petronas disclose their accounts to show where all the profits went - an outcome which may not be very favorable to a former dictator who is best known for trivial pursuits and expensive and dead-end crony-friendly mega projects, all at public expense, of course.

Exhibit B consists of two ringside clowns who were instrumental in the first inquisition circus against Anwar Ibrahim. One clown paraded into court on a unicycle while carrying a used mattress over his head, while the other clown built a case of sodomy around a star witness who denied he was ever sodomized.

Unfortunately, as with all things Umno, the clowns usually get promoted and they sit now in the corridors of power merrily honking their noses at the public. Furthermore, Malaysia Today editor Raja Petra Kamarudin has disclosed some very damaging information against one of these clowns and the possible affiliation with undesirables from the underworld, with signed affidavits to boot.

To date, neither clown has honked their noses in response to this serious allegation but are instead working double-time to not follow any useful leads or motive in the murder of some poor foreign girl who had some explosive connections with some very volatile people.

Exhibit C consists of a prominent high-level leader of Malaysia and her henpecked husband. This first-couple-in-waiting (or so they hope) now find themselves in a pickle with the recent Statutory Declaration filed in court by Raja Petra Kamarudin relating to some very explosive matters.


But I tell you what lah, we don't really need any Statutory Declaration to know that trained police bodyguards don't kill people randomly for no reason, that they also won't take orders from some civilian head of a think-thank, and that immigration entry records don't automatically vanish unless you have some clout in government.

Also, not to forget the the fact that C4 is not your grandfather's toothpaste that you can easily pick up at the local provisions shop.


Now all the characters in Exhibits A, B and C have much to lose from any change in government, and run a very good chance of being winners of extended-stay packages at Hotel & Resort Sungai Buloh, with at least one opportunity of a starring role in the resort's in-house adaptation of Murder She Wrote.

It is quite conceivable for the parties in Exhibits A, B, and C to come together as supporting roles for each other, especially considering that all of them are rotten branches that sprouted from the same diseased two-decades old tree.

The desperation of each individual party is the smoking-gun context around this latest slandering of Anwar Ibrahim, as well as the even more dire threat of an assassination attempt against him.

And all these events have coincided very nicely with the timing of the henpecked husband implying that he will be making a run for a top-notch political post in the very near future, on the behalf of his wife of course.

While the circus rolls into town, we are duly entertained by the clowns honking their noses, the first-couple-in-waiting (or so they hope) doing their political acrobatics over a bed of flaming coals, and the old ringmaster running around in circles with his pants on fire after trying to jump through a flaming hoop.

It is imperative we keep the spotlights trained on all these characters with maximum intensity and not get distracted by the concession stands trying to sell us 10-year old mee soto rebus.


As you know, concession stands always con you for the dough. So keep your eyes trained on the main act as the sad local adaptation of Monty Python's Flying Circus entertains us to their last hurrah.