Thursday, September 18, 2008

If only BN ministers would dance in their underpants instead...

Last week an Australian minister was forced to resign because he drank one beer too many and had a wee bit too much fun at a staff party.

Accused of flirting with a female colleague and "dancing in his underpants to techno music on a green couch," New South Wales state minister Matt Brown lost his job only three days after he had been sworn in as the new minister for the police. At the time of the incident Brown was the state housing minister.

Now, this is probably one of the reasons why so many Malaysians are still thinking about migrating Down Under.


If a minister in Australia can be fired for something as harmless and trivial as indecorous public behavior, what more if he had been caught pocketing hundreds of millions in commissions and kickbacks? Or wasting public funds on useless and unnecessary megaprojects?

How about offering turnkey naval contracts worth nearly 25 billion ringgit to cronies who fail to deliver, and then flee the country, leaving their kid brothers to run as parliamentary candidates?

Or laundering ill-gotten gains in foreign countries and getting caught with suitcases stuffed full of cash?

What sort of penalty would an Australian minister face for raping and impregnating schoolgirls? Or for passing racial slurs, destroying places of worship, and causing deep resentment amongst minority groups? How about snuffing troublesome mistresses?

If Matt Brown had deliberately stoked racial tensions with malicious intent to precipitate street violence and sabotage a rival political party - would he have been locked away for 15 years... or offered a cushy diplomatic posting?

Can someone in BN enlighten me?