Global News Journal
Beyond the World news headlines
Oz PM Rudd gets an “F” for language
As the U.S. Congress roils over use of the word “liar” against President Barack Obama, Australia is in uproar over the prime minister’s use of the F-word.
Prime Minister Kevin Rudd, once a diplomat, was this week forced to defend his “robust” language used against a group of unhappy junior lawmakers in his own centre-left Labor Party while slashing back their official pay entitlements.
“I don’t care what you f**kers think!” Rudd told the backbench group, which included three women, in a private conversation later leaked widely to newspapers.
Rudd, talking to reporters ahead of a meeting of G-20 group leaders in the United States, said he had only been making his point clear to members of his own union-based party.
“I think it’s fair to say that consistent with the traditions of the Australian Labor Party, we’re given to robust conversations,” he said. “I make no apology for either the content of my conversation or the robustness with which I expressed my views.”
Unlike in Washington, where standards of political behaviour are closely entwined with ideas of respect, Australia’s parliament functions with a rough-and-tumble unthinkable in the United States, but which can still raise eyebrows.
Former Labor prime minister Paul Keating, was notorious for the parliamentary vitriol he unleashed, famously describing the upper house Senate, now frustrating Rudd’s climate change agenda, as “unrepresentative swill”.
Back to the future in Malaysia with Anwar sodomy trial II
By Barani Krishnan
A decade ago, Malaysia’s former deputy prime minister Anwar Ibrahim was on trial for sodomy and corruption in a trial that exposed the seamy side of Malaysian justice and the anxieties of a young country grappling with a crushing financial crisis and civil unrest.
Anwar is Malaysia’s best known political figure, courted in the U.S. and Europe and probably the only man who can topple the government that has led this Southeast Asian country for the past 51 years.
Anwar vowed in a recent interview to fight what he says are trumped up charges.
The 14 months I spent covering the 1998 trials saw Anwar accused of sodomy with three men and having sex with a woman over a period of years. This case is simpler, there is just one accuser. All homosexual acts are illegal in this mainly Muslim country and sex outside marriage is illegal for Muslims.
The first trial was gruelling. Lines began as early as four in the morning as people tried to get into the court that could seat less than 200. Most of the spectators were ordinary people, but there was a sprinkling of dignitaries and businessmen who had known Anwar when he was in office.
There was a separate media queue and again a fight to get in line as dozens of reporters from local and international outlets jockeyed for space. Ringing the court were hundreds of riot police, backed by watercannon, waiting for trouble in a country where there were daily protests at the time, often involving tens of thousands of people.
All these political games could harm the image of Malaysia- one of the rare stable Muslim countries in the eyes of world community… However, if Mahathir Mohamad considered that Anwar should quit the “game” and the same is considered by Najib- then he must. No matter if he is gay or not. The main thing is to protect Malaysia.
Australia and its neighbours
With the Rudd Labor government now in power for just over a year, it’s worth looking what at has changed in the country’s foreign policy and its security implications for the region. Is the region, particularly Southeast Asia, ready for Australia’s new advances?
Howard’s pragmatism and ‘forward defence’ doctrine over the previous dozen years was unashamedly aimed at garnering an image of being a “considerable power and significant country” (Downer, 2006). Howard’s loyalty to the United States, no-matter-what, was also aimed at banking up some credit with Washington on the security front. Given the concerns of the time over terrorism (in particular the attack on Bali which killed dozens of Australians), one could argue his staunchly pro-American policy was well founded. Moreover, Downer was quite dismissive of past Labor policy on developing a closer relationship with its immediate neighbours. In 2006, he said of Labor: “In effect, they argue for a retreat to regionalism.”
Last week, Rudd spoke of Australia returning to this regionalism. He spoke of the “dawn of the Asia-Pacific century”, “regional engagement” and Australia’s interests in being pro-active about shaping the strategic environment in the Asia-Pacific. At the same time, the Sinologist Rudd is aware he must keep the China and India plates spinning, conscious of their strategic and financial importance to his commodity-driven economy.
I think the issue is not so much how politicians behave in private meetings but rather how they behave in Question Time where their grandstanding and cheap political and personal shots are at the expense of informed debate.