Of Foreign Maids, DOE study, UMNO election and ACA

• The plan by the Terengganu state government to train single mothers as maids is commendable. The State Government needs to think about nationwide deployment of these single mothers and whether an average of RM400-500 per month is sufficient as salary. If these two are not acceptable, then the reliance on foreign maids would likely to increase further.
• In today's STAR, Deputy Minister of Natural Resources and Enviroment Datuk Maznah Mazlan said that at least 7 out of 184 rivers in the country were classified as highly polluted. Is this really a big surprise to anyone? Isn't it time to report something like "The Ministry is happy to announce that it has completed clean up operations of 15 of the most polluted rivers in the country. The ecotourism in those areas have been restored and are now generating almost RM1M a year thanks to local retail entrepreneurs and tour guides". Singapore has generated massive income form Boat Qui and other strategic river bank locations from ecotourism, retail and F&B. Perhaps Kuching's river side should also be a model or Charles river in Boston, MA.
• There's a strong contention for the post of Kota Tinggi UMNO Division Chief (incumbent is Datuk Seri Syed Hamid). Syed Hamid trails by 7 nominations behind his challenger Daeng Malek.
• Since ACA is now investigating Monsoon Cup and the crystal mosque in Terengganu, should it also investigate the sale of MV Augusta for Euro 1 (subsequently sold to both BMW and Harley Davidson for a combined Euro 160M). I wonder if ACA has enough funds and staffing to handle these big cases given the pressure from public to expedite these investigations.
  

MV Augusta

*The Star*

From chedet.com

M.V. Agusta

1. Proton bought this Italian motorcycle maker for 70 million Euro (about RM350 million).

2. Its savvy management sold it for 1 Euro (RM5) to an unknown company in Italy.

3. Some months ago Husqvarna, a division of M.V. Agusta which manufactures scrambler sporty off-road motorcycles was sold to a German company, BMW for 90 million Euro (RM450 million). Now the rest of M.V. Agusta has been bought by Harley-Davidson Motor Cycles of the United States for RM350 million.

4. So Proton lost approximately RM800 million selling M.V. Agusta for RM5. The buyer invested one Euro and made 160 million Euro.

5. Do we need a Royal Commission to look into this or should the ACA investigate this matter particularly the role of Credit Suisse who was paid a huge consultancy fee to advise Proton's management who executed it.

6. Or maybe we do not mind losing RM800 million because we have so much money.