Hatchet Harry's girlfriend

At last, we finally come to know who "Hatchet" Harry's girlfriend really is. Unlike Harry Stonecipher, Debra Peabody, a pretty brunette of 48 and a vice-president in Boeing, is allowed to keep her job. She has been with Boeing for the past 25 years starting as an engineer and working her way up the corporate ladder. Those who have been "hatcheted" by old Harry must be rubbing their hands with glee at the dismissal of the CEO under ignominious circumstances.

Forbes Top Twenty World's Richest ..........

HK billionaire richest Chinese is worth USD13 billion: Forbes magazine
www.chinaview.cn 2005-03-11 14:00:26

The ranking of the world's 20 richest people as estimated by Forbes magazine. Listings include rank, name, home country or state, age where known, wealth in billions of dollars and source of the money.

1. William Gates III, Washington, 49, $46.5, Microsoft
2. Warren Buffett, Nebraska, 74, $44, Berkshire Hathaway
3. Lakshmi Mittal, India, 54, $25, steel
4. Carlos Slim Helu, Mexico, 65, $23.8, telecom
5. Prince Alwaleed Bin Talal Alsaud, Saudi Arabia, 48, $23.7, investments
6. Ingvar Kamprad, Sweden, 78, $23, Ikea
7. Paul Allen, Washington, 52, $21, Microsoft, investments
8. Karl Albrecht, Germany, 85, $18.5, supermarkets
9. Lawrence Ellison, California, 60, $18.4, Oracle
10. S. Robson Walton, Arkansas, 61, $18.3, Wal-Mart
11. Jim Walton, Arkansas, 57, $18.2, Wal-Mart
12. John Walton, Arkansas, 59, $18.2, Wal-Mart
13. Alice Walton, Texas, 56, $18, Wal-Mart
14. Helen Walton, Arkansas, 85, $18, Wal-Mart
15. Kenneth Thomson and family, Canada, 81, $17.9, publishing
16. Liliane Bettencourt, France, 82, $17.2, L'Oreal
17. Bernard Arnault, France, 56, $17, LVMH
18. Michael Dell, Texas, 40, $16, Dell
19. Sheldon Adelson, Nevada, 71, $15.6, casinos, hotels
20. Theo Albrecht, Germany, 83, $15.5, supermarkets

Russia to supply arms to Malaysia ...

13:36 2002-04-10

Vasily Bubnov of Pravda wrote:-

Russian weapon producers achieved success, probably not a great success, but a success all the same. DSA-2002, an exhibition of defense systems, is being held in Malaysia now. During the exhibition, Malaysian Defense Ministry and Russia-s concern Rosoboronexport signed a contract for the delivery of IGLA portable anti-aircraft missile systems to Malaysia.

Experts say that the Russian air defense systems were the main focus of the exhibition. The Sept.11 terror attacks were the cause of the increasing interest in air defense systems. Indeed, not a single country in the world is secured against terrorism from the air. Air defense systems are out-of-date in many countries of the world. For example, the Malaysian army still uses outdated Rapier air defense complexes and US-made Stingers. Therefore, Russian officials aiming at the promotion of Russia-made air defense complexes abroad can be optimistic.

At the same time, no positive comments can be said about other Russia-made weapons to be exported as well. PRAVDA.Ru has already reported that Russian figher planes are the most promising in this respect. Unfortunately, as of today, all tenders with Russia-s participation have brought no results for our country. It is perfectly clear, that such tenders mostly depend upon the politics. At the same time, economic motives still exist.

The matter is that figher planes, unlike portable anti-aircraft missile systems, require permanent technical maintenance, a regular supply of spare parts, etc. However, when it comes to service maintenance, Russian defense establishments face great problems. In addition, the fighters offered to foreign customers (Su-35 or Su-37) are not yet in large-scale production in Russia. This becomes another explanation for the failures of tenders, as it is really difficult to persuade clients of regular supplies at the very time when no large-scale production has in fact been launched.

Now, the Russian defense industry has a very complex task to solve. They have to start large-scale production using up-to-date techniques and improve the quality of the service, and this is against the background of insufficient financing. It is really a very hard task, but it is to be solved to retain the markets for weapons sales that had been originally developed.

Bank Negara - International Forex Reseves(IFR)

In its latest report, Bank Negara Malaysia (BNM) said that its IFR as at 28/02/2005 is RM 272.9 billion or equivalent to 8.6 months of import as compared to its position on 15/02/2005 which was RM 269.6 billion or equivalent to 8.5 months of import. If BNM accumulates say RM 3.0 billion every 2 weeks, then to reach RM 380.0 (USD 100.0) billion, it would take BNM about 4.5 months if the increase is at about the same rate. This will be about July 2005 which , I speculate, would be when the RM will depegged or revalued or floated.

The IFR is actually not much if compared to South Korea with its more than USD 200 billion and Singapore with USD 150-200 billion. The other top IFR nations are Japan(USD 900 billion), China USD 400 billion, Taiwan USD 250-300 billion and Hong Kong (?).

Hollywood, you always get it wrong ...

You would have thought that, in the US, the people there are a bunch of hedonists, that they lack moral fibre, and are jaded when it comes to matters of sex between consenting adults. We are being led to believe by Hollywood's portrayal of the corporate bosses and their dilettantes with their secretaries and which we accept as the American way of life. In real life, however, there is no such thing. The corporate boss, the person that wields almost unlimited power in the organisation, has actually not as much freedom as his underlings.

In a recent case of discipline, the President and Chief Executive of no less a prestigious and internationally well- known company as Boeing Inc. was forced out of office , barely 15 months in his job. The reason was because of a consensual affair with a female executive of Boeing which is in violation of the company's strict code of conduct. The discovery by a Boeing worker of intimate correspondence between the two that led to it being reported and subsequently investigated by the company's Chairman resulted in the the Chairman and the Board of Boeing to see it fit to force Harry Stonecipher out of office for being in a position that " reflected badly on his judgment and his ability to lead the company".

Prior to this, before Stonecipher was made the Group CEO, Boeing Inc. was rocked by a scandal that caused the dismissal and eventual jail sentence of its 2 corporate executives - a procurement officer and a chief financial executive.

The situation is far cry from the scene in a Robocop sequel during which an ambitious female executive was wining in a jacuzzi with the group CEO in all their naked glory in front of a fully suited No2 man in the company. So much for Hollywood nonsense.

Tit for tat ..

Having been bashed by the news media, especially by Utusan Malaysia, and by the Prime Minister himself, over the environmental degradation of Bukit Cerakah, in Shah Alam, the state govt. of Selangor is vindictively doing a tit-for-tat on the federal govt. by refusing to approve a landfill project in the state unless proper procedures have been complied with.

The landfill project at Bukit Tagar in Hulu Langat was privatised to contractor KUB-Berjaya Enviro Sdn Bhd, to build and operate, by the Housing and Local Govt. Ministery. The Ministery thought that only their approval was required for the project to commence on April Fool's Day 2005. Not so claimed the state govt. which will not allow the operation of the landfill. If the contractor went ahead with the project, it would be considered as carrying out works illegally. For one of the most important condition left unfulfilled was the status of the 260-hectare land. It is now agricultural land. To be legal, the land has to be converted or "rezoned" by the state govt.'s department specifically the Land Office from the status of "agricultral" land to that of "industrial - landfill" land for which change in status a premium and other levies have to be paid to the state via the Land Office.

Land matters in any state have always been handled by the relevant state govt. unless the land is in federal territory. Either someone forgot or did not bother with the application for conversion, the state govt. is insistent on this very fundamental condition of land usage. The project cannot start on April 1st and will only be commencable once application and approval by the state cabinet is obtained, a process that may take months to complete.

To me, this is a good thing for the country. It shows that the federal govt. cannot simply run roughshod over the state govt. nor the state govt. can do things as it likes without the people's or the federal govt's knowledge. The fiasco over Bukit Cerakah turned out to be a blessing in disguise. At last, the authorities are doing their job and are serious about it and are sensitive to the environment. I daresay that if the Cerakah "incident" did not become public knowledge, then the landfill project at Bukit Tagar would continue and operate illegally without anyone being the wiser.

Abdullah Badawi is going to get tough ...

Its nice to read in the news that, finally, Abdullah Badawi, is not going to be the Mr."Nice Guy" that he's been labelled with. In a strong speech delivered to the backbenchers and ministers, he said that he's going to make good the election promises made by the Barisan Nasional government. He's fed up with the attitude of ministers, the members of local and federal parliaments for taking it easy after the general election (which BN resoundingly won) a year ago.

The "honeymoon" is over. He's going to crack the whip, he's going to take tough action on whomsoever neglect their duties or are guilty of wrong doing. We have not seen the tough side of the Prime Minister yet. All we have been seeing so far was his forever smiling face. Those who are at fault are probably squirming in their shoes now. The PM now couldn't care less whether the person is a minister or not, or is a loyal party member. He wants to see things done, and done efficiently and with results. Those who fail are bound to be sacked. He now means business.

A recent example is the chief minister of Selangor who is responsible for the environmental degradation of land in the vicinity of Shah Alam. There will be many more necks to be wrung if not heads to roll. What the PM is going to do in the next four years will be good for the country, will bring back the people's confidence in him, will instil the people's trust in the elected representatives. If not BN will not get the two-third majority, or worse will not be returned to govern the country.

The Indonesian Navy

When it comes to showing off their naval hardware, the Indonesian Navy seems to be quick at it. In a dispute with Malaysia over overlapping oil concession areas, the Indonesian Navy, in a show of strength, deployed 3 Indonesian warships to the Sulawesi Sea in order to protect its territory from ostensible encroachment by Malaysian oil prospectors. Its tragically laughable that for 3 to 4 days from the morning of 26th Dec 2004, the Indonesian Navy did not send a single ship nor even a patrol boat to help the people of Acheh. Days after the American carrier, USS Abraham Lincoln, had been off the coast of Acheh only then did we see on TV a couple of what looked like makeshift ships from the Indonesian Navy. Not only that, there was not even an aircraft from the Indonesian Navy or Air Force, to fly over the disaster areas on the first day the tsunami struck.

In a situation when they were needed most, the commanders, apparently, did not know to do. I can imagine that in the confusion and the panic among the "well-trained" Military Command, it never occurred to any of them to send a helicopter or even a jet plane to fly over Acheh and report back to HQ.

Now, of course, when it comes to confrontation with its neighbours especially Malaysia, Indonesia wants to show who's boss. Indonesia has an axe to grind on Malaysia's treatment of its citizens who have been expelled from Malaysia for illegal entry.