British Society is Broken: Cameron's gang war 'long overdue'

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Cameron's gang war 'long overdue'

Source: AFP

For the communities and youth workers facing the daily horror of gang violence on England's streets, Prime Minister David Cameron's vow to tackle the problem following last week's riots is long overdue.

Cameron has declared "all-out war" on gangs, which he blamed for fuelling four nights of frenzied looting and said they were "a major criminal disease that has infected streets and estates across our country".

He has hired US "supercop" Bill Bratton to advise on tackling street gangs and has rolled out the use of court injunctions to stop gangs wearing colours of allegiance, congregating in certain places and using dangerous dogs as weapons.

Cameron also admitted that "social problems that have been festering for decades have exploded in our faces", and vowed to redouble efforts to tackle broken families, welfare dependence and educational failure.

But to those living and working with the problem, many question why it has taken so long for the government to notice -- during which time gangs are getting more and more violent, and their members younger and younger.

Sheldon Thomas, an ex-gang member who runs a mentoring programme in London, supports Cameron's assertion that British society is "broken".



"People like me have been saying this for decades," he said, adding: "People are angry, people are frustrated. There are no jobs, there is no aspiration."

He also accused Cameron of only acting on gangs now because shocking images of youths rampaging through relatively wealthy areas of London last week caused a national outcry, when successive governments failed to respond in the same way to up to 800 gang-related murders in the past decade.

"Are we now a nation that values materialism -- businesses and shops --more than the life of a 14-year-old kid who was chased down a road by several gang members who stabbed him 17 times for his BlackBerry?" he asked angrily.

Youth worker Patrick Regan, who has been advising Deputy Prime Minister Nick Clegg on the recent violence, agrees that the government has failed to address the issue, although he is more hopeful that ministers can help.



"People have been warning for years that something like this could happen. I'm hoping there will be a long-term view of things, that we won't paper over the cracks," he told AFP.

Regan, the chief executive of youth charity XLP, cautioned however against any simplistic definition of gangs, and also warned that it was unlikely that organised criminal groups were entirely responsible for last week's riots.

"It wasn't all young people, and some were just purely opportunistic. Young people who just got wrapped up in it, crowd dynamics took over," he said.

He said he had spoken to his local authority who reported that known gang members had actually stayed home during the riots, "because they knew if they went out they'd get targeted by police".

One of the main pieces of research on British gangs, a 2009 report by the respected Centre for Social Justice thinktank, found that 170 gangs operated in London, although Thomas puts the number at 260, with 15,000 individual members.

Another 170 operate in the Scottish city of Glasgow, where police and local authorities claim to have cut violent offending among gang members by almost 50 percent in two years through a targeted community initiative.

Community workers are calling for more resources for proven mentoring and intervention schemes, and the US supercop, Bratton, warned this weekend that a police crackdown alone would not solve Britain's gang problems.

"You can’t just arrest your way out of the problem. It’s going to require a lot of intervention and prevention strategies and techniques," he said.

Although in the past gangs used to be defined by ethnicity, most are now about territory -- the Pembury Boys take their name from the Pembury housing estate in Hackney, east London, for example -- and they often control drugs within that.

Although they range from criminal organisations to groups of disaffected teenagers, a recent government report found that people join them for protection, a sense of belonging and status as well as a way of making money.

Gavin McKenna, 21, was in a gang in Newham in east London before he turned his life around. Although he carried a knife and robbed people, he told AFP that he and his friends weren't an organised group, "we were just trying to survive".

He grew up with an abusive father who left when he was young, had little money and his gang represented both a way of earning cash and a substitute family -- a story that is played out over and over among Britain's gang members.

McKenna says he has little faith in the government's new drive against gangs.

"I think they're going to patch it over, like they always do," he said, adding: "They don't care about us."

-Sapa-AFP

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Three Ways to Think Big and Start Small

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From katerha via flickr

Taking the plunge into entrepreneurship is simultaneously exhilarating and paralyzing. If you’re like most entrepreneurs you’ve been living and breathing your business idea for what feels like forever, growing its potential in your head with each passing moment. And despite the anticipation and excitement, when the time comes for action, you feel stuck. Where do you even begin? How do you go about building an empire, changing an industry, or creating a legendary business?

The key to success for most entrepreneurs is learning to toggle back and forth between thinking big and moving things forward, which often requires taking small manageable steps. Here are three ways to make some progress.

1. Get in the Right Frame of Mind Entrepreneurship is a marathon not a sprint. It’s easy to succumb to the feeling of urgency to do everything now. But burnout and entrepreneurial fatigue can mean sabotage for your business as well as your personal life. Prioritize longevity and keep one eye on the horizon. Think about what pace you need to set now to maintain your stamina and enthusiasm for years to come.
   
   Establishing good habits and resisting bad ones go a long way to preventing burnout. I have several strategies for staying refreshed: setting and sticking to my work/life boundaries; making space for creative thinking time; and taking vacations. When I don’t practice these habits, I feel compromised and overwhelmed. When I do, I am optimistic, creative and energized.
   
   


2. Don’t Be Afraid to Experiment Think about the big questions that drive your business. What challenges are you trying to solve? What changes are you going to make to your industry? How will you know when you’ve succeeded? While these questions can help to keep the big picture in mind and your mission in focus, they don’t exactly inspire a neat step-by-process. And the truth is that there may be multiple, viable alternatives instead of one clear “right” answer.
   
   Instead of pre-determining a hypothetical outcome, get clarity by experimenting with various strategies. Experimentation will help you get more information, test the market, and build momentum for the big master plan. It will also help you get products into the marketplace faster and help you resist the inclination to be a perfectionist. For example you can test retail concepts with a pop-up store, improve products with focus groups, and test services with pilot participants. Consider the biggest question facing your business and what experiments might yield the necessary data.
   
   


3. Brush Up on Your History Lessons What businesses or entrepreneurs to you look to for inspiration. Its important to identify businesses you want to be like when you grow up. But remember, these entrepreneurial superheros had beginnings too. Do some research to find out their early days were like. Learn from their lessons and take note of their milestones and decisions points. Seeing their journey helps to demystify the process and makes your business heroes human. It’s helpful to know that all business heroes had doubts and doubters of their own.
   
   It’s also important to dismantle your own myths of the overnight success. For example, few people realize that Hanky Panky, the famed lingerie company, had already been in business for 27 years before they scored the front-page Wall Street Journal article that made them a household name. Instead of focusing on their impressive brand recognition or their significant market share, see what insight you can glean from Hanky Panky’s recent decision to build a robust e-commerce site after being exclusively wholesale or their recent introduction of several new product lines. What can your business learn from this example and the examples of the giants in your industry?

Keeping your focus on building long term momentum, establishing good habits and taking small steps can help build momentum that will take you closer to your business goals.

Courtesy of Y.E.C. 

Adelaide Lancaster is co-founder of In Good Company, a collaborative workspace for women business owners in NYC. In addition, she consults to small business owners helping them to create and grow businesses that meet their needs and goals. Adelaide regularly teaches, speaks, and writes on topics relating to women and entrepreneurshi

via Y.E.C.

Co-Founded by Natalie MacNeil and Scott Gerber, Y.E.C. Women is an initiative of the Young Entrepreneur Council (Y.E.C.), an invite-only nonprofit organization comprised of the country’s most promising young entrepreneurs. The Y.E.C promotes entrepreneurship as a solution to youth unemployment and underemployment and provides its members with access to tools, mentorship, and resources that support each stage of a business’s development and growth.

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Penang, It’s time for 'softly-softly' Koh to let go!

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It’s time for Koh to let go

Analysis By BARADAN KUPPUSAMY

Calls for Gerakan president Tan Sri Dr Koh Tsu Koon to step down from leading the Barisan Nasional charge in Penang is gaining momentum, putting the coalition at a political crossroad.

THE Hungry Ghost festival is in full swing in Penang but Tan Sri Dr Koh Tsu Koon, the former chief minister and current Gerakan president, is seeing more political ghosts than he could imagine.
Image via Wikipedia

He feels a puppet master is pulling the strings to force him out. He feels there's an agenda against him.

He blames the Opposition of wanting to dethrone him. If he listens hard enough or has the gall to admit it, the loudest calls are from his Barisan Nasional partners, from his Gerakan party and from the Penangites.

The calls are coming in stringent and unwavering, so much so that Dr Koh called a press conference in Kuala Lumpur on Friday to refute the charges.

He gave investment figures that “skyrocketed” under his watch as chief minister from 1990 to 2008.

He gave facts and figures of the projects undertaken during his tenure, the constructions that were done and the wave of investments.

But the fact remains that under his 18-year stewardship of Penang, the island's economy headed south and a new generation of Penangites could not find any use for a man who bent over backwards to please big brother Umno.

What counts is that Penangites rejected him so thoroughly like Sabahans did to Datuk Harris Salleh and his Berjaya Cabinet in 1985 and brought in the rule of Tan Sri Joseph Pairin Kitingan.

No matter how he wants to justify it or mitigate it, the fact remains that the voters of Penang have rejected him in totality.

After such a massive and thorough defeat, it is a wonder that only now, nearly four years on, that we hear rumblings for Dr Koh to step down as Gerakan president and as a federal minister.

The rumblings are coming from within Barisan Nasional and not from the Opposition, which is happy if Dr Koh stays so that it can continue to lampoon him for all the failures in Penang from uncollected rubbish to closure of foreign factories, which were household names, moving to China and the dramatic drop in foreign direct investment.

The verdict of 2008 shows Dr Koh, 62, has outlived his usefulness, so his critics charge. He is no longer relevant and has become a liability and a burden to Barisan Nasional.

Dr Koh is a man from the past, best suited for the world of academia. In fact, he was in academia as a deputy dean of education in Universiti Sains Malaysia but was persuaded to leave that cosy and comfortable job for the topsy-turvy world of politics.

Dr Koh was a big name in academia with a string of degrees and awards to his name.

And the Chinese value a man of learning like him. He was an ideal man for the times, his education, his intellectual rigour and his origins made him best suited to take over from Gerakan founder Tun Dr Lim Chong Eu as administrator of Penang.

Dr Koh was born in Penang in 1949 and attended Phor Tay Primary School and Chung Ling High School. He went on to graduate from Princeton University in 1970 with a degree in physics, and obtained his PhD from the University of Chicago in 1977 in economics and sociology of education.

He was a Fulbright scholar at Stanford University and made the transition to politics, first winning in the 1982 general election as a Gerakan Youth leader.

Eventually he climbed the ladder to become deputy president of Gerakan all in 15 years and under the tutelage of the plain-speaking Tun Dr Lim Keng Yaik.

After 18 years at the helm, years that some critics say he has nothing to show for he and his entire Gerakan team of Cabinet ministers were wiped out in the 2008 tsunami.

A new man is at the helm as the chief minister in DAP secretary-general Lim Guan Eng.

First Dr Koh is not doing what he should do fighting Pakatan Rakyat point for point in Penang and at the same time revive his own party's fortunes.

Neither is he combative nor has the leadership acumen to lead the state Barisan in its time of crisis.

The most telling thing said of Dr Koh came from his former boss Dr Lim who, in a recent interview, said Dr Koh had the intellectual capacity and integrity but was unable to match it with political decisions or to provide the crucial political leadership.

Dr Lim, who headed Gerakan for 27 years, believes that Gerakan has lost Penang for good.

Barisan Nasional has carried Dr Koh for some three decades and it is time to let him go.

What next for ‘softly-softly’ Koh?

COMMENT By JOCELINE TAN

Tan Sri Dr Koh Tsu Koon is trying to move his political base from Penang to Kuala Lumpur but the renewed pressure about his political future shows that he is still a liability for Gerakan in Penang.

GERAKAN members in Penang say Tan Sri Dr Koh Tsu Koon has sold the Tanjong Bungah house in Penang where he had lived for much of his 18 years as chief minister. He seldom goes back to Penang these days and seems set to make Kuala Lumpur his home.

The talk in his party is that he is preparing to make Kuala Lumpur his next political base too and that he is eyeing a parliamentary seat in the next general election. Some people call it running away; others say he is merely moving on. Anyway, Penang is no longer a tenable option for the Gerakan president. His party has been wiped out in the state that used to be synonymous with Gerakan and he is still being blamed for the catastrophe.

At the height of their political standing, party members were fond of saying that Penang is Gerakan and Gerakan is Penang. And now, without Penang, the party is floundering and Dr Koh’s shortcomings have become the DAP’s strength. He has not had an easy time since the 2008 general election. But the last one week has seen him come under renewed pressure to atone for the loss of Penang to Pakatan Rakyat.

Scathing remarks about him by Tan Sri Tan Kok Pin, a developer tycoon and Penang Chamber of Commerce president, resulted in calls for Dr Koh to step aside in Gerakan and give Barisan Nasional a chance to make a comeback. They claimed he is not helping his party or the coalition in Penang in accepting a Cabinet post via the Dewan Negara.

Several figures in his party have defended him and he held a press conference in Kuala Lumpur yesterday to refute some of the allegations. The circle around him imagine there is a conspiracy to bring him down and they use terms like “orchestrated” and “coordinated attacks”.

But, by and large, his party, especially in Penang, has been strangely tongue-tied about the criticism. The Penang Gerakan folks are aware of what people in the state think of the party and the former chief minister. They are disturbed that public sentiment has yet to shift in their favour three years after the political tsunami.

“I get a lot of that from members on the ground but I always ask them: I know you guys want a change in leadership, but tell me, change to who? They have no answer to that and neither do I,” said Gerakan Youth chief Lim Si Pin.

Party members, as Lim admitted, are resigned to accepting the situation till the next general election which will decide the fate of the party.

Dr Koh has shown little sign that he is about to exit the political stage now or in the near future. During the recent party’s state conventions, he asked members to give him two terms as president so that he can put things back on course.

Some were stunned because they felt that he should be thinking about a workable exit plan instead of trying to push for an extended term in office. Some had even wanted him to address the transition issue at the coming National Delegates Confer-ence but it looks like that is the last thing on his mind.

The trouble is that very few top leaders in Gerakan are in a position to ask Dr Koh to go because many of them had also lost in the election and are unwilling to make way.

There was empathy for Dr Koh immediately after March 8. He won respect for overseeing the peaceful transition of power to the new regime and was praised as a gentleman politician.

He could have gone with his head held high at that point. His sin was being unable to stand up to Umno but he had little personal baggage - he was seen as a relatively clean leader and he led a moderate private life.

But the goodwill quickly evaporated when he accepted a Cabinet post via the Senate. The public perception was that he had not taken responsibility for his party’s losses. He conceded the moral high ground by accepting the ministership and when MIC president G. Palanivel was appointed a minister recently, some blamed Dr Koh for setting the precedent.

The fact that he is making a fresh start elsewhere also irks those who are left trying to clear the mess in Penang. They feel that he is washing his hands of a problem that had and still has much to do with him.

Penang is where the party base is most extensive, yet he has relegated the party’s recovery in the state to Penang chairman Datuk Dr Teng Hock Nan who has been unable to inspire the troops.

“He should consider not running in the next general election. He would bring the whole party down with him if he does. He is a smart guy. He should be able to see that,” said a Penang Gerakan figure.

Even former party president Tun Dr Lim Keng Yaik has not been spared – he is being blamed for grooming Dr Koh.

He has privately told people in that blustery way of his: “Don’t think I don’t feel bad about what has happened to the party. I am very frustrated but there is nothing I can do.”

Chinese history is full of lessons in politics and Dr Koh should know that his intellectual and “softly-softly” style was suitable in peace-time politics. But it is a war zone out there these days and Gerakan needs a wartime leader – someone who can take the hits and hit out at the same time.

In private conversations, party members readily admit that he is not balancing his priorities between the party and his ministry. They feel that he should spend more time on party matters.

Instead, he seems more concerned about his ministry duties, to be seen with the Prime Minister and appearing in the media with him.

Dr Koh has been put on the defensive by renewed pressure for him to go. While it is true that the calls are coming from people without any real locus standi, the point is: There are not enough calls from his own party expressing confidence in his leadership.

It will be 30 years in politics for Dr Koh next year. That is a long time and that may be why people are wondering whether he still deserves to be up there.

Hungry Ghost Festival: How to avoid meeting ghosts? When the ghosts see red! Fascination for all things spooky

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How to avoid meeting ghosts

By BEH YUEN HUI newsdesk@thestar.com.my

KUALA LUMPUR: Cutting hair, shaving, going for outings and hanging clothes outside the house are among the things people should avoid doing at night throughout the Hungry Ghost Festival.

People should also avoid moving house and getting a new vehicle, as it is believed that the chances of bumping into ghosts are higher by doing all these.

“Keep away from the walls because ghosts love sticking to it,” said Master Szeto Fat-ching, a famous exorcist and feng shui guru from Hong Kong.

He said although ghosts are around during daytime, they are more active at night.

Thus, precautions have to be taken during the month-long festival beginning July 31 when the Hell Gate is open and the spirits are allowed to return to the human realm.

Master Szeto also said women are more prone to seeing ghosts than men.

Famous guru: Master Szeto talking as the guest deejay for 988 radio station in Kuala Lumpur recently.

According to the Yin and Yang philosophy, women belong to the Yin category the same as ghosts and so they are easier to “click” with each other.

“There's nothing to fear because the ghosts are more afraid of humans than we are of them.”

Dubbed the Ghost King of Macao, Master Szeto was invited here by Chinese radio station 988 as a guest deejay in a ghost-related programme in conjunction with the festival.

He also shared his stories and exchanged views with over 300 supernatural fans at an “up close and personal” session here on Wednesday.

Besides the above mentioned taboos, Master Szeto also warned the public to not take the offerings on the streets that were served to the “homeless spirits” or make fun of the belief.

Read more in Daily Chilli (www.dailychilli.com) about Master Szeto's encounter with a tree demon in Sabah, which left him confined to his bed for three months.

When the ghosts see red!

By CHRISTINA CHIN sgchris@thestar.com.my

Taoists believe that spirits are at their most powerful during the seventh lunar month.

IT'S Hungry Ghosts or Phor Thor festival now. The Chinese equivalent of Halloween, the festival is still very much alive in predominantly Chinese areas like Penang, and believers are now busy appeasing the spirits through ritual food offerings, burning of joss paper, and stage shows.

According to Taoist ghostbuster Ong Q Leng, spirits are at their most powerful during the seventh month of the Chinese calendar but those released from the gates of hell are not harmful.

“The harmful ones are the restless spirits that roam the earth freely throughout the year,” says Ong, who claims to have seen them all, from office hauntings to eerie bodily possessions.

The 34-year-old spiritual healer shares some advice with those low on luck during this festival.

Heavenly protection: Lai, possesed by Tua Pek, preparing a talisman for a family of devotees.

“Do not wear red this Hungry Ghost Festival. The spirits are drawn to red, so avoid anything red, including underwear. This is especially so if things have not been going smoothly for you these past few months.”

She also warns believers against going out past 9pm.

“Stay away from drugs and alcohol because it's easier for spirits to take over those who are intoxicated. If you are always alert, it's also difficult for people to cast a spell or charm you.”

Ong's caution may offer some “personal protection” against the unseen but hauntings are not limited to people.

The 65-storey Komtar tower in Penang which houses Chief Minister Lim Guan Eng's administration has its fair share of stories about ghostly apparitions. Staff members who experienced unnatural phenomenon on one of the higher floors recently called in an Ustaz to conduct prayers and sprinkle black pepper, apparently to “cleanse” the place.

Law firms seem to be a popular haunting ground in old George Town, with chilling tales ranging from smelling burning incense late at night to seeing an old woman roaming the corridors.

A 33-year-old senior partner in one firm shares: “A feng shui practitioner came to our office once and saw a child running around. In fact, we had an employee who suffered a miscarriage and it is thought that the baby's spirit followed her to work.”

Another lawyer, who also declined to be named, relates how a client saw “another lady” in the conference room when there were just two of them.

“My boss too has a gift' for seeing these things'. One day, he saw an old woman wandering along the corridor but she vanished as he approached her. I've heard that during the Japanese Occupation, soldiers were beheaded here.”

At a developer's firm not too far away, the office workers have come to terms with sharing their premises with “unseen friends”.

“There have been many unexplained incidents; the air-conditioner starts even after it has been switched off and radio channels change randomly. A monk hired to cleanse the place failed to drive away the spirits, claiming there were just too many to capture.Every year during the Hungry Ghost Festival, we make offerings to the spirits here,” one senior staff confides.

Even cars are not spared the spooks. Writer E. J. Loh, 46, recalls how a nee-kor (nun) who performed the funeral rites for her premature baby, sold her car, claiming that the child's spirit was “disturbing” her. The nun had driven the dead child in a casket to the crematorium.

Ong, who offers healing, spiritual cleansing, feng shui tips and general consultation to her clients, reckons that seven out of 10 cases she sees are caused by evil spirits or black magic. Her clients are from different races and religions, and include Germans, Australians, people from China and Hong Kong, and Singaporeans.

She says she has seen cases of clients experiencing extreme body aches, youngsters speaking in old voices, and those who cannot stop sobbing or whose eyes and tongues are rolled back as they stare blankly into space.

“Whether it's Thai kong tau or Chinese mao shan (black magic), it doesn't matter. I will try to help as long as the victim trusts me.”

Ong, who always appears confident, is the first to admit she is not always this brave. Growing up, she says, she used to be scared out of her wits by apparitions she saw, which led to her stuttering as a child. But by the time she was 11, she was so fed up of being frightened that she started “scolding the spirits and threatening them not to bother her”.

Four years ago, while working as a sales representative, it dawned on her that she could use her “gift” to help others.
 
Her most recent success was helping 73-year-old Zainab Sulaiman from Kelantan. The widow, who lives in a wooden house in Kampung Penambang Bunga Emas near Kota Baru with her daughter-in-law and two grandchildren, had been plagued with hundreds of mysterious fires which destroyed over 250 articles of clothing, mats, curtains, mattresses and many other things. Last month, Zainab made a trip to Penang to thank Ong.

For Ong, the more evil spirits she battles, the stronger and more alert she feels.

“I don't get tired although I sometimes work from early morning until past 3am.”

Temple medium Lai Seng Hee says the younger generation are not as sceptical about ghosts as you would imagine.

“The temple is always packed with devotees who include young Mercedes-driving professionals and businessmen,” he shares.

Lai, 47, goes into a trance at the Leong Hong Keong temple in Penang to assist Tua Pek (Grand Uncle) devotees to communicate with the deity.

The temple, which was established more than three decades ago, is dedicated to underworld deities - Tua Pek and Jee Pek (Second Uncle). Tua Pek - the Chief Inspector of Hades - always carries a fan while his assistant Jee Pek, carries a chain. Together, the brothers are known as Poh Tiao Pek.

Three nights a week, Lai goes into a trance until way past midnight. Devotees come from as far as Johor, Kuala Lumpur and Kedah with pleas to cure their illnesses, prolong the life of a sick loved one, or keep away evil spirits.

Lai's service was procured after the tragic and gruesome murder of three-year-old Ooi Ying Ying in 2007, a case that jolted the nation. Lai used a dried, wax-coated lime to communicate with the dead girl a method the former electrician learnt from a sifu (master) in Chiang Mai, Thailand.

The seance was filmed by a Hong Kong production company for a documentary.

Lai's expertise was also sought to help “collect” fragments of Ying Ying's soul and conduct rituals to appease her soul.

Lai says during the Hungry Ghost month, spirits of the ancestors will try to contact their living descendants.

“They don't mean any harm. They may have some requests or want to warn their families of some impending danger.”

Fascination for all things spooky

By CHRISTINA CHIN 

MALAYSIANS are a culturally diverse lot but one common thread is their fascination with the supernatural. Whether you are Chinese, Indian or Malay, stories of ghostly encounters are part and parcel of the Malaysian experience.

While our spooks look nothing like the Twilight films' vampire heartthrob Edward Cullen, the local spirits, ghosts and ghouls are, indeed, hauntingly real for some.

Weighing in on the subject of Malaysians' fascination with the supernatural, Universiti Sains Malaysia (USM) associate professor Dr Muhammad Azizan Sabjan from the School of Humanities (philosophy and civilisation section), explains that from an Islamic perspective, jinns do exist.

“The main difference between them and us is that they are invisible. Only those bestowed special skills or talent' by God can see them,” he explains.

“So, the belief in the existence of jinns in modern times is not superstitious but the way one conducts certain ceremonies to appease them, is,” he adds.

But ghosts have been unfairly blamed whenever something goes wrong, Xiao En Cultural Endowment chief executive officer Dr Ong Seng Huat (pic) opines.

Dr Ong, who is also a Taoist high priest and a visiting professor to China's National Overseas Chinese University (faculty of religious and cultural studies), says the supernatural is a convenient excuse and one that is widely accepted even today.

“For instance, mass hysteria happens when one loses coordination, consciousness of identity, feeling and body movement. You read about it happening in schools a lot lately. Is it the doing of a spirit or are pressure and stress really the culprits?

“People sympathise when you tell them that you are disturbed' by a ghost or someone has placed a hex on you; but admit to being mentally ill and you will be shunned. So mental illness is often passed off as a ghostly encounter,” he explains.

However, ghostly encounters are not to be dismissed, he says.

For the Chinese, there are ancient textbooks that list down symptoms of patients' ailments based on the type of ghosts they encountered.

“The old Chinese physicians were learned people who addressed all these problems. They didn't just blame it on the supernatural,” says Dr Ong.

In ancient China, he says, the ashes of paper talisman with Chinese writings actually had medicinal properties. The paper dispensed to patients who claimed to have been afflicted by ghosts was made from plants like ginger and bamboo leaves.

“And jossticks in the old days had aromatherapy benefits. These days, the talisman handed out may cause more harm than good. I don't even know what they are made of.”

Dr Ong says society's belief in the supernatural has its pros: “When you believe in the realm of the ghosts and gods, you will be more inclined to do good for fear of the repercussions.”

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UK Riots: Lessons to be learned; Role for US crime guru?

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Lessons to be learned

Comment by LOURDES CHARLES

The perceived police inaction during the riots in Britain has shone a light on our own cops' response to protests here.

ANY Malaysian watching the riots in London and other cities in England must have asked what were the British police doing? Why did they restrain themselves? So much so, that people around the globe were wondering how the hooligans were allowed to carry out such criminal acts of looting, robbery and assault.

In some scenes, the police were seen retreating and reports estimate that no fewer than 100 policemen were injured and at least five police dogs hurt by these thugs.

The authorities there did practically nothing, allowing the yobs and rioters to set fire to shops,  supermarkets and other business outlets, while others looted, assaulted and robbed passers-by.

No water cannons were used nor were there mass arrests made during the incident.

Only after four days did the police there act by deploying 16,000 personnel to patrol the streets in their bid to maintain law and order. They have arrested more than 1,000 people but not before three people were killed with losses amounting to millions of pounds.

These young criminals may have issues with unemployment and a sense of hopelessness in England where inflation, slow growth and budget cuts have hurt them but that is no excuse for their acts of violence.

Only the most diehard bleeding liberals would want to blame the system for the criminal acts of these opportunists.



Their targets, as we saw, were ironically the neighbourhood shops people they knew and small businesses that have provided jobs to the people.

To smash, loot and burn these shops is hard to comprehend.

One looter was even quoted as saying: “It's us versus them, the police and the system.”

“They call it looting and criminality. It's not that. There's a real hatred towards the system,” he said.

The British riots have generated a debate with the social media here comparing the police's handling of the looting and arson there and the Malaysian police's action over the Bersih 2.0 protest, where water cannons and tear-gas were used.

More than 1,000 people were arrested here amid allegations of police brutality. The roadblocks set up ahead of the rally also led to public complaints.

Some said it was unfair to link the British riots with Bersih 2.0, as there was no damage to public property in Kuala Lumpur. To make comparisons, the argument goes, would not be fair.

Police operations in any part of the world would always be subject to scrutiny, as civil society becomes a crucial part of a growing democracy.

From discussions on British TV, the sentiment is that the police did not want to be too robust in confronting the rioters for fear of being criticised, as has happened in the past.

Many were worried that their superiors would not back them if there was a public backlash. No policeman would want to risk losing his position and pension over such controversies. They have the power and authority but feared exercising them.

Civil lawsuits against the police by aggrieved parties, including burglars, are a norm there.

Even now London police are bracing themselves for another possible suit by some 5,000 demonstrators who took part during the G20 protests in April 2009 in the now infamous “kettling” case.

The demonstrators may sue Scotland Yard for false imprisonment as judges found that the mass detention (preventing them from nearing the summit area) for five hours was an unlawful deprivation of liberty under Article 5 of the European Convention on Human Rights.

Human rights are so stringent there that even a suspected burglar who was chased by a police dog and bitten is said to be suing the police. Never mind that the stolen loot was found on him and he was charged with burglary.

He is expected to be compensated with about 50,000 (RM245,000) for his injuries.

Some of us here would cry out that it is a case of excessive democracy and abuse of human rights. Demonstrators have their rights to protest but those who suffer losses have their rights, too. So it came as no surprise that the public in Britain is outraged at the response to the rioters.

Deputy Prime Minister Nick Clegg and London mayor Boris Johnson were filmed on television being scolded by the public for the slow action against the yobs, the British term for hooligans.

Most of us must have been outraged to see how the young criminals taunt the policemen while openly breaking into shops. We would have expected immediate arrests, not days after the looting.

There is also a lesson which the British policemen as well as the PDRM can learn from this episode. Social media was used extensively in the riots. Young people knew in advance where people could gather to make trouble via Twitter and Blackberry Messenger but the police were unaware of it.

They were so clueless that many wondered why the police did not show up in potentially explosive areas.

There seems to be a shift in public opinion since the recent anarchy following a series of seemingly peaceful protests which turned violent such as the G20 in April 2009 as well as the Nov 10, 2010 student fees protest where open clashes took place in the streets of central London. Now they want their police to be more assertive in carrying out their duties.

Even Prime Minister David Cameron has now told the police that they should adopt a more robust approach and has given them the green light to use water cannons and rubber bullets to quell the rioters.

The British incident serves as a lesson for us here. Preventive measures are good and though we sometimes criticise what is termed as highhanded action by the police, at least the cops here are doing a decent job in keeping law and order.

Britain's top cop slams UK role for US crime guru

LONDON (AP) - Tensions between Britain's government and police leaders flared Saturday over Prime Minister David Cameron's recruitment of a veteran American police commander to advise him on how to combat gangs and prevent a repeat of the past week's riots.

The criticism, led by Association of Chief Police Officers leader Sir Hugh Orde, underscored deep tensions between police and Cameron's coalition government over who was most to blame for the failure to stop the four-day rioting that raged in parts of London and other English cities until Wednesday.

Cameron criticized police tactics as too timid and announced he would seek policy guidance from William Bratton, former commander of police forces in Boston, New York and Los Angeles. British police have branded the move misguided and an insult to their professionalism.

"I am not sure I want to learn about gangs from an area of America that has 400 of them," Orde said of Los Angeles, which the 63-year-old Bratton oversaw until 2009.

"It seems to me, if you've got 400 gangs, then you're not being very effective. If you look at the style of policing in the states, and their levels of violence, they are fundamentally different from here," said Orde, a former commander of Northern Ireland's police and deputy commander of London's Metropolitan Police. Orde made his comments to the Independent on Sunday newspaper.

The riots row overshadowed a day of peace on England's streets and continued progress in processing more than 2,100 riot suspects arrested so far, mostly in London, in unprecedented round-the-clock court sessions.

In England's second-largest city of Birmingham, prosecutors charged two males with the murder of three men in a hit-and-run attack Wednesday, the deadliest event during the past week's urban mayhem.

Both males - identified as Joshua Donald, 26, and a 17-year-old whose name was withheld because of his juvenile status - were being arraigned Sunday at Birmingham Magistrates Court on three counts each of murder.

The breakthrough by a team of 70 detectives came less than four days after Haroon Jahan, 20, and brothers Shazad Ali, 30, and Abdul Musavir, 31, were mortally wounded when a car struck them at high speed. The trio had been part of a larger group standing guard in front of a row of Pakistani-owned shops.

The killings threatened to ignite clashes between the area's South Asian and black gangs, but the father of Haroon Jahan made a series of impressively composed public statements in the hours after his son's death pleading for forgiveness, racial harmony and no retaliation.

Hours before Saturday's murder charges were announced, the father, Tariq Jahan, told journalists at a Birmingham news conference he had received thousands of letters from well-wishers worldwide.

"I would like to thank the community, especially the young people, for listening to what I have to say and staying calm," said Jahan, 46, a delivery driver for an electronics chain.

Police in London were continuing to interrogate several suspects linked to the riots' two other killings: of a 26-year-old man shot to death in a car after a high-speed chase involving a rival group of men, and a 68-year-old loner who was beaten to death after arguing with rioters and trying to extinguish a fire they had set.

England's forces of law and order have been on the defensive over their slow initial response to riots that rapidly spread Aug. 6 from the north London district of Tottenham to several London flashpoints and, eventually, to Birmingham, Manchester, Nottingham and other cities with high gang activity.

But police leaders mounted a series of critical interviews Saturday underscoring their view that Cameron was jumping the gun by seeking foreign advice at a time when his debt-hit government was pressing ahead with plans to cut police budgets by 20 percent.

Leaders of the police unions in London and the northwest city of Manchester - which dealt relatively harshly with rioters and quelled trouble there in one night - stressed that Cameron needed to listen to their expertise first, rather than seek to apply lessons from America's better-armed, more aggressive approach to policing.

"America polices by force. We don't want to do that in this country," said Paul Deller of the Metropolitan Police Federation, which represents more than 30,000 officers in the British capital.

Deller, a 25-year Met officer, accused the government of not being serious about following Bratton's recipe for reducing crime.

"When Mr. Bratton was in New York and Los Angeles, the first thing he did was to increase the number of police on the street, whereas we've got a government that wants to do exactly the opposite," he said, warning that planned budget cuts would mean 2,000 officers lose their jobs in London and thousands more nationwide.

Ian Hanson, chairman of the federation's Manchester branch, said local officers knew better how to police their own communities than "someone who lives 5,000 miles away."

Results of an opinion poll published Sunday suggested stronger public support for the police than for Cameron's approach to the crisis.

The poll, commissioned jointly by British newspapers Sunday Mirror and the Independent on Sunday, found that 61 percent thought Cameron and his Cabinet colleagues were too slow to end their foreign summer holidays following last weekend's outbreak of violence. Cameron returned to London from his break in Italy's Tuscany region Tuesday, after almost all of the London rioting had passed.

And strong majorities backed greater support and resources for the police, calling for planned budget cuts to be put on hold. About 65 percent said British troops should be used to reinforce police in event of future riots, while even heavier majorities said police should be permitted to use water cannon and plastic bullets against rioters and impose curfews on unruly communities. All of those measures have been used to control street violence in the British territory of Northern Ireland but never in Britain itself.

The survey of 2,008 people, conducted Tuesday and Wednesday, had an error margin of 3 percentage points.

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