Lazy police and too many old farts

Hmmm... is it just me or is this election campaign period just a little bit boring and uneventful? I've got hardly anything new to blog about... well, almost hardly...

Here is junior spin doctor The Star making a big deal out of the police investigating DAP's Karpal Singh and Lim Guan Eng for Sedition because they called the police "lazy" and "good for nothing".

Two Opposition leaders found themselves in hot water for allegedly condemning the police during their talk in Air Itam here on Wednesday. A report was lodged against DAP chairman Karpal Singh and secretary-general Lim Guan Eng by a police officer after they allegedly called the police "lazy" and "good for nothing" among other things.

George Town OCPD Asst Comm Azam Abd Hamid said both of them would soon be called to give a statement over the matter. "We have classified the case under the Sedition Act 1948 as what was said during the talk had tainted the police force's good name," he said.

On top of that, the police had were free enough to catch someone tearing down BN posters.

In another incident, a man, in his 40s, was nabbed for pulling down the posters of Barisan Nasional candidates in various parts of Air Itam on Thursday.

ACP Azam said the man was caught in the act by a police team on patrol at 11pm, adding that he was released on police bail after his statement was taken.

On the other hand, the police seem to be doing fuck all about people tearing down Opposition posters.

Hundreds of posters of DAP sec-gen Lim Guan Eng were found torn down in the Air Putih state constituency in the past three days. - Malaysiakini

The opposition party members are alleging that BN is employing ‘hooligan tactics’ to gain an upper hand in the electoral race. Posters torn, supporters stopped. Two police reports lodged - Malaysiakini

At the end of the day, don't the police have better things to do than to waste precious time and police resources on petty name calling and vandalism? What about preventing crimes, catching crooks, finding lost little girls and apprehending murderers of Mongolian models?

Meanwhile PAS has alleged that the electoral roll includes 8,600 voters who are aged 100 and above, the oldest being 128!

According to the Election Commission, there are more than 8,600 registered voters that are aged 100 and above, and opposition PAS leaders fear that most of these voters would have died by now and others may vote in place of these dead voters.

Roslan Shahir, Secretary to PAS president, said, "To us, the existence of these registered voters is very questionable, the oldest we have is 128 years old." - ChannelNewsAsia

Just to illustrate how that statistic makes the Malaysian electoral roll look absolutely absurd (or the election commission absolutely incompetent and/or corrupt), read this:

The Guinness Book of Records currently lists 114-year-old Edna Parker of Shelbyville, Indiana, as holding the title [world's oldest person].

[On top of that, Isreali] Mariam Amash [claims] she was born 120 years ago - a claim, if confirmed, that would make her the oldest person in the world. - BBC

Chehhh... 114 and 120 only. They've got nothing on our 128 year old Malaysian. Also read this interesting bit of statistical trivia about the average population of centenarians overseas:

As of February 2005, there were 21 centenarians in Dominica with the oldest at the age of 107. The US has the highest number of centenarians about 55 000, followed by Japan with 25 000. Based on the population of all three countries, Dominica has 3 centenarians for every 10 000 of the population compared to about 2 centenarians for every 10 000 for the US and Japan. - TheDominican.net

If the electoral roll is correct (ie. uncorrupted)... 8,600 persons over 100 years old in Malaysia translates into 3.5 centenarians for every 10,000 Malaysians. That makes our ratio nearly double that of the US or Japan. And this is only counting the old farts who are registered voters. The ratio will be even higher if we include the unregistered old farts. Believe it, or not. NOT!