How small is small?

Spent almost hours sipping coffee at the IBC's cafe days ago. We were engaged in a rather undesired conversation pertaining to the Anwar's case, and the way he was taken away by the authority.

"Well, it is such a small issue", I said to Jumali.

"How small is your small?" Jumali smiled.

"Depending on who's asking..", was my reply.

"Meaning?"

"Meaning, if you are asking on behalf of the government, you may want to look at it in a rather 'criminal-case' manner, which is no big deal, too small a case."

"However, if you look at it in a more personal and political perspective, then it is an extremely big case!"

Wak Din came, and we stopped at once. We talked about Tasik Puteri instead.

retrospective

It took me almost an hour to get passed the road block (police) to Sepang last thursday. I managed to get to the hotel on time however and went straight to the seminar room - already packed with participants from the Ministry of Natural Resources & Environment. Met Zul there. Had a long discussion (argument?) with some heads of departments, and ended up with a consensus: top political leaders must do something with the current situation of Malaysian politics. Or is it?

debate

Last nite's debate - between Anwar Ibrahim and Shabery Cheek - was a 'so-s0' ones and it wasn't at all amusing the way it was expected to be. Shabery was just like what he was during his student days in MU (early 1980s); and last nite's platform was used in a rather 'college-debate' way of selling and arguing. Anwar, however, did better, in fact far more better (wiser and matured, because he did not go for character slaying) like what Shabery was doing last nite. Anwar stayed focused while Shabery strayed and seemed to be a bit emotional and shaky. The debate was good indeed, considering it was the first debate aired live by electronic media ever (there was once a forum organised by one tv station years ago featuring Allahyarham Dato' Fadhil Noor, and one government's representative, I think it was Tun Dr Mahathir (?) ). Good start. Congratulations Shabery, Anwar!

Intellectual tradition

I thought this would enlighten Rinie a bit on the issue she was raising recently, about the classification of knowledge - and subsequently the ranking of courses/universities. She was a bit upset with the perception shown by some university officials/& ministers (?) regarding current higher education state of reasoning: that some course are irrelevent and mismatched; thus the courses need to be reviewed.

Personally, I think this has got to do with the officials/ministers prior learning experiences. No doubt, they are knowledgeable, they got all the info needed - that they can utilise in meetings, seminars and even during parliamentary debates - apart from the newspapers and what not. Its just that they dont really understand the importance of history and philosophy. They may be good at something, and they are experts in their very own disciplines - the reason why they are called intelligentsia (distinguish this from 'intellectuals) - but the intelellectual traditition, the history, philosophy and classification of knowledge has long been ignored deliberately.

I thought Prof Osman Bakar's view on this is self-explained:

"The lowest of the philosophical sciences is natural sciences (al-'ilm al-tabi'i) because its subject-matter is comprised of terrestrial bodies, which posses the lowest rank in the hierarchy of beings."

In view of that, S.H. Nasr (in, Science & civilisation in Islam) puts it exceedingly well by saying,

"The link between intellect and reason is never broken, except in the individual ventures of a handful thinkers, among whom there are few that could properly be called scientists. The intellect remains the principle of reason; and the exercise of reason, if it is healthy and normal, should naturally lead to the intellect."

Till then, bye.

falling & raising

Dhani, this is my personal view.

The general conceptualisation of leadership as perceived by researchers and practitioners is that leadership is understood as a social influence process through which one individual exerts influence, intentionally, over others to structure the behaviours and relationships within a group or organisation. Some scholars described it as a dynamic process in a group whereby one individual influences the others to help achieve group tasks. In general, however, people believe that if matters involving leadership are closely observed, there are always three elements or variables emerge on the surface, i.e. (1) the leader qualities of character or personality; (2) the situation; and (3) the group or followers’ needs and values.

With that in mind, it is fairly interesting to see how Anwar Ibrahim deals with the political situations in Malaysia within the scope of current political culture.

In a way, Anwar shows that the greatest glory is not in never falling, but rising every time leaders fall.

And looking at a rather different angle, the current situation has also provided a very good lesson in knowing who are our true friends are, as Thomas Carlyle once said:

"Show me the man you honor, and I will know what kind of man you are, for it shows me what your ideal of manhood is, and what kind of a man you long to be."