Tok Guru `Boleh Jalan Lah'!

No, this isn't my being contemptuous or insulting towards the world's most famous Tok Guru. Really;-)
"Tok Guru boleh jalan lah!" shouldn't¹ be interpreted as "Tok Guru can stuff it!". The Oxford English translation is: "Tok Guru gets a road-lah! Wow!"


Well, `lah' isn't recognised and approved by Oxford - yet. But if we Malaysians insist on using it, then maybe one day even the Queen of England (who is a regular reader of this blog) might start punctuating her sentences with `lah'!
¹shouldn't -- but then, who am I to stop you all from interpreting it as such. --- Korang tengok: sikit punya standard blog ni ye, siap ada footnotes:-)

Back to this Tok Guru matter: one of my pet hates is when well established names of places are changed. This is especially so when the new name is of a person, particularly of a living person. It doesn't matter which government is doing it: BN or Pakatan Rakyat - when you change the name for no real good reason, I get resentful and suspicious.

This renaming of Jalan Pengkalan Chepa in Kota Bharu to Jalan Tok Guru: WHY and WHAT THE HECK FOR?!

To add to this, Nik Abdul Aziz's coy and rather evasive response to the uproar that erupted from this totally unnecessary change raises a few disturbing questions about the Kelantan government and its long-serving Menteri Besar. Among them is the transformation of people who once were "fighting to propogate Islam"... to slick, nouveau rich, fat-cat politicians -- people who are now not much better than those they had replaced in 1990.

This is yet another embodiment of George Orwell's Animal Farm in the making, with one addition: the Kelantan version also manipulates Islam for its own benefit.

CAPTION: On the right in the picture - the category that was very visible during Bersih 2.0; the staple of PAS: Ladies and Gentlemen, may I present... the legendary Melayu Bingai  

The pompous and arbitrary move to rename roads in Kelantan - this road especially - is a demonstration of what PAS, the Kelantan government and its Menteri Besar have become. After 21 years in power, they are no longer the defenders of the oppressed... not by a long shot.

Most probably it wasn't Nik Aziz himself who had moved for the change: as usual, it's one of the many Kaki Bodek & Ampu in the local council or state government out to score points for himself by showing some slavish devotion to the state's Number One.

But Nik Aziz should have stepped in and killed off this toady's manoeuvring by saying "No, thank you." Instead, see how Nik Aziz tries to justify the rename: The New Straits Times reports that Nik Aziz said "the new name was chosen because he wanted to revive the role of the religious teachers or tok guru whose presence had been limited to their pondoks or religious schools."
Aww, now isn't that nice: Nik Aziz wants so badly to honour all religious teachers! But the problem is, in Kelantan and Malaysia, the name has become synonymous with... Nik Aziz. And he knows it too.

"If I had wanted to boost my image, I would have named the street as Jalan Nik Aziz or I could have named it for the road in front of my house, but I didn't"

No, he didn't... because that would have been too obvious, wouldn't it? But Jalan Tok Guru (Nik Aziz): with this one, Nik Aziz can have his cake and eat it too.