Can PM Yingluck Win Over A Foreign Audience?

[BookMan]

Give her a chance, she has been thrown to the wolves in the past 9 months, an almost impossible task. The amount of character asassination has been appaling and the pressure would crush anybody. Just give her a chance.

As prime minister I would expect her to be at a higher level of competence than she displays. Of course, having said that, look at some of the public gaffes US president Reagan and Bush junior made. And that from the world's most powerful country. I guess everyone can display some absurd moments.

[Unkomoncents]

Give her a chance, she has been thrown to the wolves in the past 9 months, an almost impossible task. The amount of character asassination has been appaling and the pressure would crush anybody. Just give her a chance.

As prime minister I would expect her to be at a higher level of competence than she displays. Of course, having said that, look at some of the public gaffes US president Reagan and Bush junior made. And that from the world's most powerful country. I guess everyone can display some absurd moments.

It's not just what they say, it's what they do. And you're right. We (everyone in the world) are all paying for Reagan's market "liberalizations" (especially in the banking sector).

[blazes]

[Answering blazes, quote won't work]

Money gets you in, of course, but what gets you the degree?

If you speak perfect English, you can write perfect English, as long as you know how to spell, so your second point is nonsensical.

If pidgin English is tolerated, why is it tolerated? Is that about money too? In other words, would failing students because of poor English be unacceptable as it would lead to fewer foreign students coming to the USA to study and therefore less income for American academe? Is money lust the cause of American universities looking so inadequate when you encounter their alumni's poor English? If not, what?

I don't know which of your many gun-splatter points need answering first.

Perhaps the most egregious non-sequitur I have ever read on this site is your assertion that "if you can speak perfect English, you can write perfect English (providing you can spell well)". Since I don't want to bore other people with what is essentially becoming a private conversation, I have to content myself with asserting as a truth, gathered over forty years, that good writing is not a necessary corollary of good speaking.

Your other stuff about why things are tolerated needs a whole book, since it involves accounting for why standards have gradually been lowered and lowered throughout the last forty years or so...inflation in grades has been almost as noticeable as in the wider economy. One reason for the lowering is that there is, throughout the university world, (in Britain and N America...I am a Brit and know both systems well) a kind of silent pressure on faculty to "let students through", whether they are Chinese who cannot write but can speak and read the language or whether they are native students who can't string two sentences together coherently.

Finally, what is surprising is that Yingluck's wealth was not used to buy her a genuine education, which might have included learning English, and which surely could have bought her a better place to study than Kentucky. I have no answer to that, but it is at least possible that her family considered her education to be irrelevant since she is a woman. Which brings us back to what she is saying, perfectly coherently, in Davos...that women in Thailand are second-class citizens in one of the most chauvinist countries on earth.

[Thai at Heart]

[Answering blazes, quote won't work]

Money gets you in, of course, but what gets you the degree?

If you speak perfect English, you can write perfect English, as long as you know how to spell, so your second point is nonsensical.

If pidgin English is tolerated, why is it tolerated? Is that about money too? In other words, would failing students because of poor English be unacceptable as it would lead to fewer foreign students coming to the USA to study and therefore less income for American academe? Is money lust the cause of American universities looking so inadequate when you encounter their alumni's poor English? If not, what?

I don't know which of your many gun-splatter points need answering first.

Perhaps the most egregious non-sequitur I have ever read on this site is your assertion that "if you can speak perfect English, you can write perfect English (providing you can spell well)". Since I don't want to bore other people with what is essentially becoming a private conversation, I have to content myself with asserting as a truth, gathered over forty years, that good writing is not a necessary corollary of good speaking.

Your other stuff about why things are tolerated needs a whole book, since it involves accounting for why standards have gradually been lowered and lowered throughout the last forty years or so...inflation in grades has been almost as noticeable as in the wider economy. One reason for the lowering is that there is, throughout the university world, (in Britain and N America...I am a Brit and know both systems well) a kind of silent pressure on faculty to "let students through", whether they are Chinese who cannot write but can speak and read the language or whether they are native students who can't string two sentences together coherently.

Finally, what is surprising is that Yingluck's wealth was not used to buy her a genuine education, which might have included learning English, and which surely could have bought her a better place to study than Kentucky. I have no answer to that, but it is at least possible that her family considered her education to be irrelevant since she is a woman. Which brings us back to what she is saying, perfectly coherently, in Davos...that women in Thailand are second-class citizens in one of the most chauvinist countries on earth.

I think you may find, that this is one of the bugbears between the "old" and "new" money in Thailand. One one side you have Eton, Rugby, Winchester, Dulwich and Cheltenham Ladies, Oxford and Cambridge and on the other you have Chiangmai and Kentucky State.

[Buchholz]

[Answering blazes, quote won't work]

Money gets you in, of course, but what gets you the degree?

If you speak perfect English, you can write perfect English, as long as you know how to spell, so your second point is nonsensical.

If pidgin English is tolerated, why is it tolerated? Is that about money too? In other words, would failing students because of poor English be unacceptable as it would lead to fewer foreign students coming to the USA to study and therefore less income for American academe? Is money lust the cause of American universities looking so inadequate when you encounter their alumni's poor English? If not, what?

I don't know which of your many gun-splatter points need answering first.

Perhaps the most egregious non-sequitur I have ever read on this site is your assertion that "if you can speak perfect English, you can write perfect English (providing you can spell well)". Since I don't want to bore other people with what is essentially becoming a private conversation, I have to content myself with asserting as a truth, gathered over forty years, that good writing is not a necessary corollary of good speaking.

Your other stuff about why things are tolerated needs a whole book, since it involves accounting for why standards have gradually been lowered and lowered throughout the last forty years or so...inflation in grades has been almost as noticeable as in the wider economy. One reason for the lowering is that there is, throughout the university world, (in Britain and N America...I am a Brit and know both systems well) a kind of silent pressure on faculty to "let students through", whether they are Chinese who cannot write but can speak and read the language or whether they are native students who can't string two sentences together coherently.

Finally, what is surprising is that Yingluck's wealth was not used to buy her a genuine education, which might have included learning English, and which surely could have bought her a better place to study than Kentucky. I have no answer to that, but it is at least possible that her family considered her education to be irrelevant since she is a woman. Which brings us back to what she is saying, perfectly coherently, in Davos...that women in Thailand are second-class citizens in one of the most chauvinist countries on earth.

Which conflicts in some areas with :

Research by business consultant Grant Thornton revealed earlier this year that Thailand boasts the greatest percentage of women in senior management of any country in the world, 45 percent compared with a global average of 20 percent.

http://www.news.com....r-1226017109168

There's also more Thai women enrolled in tertiary education than Thai men.

An additional concern for Yingluck is how she is seen by other women:

First Thai female leader no victory for feminism

http://www.manilatim...y-for-feminism1

In regards to the decline in North American universities over the past 40 years, it's a shame that North American professors involved over that time have been unable to take a stand and change that and seem to readily accept its ever-worsening status by caving in to silent pressures.

.

Edited March 20, 2012 by Buchholz

[bigbamboo]

[Answering blazes, quote won't work]

Money gets you in, of course, but what gets you the degree?

If you speak perfect English, you can write perfect English, as long as you know how to spell, so your second point is nonsensical.

If pidgin English is tolerated, why is it tolerated? Is that about money too? In other words, would failing students because of poor English be unacceptable as it would lead to fewer foreign students coming to the USA to study and therefore less income for American academe? Is money lust the cause of American universities looking so inadequate when you encounter their alumni's poor English? If not, what?

I don't know which of your many gun-splatter points need answering first.

Perhaps the most egregious non-sequitur I have ever read on this site is your assertion that "if you can speak perfect English, you can write perfect English (providing you can spell well)". Since I don't want to bore other people with what is essentially becoming a private conversation, I have to content myself with asserting as a truth, gathered over forty years, that good writing is not a necessary corollary of good speaking.

Your other stuff about why things are tolerated needs a whole book, since it involves accounting for why standards have gradually been lowered and lowered throughout the last forty years or so...inflation in grades has been almost as noticeable as in the wider economy. One reason for the lowering is that there is, throughout the university world, (in Britain and N America...I am a Brit and know both systems well) a kind of silent pressure on faculty to "let students through", whether they are Chinese who cannot write but can speak and read the language or whether they are native students who can't string two sentences together coherently.

Finally, what is surprising is that Yingluck's wealth was not used to buy her a genuine education, which might have included learning English, and which surely could have bought her a better place to study than Kentucky. I have no answer to that, but it is at least possible that her family considered her education to be irrelevant since she is a woman. Which brings us back to what she is saying, perfectly coherently, in Davos...that women in Thailand are second-class citizens in one of the most chauvinist countries on earth.

I think you may find, that this is one of the bugbears between the "old" and "new" money in Thailand. One one side you have Eton, Rugby, Winchester, Dulwich and Cheltenham Ladies, Oxford and Cambridge and on the other you have Chiangmai and Kentucky State.

As an Old Alleynian thank you for the first mention in my memory of my old school on TV!

As to Yingluck, it could be argued that, as ever, that she did her best and was brave enough to get up on stage when clearly she was going to be found wanting. Some might say she was simply naive to do so. The fact remains that this is a woman who was president of one Thailand largest corporations and in normal circumstances even an applicant looking to work in a much less senior position would be required to have at least a 'working knowledge of written and spoken English' if not fluency.

I am assuming of course that with her previous and current jobs she was selected on merit.

Edited March 20, 2012 by bigbamboo

[Buchholz]

The fact remains that this is a woman who was president of one Thailand largest corporations and in normal circumstances even an applicant looking to work in a much less senior position would be required to have at least a 'working knowledge of written and spoken English' if not fluency.

Actually, she was in a position that didn't exist until she invented it on her own and one which was dumped once she was no longer connected to her brother's company as its biggest shareholder cum president.

AIS to abolish president's post

Advanced Info Service will eliminate the president's position that is being vacated by Yingluck Shinawatra, the sister of Prime Minister Thaksin Shinawatra, according to a company source.

The source said the decision was made by the Singaporean state investment company Temasek Holdings after taking over AIS's parent company, Shin Corporation.

Ms Yingluck had been the president of AIS since the post was created five years ago on her initiative

Edited March 20, 2012 by Buchholz

[Thai at Heart]

[Answering blazes, quote won't work]

Money gets you in, of course, but what gets you the degree?

If you speak perfect English, you can write perfect English, as long as you know how to spell, so your second point is nonsensical.

If pidgin English is tolerated, why is it tolerated? Is that about money too? In other words, would failing students because of poor English be unacceptable as it would lead to fewer foreign students coming to the USA to study and therefore less income for American academe? Is money lust the cause of American universities looking so inadequate when you encounter their alumni's poor English? If not, what?

I don't know which of your many gun-splatter points need answering first.

Perhaps the most egregious non-sequitur I have ever read on this site is your assertion that "if you can speak perfect English, you can write perfect English (providing you can spell well)". Since I don't want to bore other people with what is essentially becoming a private conversation, I have to content myself with asserting as a truth, gathered over forty years, that good writing is not a necessary corollary of good speaking.

Your other stuff about why things are tolerated needs a whole book, since it involves accounting for why standards have gradually been lowered and lowered throughout the last forty years or so...inflation in grades has been almost as noticeable as in the wider economy. One reason for the lowering is that there is, throughout the university world, (in Britain and N America...I am a Brit and know both systems well) a kind of silent pressure on faculty to "let students through", whether they are Chinese who cannot write but can speak and read the language or whether they are native students who can't string two sentences together coherently.

Finally, what is surprising is that Yingluck's wealth was not used to buy her a genuine education, which might have included learning English, and which surely could have bought her a better place to study than Kentucky. I have no answer to that, but it is at least possible that her family considered her education to be irrelevant since she is a woman. Which brings us back to what she is saying, perfectly coherently, in Davos...that women in Thailand are second-class citizens in one of the most chauvinist countries on earth.

I think you may find, that this is one of the bugbears between the "old" and "new" money in Thailand. One one side you have Eton, Rugby, Winchester, Dulwich and Cheltenham Ladies, Oxford and Cambridge and on the other you have Chiangmai and Kentucky State.

As an Old Alleynian thank you for the first mention in my memory of my old school on TV!

As to Yingluck, it could be argued that, as ever, that she did her best and was brave enough to get up on stage when clearly she was going to be found wanting. Some might say she was simply naive to do so. The fact remains that this is a woman who was president of one Thailand largest corporations and in normal circumstances even an applicant looking to work in a much less senior position would be required to have at least a 'working knowledge of written and spoken English' if not fluency.

I am assuming of course that with her previous and current jobs she was selected on merit.

It isn't coincidence that Prem went there and then Dulwich was one of the first public schools to open up over here. You share an old school with probably Thailand's second most influential man.

[DickFarang]

What are you worrying about ?

Do you think your German Queen Victoria spoke English perfectly ?

[Unkomoncents]

[Answering blazes, quote won't work]

Money gets you in, of course, but what gets you the degree?

If you speak perfect English, you can write perfect English, as long as you know how to spell, so your second point is nonsensical.

If pidgin English is tolerated, why is it tolerated? Is that about money too? In other words, would failing students because of poor English be unacceptable as it would lead to fewer foreign students coming to the USA to study and therefore less income for American academe? Is money lust the cause of American universities looking so inadequate when you encounter their alumni's poor English? If not, what?

I don't know which of your many gun-splatter points need answering first.

Perhaps the most egregious non-sequitur I have ever read on this site is your assertion that "if you can speak perfect English, you can write perfect English (providing you can spell well)". Since I don't want to bore other people with what is essentially becoming a private conversation, I have to content myself with asserting as a truth, gathered over forty years, that good writing is not a necessary corollary of good speaking.

Your other stuff about why things are tolerated needs a whole book, since it involves accounting for why standards have gradually been lowered and lowered throughout the last forty years or so...inflation in grades has been almost as noticeable as in the wider economy. One reason for the lowering is that there is, throughout the university world, (in Britain and N America...I am a Brit and know both systems well) a kind of silent pressure on faculty to "let students through", whether they are Chinese who cannot write but can speak and read the language or whether they are native students who can't string two sentences together coherently.

Finally, what is surprising is that Yingluck's wealth was not used to buy her a genuine education, which might have included learning English, and which surely could have bought her a better place to study than Kentucky. I have no answer to that, but it is at least possible that her family considered her education to be irrelevant since she is a woman. Which brings us back to what she is saying, perfectly coherently, in Davos...that women in Thailand are second-class citizens in one of the most chauvinist countries on earth.

I think you may find, that this is one of the bugbears between the "old" and "new" money in Thailand. One one side you have Eton, Rugby, Winchester, Dulwich and Cheltenham Ladies, Oxford and Cambridge and on the other you have Chiangmai and Kentucky State.

As an Old Alleynian thank you for the first mention in my memory of my old school on TV!

As to Yingluck, it could be argued that, as ever, that she did her best and was brave enough to get up on stage when clearly she was going to be found wanting. Some might say she was simply naive to do so. The fact remains that this is a woman who was president of one Thailand largest corporations and in normal circumstances even an applicant looking to work in a much less senior position would be required to have at least a 'working knowledge of written and spoken English' if not fluency.

I am assuming of course that with her previous and current jobs she was selected on merit.

Who knows a dam$ thing about those corporations (in Thailand, quality is a subjectively important consideration? You talk like a knower when everyone knows you don't). If you're Thai, and you speak Thai, you likely know less than anyone who doesn't (speak Thai; it's a language of obfuscation). How many times has someone said "Mai Mii" or "Mai Pen Rai". That's the most hilarious caveat for Thailand: live, and be dumb. (Intelligence doesn't exist here; they say, "Don't think" and no one does). Welcome to the proudest, most delusional country in Asia.

Edited March 20, 2012 by Unkomoncents

[animatic]

Give her a chance, she has been thrown to the wolves in the past 9 months, an almost impossible task. The amount of character asassination has been appaling and the pressure would crush anybody. Just give her a chance.

A chance is not what you expect in a national leader. You expect them to DO THE F'n JOB.

9 months is more than enough time to 'get up to speed'.

Considering the number of former government ministers, MPs and Ministry heads surrounding her, there is no reason that 3 months should have been necessary to be able to DO The JOB.

I can't but agree. So I guess, when it comes to the international stage, we will have to expect to be disappointed.

Everyone gets a certain "honeymoon" period, and everyone has a certain amount of time to blame the previous administration for the problems encountered today, but that time has run out. Time to start performing.

Of course, domestically, there are some pretty serious changes coming with minimum wage etc, but when it comes to the flood, they have made a rod for their own back by initially stating that there wasn't a serious flood coming, now everything will be solved in weeks, when it in reality takes years. Running a country is pretty serious business, and there isn't time to stand still, take stock and wait and wait for the right result. However, this also presumes that you have capable people around to do the job quickly, which, unfortunately, I don't think they do.

So as I said, chaos reigns.....

And who does hold the reins of this chaos?

There's the rub.

Edited March 20, 2012 by animatic

[animatic]

I don't know which of your many gun-splatter points need answering first.

Perhaps the most egregious non-sequitur I have ever read on this site is your assertion that "if you can speak perfect English, you can write perfect English (providing you can spell well)". Since I don't want to bore other people with what is essentially becoming a private conversation, I have to content myself with asserting as a truth, gathered over forty years, that good writing is not a necessary corollary of good speaking.

Your other stuff about why things are tolerated needs a whole book, since it involves accounting for why standards have gradually been lowered and lowered throughout the last forty years or so...inflation in grades has been almost as noticeable as in the wider economy. One reason for the lowering is that there is, throughout the university world, (in Britain and N America...I am a Brit and know both systems well) a kind of silent pressure on faculty to "let students through", whether they are Chinese who cannot write but can speak and read the language or whether they are native students who can't string two sentences together coherently.

Finally, what is surprising is that Yingluck's wealth was not used to buy her a genuine education, which might have included learning English, and which surely could have bought her a better place to study than Kentucky. I have no answer to that, but it is at least possible that her family considered her education to be irrelevant since she is a woman. Which brings us back to what she is saying, perfectly coherently, in Davos...that women in Thailand are second-class citizens in one of the most chauvinist countries on earth.

I think you may find, that this is one of the bugbears between the "old" and "new" money in Thailand. One one side you have Eton, Rugby, Winchester, Dulwich and Cheltenham Ladies, Oxford and Cambridge and on the other you have Chiangmai and Kentucky State.

As an Old Alleynian thank you for the first mention in my memory of my old school on TV!

As to Yingluck, it could be argued that, as ever, that she did her best and was brave enough to get up on stage when clearly she was going to be found wanting. Some might say she was simply naive to do so. The fact remains that this is a woman who was president of one Thailand largest corporations and in normal circumstances even an applicant looking to work in a much less senior position would be required to have at least a 'working knowledge of written and spoken English' if not fluency.

I am assuming of course that with her previous and current jobs she was selected on merit.

Who knows a dam$ thing about those corporations (in Thailand, quality is a subjectively important consideration? You talk like a knower when everyone knows you don't). If you're Thai, and you speak Thai, you likely know less than anyone who doesn't (speak Thai; it's a language of obfuscation). How many times has someone said "Mai Mii" or "Mai Pen Rai". That's the most hilarious caveat for Thailand: live, and be dumb. (Intelligence doesn't exist here; they say, "Don't think" and no one does). Welcome to the proudest, most delusional country in Asia.

We do know that her brother owned BOTH the corporations she had high ranking positions in.

Merit, or he just trusted her to make people wonder if she actually saw what they were doing on the job and would tell her brother. Sort of like a family scarecrow, the dirty birds won't know if the threat is real or not, so stay away from trouble.

[DickFarang]

Yingluck should not speak in front of international audiences. I love that this article addresses the obvious problem of the "face-saving"/reinforcement issue. Thais bring a whole new meaning to the term "lackey", but that's more of an aside. Yingluck's administration demonstrated clearly that she is NOT in control when the floods happened. There were so many mouths spewing incomprehensible nonsense that government incompetence became as much a concern for the public as actual flooding. But there have been other instances as well, such as when Yingluck tried to tell the public that she wasn't aware of her own Foreign Ministry's plans to provide her brother with a passport (even if that's a bold-faced lie, it just shows how stupid they think the public is/how stupid they think they can be and get away with it). The fact is that successive Thai governments don't stand up to international scrutiny at all. This isn't just Yingluck; it's the entire system and it's been this way for a decade, at least. Thailand has essentially disconnected from global economic and political progress and integration. Thais are scrambling to prepare for the 2015 ASEAN integration because the citizens of other ASEAN nations have shown themselves to be much more aggressive and willing to learn. Bold, adventurous, confident, well-educated ASEAN investors will likely trounce their Thai equivalents in the global race towards prosperity. Thai academics and officials already know this and there have been numerous articles touching on the issue. Ultimately, Thai cultural pride (they were not colonized, something they really, really want everyone to know) and complacency have left the country with a government that reflects it's populace: oblivious and unskilled. Most Thais, it's been demonstrated, cannot find their own country on a map.

The Thai government is chock-full of proxies, puppets and known criminals. The international community knows this. Take a look at Yingluck's meetings with foreign officials in Davos: she met with no one of importance. It's very easy to see why. No serious government official, with little time and huge challenges before him or her, would sit down with someone who so clearly doesn't have her cards in order. There is every reason to believe that her brother would have to rubber stamp anything she happened to agree upon. She is so clearly incapable of leading a country and government (and that's not completely her fault; Thai political culture isn't merely a topic for study, it's a disaster) that it wouldn't truly make sense to spend any time discussing anything with her. When I stand her up next to Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono (Indonesian PM; great interview with Charlie Rose), Barack Obama, Wen Jintao, Angela Merkel, or even Cristina Fernandez de Kirchner, I can immediately make sense of the fact that Yingluck attracts little attention from foreign diplomats at major international political gatherings. She isn't a PM/President like any of them are (they all are leaders and are truly looking out for the long-term health of their respective countries). She can barely manage things in her own language, let alone in English.

Do you think Merkel speaks anything but German ?

Or Kirchner anything but (Argentinean) Spanish ?

[waza]

I guess it would help Yinglucks credibility if her brother and her government let her in on their agenda instead of keeping her in the dark for credible deniability.

Edited March 20, 2012 by waza

[Slaps]

Yingluck should not speak in front of international audiences. I love that this article addresses the obvious problem of the "face-saving"/reinforcement issue. Thais bring a whole new meaning to the term "lackey", but that's more of an aside. Yingluck's administration demonstrated clearly that she is NOT in control when the floods happened. There were so many mouths spewing incomprehensible nonsense that government incompetence became as much a concern for the public as actual flooding. But there have been other instances as well, such as when Yingluck tried to tell the public that she wasn't aware of her own Foreign Ministry's plans to provide her brother with a passport (even if that's a bold-faced lie, it just shows how stupid they think the public is/how stupid they think they can be and get away with it). The fact is that successive Thai governments don't stand up to international scrutiny at all. This isn't just Yingluck; it's the entire system and it's been this way for a decade, at least. Thailand has essentially disconnected from global economic and political progress and integration. Thais are scrambling to prepare for the 2015 ASEAN integration because the citizens of other ASEAN nations have shown themselves to be much more aggressive and willing to learn. Bold, adventurous, confident, well-educated ASEAN investors will likely trounce their Thai equivalents in the global race towards prosperity. Thai academics and officials already know this and there have been numerous articles touching on the issue. Ultimately, Thai cultural pride (they were not colonized, something they really, really want everyone to know) and complacency have left the country with a government that reflects it's populace: oblivious and unskilled. Most Thais, it's been demonstrated, cannot find their own country on a map.

The Thai government is chock-full of proxies, puppets and known criminals. The international community knows this. Take a look at Yingluck's meetings with foreign officials in Davos: she met with no one of importance. It's very easy to see why. No serious government official, with little time and huge challenges before him or her, would sit down with someone who so clearly doesn't have her cards in order. There is every reason to believe that her brother would have to rubber stamp anything she happened to agree upon. She is so clearly incapable of leading a country and government (and that's not completely her fault; Thai political culture isn't merely a topic for study, it's a disaster) that it wouldn't truly make sense to spend any time discussing anything with her. When I stand her up next to Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono (Indonesian PM; great interview with Charlie Rose), Barack Obama, Wen Jintao, Angela Merkel, or even Cristina Fernandez de Kirchner, I can immediately make sense of the fact that Yingluck attracts little attention from foreign diplomats at major international political gatherings. She isn't a PM/President like any of them are (they all are leaders and are truly looking out for the long-term health of their respective countries). She can barely manage things in her own language, let alone in English.

Do you think Merkel speaks anything but German ?

Or Kirchner anything but (Argentinean) Spanish ?

Well Spotted Dick

.

[DickFarang]

How to retain the Japanese investors? A lesson from the Asean neighbouring Country;

Less xenophobia, willing to retain high international skills and brains....

"from a Malaysian newspaper: JOHOR BARU: Japanese investors plan to develop Malaysia's first "Little Japan" township in Taman Molek here for high net worth ethnic Japanese keen to relocate and make Malaysia their second home.

Global Asia Assets (M) Sdn Bhd (GAAM), an asset-building consulting company for Japanese investors, which is behind the project, hopes to woo 2,000 wealthy Japanese to live, work or do business here within the next few years.

GAAM chief executive officer Fujimura Masanori said since March last year, some 70 Japanese individuals had already relocated here under the Malaysia My Second Home (MM2H) programme.

Additionally, 365 Japanese investors have also acquired high-end residential and commercial properties worth more than RM400mil here since January last year and are expected to also move here permanently soon.

"In view of the overwhelming response, we are eager to kick start the "Little Japan" project in Taman Molek where Japanese individuals are expected to invest over RM500mil in landed houses and luxury apartments over the next few years," said Fujimura.

Do those Japanese not worry about the introduction of the sharia/Islamic law in Malaysia ?

[hellodolly]

Give her a chance, she has been thrown to the wolves in the past 9 months, an almost impossible task. The amount of character asassination has been appaling and the pressure would crush anybody. Just give her a chance.

Good point, it's unrealistic for the leader of any country to have to demonstrate they are capable of doing the job they were elected to do. Poor dear needs some TLC.

It's quite obvious to anyone she was shoehorned into this job...........there are powers at play here that you well know that are beyond her control.

There have been multitude's of predictions as to the return of her brother etc, all wrong. There have been multitude's of predictions as to the inevitable melt down of Yingluck and her government, to this point, all wrong.

I would suggest to you that the Thai political situation is as stable just now as it has been for a long time, and whatever way you spell it, Yingluck has to get a bit of credit for that.

Quite frankly if she can survive until the next election without any mass demonstrations, blood on the streets, or military coups, that in itself would be an outstanding result.

I'm not an apologist for her or any faction in Thailand, but anyone with an interest knows that Thai politics is volatile at the best of times, knows the reality of how Yingluck was shoehorned into this position, and knows that it doesn't matter how much you think things are bad today, they could get a lot lot worse very rapidly.

Give her a chance.

She asked for a chance of six months she has had nine. It is obvious you are not happy with the results.

As for blood in the streets who else besides her brother has the money and disregard for human life to pay for another armed peaceful demonstration? Aint going to happen.

I personally believe she will survive to the next election partly because the opposition is just fighting every thing rather than coming up with a good idea or saying hay you have some thing there can we help.

[hellodolly]

No one is expecting that.

They are, however, expecting something a smidgen better than this.

Yingluck is no different from most - even using the benchmark of a shoddy US college peer group.

Are any of them representing the nation on the world stage?

.

the first 2 minutes aren't so bad, then... she just went off in a tangent of gibberish.

but don't be fooled, or try to fool others into thinking this is based on a lack of intelligence rather than a lack of language skill

there's absolutely no requirement for her to be a fluent english speaker for her position. or even to be able to speak a word of english.

it's no dent on her character, no matter how much people like to spin it as such.

and to your last question "Are any of them representing the nation on the world stage?"

i think china have a pretty big space on that 'world stage' don't you? i don't hear much english from their politicians.

maybe she should be concentrating more on her mandarin and you could be slating her for that instead? obviously only if that's the language you speak, that is.

Makes no difference to me how good or bad her English is.

What alarms me is she hasn't got the sense to get a qualified interpreter.

Two collage diplomas and she can't figure that out.

I leave it to the rest of you to debate her abilities to speak English.

[Jingthing]

She shouldn't speak English in public. Yes, Kirchner speaks Spanish. She would come off as a brilliant woman who can think on her feet if she spoke Sanskrit.

[DickFarang]

(...)

Makes no difference to me how good or bad her English is.

What alarms me is she hasn't got the sense to get a qualified interpreter.

Two collage diplomas and she can't figure that out.

I leave it to the rest of you to debate her abilities to speak English.

If you do not even know the difference between “collage” and “college”, I wonder what YOUR qualifications are.

[Thai at Heart]

Give her a chance, she has been thrown to the wolves in the past 9 months, an almost impossible task. The amount of character asassination has been appaling and the pressure would crush anybody. Just give her a chance.

A chance is not what you expect in a national leader. You expect them to DO THE F'n JOB.

9 months is more than enough time to 'get up to speed'.

Considering the number of former government ministers, MPs and Ministry heads surrounding her, there is no reason that 3 months should have been necessary to be able to DO The JOB.

I can't but agree. So I guess, when it comes to the international stage, we will have to expect to be disappointed.

Everyone gets a certain "honeymoon" period, and everyone has a certain amount of time to blame the previous administration for the problems encountered today, but that time has run out. Time to start performing.

Of course, domestically, there are some pretty serious changes coming with minimum wage etc, but when it comes to the flood, they have made a rod for their own back by initially stating that there wasn't a serious flood coming, now everything will be solved in weeks, when it in reality takes years. Running a country is pretty serious business, and there isn't time to stand still, take stock and wait and wait for the right result. However, this also presumes that you have capable people around to do the job quickly, which, unfortunately, I don't think they do.

So as I said, chaos reigns.....

And who does hold the reins of this chaos?

There's the rub.

It seems to be whoever is nearest the microphone for the day. They put out their policies, one by one before the election, which, love or loathe them is an improvement on politics 15 years ago in this country because it was virtually impossible to find out what any of the major parties was going to do at all prior to election.

They have started muddling through the policies, changing them here and there, which is to some degree acceptable, but not acceptable to the degree with which they have acted. Nationwide minimum wage up, then only 7 provinces etc. It illustrates that they had very badly thought out policies from the beginning.

And then the flood brought chaos everywhere. Some bigwigs ran for the hills never to be found, others simply spouted b*******t day after day blatantly lying to the country. These idiots and Yingluck are to blame for not speaking a unified message. Basically, no one believes (particularly the investors) that any plan they come up with will work. I notice that they have just announced the details of an enquiry into the mess in Queensland last year and the dam_n operators may end up with criminal charges because they broke the operating manual for the dam_n. Is there even any such official document for the damns in Thailand. is anyone accountable yet or in the future. Is there a publicly disclosed operating standard procedure for every aspect of managing a natural disaster such as this? Not yet. So why would anyone believe there is a unified plan?

"We will have a single command to manage any floods!" What a pile of BS. By the time the irrigation dept, then the marine dept, then the agriculture dept and last but not least the army have had their say to protect their asses, the country will be under water again. All that allows it to happen or not is how much rain will fall.

Every government in the world has its wild cannons who don't follow the party line all the time, it seems to me that vast majority of this lot are actively speaking against the party line, which of course begs the question, is the party line being set 100% overseas, in which case how could they know the party line all the time.

As for specifically winning over a foreign audience, she can't because she is so obviously Thaksin's proxy and has a bunch of crooks behind her who don't give a dam_n about the country. Even if she was the best of the best at everything, she doesn't have people with her who care one jot about delivering real policies that can attract or keep foreign investors happy. In the last week we have had stories about crack downs on land ownership, visa problems and the rest. There is realistically nothing being done to make the country one jot more attractive in the eyes of foreign investors. Every day there is another story to make the country less and less attractive.

I await all of the estates north of Bangkok slowly becoming ghost towns, because if you were thinking of investing there, who the hell will do it now? and those that are already there if they haven't opened up, never will, and those that have, will run the machines until the wheels fall off and slowly but surely drift over the border elsewhere.

[simon43]

If you do not even know the difference between “collage” and “college”, I wonder what YOUR qualifications are

After reading this thread, I suspect that they really are 'collage' diplomas

Simon

[Payboy]

If you do not even know the difference between “collage” and “college”, I wonder what YOUR qualifications are.

You finish college with a group picture and you finish a collage with a group of pictures.

[DLock]

She would not even get a job as an Admin or Receptionist in any of my companies given her poor communication skills...

[blazes]

She would not even get a job as an Admin or Receptionist in any of my companies given her poor communication skills...

"Any of my companies".....your name wouldn't be Roman Abramovich, by any chance??

[Payboy]

She would not even get a job as an Admin or Receptionist in any of my companies given her poor communication skills...

I guess that's what Mr. T thought before deciding she should be CEO of the family business.

[Unkomoncents]

Yingluck should not speak in front of international audiences. I love that this article addresses the obvious problem of the "face-saving"/reinforcement issue. Thais bring a whole new meaning to the term "lackey", but that's more of an aside. Yingluck's administration demonstrated clearly that she is NOT in control when the floods happened. There were so many mouths spewing incomprehensible nonsense that government incompetence became as much a concern for the public as actual flooding. But there have been other instances as well, such as when Yingluck tried to tell the public that she wasn't aware of her own Foreign Ministry's plans to provide her brother with a passport (even if that's a bold-faced lie, it just shows how stupid they think the public is/how stupid they think they can be and get away with it). The fact is that successive Thai governments don't stand up to international scrutiny at all. This isn't just Yingluck; it's the entire system and it's been this way for a decade, at least. Thailand has essentially disconnected from global economic and political progress and integration. Thais are scrambling to prepare for the 2015 ASEAN integration because the citizens of other ASEAN nations have shown themselves to be much more aggressive and willing to learn. Bold, adventurous, confident, well-educated ASEAN investors will likely trounce their Thai equivalents in the global race towards prosperity. Thai academics and officials already know this and there have been numerous articles touching on the issue. Ultimately, Thai cultural pride (they were not colonized, something they really, really want everyone to know) and complacency have left the country with a government that reflects it's populace: oblivious and unskilled. Most Thais, it's been demonstrated, cannot find their own country on a map.

The Thai government is chock-full of proxies, puppets and known criminals. The international community knows this. Take a look at Yingluck's meetings with foreign officials in Davos: she met with no one of importance. It's very easy to see why. No serious government official, with little time and huge challenges before him or her, would sit down with someone who so clearly doesn't have her cards in order. There is every reason to believe that her brother would have to rubber stamp anything she happened to agree upon. She is so clearly incapable of leading a country and government (and that's not completely her fault; Thai political culture isn't merely a topic for study, it's a disaster) that it wouldn't truly make sense to spend any time discussing anything with her. When I stand her up next to Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono (Indonesian PM; great interview with Charlie Rose), Barack Obama, Wen Jintao, Angela Merkel, or even Cristina Fernandez de Kirchner, I can immediately make sense of the fact that Yingluck attracts little attention from foreign diplomats at major international political gatherings. She isn't a PM/President like any of them are (they all are leaders and are truly looking out for the long-term health of their respective countries). She can barely manage things in her own language, let alone in English.

Do you think Merkel speaks anything but German ?

Or Kirchner anything but (Argentinean) Spanish ?

What's your point?

[MikeOboe57]

Yingluck should not speak in front of international audiences. I love that this article addresses the obvious problem of the "face-saving"/reinforcement issue. Thais bring a whole new meaning to the term "lackey", but that's more of an aside. Yingluck's administration demonstrated clearly that she is NOT in control when the floods happened. There were so many mouths spewing incomprehensible nonsense that government incompetence became as much a concern for the public as actual flooding. But there have been other instances as well, such as when Yingluck tried to tell the public that she wasn't aware of her own Foreign Ministry's plans to provide her brother with a passport (even if that's a bold-faced lie, it just shows how stupid they think the public is/how stupid they think they can be and get away with it). The fact is that successive Thai governments don't stand up to international scrutiny at all. This isn't just Yingluck; it's the entire system and it's been this way for a decade, at least. Thailand has essentially disconnected from global economic and political progress and integration. Thais are scrambling to prepare for the 2015 ASEAN integration because the citizens of other ASEAN nations have shown themselves to be much more aggressive and willing to learn. Bold, adventurous, confident, well-educated ASEAN investors will likely trounce their Thai equivalents in the global race towards prosperity. Thai academics and officials already know this and there have been numerous articles touching on the issue. Ultimately, Thai cultural pride (they were not colonized, something they really, really want everyone to know) and complacency have left the country with a government that reflects it's populace: oblivious and unskilled. Most Thais, it's been demonstrated, cannot find their own country on a map.

The Thai government is chock-full of proxies, puppets and known criminals. The international community knows this. Take a look at Yingluck's meetings with foreign officials in Davos: she met with no one of importance. It's very easy to see why. No serious government official, with little time and huge challenges before him or her, would sit down with someone who so clearly doesn't have her cards in order. There is every reason to believe that her brother would have to rubber stamp anything she happened to agree upon. She is so clearly incapable of leading a country and government (and that's not completely her fault; Thai political culture isn't merely a topic for study, it's a disaster) that it wouldn't truly make sense to spend any time discussing anything with her. When I stand her up next to Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono (Indonesian PM; great interview with Charlie Rose), Barack Obama, Wen Jintao, Angela Merkel, or even Cristina Fernandez de Kirchner, I can immediately make sense of the fact that Yingluck attracts little attention from foreign diplomats at major international political gatherings. She isn't a PM/President like any of them are (they all are leaders and are truly looking out for the long-term health of their respective countries). She can barely manage things in her own language, let alone in English.

Do you think Merkel speaks anything but German ?

Or Kirchner anything but (Argentinean) Spanish ?

What's your point?

Angela Merkel is fluent in Russian.

[metisdead]

A post using all caps for font has been removed. Turn off your Caps Lock button and try again.

[Famespear]

Umm, No!