Seems 'Truly Asia' BolehLand has gone from courting Bollywood hunk to a Frenchman with a penchant for fast f1 motorsports as well as has an intimate bond with local Hollywood former 007 gal Michelle Yeoh.

While Bollywood Khan is Melaka Cincalok Ambassador, Jean Todt is to BolehLand newly-appointed Malaysian Tourism Ambassador for the Malaysia My Second Home (MM2H) programme.

Tourism Minister Dr Ng Yen Yen, said 'yeh, yeh' that RM1 million has been allocated 'to spend over two years as Malaysia’s Tourism ambassador" and not a sen or any piece of land was given to him. He will be paid whenever he travels to meet people overseas.

PKR MP Azmin Ali rightly pointed out what is the role of Tourism Malaysia offices outside the country if the ministry has to spend to engage in a foreigner to promote the MM2H. Yeh, what are the Tourism Malaysia offices doing, showing 1Malaysia concept and explaining it to tourists?

And aren't the embassies also a good promotion venue? Or are they still holding diplomatic briefing sessions on 'how a certain opposition political leader decided to find out what was behind the good cappuccino served by former kopi boy assistant' which was proposed by the former administration.

Or perhaps getting good diplomatic staff is hard to come by, with their level of Ingrish or other foreign languages or basic knowledge of BolehLand, the government had to depend of foreign mat salleh to promote the country to other foreign 'mat sallehs'.

If BolehLand offers the pull factor like other international tourist destinations, the tourists will flock and come. No need for ambassadors or beg international publishers to come and write on the country.

BolehLand must have its own inward examination if it provides the attractive benefits and condition for foreigners to come and stay here. Is the political climate now conducive, are basis freedom such as freedom of expression, freedom of association, even religious freedom respected and even encouraged?

What is international perception of its recent rather mediocre international ranking for safety, transparency and riskiness. What about issues related with concern of rising crime, abuse of foreign workers, transportation even dealing with the agencies on the MM2H programme.

Sometime back, there were reports of those who were attracted by the MM2H programme. Bet none were enticed by any French flair , nor even junior Kit's proposed tiger sanctuary nor a former famous crouching tiger and bond gal actress.

If BolehLand has the draw like the Caribbean or monte carlo (sans the casinos) or the French Riviera, there is certainly no need to network or beg international publications and travel magazines to do a story here!

Or if the leadership is an exceptional statesperson, the press will come in droves. The most effective ambassador is surely the leader and the leadership as it is leadership by example that will get international attention, i.e. for the right reasons of course and not scandals.

It is not all cheap standard of living compared to French standard or the food or the weather that are enough to sustain the MM2H programme. Of course each nation and its peoples has its own idiosyncrasies, and for old fellos to stay in BolehLand under the MM2M, BolehLand must offer something more that eat, rest and sleep. The new residents may have escaped the cold weather or the high cost of living for the sunshine and cheap tosai. But, they will expect to cherish and feel that the basic human rights they enjoyed from their original country are similarly in existence in their new abode if not more not less. They also do not want to trade-off the ills in their society to be present with a new set of ills in their new home!

So foreign Tourism Ambassadors who spend probably only 30 days in a year in BolehLand do not make good ambassadors what about the MM2H programme. If they are bored they can just fly away anytime.

French fellos are know to be proud of their le canard à la presse, fois gras or Chardonnay the best cuisine. So to their design, fashion and taste for men and women. Imagine Todt trying to promote toad, rather froglegs stew(no not political parties fellos) satay, ice-kacang, mee rebus, rojak or batik and ah beng local attire to entice rich old folks to come over.

Maybe Ms Bond may prove the better ambassador, the hidden dragonne who may be more convincing promoting ipoh chicken rice or taugeh or beef noodles and innards broth if she has not taken for a liking for coq au vin,french onion soup or Crème Brûlée.

There must be many BolehLand fellos famous ones who will make great ambassadors to promote the MM2H programme ie. if they stay in BolehLand than are foreign residents with homes in London, Paris or New York. It is certainly an irony to select an ambassador who doesn't even stay in BolehLand. Anyone knows if the Khan has any resident in Melaka?

Yes, why waste RM1 million on really rich French bourgeoisie whose motive is possible nothing to do with houses but using the deal to derive more millions from what he does best, super fast cars - formula 1 models and Grand Prix tournament.

"Besides, RM1 million in Europe gets you nothing nowadays," so says this BN Minister perhaps echoing the behaviour of her BN colleagues that they are used to spending millions more on other less dubious programmes. Is it implying that the amount may increase in future?

So while Todt, is chasing after a possibly dying grand prix sports, bond gal may be lying on the couch watching it from the Sepang F1 grandstand than promoting the MM2H programme.

What is it that BolehLand wants to have more rich old folks foreign imports into the country? To have a programme such as MM2H to create a more positive image of the nation doesn't seem effective unless you are willing to bring in 1 million old rich folks living here and send back the 1 million poor lowly paid illegal migrant fellos right?

Getting a thousand old rich foreign migrants and giving them better treatment because they are rich and we want their money doesn't do justice to the rest of BolehLand fellos. Already those who have contributed to building up this nation has been labelled 'migrants and immigrants' with many finding it difficult to find even a decent home or being treated nicely by the other more than half of the citizens or rather those in race based parties seem to show it.

It would be interesting to see if Azmin will continue to be crouching at the Minister of Tourism's door to seek for more evidence if there are any more hidden allocation than the RM1 million revealed by Yen Yen.

Source: http://jonathan66-my.blogspot.com/2009/06/crouching-replies-to-hidden-allocation.html

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