Date rape: The devil you know!!

DATE rape is the new sex crime facing Malaysian women. Last year, in more than 60 per cent of the 1,931 rape cases reported to police the attackers were known to their victims.


Women’s Aid Organisation (WAO) refuge social worker Shoba Aiyar said they had many cases where victims had trusted the would-be rapists, but there were also those where ‘drugs’ were used.

“Last year, there was a case where spiked drinks were used on the victim who woke up in between two naked men in a hotel room. The victim knew the men through a friend and went out on a blind date with one of them.

“The victim didn’t realise that her drinks were spiked until she passed out.”


Many cases, she said, went unreported because the victim was too ashamed or couldn’t remember much of what had happened.

“I remember a victim who bore the child of her rapist before finally seeking help.”

She said WAO’s shelter receives between one and four rape victims a year. “Many are ashamed and traumatised but didn’t know where to get help. We usually get those raped a few months or more earlier."

She said victims should never blame themselves for what had happened, adding that Malaysian women are very trusting and this has been taken advantage of by some men.

“Some attacks were committed by ex-boyfriends who wanted to ‘teach’ the women a lesson while others were friends or colleagues.”

She said there is no best defence against date rapes, except educating the young about the crime and respect for another person’s body.

“In most cases, the young, especially men, didn’t seem to realise the seriousness of rape. Rape is not an impulsive crime or an over-spilling of sexual energy. It’s wrong,

“Any healthy relationship should involve respect for another person's body and sex should never be forced.”

MM says: “It pays to introduce your date to your best friend, office-mates, mummy & daddy, neighbourhood cops.”


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Cases on record

April 2006:
A Form 4 student from Mak Mandin claimed she was raped by a 20-year-old man on two occasions. The second incident occured in a vacant flat. The 16-year-old claimed she was first raped by the suspect in a car when she went out with him on a date several weeks ago.

A police source said the suspect had threatened the victim with exposure of a video he took when they had sex in the car if she refused to have sex with him again.

April 2006:
Parents of a Form 3 student lodged a missing persons report when she failed to return home for three days. She was later found gang-raped.

The 15-year-old went with a group of men who took her to a vacant house in Bukit Tambun where she was held captive and raped. Four suspects were detained.

August 1999:
For two weeks, a 15-year-old girl chatted on the Internet with a man. The cybermate managed to convince her to meet him at a pasar malam in Cheras.

He turned up on a motorcycle and invited her for a drink. The 19-year-old youth took her to a banana plantation where she was raped by four other men and held captive for 15 hours. Five suspects were arrested.

More:
Mmail Date rape: Why me?

Making of Johor Disneyland?

THERE has been no official word but the talk is that preliminary meetings have been held to get Disneyland to Johor.

Prime Minister Datuk Seri Abdullah Ahmad Badawi, who was in Japan for a five-day working trip, reportedly met officials from Oriental Land, the Japanese partner of Tokyo Disneyland.

The plan, according to speculation, was to bring Mickey Mouse and the fantasyland to the proposed 9,645ha Nusajaya, a massive new township in the southern Johor corridor.

The state is said to have set aside 960ha and investments worth RM2bil for the plan, which could create 20,000 jobs.

Interestingly, in April last year, Abdullah said he had no objection if Disney were to come to Johor.

Following that remark, Singapore’s Straits Times contacted Michelle Nachum, the spokesman for Disney theme parks in California for a confirmation but all she was prepared to say was that Disney constantly evaluated strategic markets around the world.

She would not confirm or deny that Johor was on the list.

No one is surprised that Singapore is keeping a close watch on developments in neighbouring Johor. The Lion City, in fact, almost got its own Disneyland in the Seletar area but the plan fell through.

It was reported last year that negotiations went so far as identifying the site and the government was even prepared to add another station to the North-South MRT Line, with the reservoir as a backdrop.

Singapore Trade and Industry Minister Lim Hng Kang was quoted in the Straits Times as saying that in the end, it did not work out because Disney wanted a 300ha chunk of land and was not prepared to pay for it.

Lim told Parliament that this happened in the 1990s when the government was keen to attract a major theme park like Disneyland or Universal Studios to set up in Singapore, saying “theme park operators are actually content providers, they really only provide the software and the intellectual property.”

He said they wouldn’t “want to put in too much of their own money” and that “they earn a development fee even before the theme park operations starts” – management fees would be added when operation started, followed by a cut of the gate takings.

Johor, on the other hand, has plenty of land. It is ready to offer up to 1,000ha of land and in comparison to Hong Kong’s 70ha and Singapore’s reluctance to give up 300ha, the southern state has a distinct advantage.

But running theme parks is not easy, especially in South-East Asia. The humid weather obviously works against us in Malaysia, especially when visitors have to do plenty of walking and waiting in a sprawling theme park.

The theme park in Genting Highlands is successful because of its cool weather and not forgetting the casino element.

The Sunway Lagoon’s wet concept is also successful, given the fact that Kuala Lumpur and Selangor, which have no beaches, have a big market.

The present Disney locations are in California, Florida, Paris, Hong Kong and soon, Shanghai.

Florida has warm weather but it is not humid, unlike Malaysia, and can be windy at times.

But our hot weather need not necessarily be a minus point.

The Formula One race in Kuala Lumpur is now touted the “hottest race on earth” and even the monsoon season in Terengganu has helped put Malaysia on the world map with the Monsoon Cup.

Singapore has had two bad experiences – the 12ha Tiger Balm Gardens, set up in 1935, which later became the Haw Par Villa. It had over 1,000 statues depicting Chinese legends but visitors found them gruesome.

It lost RM72mil.

The Tang Dynasty City was another flop, with one report finding the place too hot on sunny days, having too much concrete with too few shelters and people having to queue up for 40 minutes for a boat ride.

It was part of a comprehensive finding by National University of Singapore’s Associate Prof Peggy Teo, who does research on tourism.

Since then Singapore has played safe, preferring the air-conditioned indoor kind of theme parks such as Underwater World and Snowcity.

Malaysia has taken the right direction by planning new tourist attractions as scenic spots and shopping malls alone won’t do, especially if we wish to get repeat visitors. That was the view of some Arab tourists, interviewed by a newspaper here recently. Our country should also not be in the category of short-stay destination.

More attractions need to be created as the tourism industry becomes more competitive.

Huge sums of money have to be invested to shift world attention to Malaysia.

For example, Brazil paid more than US$1mil (RM3.6mil) to the Rolling Stones for a one-night concert recently. Although the city treated its people and tourists to the free concert, it drew world attention. Shanghai also paid for the ageing rockers.

But in Malaysia, our politicians and some sections of the people may not be so receptive; but it is a small sum to pay for assured global advertisement.

As travelling becomes easier, tourists have also become more demanding. They expect their tour guides to know what they are talking about, having done their research on the Internet before they started their visits.

If they wish to visit a zoo, it must be like San Diego Zoo, a world-class outfit, or a safari park, where animals are allowed to roam freely and not locked up.

Snakes and crocodiles are also passe now.

Plenty of homework needs to be done, especially on the financial prospect of attracting regional visitors, if we wish to set up world-class theme parks here.

Malaysians would surely like to see Mickey Mouse in Nusajaya but we believe careful planning and plenty of common sense are needed as massive public funds would be involved, so that no one takes the mickey out of us.

YAU MOU GAU ...CHOR!!! PLAYBOY sold at Kelantan!

Illegal Playboy magazine

KUANTAN: If you pick up a copy of Playboy carrying a publishing permit number, do not think what you have is legal reading material.

Deputy Internal Security Minister Datuk Fu Ah Kiow said the ministry had never approved any publishing permit to any company for such a magazine.

“The so-called permit registration number appearing on the magazine cover is fake. Our enforcement division is in the midst of carrying out an investigation to find out the background of the printer and publisher.

“We will get to the bottom of the matter and reveal the culprits involved,” he told reporters before meeting village security and development committee members of Kuantan district at MS Garden Hotel here on Friday.

He was commenting on reports that a “Malaysian edition” of Playboy was being sold in Kelantan.