Evaluating the state of investigative journalism in Malaysia from practitionners' perspectives

Investigative journalism is not a new area in journalism but its practice around the world vary from one country to another as media practitioners are arguing whether it should be practiced or not. Therefore, this research is trying to find out the state of investigative journalism in Malaysia from media practitioners’ perspective. Using qualitative interview, this research will try to evaluate their understanding on the roles of investigative journalism and barriers in practising it in Malaysia. Eight respondents consist of editors and reporters from four print media organizations were interviewed in this research. This research found that Malaysian media practitioners do understand investigative journalism but they have to adapt their practice into the country’s media environment. Most of them prefer to abide by the rules and regulations set by the government, their organization and even themselves. Consequently, the study showed that they prefer to investigate issues concerning consumer affairs and rarely touch on political issues

1948 AND THE COLD WAR IN MALAYA: SAMPLINGS OF MALAY REACTIONS

This paper is a preliminary report of an on-going research on the reactions of the Malays in Malaya to the coming of the Cold War to the region, with particular reference to the importance of the year 1948. For the majority of the Malays, the Cold War was most popularly associated with the Emergency, which British authorities had declared in the effort to quell the armed uprising mounted by the MCP. The vast majority of Malays in Malaya were not interested in the on-going Cold War between the Western bloc led by the United States on the side the Eastern bloc led by the Soviet Union on the other. The preoccupations of the Malays during the immediate post-Pacific War period was nationalism and the concomitant effort to gain independence for Malaya from Britain. In particular, they had been rather anxious that the Malays, who were the native of the land, were not robbed of the custodianship over Malaya and political privileges of the Malays in independent Malaya. Consumed with these issues, the Malays had little interests in external affairs. It was perhaps the lack of Malay support that foredoomed the fate of communism in Malaya

Perbezaan etnik di dalam kesan hipokalemia di sebabkan oleh beta-2 agonist

Saya telah mengkaji dua puluh orang wanita sepuluh keturunan Melayu dan sepuluh Cina. Mereka telah di kaji selama dua kali selepas di berikan samaada Terbutaline (5Mg) atau Plasebo. Penemuan yang utama ialah kadar kalium selepas Inhalasi Terbutaline lebih rendah di kalangan keturanan Ciba kalau di bandingkan dengan keturunan keturunan Melayu. Berbezaan di dapati samaada dari sudut purata tahap kalium. Selepas inhalasi mahu pun dari sudut jumlah mereka yang mengalami hipokalemia selepas inhalasi. Penemuan ini mungkin di sebabkan kesensitifan reseptor beta-2 di kalangan keturunan Cina lebih daripada keturunan Melayu. Ini mempunyai implikasi klinikal yang penting kerana kekuatan ubat untuk berlainan kaum yang perlu di preskripsi oleh doktor untuk kaum-kaum tertentu mungkin berbeza. Perkara ini akan menjadi tumpuan seterusnya penyelidikan saya di masa hadapan

Identification of Causes and Effects of Poor Communication in Construction Industry: A Theoretical Review

Construction industry is characterized in nature as complex, fragmented, dynamic and involves many parties therefore effective communication is essential to overcome these challenges. Many researchers found that the industry faces major challenge to ensure effective and successful communication throughout the lifecycle of the project which therefore resulted to project failure. Poor communication in construction industry had been addressed in previous research studies; however, this paper presents and examines the identification of causes and effects which lead to poor communication. Further investigations on previous literature were conducted to extract the causes and effects which contributed to poor communication in construction industry. Similarity technique was applied to avoid duplications in the identified causes and effect of poor communication. Using the frequency technique, from the 33 causes of poor communication it was found that the most dominant cause is lack of effective communication. Whereas, out of 21 effects from poor communication, it was found that highly repeated effect is time overrun. These findings will serve a good platform for further investigation on the relevancy of causes and effects to the local construction practitioners

Inclination towards fraud among the participants in financial reporting process

Fraud is a significant ethical dilemma for businesses and harmful to the capital market participants.Financial reporting fraud is an intentional misstatement of financial information to mislead the financial statement users.It causes huge losses to the organizations, threatens the investors’ confidence on the published financial statements and erodes the image of accounting profession.This descriptive paper attempts to explore the inclination level towards financial reporting fraud among the participants in the financial reporting process and to determine the effect of their personal background on such inclination level.Using a sample of 121 Muslim participants in the financial reporting process at Malaysian banking institutions, the findings indicate that the inclination level is low.The inclination level is only affected by the working experience at the present bank and the bank type.The findings provide insights to the banks’ stakeholders on the inclination level of fraud among the participants in financial reporting process and are particularly useful to the top management of banking institutions for a better understanding on personal background items influencing fraud in financial reporting intention.Limitations and suggestions for future research conclude the paper

Governance strategies in sustainable campus using Rasch model

In moving towards sustainability, university needs to establish a good governance strategy which practices to transform a positive sustainable culture toward successful green campus. Howe ver, due to constraint of knowledge and commitment regarding sustainability integration has caused weakness in the implementation of green concept in majority of Malaysian universities. This paper is presents one of the five dimensions of a developed hypot hetical integrated sustainable campus model which is university governance. The university governance dimension consists of 5 constructs and 23 items which are strategies for the university to be complied. These strategies were uncovered using questionnair e survey with 35 selected experts who are currently active in sustainable campus activities and researches. Collected data from this survey was analysed using Rasch method in Winstep software to measure items reliability, separation index, items polarity, item fit and item person map. Results from the analysis indicated that 19 strategies were significant to be implemented. Thus, it provides good information for universities to adopt these sustainable campus strategies in making their campus as a role mode l for a sustainable and conducive living environment

Availability and suitability of Kuala Gula mangroves for milky stork reintroduction program in Malaysia: a re-evaluation

The Milky Stork population is endemic to a small part of the Southeast Asia region and is considered as an endangered species as its number has gone considerably low throughout its home-range. In Malaysia alone, the species numbers have dwindled significantly and the last group of the wild population was last recorded in 2010. Hence, the work to repopulate the species is currently being done in Kuala Gula, Perak as the location is still considered as pristine and of high importance to large numbers of resident and migratory birds. However, the recent increase of anthropogenic activity in the area has raised considerable attention among environmentalist and scientist as the mangroves along Kuala Gula coast are being reclaimed excessively to give way to the aquaculture industry. Accordingly, this study was undertaken to re-evaluate the availability and suitability of Kuala Gula as nesting and foraging grounds for the reintroduction of the Milky Stork population. Important nesting and foraging areas were surveyed and data on the habitat, including size, types, forest composition and structure were recorded. In general, at least one nesting site and two foraging areas have been affected and could no longer benefit the waterbirds population. The findings suggest that urgent attention be given to protect remaining mangroves from further development and reclamation activity to ensure the success of the reintroduction program in the future

Using Green Roof Concept As A Passive Design Technology To Minimise The Impact Of Global Warming

Global warming phenomenon or climate change has grabbed people attention worldwide. This phenomenon leads to many environmental issues including, higher atmospheric temperatures, intensive precipitation and increase greenhouse gaseous emission. Sea level rising, melting of ice sheets, drought, hurricane are also the effect of global warming

Software development for real-time weed colour analysis

The application of computer and machines for agricultural production has been one of the outstanding developments in Malaysian agriculture, especially in overcoming labour shortages in Oil Palm plantations. The on-line automated weedicide sprayer system was developed at Universiti Putra Malaysia to locate the existence and intensity of weeds in real-time environment and to spray the weedicides automatically and precisely. During the start of the spraying operation, the web camera will initially capture the image of weeds. The computer programme will compute the red, green, blue (RGB) values in the form of computer pixel. These values will be used as reference RGB values to be compared with the RGB values of the weeds captured real-time during the spraying operation. The sprayer nozzle will be turned 'on' or 'off', depending on the percentage or intensity of the green colour pixel value of weeds. The sprayer valve will open the nozzle/s when the camera detected the presence of weeds. The purpose is to reduce wastage, reduce labour, reduce cost, and control environment hazard