INTERNATIONAL
Time to pay attention
The British general election is only
10 days away
Prime Minister Tony
Blair launches the Labour
Party's 110-page, 23,000-word election manifesto April
13.
— EPA |
May
5 is rapidly approaching, so it’s time to start paying attention
to the news out of the UK - news apart from football, that
is. On that day, all 646 members of the lower house of parliament
(the House of Commons) will be up
for grabs.
This election should be
particularly interesting since Prime Minister Tony Blair
is trying to lead his party to its third consecutive
victory, a first in the country’s history for the party.
And he is trying to do so against the backdrop
of a very unpopular war effort in Iraq, opposed by many
members of his own party. Some of them are openly saying
they will desert
Labour for an opposition party.
So, is it possible that
May 5 may lead to a new prime minister, either Conservative
Party leader Michael Howard or Liberal Democrat leader Charles
Kennedy? Recent polls give virtually
no chance to Mr Kennedy, but the Conservatives seem to be
only a few percentage points behind.
That
is very misleading say most analysts. In reality,
Mr Blair’s Labour Party is likely to be much further ahead
than the polls indicate. First, the party stars with a huge
advantage. In the 2001 Labour secured
a total of 412 seats. The Conservatives won 166, the Liberal
Democrats 52 and 29 were won by other minor parties. Interestingly,
Labour gained more than 60 percent of the seats despite
having won only 41 percent of the vote.
The
reason is that the UK obviously doesn’t not have a system
of proportional representation. A candidate
needs to win a constituency by a single vote to take a seat
in parliament. Any many of the constituencies
that traditionally favour Labour are quite small in population.
Thus, Labour can win a lot of seats with relatively few
votes.
The
news in the UK over the past four years has not been all
that bad either. The economy has done well and unemployment
has fallen to its lowest level in nearly 30 years. Many
British citizens also approve of what the Labour Government
has done to improve some important public services, especially
health and education. The war is less of a factor than it
might have been because the Conservative Party has consistently
supported the war effort.
One
party that hasn’t is the Liberal Democratic Party and Mr
Kennedy is making a big effort to attract war opponents.
Watch to see how successful he is. The Conservatives, on
the other hand, are trying to win votes by advocating a tighter immigration policy.
With so many immigrants holding British citizenship, that
may not be terribly successful.
All
in all, most analysts expect Labour to win comfortably,
but with a reduced majority. Watch to see if they are right.
Sensitive history
A little-used Japanese
textbook sets off a storm of protests
Meanwhile, back
here in Asia, the row between China and Japan over a junior
high school history textbook, seems to be tapering off.
The approval by a Japanese government screening panel of
a new edition of the controversial New History Textbook,
written by a group of Japanese nationalistic scholars, had
set off violent demonstrations in several cities in China
and threats of a widespread boycott of Japanese goods.
On Friday in Jakarta, Japanese Prime Minister Junichiro
Koizumi apologised profusely for the pain its troops had
inflicted on neighbouring countries during the previous
century. For its part, the Chinese government said it would
no longer tolerate anti-Japanese protests.
Interestingly, the book in question is hardly used in Japanese
schools. To date, less than 20 of Japan’s 11,000 junior
high schools have adopted it. The rap against the book is
that it attempts to rationalise Japan’s invasions of
neighbouring countries as a necessary response to the pressures
the country was under from outside forces, particularly
the US. Also, according to the critics, it fails miserably
to adequately mention Japan’s wartime atrocities.
The critics go on to say that while this book is the worst
example, there is a general trend in Japanese history book
to whitewash the history of the World War II period.
This is clearly a very sensitive issue, not just in China
but throughout our region. Watch to see how government leaders
try to normalise relations.
|
up for grabs
able
to be won or lost
consecutive
following one after the other
backdrop
the general situation
desert
to leave
virtually
almost
misleading
giving the idea or impression
secured
obtained; won
proportional
representation
a system where the number of parliamentary seats
a party wins depends on the proportion (percentage)
of the total vote it receives
|
constituencies
districts represented by a member of parliament
consistently
always behaving or happening in a similar way
advocating
supporting
immigration
coming to live in another country
tight immigration
policy
a policy of strictly controlling who is able to
come in live in a country
row
a noisy argument or fight
|
tapering off
to gradually become smaller and less frequent
controversial
causing strong disagreement
nationalistic
showing a lot of or too much pride in your own country
boycott
to protest by refusing to by a product or take part
in an activity
profusely
giving or involving large amounts of something; in
this case, apologies
inflicted
forced to experience something unpleasant
|
tolerate
to accept
rap
criticism
rationalise
to find reasons to explain your actions or behaviour
miserably
completely
atrocities
extremely violent, cruel and shocking actions
trend
a general development or change in a situation
whitewash
to make something bad seem acceptable by hiding the
truth |
|
