The Sarawak Report in Penang

We attended a book signing event last night (13 Sep 2018) and that's the author, Clare Rewcastle Brown, with her book The Sarawak Report. Clare is a celebrity of sorts in Malaysia and this is her first visit to Penang - the hometown of Jho Low, she called it - although she has been in the country a number of times, having been born in Kuching.

Who could have known that just less than five months ago, she would have been arrested if she had entered Malaysia. The previous Barisan Nasional government would have made sure of that! But with the fall of the Najib regime, Clare is no longer persona non grata in Malaysia. In fact, she was welcomed into the country almost immediately after the present Pakatan Harapan government took over. Same with other foreigners like Xavier Justo who had contributed to the scandal known as 1MDB.

Soon after I arrived home last night, I had posted this photo (top right) to my facebook account. People seemed to like this picture and I received an inquiry from a friend in far away Dittisham in the UK. "Quah," she had asked me, "who is the person signing the book?" I made a lengthy reply in facebook but as an after-thought, seeing the interest that Clare had generated in Penang and the whole country, here is a snapshot of my reply to Helen Woodman, my Dittisham friend.

The book signing event was well attended. The Penang Institute's chief executive officer, Ooi Kee Beng, said that the crowd was possibly the biggest he had experienced at a Penang Institute event. Not only were the 150 seats all occupied by the early registrants - only those with validated tickets were allowed in - it was standing room only for some of the registrants. So possibly, about 200 people were crammed into the conference room. Everybody had wanted to hear Clare speak and her every word was readily absorbed in. People were thanking her for her part in bringing about the downfall of Asia's most infamous kleptocrat.