When landlords are held accountable

To rent or not to rent?: A ‘To Let’ sign displayed at a house in SS15 Subang Jaya.

PETALING JAYA: A landlord’s rented property could unknowingly become a base for vice and crime, but legal experts say there are ways for homeowners to escape liability.

Former federal Criminal Investigation Department (CID) assistant director Datuk S. Shanmugamoorthy said owners can only be held liable if authorities can prove they knew about the illegal activities and failed to act.

“If police want to act against the homeowner, there must be evidence that the owner was either directly involved, or was fully aware of the activities and failed to take necessary action to stop or report it,” he said.

Shanmugamoorthy, who is also a lawyer, said proving this could be a challenge for investigators.

“It is not easy to take action against homeowners or to prove they were aware. But there are areas that can be probed. This could include CCTV footage showing the owner visiting the premises, financial trails linking illegal proceeds to the owner’s bank accounts or witness accounts from neighbours,” he said.

He said complicating matters further is the growing trend of sub-letting.

Shanmugamoorthy pointed out that in many cases, the main tenant may not be involved in any wrongdoing but sublets the property to others who carry out illegal activities

“This creates multiple layers of tenancy, which makes it even harder to establish who knew what,” he said.

National House Rental Association (NHRA) president Prakash P. Kalivanan said most landlords rent out their properties in good faith.

“They should not be unfairly penalised for illegal acts of their tenants that were not in their knowledge,” he said.

However, Prakash said landlords should exercise reasonable responsibility and diligence when renting out their properties.

He stressed that having a documented tenancy agreement is one of the most important safeguards and failing to do so could expose owners to greater risk.

“This is why having a tenancy agreement stamped by the Inland Revenue Department is important for homeowners to safeguard themselves. Terms and conditions in the agreement that prohibit illegal activities will show that tenants have been clearly reminded and are bound by them,” he said.

Among the illegal activities the NHRA is aware of are cases involving illegal cryptocurrency mining, prostitution, loansharking activities, storing stolen goods and harbouring illegal immigrants.

To protect themselves, Prakash urged landlords to take precautionary steps including conducting background checks on tenants, carrying out periodic inspections and maintaining proper documentation such as identification records and payment history.

“If homeowners become aware of suspicious or illegal activities, they should immediately report the matter to the authorities,” he said.

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Japan at a crossroads; inside unit 731

Des­pite Tokyo’s hard­line stand on its his­tory in the region, there is still time to invest in a more fruit­ful shared future through greater accom­mod­a­tion.

Unpopular move? Protesters hold placards and lights during a rally against Takaichi’s administration for its military expansion policies in front of the parliament building in Tokyo last month. — Reuters 

 

LAST Octo­ber Sanae Takai­chi became Japan’s first female leader of both the Lib­eral Demo­cratic Party (LDP) and the gov­ern­ment.

The “lib­eral” in the LDP actu­ally means con­ser­vat­ive. Takai­chi her­self belongs to the hard­line rightwing Nip­pon Kaigi fac­tion of the party.

Soon enough, she would come to brush against China. Respond­ing to a ques­tion, she said Japan would take mil­it­ary action if China moved on Taiwan and affected Japan’s interests.

That soured China-japan rela­tions, trig­ger­ing bit­ter WWII memor­ies of a rightwing mil­it­ar­ist Japan invad­ing, occupy­ing and com­mit­ting war crimes in China. Those wounds have yet to heal.

Mod­el­ling her­self after Bri­tain’s brazen first female Prime Min­is­ter Mar­garet Thatcher, Takai­chi was unapo­lo­getic. She fur­ther prod­ded Beijing by seek­ing to revise Japan’s post­war Con­sti­tu­tion to favour mil­it­ar­ism, and work­ing with the US and its allies to con­tain China.

Other coun­tries began to regard Takai­chi’s Japan as poten­tially revi­sion­ist, bent on white­wash­ing its his­tory of war atro­cit­ies and may even repeat them. So is Japan get­ting ready to remil­it­ar­ise?

At issue is Art­icle 9 of the Con­sti­tu­tion on Japan’s mil­it­ary forces, offi­cially the Self-defence Forces (SDF) after Japan’s sur­render in 1945. Takai­chi wants to remove the SDF’S con­sti­tu­tional con­straints to enable an assert­ive mil­it­ary pos­ture abroad.

That is chal­len­ging because it requires two-thirds major­it­ies in both the Lower and Upper Houses of the Diet. While the LDP lacks sup­port from the lat­ter, it is work­ing to boost mil­it­ary power, capa­city and reach in other ways.

For the first time since 1945, Japan par­ti­cip­ated prom­in­ently in this year’s Us-led Balikatan mil­it­ary exer­cises with live-fire drills in the South China Sea. Japan will also be export­ing lethal weapons, man­u­fac­tur­ing to scale and expand­ing mil­it­ary links abroad.

Must this mean Japan is return­ing to its mil­it­ar­ist past of a cen­tury ago? Much depends on the pre­vail­ing regional real­it­ies.

The US is encour­aging other coun­tries to play a big­ger regional defence role. This is as true for Asia as it is for Europe, and applies for both Repub­lican and Demo­cratic admin­is­tra­tions.

A 2012 Us-japan treaty would halve the 19,000 Mar­ines in Okinawa by return­ing them to Guam, Hawaii and the US main­land. Deploy­ments to the Phil­ip­pines tend to be more lim­ited and ad hoc.

In post-wwii East Asia, US mil­it­ary hege­mony is seen to keep the peace by remov­ing the need for Japan’s mil­it­ary build-up. The same applies with Ger­many in Europe.

However, US bipar­tisan policy is retrench­ing long-term regional mil­it­ary post­ings. Mil­it­ary forces will still be deployed for lim­ited mis­sions, such as in Iran or Venezuela, but major post­ings in far-flung regions are another mat­ter.

Regard­less of who is head­ing Japan’s gov­ern­ment, Tokyo will want to look more to itself for its defence role and com­mit­ments.

Unlike Ger­many, Japan is not seen by other coun­tries to have fully atoned for its imper­ial wars and the dev­ast­a­tion they unleashed. An unre­pent­ant rightwing leader now lead­ing an appar­ent mil­it­ary revival only exacer­bates Japan’s trust defi­cits.

Non­ethe­less, mod­ern East Asia’s real­it­ies would inhibit if not pro­hibit any ultra-nation­al­ist Japan­ese leader from return­ing to the coun­try’s imper­i­al­ist past.

Such an out­come will not be accept­able to West­ern powers because Japan­ese nation­al­ism is anti-west­ern. A rampant nation­al­ist Japan will ali­en­ate all other sig­ni­fic­ant powers in a more developed Asia and a more mul­ti­polar world.

Eco­nom­ic­ally, Japan’s best days are over so it has insuf­fi­cient resources to chal­lenge the sov­er­eignty of other global stake­hold­ers includ­ing Asia’s middle powers. Its eco­nomy has slipped below Ger­many’s and India’s to fifth place, and con­tin­ues slid­ing.

Socially and insti­tu­tion­ally, Japan­ese hawks may be in a minor­ity even in Japan. Groups and indi­vidu­als stage protests against per­ceived drifts towards mil­it­ar­ism, in a coun­try where dis­sent­ing voices mat­ter.

Even within the LDP and other main­stream insti­tu­tions, evid­ence of an exclus­ive, mono­lithic bloc favour­ing mil­it­ar­ism is sparse. The gen­eral pub­lic still tends to be averse to rad­ical con­sti­tu­tional changes.

Former Prime Min­is­ter Yukio Hat­oy­ama cri­ti­cised Takai­chi’s petty pop­u­lism, stress­ing that Taiwan’s status is China’s internal affair. Former Deputy Prime Min­is­ter Yohei Kono inves­ted a life­time in build­ing bridges with China.

Another former Prime Min­is­ter, Yasuo Fukuda, accepts rein­ter­pret­a­tion of Art­icle 9 without des­cend­ing into pop­u­list mil­it­ar­ism. In 2017, then Prime Min­is­ter Shinzo Abe declared that Japan was ready to cooper­ate with China in the Belt and Road Ini­ti­at­ive, des­pite Abe being another mem­ber of the LDP’S Nip­pon Kaigi fac­tion.

Pro­fessor Mike Moch­izuki says the way for Japan to work with a way­ward Trump-led US is not to ali­en­ate China, but instead to improve rela­tions with Beijing and deepen Tokyo’s stake in the region. Takai­chi also hap­pens to be reach­ing out to Asean coun­tries like Malay­sia in busi­ness deals, and this should be encour­aged.

Kono passed away last Monday, while fine-tun­ing new plans for cooper­at­ing with China. Whether Takai­chi’s real­ism will even­tu­ally out­live her pop­u­lism remains to be seen.

Bunn Nagara is dir­ector and senior fel­low of the Renais­sance Stra­tegic Research Insti­tute, and hon­or­ary fel­low at the Perak Academy. The views expressed here are solely the writer’s own.

By BUNN NAGARA

Bunn Nagara is dir­ector and senior fel­low of the Renais­sance Stra­tegic Research Insti­tute, and hon­or­ary fel­low at the Perak Academy. The views expressed here are solely the writer’s own.

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Champion scions give Penang durian its edge, Farmers grafting superior cuttings for fruits quality variety

Pak Teh Fruits owner Mohd Taufiq Tajuddin, showing a variety of durian at his stall in Kampung Pelet, Jalan Guar Perahu in Bukit Mertajam, Penang. — ZHAFARAN NASIB/The Star.

LET’S say you love Musang King durian and have the land, money and time, so you plant a seed from one.

Eight years later, the tree finally bears fruit.

  What do you get?

There is no guarantee that a Musang King seed you sow will grow into a tree producing pure Musang King fruits.

Based on the laws of nature, you could end up naming your durian Musang Joker, Bad Musang or Musang Nonsense.

In March, the Johor government announced that the state’s 81,000ha of durian orchards recorded an annual production of 214,000 tonnes of the fruit.

With Penang island spanning about 30,000ha, Johor’s durian orchards collectively amount to nearly three times that area.

Johor’s durian tonnage comprises Musang King (40%), IOI (30%), Kampung Premium (20%) and Black Thorn (10%).

Data on Penang’s durian orchard sizes and tonnages is harder to acquire, but when you walk up to any Penang durian stall, you might be stunned by the variety.

You will find Ang Heh, Xiao Hong, Cheh Poay, Lipan, D600, D604, D11, D14, Capri, Tian Song, Black Thorn, Ang Bak Kia, Lin Feng Jiao and more.

A durian connoisseur will be able to tell the differences in taste, smell, texture and pulp thickness.

Some are extra bitter. Some leave a tingling sensation on the tongue.

Many carry hints of fermentation, honey, vanilla or even cinnamon.

I love Capri, D600 and D604, among the oldest varieties found only in Penang.

This season, I have developed a liking for D14, although it will take a few more tastings before it gets a spot on my must-have list.

You must survive many durian seasons and thousands of calories to build your own list.

Why does Penang have such a dizzying variety?

If there is land at your disposal, money and time, you might invest effort in a durian orchard.

You plant anonymous durian seeds and wait patiently.

Because of genetics and cross-pollination, this is essentially a durian gene roulette.

Perhaps only one in every 10 trees will produce truly exceptional fruit.

Let’s call that tree Dragon Reborn.

The fruits from the other nine trees may just be average ones.

So what is the next step?

You turn to what agriculturists call top-working grafting.

The underperforming trees are cut back, leaving only their roots, trunks and main branches.

Then you take scion wood from your Dragon Reborn and graft it onto your “headless” trees.

The scions grow into new branches.

Genetically, the roots and trunks still belong to the old trees while the fruiting branches and fruits carry the Dragon Reborn genes.

In Penang, many durian orchards are generations old, long before clones like D24 and Musang King gained mass-market fame.

Over decades of playing durian gene roulette, neighbouring orchard owners exchanged and bought scions, spreading successful clones throughout the island’s orchards.

Start a durian orchard from scratch today, and business logic dictates sourcing scion wood from the best-selling varieties.

That is why Musang King can become so widely planted in states with vast land areas that its price sometimes falls close to kampung durian levels towards the end of the season.

To durian lovers, here’s a tip _ savour no more than five or six varieties in a sitting.

Beyond that, your taste buds and sense of smell become overwhelmed, and every durian starts tasting the same.

Follow us on our official WhatsApp channel for breaking news alerts and key updates!

Tags / Keywords:Musang King , durian genetics , Penang durian , Johor durian production , durian varieties , top-work grafting , durian orchard , scion wood , durian taste , cross-pollination

SOURCE:

Pinang Points 09 Jun 2026

Champion scions give Penang durian its edge)

High-five to new passport, 10-year Malaysian passport introduced at RM350

  PETALING JAYA: Frequent Malaysian travellers have largely welcomed the government’s new 10-year passport, describing it as a more convenient and cost-­effective alternative to the ­current five-year passport.

Data processing manager Atikah Razak, 33, who travels overseas three to five times a year, said the new system offers better long-term value.

“I think RM350 for 10 years is reasonable. It works out to RM35 per year, which is affordable ­considering a passport is an important travel document,” she said.

The change, she added, would minimise the hassle of renewals and help ease congestion at Immigration Department offices.

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Tham Jo Yee, 30, also prefers the 10-year passport as it reduces the need for frequent renewals.

“Perhaps a 10-year passport makes more sense because many people tend to forget to renew their passports. Most of the time, they only check the expiry date when they are planning to travel,” she said.

The longer validity period, she said, could reduce last-minute problems caused by expired passports, especially for occasional travellers.

The Fees (Passports and Visas) (Amendment) Order 2026, which came into force on June 3, extends the validity of Malaysian passports to 10 years.

The gazette however did not state when the new 10-year Malaysian passport will be made available to the public.

Malaysians will be charged a fee of RM350 while senior citizens aged 60 and above will be charged RM175 for the 10-year passport.

Meanwhile, registered persons with disabilities aged 18 and above who hold an OKU card are entitled to a passport free of charge.

The gazette also states that Immigration Department officers and staff are entitled to 10-year passports at no charge.

Previously, Malaysian passports were issued with a five-year validity period at RM200 for adults and RM100 for senior citizens, while persons with disabilities were exempted from fees.

Dubai-based aviation engineer Rashidie Noridin, 34, described the RM350 fee as “cheap” when broken down annually.

“This new policy is better as it is in line with passport systems in several developed countries like the US, Singapore and the UK,” he said, adding that the 10-year expiry gives travellers more flexibility in planning their trips.

Banker Mohd Asri Bin Hishamuddin, 36, said the longer validity period improves efficiency for frequent travellers.

“It offers better value compared to renewing a five-year passport twice,” he said.

Mohd Asri added that passport validity often affects travel planning due to the minimum six-month validity requirement imposed by many countries.

Flight attendant Mahani Ishak, 27, said the 10-year option is particularly useful for those in the aviation industry, where valid travel documents are critical to operations.

She added that passport validity plays an important role in her job, as expired passports or insufficient remaining validity can directly affect flight assignments.

“If a passport has expired, it may lead to crew being offloaded from flights due to incomplete documentation.

“It helps reduce the need for frequent renewals, especially for those of us who are constantly travelling for work,” she said.

The amendment also introduces a fee structure for replacing lost or damaged 10-year passports.

For those aged 18 to 59, replacement fees are set at RM550 for the first replacement, RM850 for the second, and RM1,350 for the third and subsequent replacements.

Senior citizens will be charged RM375 for the first replacement, RM675 for the second, and RM1,175 for the third and subsequent replacements.

Eligible OKU cardholders and Immigration Department staff will be required to pay RM200 for a first replacement, RM500 for a second, and RM1,000 for a third and subsequent replacements.

Meanwhile, for the five-year passport, replacement fees range from RM400 to RM1,200 for those aged 13 to 59 years, and RM300 to RM1,100 for senior citizens depending on replacement frequency.

Registered persons with disabilities aged 18 and above who hold an OKU card are charged RM200, RM500 and RM1,000 for the first, second, and third and subsequent replacements, respectively.

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