Author . Speaker . Strategist

The water in the photograph looks placid. A white barrage stretches across the river, its gate hoists lined up like sentries, and the surface mirrors a sky heavy with monsoon cloud. Nothing in the scene hints at difficulty. This is the kind of achievement in which calm has been engineered. The Ampang Jajar 'tandop' or barrage on the lower Sg Kedah in Mergong. It is one of the key structures protecting Alor Setar by balancing river discharge againts the tides of Selat Melaka B

In Kulim, Kedah, a river has been taking land from people who never agreed to give it up. Nobody sold it. Nobody signed anything. The river simply moved in. Older residents still remember Sg. Kélang Lama as a parit gila, a monsoon stream that carried off the extra water after a downpour. Back then nobody feared it. It was just there, doing a quiet job. Nobody lay awake wondering if it might one day swallow the ground beneath their house. But the little drain was never on its

In 1950 — seventy-six years ago — the legendary Japanese filmmaker Akira Kurosawa gave the world a film called Rashomon. It is a thriller, but not the usual kind. Through it, Kurosawa offered a permanent insight into the human condition. In the story, a samurai named Takehiro Kanazawa is found dead in a forest. Four witnesses come forward. The bandit who ambushed him, Tajomaru. The samurai’s widow, Masago. A woodcutter, a kikori, who watched from the shadows. And, remarkably,

The trouble with the climate debate is that it often sells the worst case as the baseline case. That is broadly what happened with RCP8.5, a high-end emissions scenario developed by the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change as a stress-test for policy. Gradually, this doom-and-gloom scenario escaped that context and entered public debate as though it were the default future. Scenarios are tools for thinking about risk, built around assumptions about population, energy use

Last Friday, rising waters flooded central Johor Bahru, with images of knee-high floods in Nong Chik, Jalan Kolam Ayer, and Tasik Merdeka circulating on Socmed. The flooding threat is far from over as we expect high tide tonight (17 December 2025) to trigger fresh flooding in low-lying areas. In fact, JB, like many coastal areas, sometimes faces a tug-of-war between monsoon rainwater and the rising tides. Over the decades, the Malaysian government has taken significant steps

When I stood before brigadier generals and colonels from Malaysia, Thailand, Indonesia, Bangladesh, Jordan, Qatar, and Brunei at the National Resilience Centre of PUSPAHANAS, the focus was not on tanks or tactics. It was on the fragile nexus of water, food, and energy—the natural frontlines of resilience. Their presence, uniforms, and composure fostered an atmosphere of discipline and gravitas. These were not the usual conference delegates or corporate leaders I often meet. T

Our urban success also presents a dilemma. By 2030, six out of ten people will reside in cities, and by the middle of the century, this figure will rise to seven out of ten. In ASEAN alone, an additional 205 million urban residents are expected to emerge by 2050. This is more than merely a demographic shift—it heralds an environmental reckoning. As our cities expand, agricultural land will decrease, and flood risks will escalate, particularly in low-lying areas. Urbanisatio

Recently a rich Datuk who owns a luxury watch shop told me an amazing fact. His best record was selling a wristwatch for RM 20 million. I had to ask him if he meant RM 2 million, because that was already a price tag that didn't make much sense to me. But it really was RM 20 million. I quipped that this sum was big enough to invest in a clean energy company and create jobs for Malaysians. Thus began our conversation about developing sustainable energy businesses. He said he ha

How can we bring about a social change towards a more balanced relationship between environment and development? It's a deceptively simple question, but you could risk spending hours telling incoherent stories to answer it. Or you could write your memoirs, as the famous environmentalist Gurmit Singh did in his Memoirs of a Malaysian Eco-Activist book. But what about a policy wonk like me? What story am I telling for the benefit of future generations in my journey to promote s

Eminent Chairman, Honorable Minister of Renewable Energy of India, distinguished panellists and learned participants of the Delhi Dialogue, greetings of peace, greetings of solidarity. Let me begin by expressing deep gratitude to the organisers of the Delhi Dialogue, especially Professor Sachin Chaturvedi, for inviting me to this discussion. The theme of the Delhi Dialogue is very apt. The bridge we want to build is a natural bridge because we share a common destiny, geograph