The Prime Minister’s Department has released the list of public holidays in Malaysia for the year 2007. It is available at Bernama’s website at http://www.bernama.com/bernama/v3/publicholiday2007.php.

Among the notable dates are:

• Chinese New Year - 18 & 19 February
• Hari Raya Puasa - 13 & 14 October
• Deepavali - 8 November

Also take note that as Hari Raya Qurban 1427H falls on Sunday 31 December 2006 while in all but 5 states will have New Year’s Day holiday on Monday 1 January 2007, Tuesday 2 January 2007 shall be a holiday to replace the Sunday.

As Wesak Day and Labour Day both fall on 1 May 2007, it is also expected that the government will declare 2 May 2007 an additional holiday as a replacement.

Do you remember the bomb scare at Petronas Towers, KLCC and Menara IBM, Taman Tun Dr. Ismail on 12 September 2001, some half a day after terrorists struck the World Trade Center in New York? The bomb scared caused occupants to be evacuated for the entire day and the Suria KLCC shopping center deserted almost the entire day.

Then, there was this bomb scare, believed to be the works of a college student, causing everyone to be evacuated for half a day on 14 August 2003 at KDU College, Petaling Jaya. It was suspected that the bomb scare was made in an attempt to delay the semester final examinations on that day, however, the examinations was only delayed a few hours, to be postponed to the afternoon instead.

In the wake of the findings of terrorists plans to bomb aircrafts flying between UK and US, a prankster is at play again this time, causing an AirAsia flight between Kuching and Kuala Lumpur to be delayed several hours. The prankster alerted the authorities of the existence of liquid substances in AirAsia’s aircraft bound for Kuala Lumpur at the Kuching International Airport yesterday.

Well, to all those pranksters, stop causing trouble and inconvenience to the public.