This Precious Life

From the Malaysian Crime Watch site today, “Police have seized about 636 savings account books and 188 ATM cards from an illegal loan shark syndicate’s house last week.” I’m guessing the loan sharks had seized the 636 savings account books and 188 ATM cards from their debtors who could not pay up in the first place.

Frankly, I’m a little tired of this same old story. Loan shark lends money to a gambler or alcoholic, he refuses to pay for whatever reason, loan shark burns his house down while he is at work but his wife and children at home, or loan shark kidnaps his children from school or loan shark splashes pork’s blood all over his front door to embarass him in his neighbourhood…

While we often feel angry towards the violent lender who would do anything to get his money back and empathise with the bullied borrower and his suffering family, the borrower does need to take responsibility too. Why oh why did he borrow from the loan shark in the first place? Correct me if I’m wrong but from what I’ve heard, it is usually to feed a gambling or drinking or drug addiction.

We desperately need help in addiction management as well as debt management.