Journalist Quentin Lim said the first job was not a time for fresh graduates to demand for high salaries and benefits. He adds: “At this point, they have no experience and so salary should not be the most important factor. What is most valuable is the experience you can gain. Fresh graduates also cannot afford to be lazy. We have to work even harder to stand out from the rest, as there are so many graduates these days. During my parent’s time, being a graduate was enough to guarantee a job but today, that’s not enough. You need to pick up skills which are good enough for the employers.”

Elsewhere on this page is a summary of the various events that everybody can look forward to. There is something for everyone, be it a simultaneous chess game, a five-minute blitz tournament, a 30-minute rapid chess tournament or a full 90-minute normal time regulation tournament.

Concerns that I voiced last week about the Malaysia Chess Festival taking a possible beating from a major rival tournament being planned at the same time in nearby Manila seems to have eased.

I have been checking with the organisers the whole of this week, and their confidence seems to have been restored. In fact, the organisers are delighted that the response to the festival has exceeded last year’s.

(Pitting wits: Current national champions Tan Khai Boon (left) and Fong Mi Yen will be participating in the Malaysia open tournament.)

Tomorrow’s one-day event has attracted at least 74 players. This was the number told to me three days ago and as more chess players arrive in Kuala Lumpur, the number of participants is set to increase.

Similarly, too, there are at least 67 teams in the Merdeka team rapid open with foreign grandmasters from Australia, Bangladesh, Uzbekistan, Germany and India joining in the fray.

But the real icing on the cake is the increased entries for the main event, the Datuk Arthur Tan Malaysia open, that will start on Sept 1. Last year, the field consisted of exactly 100 players. Until Tuesday, 135 players have already registered for this year’s edition.

For a long time, the organisers have been overly cautious about disclosing publicly the list of participants for fear that the foreign entries could be persuaded to withdraw and play elsewhere. Maybe the fear was unfounded but then, anything can happen in the world of chess today.

(Fong Mi Yen.)

Nevertheless, today being the eve of the Malaysia Chess Festival where everything comes together, I can now safely say that the grandmasters registered for the Malaysia open include:

Abhijeet Gupta (India, rated 2587), Zhou Weiqi (China, 2570), Ziaur Rahman (Bangladesh, 2543), Cao Sang (Vietnam, 2540), Prasad Arun (India, 2535), David Smerdon (Australia, 2526), Dao Thien Hai (Vietnam, 2516), Wen Yang (China, 2507), R.R. Laxman (India, 2503), Xu Jun (China, 2503), Nguyen Anh Dung (Vietnam, 2500), Saidali Yuldachev (Uzbekistan, 2496), Jha Sriram (India, 2490), Xu Yuhua (China, 2488), Marat Dzhumaev (Uzbekistan, 2484), Gerhard Schebler (Germany, 2474) and Niaz Murshed (Bangladesh, 2406).

They may not be the top echelon of grandmasters in the world but hey, the Malaysia open was never about attracting the crème de la crème of grandmasters in the first place. Much like water finding its own level, grandmasters and international masters will find the right level of tournaments to suit their playing levels.

Anyway, the Malaysia open will also feature two woman grandmasters from China and Vietnam, at least 18 international masters, several Fide masters and woman Fide masters.

The Malaysian challenge will be spearheaded by international masters Mok Tze Meng and Jimmy Liew.

There is a sizeable number of Malaysian entries and apart from Mok and Liew, we have four national masters in the field, too, namely, Lim Chuin Hoong, current national champion Tan Khai Boon, Edward Lee and Evan Timothy Capel. There will also be a spotlight on Yeoh Li Tian. I should also mention the presence of two of our woman national masters, current women’s national champion Fong Mi Yen and Alia Anin Azwa Bakri, as among the competitors.

MANILA, Philippines, 26 Aug 2010 – The Anti-Money Laundering Council (AMLC) has filed before the Department of Justice a complaint against an individual posing as a recruiter of caregivers and nurses.

In its complaint-affidavit, AMLC filed 50 counts of money laundering charges against Wilfredo Almira Isaac, Jr., who has also been using different aliases such as Paul Almanza Sauer, Allain Boy Paras Mallabo, John Almira Jasmin, Cyrus Ramos Villanueva and Dennis Ramos Dominguez.

Isaac allegedly uses the Internet to manipulate unsuspecting victims.

He would pretend as a foreign employer posing as an official from different hospitals abroad. His advertisements are then posted on job search websites such as jobsdb and jobstreet.

He would then send e-mails to prospective applicants, requiring them to attend a “British English Training Course.”

He would entice them by saying they are not required to pay placement fees, processing fees, etc. The applicant’s salary will also not be deducted.

The employer will also allegedly shoulder the airfare, work permits and visa processing fees.

All that the applicant would pay are the medical and training fees, ranging from P3,000 to P45,000, to be paid to Carondelt Training and Review Center and Flyff Training and Review Center or to certain GCash accounts designated by the respondent.

Isaac would then tell the applicant that nobody has ever failed the training.

The applicants, who were never actually employed, filed estafa and large-scale illegal recruitment. The earliest case goes back to as early as 2007.

A warrant of arrest was consequently issued by the Manila Regional Trial Court.

Isaac was able to evade arrest, until the victims lost interest in pursuing the case.

It was subsequently dismissed.

AMLC however noted the money laundering charges should proceed because the main case was not assessed on its merits.

AMLC said the 50 counts of money laundering correspond to the number of cash out or withdrawal transactions he made with the money he obtained illegally.

He won’t be playing in any of the tournaments. Rather, he will be here for only a few days in early September before jetting off to continue with his worldwide campaign to become the next president of the World Chess Federation (Fide).

Nevertheless, spectators and participants alike at the Malaysia Chess Festival can expect to bump into the former world champion.

A keen rivalry has developed between former chess world champion Anatoly Karpov and Kirsan Ilyumzhinov for the presidency of the World Chess Federation

If you need him to autograph any of his chess books, this will be an opportunity for you.

Chess enthusiasts can also look forward to a special subscription-based buka puasa function with him on Sept 5.

When I was speaking to the organisers of the festival earlier this week, I was reminded that they were facing possibly the greatest challenges to their organisational capabilities in the last seven years.

For the first time since the inception of the Datuk Arthur Tan Malaysia open chess championship in 2004, the organisers are bracing for a rival competition in nearby Philippines to pull away some of the entries.

Yes, there is also an international chess tournament that’s been planned in Manila at almost the same time.

Normally, federations would work together to ensure that international tournaments do not overlap. It’s not difficult to understand why. If tournaments do not overlap, it would be easier to persuade players – especially professional chess players – to play in these events one after another.

It maximises their investment of time and money to fly to this region to play in the chess competitions, and all organisers are happy with the quality of players that they can attract.

Not this time.

The National Chess Federation of the Philippines (NCFP) has been promised US$100,000 (US$320,000) by Kirsan Ilyumzhinov, the current Fide president, to hold a tournament in memory of his predecessor, Florencio Campomanes, who died earlier this year.

Now, with Campomanes being a Filipino and all that, there was no way that the NCFP was going to say no to holding this memorial event. But for some reason, the dates chosen for their event were pushed from mid-August to the end of August. This overlapped with the dates for the Malaysia Chess Festival.

Some people say that it had been done with a purpose.

It’s not that the NCFP is unaware that the Malaysia Chess Festival is an annual event. The festival is already in its seventh year and is well publicised around the world.

In the past, Filipino chess players have always turned up to support both the Datuk Arthur Tan Malaysia open and the Merdeka rapid chess team tournaments.

But not this year.

Word has been going around that the NCFP had advised its players in no uncertain terms that they should be playing in Manila instead of Kuala Lumpur.

Worse still, there is unconfirmed news that the top Filipino players have been threatened with bans by their federation should they ignore this “advice”.

In all likelihood, the Filipino players will not be here.

Certainly, those players who have already been selected by their federation for the Chess Olympiad in Khanty-Mansiysk will not want to jeopardise their selection status.

Those players not in the Filipino team can’t be bothered with the ban but they may be attracted to the larger prize monies at the Campomanes memorial tournament in Manila.

All this is very sad because if Campomanes were alive today, the last thing he would want was for his memorial tournament to clash with the Malaysian Chess Festival.

Campomanes has always been a very good and supportive friend of Malaysia. It was a friendship that started in 1974 and even until last year, he had been a regular visitor here.

But why, you may ask, is the NCFP risking to upset the other federations in the region?

The answer may be simply that it all boils down to relationships and the charged atmosphere that’s presently enveloping chess, an atmosphere created by the Fide election campaign.

In the world of chess, there is a close bond between Fide and the NCFP. It started with Campomanes’ election as Fide president in 1982. The bond remained after Ilyumzhinov took over the Fide reins. Even Campomanes’ death has not changed this relationship.

It is publicly known that the NCFP is supporting the Ilyumzhinov ticket at the Fide elections next month, while Malaysia’s stand has been to side with Karpov.

There are claims by Karpov’s team that the Ilyumzhinov team has been going around the world promising great rewards to national federations that support them.

Whether or not this claim can be substantiated is not for me to say but in the absence of any other explanation, any observer will be guessing that if this claim is true, then there’s every reason for the NCFP to want their Campomanes memorial tournament to succeed at the expense of the Malaysian Chess Festival.

Nevertheless, the organisers of the Malaysian Chess Festival are quite confident that the Manila event will have little impact on the success of our local festival.

“We are still enjoying very good response from the foreign players. They know Malaysian hospitality well and they know that when they play here, they are among old friends. Friendship counts a lot among real friends,” said one of the organisers.

1. Decide who will benefit

Your spouse or children will not always inherit everything if you die without having written a Will. Also, unmarried or single-sex couples have no automatic legal rights of inheritance. If you are leaving money to your children, consider whether you want them to inherit when they reach 18 years old or a later age.

2. Who will act as executor and deal with the winding up of the estate?

You can let the main beneficiary act. But if you are not confident that he can act for you, you should think about appointing a Trust company to provide professional guidance in winding up the estate. It is usually more expensive but the job of administering the estate may get done more quickly and efficiently.

3. Who will act as guardians of any minor children?

If not appointed in the Will, your children could be placed with someone who is not your first choice as guardian. Guardians may also control the children’s trust fund, but it is often better to have the executors act as independent trustees. This is to balance the guardians’ short-term view of the children’s immediate needs against a long-term investment plan. In making the appointment, you must also ensure that executors and guardians work together for the benefit of the children rather than fighting between themselves.

4. Gifts of money

If you so desire, you can decide how much you want to give to friends, wider family or organisations.

5. Gifts of property

If you want to leave a specific item, a proper description is needed to identify it. A vague reference to ‘a china tea-set’ will not do – the make or pattern must be stated. Remember that if you sell or break the item the gift will lapse.

6. Gifts to charity

Any charity benefiting under your Will must be properly named and you must include its registered address.

7. Special circumstances

If you have been divorced, have children from a previous relationship or any legal obligation to maintain someone the person writing your Will should be made aware of this. Also tell him if any beneficiary is in exceptional circumstances, such as a child with special educational needs. Trust clauses may be needed to protect them.

8. You won’t need

A formal valuation of your assets is unnecessary, although you should have a vague idea of your worth.

9. You will need

Take along the full names, identification numbers and addresses of all beneficiaries, guardians, executors and anyone else you want mentioned in the Will. Obtain the consent of guardians and executors before you appoint them. Divorce documents or agreements over maintenance can be useful, so take them just in case.

10. Pick up the phone

Any lawyer can draw a basic Will, but you could need better resources from specialist will-writing companies such as Rockwills Corporation. Most will give a quotation of fees and have your will ready for early signature.

Buying a house, marrying or having children are all trigger points for making or reviewing a Will, whatever your age. Most people see it as a preparation for death, but in reality it is the best protection you can buy for your family.

For more details or consultation in Penang, southern Kedah or northern Perak, please do contact this writer here.

If the top 10 players in each country are taken as the basis of comparison, the Russian men leads their Chinese counterparts by 89 rating points today. And if a comparison is made of their women chess players, the difference is even smaller: a mere 11 points separate the 10 best players from both sides.

Therefore, a match between these two chess superpowers would make a very good reason to determine which country is superior.

And actually, there is such a match going on today. It is the seventh such encounter between the two countries but it did not start out as an annual match because after the first one was played in Shanghai in 2001, there was a three-year gap before the second match was organised in Moscow in 2004.

After that, the chess federations of the two countries thought it best to have an annual match and so, Argun in Russia was the host in 2006, followed by the fourth match in Nizhni Novgorod in 2007, Ningbo in China in 2008, and last year’s match in Sochi, Russia.

Tough opponent: Wang Hao, China’s chess champion.

This year’s match is taking place today in Yinzhou, Ninbo in China. It started on Aug 4 and will end this Sunday. Each side is fielding five men’s players and five women’s players.

The match comprises a Scheveningen-style of team event where the members of each team will play the members of the opposing team once at normal time controls, followed by rapidchess games and finally, a series of blitz games. Of course, to ensure an even playing field, the men are competing among themselves only and likewise, the women are playing among themselves, too.

In the first round, the China men’s team won with a 3-2 score but the Russian women won 3½-1½. In the second round, the Russian men were almost whitewashed when China won by 4½-½. However, the women’s teams fought to a 2½-2½ draw. In the third round, Russia and China tied at 2½-2½ in both the men’s and women’s contests.

The fourth round saw the men drawing on all the boards, while the Russian women edged out their Chinese opponents by a 3-2 margin. In the fifth, both the Chinese men’s and women’s sides won by 3-2.

The final score at the end of the normal time control games on Tuesday was 27 points to the China team and 23 points to Russia.

The Chinese men’s team could take credit that they did not lose any of the rounds. At their worst, they drew the third round but at their best, they almost totally blanked out the Russian men in the second round.

Life expectancy is rising and property prices are rocketing. As a result, many older people are looking to the future and asking: how will my assets be managed if my faculties desert me? They wish to protect themselves, and their legatees, from possible consequences of any future physical or – more significantly – mental infirmity.

With this in mind, many older people are choosing to donate enduring power of attorney (EPA) to a trusted relative, friend or professional, such as a bank manager. If this person feels that the donor has reached a point where he or she can no longer cope, he or she can apply to the Public Guardianship Office (the PGO, the administrative arm of the Court of Protection) to have the EPA registered – and thereby gain certain powers to manage the donor’s affairs.This process is not automatic: power of attorney is granted only after rigorous scrutiny and the donor has a right to object.

Even after power of attorney has been granted, the donor may still be considered capable of carrying out certain legal steps – such as making a will. It is a common misconception that registration means that the donor can no longer make a will independently, without the involvement of the attorney and the Court of Protection. But a High Court case last year shows that assumption to be mistaken.

The case involved a spinster in her nineties, living alone in her own home, who became physically infirm and mentally incapable of dealing with day-to-day business such as payment of bills, cooking and cleaning. She needed a home help, who was paid from her assets by her bank. Her attorney, family and friends suspected that the home help was attempting to secure the covert creation of a new will in her favour. Registration was sought on the mistaken assumption that this would make any such move impossible.

When the donor died the home help produced a will, signed six months earlier, making her a significant beneficiary and sole executor. No one knew of the will’s existence other than the home help, a will-writer and his wife, who served as second witness. No medical advice had been sought and no legal advice obtained other than the expertise of the will-writer. He had not inquired as to the possible existence of an EPA.

The family and other beneficiaries under an earlier will sought to have the later will set aside. This the court did on the basis of lack of testamentary capacity. The defendant had been granted legal aid and the substantial costs of both sides were paid from the estate.

A will correctly drafted, signed and witnessed, even in dubious circumstances, is a powerful instrument. Any attempt to overturn it is likely to be long, difficult, expensive and uncertain of outcome. This can be even more problematic if the beneficiary is also made executor, giving him or her initial control over the papers of the deceased, including earlier wills.

The PGO’s advice is: “If a doctor and a solicitor consider that the donor is mentally able to make a will, you do not need our permission for it to be drawn up and signed. Legal and medical advice is essential.” But this can give a false sense of security to attorneys and other interested parties.

Provided a will satisfies the minimal legal requirements it is prima facie valid – even a will kit from a stationer, signed on the kitchen table. A beneficiary or executor does not have to prove that such a will is valid; it is for a claimant to prove that it is invalid.

The case has important implications for anyone arranging domiciliary care. Consideration should be given to making it a condition of employment that the employee does not discuss legal or financial matters with the person being cared for. If possible, this could be made a term of a written contract. If there is firm evidence that the term is being breached, the contract can be terminated.

It may also be wise to arrange a periodic medical examination of the patient.

The elderly staying in their homes are served by a growing body of casual domiciliary workers, largely without training, accreditation or regulation. Old people enjoy less protection than children, although their substantial assets make them more vulnerable, if not to fraud and manipulation then to testamentary complications. It is in everyone’s interests that this is promptly addressed.

The author is involved in the welfare of the elderly in the United Kingdom

By all accounts, it can be safely assumed that Wong Zijing is no longer playing in chess competitions. As far as I can determine, he hasn’t been playing much at all since August 2006. In fact, even social chess may have taken a back seat for him as his last known attempt at a serious chess game must have been at last year’s annual chess match between the teams of Cambridge and Oxford universities.

His friends and fellow chess players in the country may want to know that he is now pursuing his Doctorate at the University of California Berkeley in the United States. He asked me to say “hi” to them.

Before going to the States, Wong was at University of Cambridge in England and before that, the Korea Advanced Institute of Science and Technology. He is now doing research on a specialist area of science called metamaterials.

Anyway, after taking a look at the picture in last week’s column, Wong dropped me a short note to say that it was about time that 12-year-old Yeoh Li Tian, pictured playing a blitz game with former world chess champion Anatoly Karpov, decide whether he wants to be like “Le Quang Liem” or “one of us”.

He didn’t mince his words. The “one of us” refers explicitly to himself and his chess peers, local players like Mas Hafizulhelmi, Lim Yee Weng, Marcus Chan, Nicholas Chan and Lim Chuin Hoong.

Note this: Wong Zijing has some interesting things to say about 12-year-old chess player Yeoh Li Tian.

The “Le Quang Liem” he mentioned happens to be Vietnam’s top chess player. Liem joined the world’s grandmaster club four years ago.

Today, while only 19 years old but with an international rating of 2681 points, he is already knocking on the doors of that even more elite club of chess grandmasters who are rated at 2,700 points and above. There are not many of them, certainly not more than 40 players currently in this category of super-grandmasters.

I knew fairly well what Wong was trying to say but his note made such a fascinating impression that I wanted to know more from him.

He said that it is well known that to become a grandmaster like Liem, you need to be a professional chess player and the financial support to train abroad.

Recently, the Vietnam Chess Federation stated that Liem would require an annual fund of US$100,000. Then there is the player’s own commitment and sacrifices, especially academic sacrifice. Is our society ready for that, he questioned.

“I have a good friend in China who told me that many of the Chinese grandmasters had quit school early in their lives to take up a professional career in chess. Many of them had not even completed their primary education.

“Are our chess players prepared to make such personal sacrifices?” he asked. “My peers and I had to balance chess with our studies because at the end of the day, we have to think about our own livelihood and our direction in life.”

Livelihood. Indeed, if we look at some of our national champions, I can say that they have ended up very well in life. Mas Hafizulhelmi is today a chemical engineer, both Lim Chuin Hoong and Nicholas Chan are medical doctors, Lim Yee Weng is a lawyer while Marcus Chan is an electronics engineer.

Even Ooi Chern Ee, arguably our highest ranked player not to have become a national champion, is an actuarist. But to get where they are today, they recognise that they had to sacrifice their chess.

According to Wong, only geniuses are able to continue with this fine balance in their lives. He believed that Gata Kamsky, a chess prodigy, was one of them.

(Kamsky was born in the old Soviet Union in 1974 and his family emigrated to the United States in 1989. At 16 years old, he took his first steps towards the pinnacle of world chess and ultimately challenged Viswanathan Anand for the Professional Chess Association version of the chess crown in 1995. One year later, he challenged Anatoly Karpov for the World Chess Federation version of the chess title. After he lost both matches, he disappeared completely from the chess world for nine years to earn his law degree and then returned to top-level chess in 2004 with great success.)

Unless you are like Kamsky, Wong said, it is almost impossible to find that balance between chess and work. Where Li Tian is concerned, he suggested that the boy would have to make up his mind soon.

No doubt, his one-month stint in Beijing last year and his present chess tutelage under Bangladeshi grandmaster Ziaur Rahman would help his chess grow in the short to medium term. But he must either have the courage to make chess his profession or concentrate on his studies and eventually “be like one of us”.

“It’s a tough decision, very tough indeed,” Wong acknowledged, “but there are no two ways about it.”

Karpov, 59, was in Kuala Lumpur for three days last week as part of a whirlwind visit through several Asian countries to raise support in his bid to be elected the next Fide president.

According to Karpov, the leadership in Fide had not achieved much in the past 15 years and had neglected the interests of many of the chess federations in its fold.

One of the sore points that Karpov raised was that the incumbent Fide president, Kirsan Ilyumzhinov, had alienated international sponsors.

(Face-to-face: Karpov playing with 12-year-old Yeoh Li Tian.)

“Chess is one of the most active sports in the world and Fide has 158 member countries.

‘In terms of members, we are among the biggest international sports federations and yet we don’t see long-term ties with sponsors that should benefit us,” Karpov charged.

“For example, world chess championship matches used to offer prize money by the millions of dollars but ever since the present Fide president came on board, we have seen lower prize monies. In fact, the many changes in the formats for the world championship cycles have caused a lot of confusion. Is it any wonder that international sponsors have shied away?” he asked.

If his team gets elected at the Fide congress this September, one priority would be to bring dignity back to chess. According to him, short 10-game or 12-game matches were hardly reflective of chess struggles at the highest levels.

“World championship matches should not be less than 16 or 18 games but Fide presently finds difficulty to bring in quality sponsors who can support matches of this length.” he said.

Karpov gave another example of the decreasing visibility, saying that significant activities like world championship matches used to be played in the big cities of the world – New York, London, Seville, Paris – but he claimed that since 1995, these events were being moved to lesser cities.

“It doesn’t say much for chess that this year’s chess Olympiad – the traditional biennial gathering for the worldwide chess family of close to 160 countries – is being held in Siberia, in a place called Khanty-Mansiysk,” he claimed.

And in truth, that is correct because I’ve written about Khanty-Mansiysk before. Even getting there is going to be problematic as most connecting flights are only available from Moscow and it’s a journey of several days.

But the chord that struck home was that in recent years, national chess federations have been feeling the pinch of having to pay increasingly higher fees for all sorts of activities. Smaller chess federations such as the Malaysian Chess Federation find that annual fees have gone up significantly.

Getting new players onto the Fide rating list, no matter their rating levels, means getting billed. Then there are the fees for registering even Fide-rated events. All these add up and it is not surprising that there are countries that find themselves temporarily out of benefit from Fide because fees are in arrears.

The MCF, for example, found out that our players were temporarily removed from the Fide rating list because of unpaid dues.

According to Karpov, countries should not be forced to fund Fide. It should be the other way around, that Fide should instead be helping the countries raise funds for their activities.

“It should make sense,” he argued, “that a happy national chess federation will contribute more towards the progress of chess.”

Apart from Malaysia, Karpov and his small entourage that included his candidate for deputy president, Richard Conn Jr, had travelled through China, Japan, Singapore, Indonesia, Vietnam and Thailand.

While in Kuala Lumpur, Karpov paid a courtesy call on Olympic Council of Malaysia president Tunku Imran ibni Almarhum Tuanku Ja’afar at the OCM office and was guest of honour at a function hosted by the Malaysian Chess Federation’s honorary life president, Datuk Tan Chin Nam, who incidentally also sits in Karpov’s Advisory Team.

The former world champion also played two exhibition blitz games with Malaysian international master Mas Hafizulhelmi and up-and-coming youngster Yeoh Li Tian, winning against both players.