COMMENT | A sneak peek into the former attorney-general's soon to be released memoir reveals a
tantalising tidbit of how the old maverick attempted to pressure him to
resign because of “Malay opposition”. Of course, like everyone else, I
wonder why the Pakatan Harapan political elite would nominate a
non-Malay and then be “surprised” by the reaction from the “Malay
community”.
You see, the old maverick is always cultivating such
tensions. Tommy Thomas should resign because he was a target of Malay
opposition. Lim Guan Eng wanted to resign to ease tensions. Meanwhile,
Anwar Ibrahim is not a suitable candidate for the prime minister's post
because the Malays reject him for being a liberal.
Dr Mahathir Mohamad, as reported in Berita Harian: “Anwar keluar-keluar (Umno), dia buat parti liberal. Dia nak dapat sokongan daripada DAP, maka dia ajak DAP masuk, PAS masuk. Falsafah dia liberal". The
former Harapan prime minister added that this was why the majority of
Malays rejected Anwar and why he (Mahathir) was needed to court the
Malay vote.
Why
don’t we just legislate this issue? Why doesn’t the Malay establishment
work with their willing non-Malay counterparts and draft up legislation
that non-Malays and Malay liberals cannot hold positions of power and
influence in the government because this would cause distress to the
Malay community?
Why not draw up legislation which would give
legal validity to all those fears and grievances of the Malay community
when it comes to non-Malay/liberal Malay leadership in this country?
After all, non-Malay political operatives and Malay liberals are always
warned not to spook the Malays or not trespass into territories that are
supposedly exclusive “Malay”. For years we were fed the narrative that
the government was supposed to be a bastion of Malay leadership and
privilege.
Or how about this - why not all non-Malay and liberal
Malay candidates sign pledges that even if elected to state or federal
level they would not seek positions of power and influence. Maybe
assistant roles would be all they would hope to achieve but the big
positions would only be for the Malays of the "illiberal" persuasion.
This is in line with what PAS said
during that wonderful Malay dignity congress that many Malay leaders
attended. "Obviously we will take it up to the government for discussion
as this reflects the feelings of the Malays, and they are worried about
their future. We want to find ways so the Malays can play a role in
restoring their honour".
After all, if every time a non-Malay
(especially if they come from Harapan) needs to worry about restoring
honour for the Malay community, maybe the federal government and state
governments should just legislate and make it clear that non-Malays and
liberal Malays can never be qualified to do so?
This way we can
avoid all these needless controversies of how non-Malays in positions of
power or influence are threatening the Malay community. This way we can
make it clear that it is government policy not to have non-Malays in
positions of power instead of this drama of the PM - whoever it is –
asking folks to resign because of Malay opposition. The same goes for
Malay liberals.
I
have no idea if the Malay community really objects to the appointment
of non-Malays to positions of power and influence. I do know that what
they think of as "liberal" is complete horse manure. The only time we
hear of Malay discontent is from political operatives who claim to
represent Malay interests but who keep telling us that the Malays are
lagging in the social and economic spheres of influence.
'Embodiment of evil'
I
have no idea if this Malay outrage really exists because like all these
manufactured outrages, the people who ferment trouble and incite the
Malay community to action are political operatives and the various
outsourced grievance machines often funded by the state.
Malay
political operatives either incite opposition to non-Malay politicians
or coddle anti-democratic, fascist or racist sentiments against
non-Malay political operatives. If someone like Syed Saddique Syed Abdul
Rahman has to write about how he thought that Lim Guan Eng was the embodiment of evil, it should tell us – non-Malays – of the kind of propaganda that has taken hold of the majority community.
Mind
you, as someone who has very specific criticism against the DAP, I have
never thought of anyone in the Malaysian mainstream politics as “evil
incarnate”. Can you imagine the level of toxicity that propaganda
organs spew to incite such levels of fear and mistrust?
And it is
not as if the Malay establishment has not dealt with non-Malays in
positions of power and influence or even liberal Malays for that matter.
The underlying theme in such transactions is that those “acceptable”
non-Malays in positions of power and influence pose no threat to the
Malay political establishment and "liberal" Malays have always provided a
fig leaf for all the other nonsense that goes on in government.
So
where does this leave you? Either with Malay political operatives who
are there because they can defend race and religion which means they
will side with the Malay establishment or non-Malays who will kowtow to
the Malay establishment because they are “acceptable”. In this
situation, can anyone really trust the government?
It also makes
any objective assessment of the way appointees carry out their roles
impossible because Malay only leadership by its definition means that
any objective assessment of their abilities is moot because race is the
determining factor. Qualified independent Malays would be unsuitable for
such positions.
Meanwhile, acceptable non-Malays will always be
referred to as running dogs because they would be too busy giving the
impression that upholding Malay dignity is their mandate no matter which
part of the government they lead.
I do not normally use the
“think of the children” line of argument but in this case, think of the
children. Non-Malay young adults and children are told by politicians
that their very existence in leadership roles are a threat to the Malay
community. Meanwhile, Malay young adults and children are told that only
they can lead this country and anyone else who is not of their “race”
and “religion” are an existential threat. And forget about how these
Malays are supposed to think about Malay liberals.
And remember, kids, it is Malay Muslim and not just Muslim. So if you are Muslim convert than you are not fit to lead this country too. Ridhuan Tee Abdullah is, of course, upset.
