For all the armchair critics of the Commander

COMMENT | They say power corrupts and nowhere is this more axiomatic than in Wan Saiful Wan Jan, who used to peddle this image of being in the vanguard of Malay thought. In 2017 he wrote two big think pieces - ‘Affirmative action is morally wrong’ and ‘Bring back morality into economics’ which slipped under the radar but were interesting reads steeped in the kind of genuine American conservatism (as opposed to Trumpism) that used to be spread around by local lads influenced by outreach programmes from K Street.

You can read my take on those pieces here – “What I really like about Wan Saiful’s piece beyond his candour is that he stakes no middle ground. He argues against affirmative action as something morally wrong and does not attempt to soften the stance by pandering to the politically-correct narrative of a 'needs-based' approach.”

A friend had warned me privately and publicly about being too enamoured by Wan Saiful's rhetoric and his conduct since joining a race-based political party has proven that his deeds, not words, defined his political stance.

Ever since embracing the racial politics of Bersatu, which is a replica of Umno, and joining the treacherous bunch in the Sheraton Move, Wan Saiful has been peddling his racial polemics and various other failed political stratagems as a means to secure power for his coterie of treacherous cohorts.

Wan Saiful's latest remarks about how people trying to legitimately topple a backdoor government are agents of the DAP and Pakatan Harapan are the kind of Malay uber alles propaganda that got Umno into trouble in the first place. 

First of all, it is not about the DAP and Wan Saiful knows this. The only political operatives who could topple the Periktan Nasional regime are sections of the Malay political establishment.

The only people who could split the Malay vote - and they have demonstrated they can - are members of Malay political parties. Anwar Ibrahim did not split the Malay vote, try as he might. What he managed to do was destabilise the Umno hegemon by forming alliances with disparate power groups.

So the only reason why the DAP is dragged into this Malay political power play is that it is hoped that Malay personalities attempting to dislodge the PN regime would be guilty by association with the supposedly “Chinese” chauvinistic party.

This is why Wan Saiful does not have the cajones to name names – who knows how the dust will settle and Bersatu, if it still exists, may need to grovel before the new Malay powerbrokers in town – but is merely content to throw racial incendiary remarks against his political opponents.

As I have argued before and in the words of strategists like Liew Chin Tong, the DAP “never failed Muhyiddin” which means it never failed Bersatu but this was never enough.

When Wan Saiful was on the other side, he had no problem splitting the Malay vote when he was riding with the Old Maverick. He had no problem pontificating on how Umno had betrayed the Malay cause and was wallowing in cronyism and corruption. 

He had no problem associating with the DAP and using the DAP to get non-Malay votes. He had no problem mocking those who claimed that Harapan – which Bersatu was a part of – was destroying the ummah.

He had no problem being an agent of the "DAP" - which was what Umno peddled before they lost the election - and jeopardising the political stability of the country, which again, was the propaganda peddled by Umno.

Regime in shambles

To imply that someone like Tengku Razaleigh Hamzah, who is an arch Malay establishment figure, is an “agent” of the DAP, points to how Bersatu and PN have strayed so far off the reservation and is demonstrative of how much in shambles this regime is. 

The fact that Malay power brokers, for whatever reasons, are so desperate to cling on to the gravy train should tell us of the shape of things to come.

Demonising the DAP is an old trick but is the only kind Bersatu plays because it is too lazy to think of new ones. Muhkriz Mahathir has already exposed the con of using the DAP as a punching bag for all the problems that Malay parties cannot handle. 

He said, "Looking at Umno, when there were big issues which we could not address, we would talk about DAP, Chinese chauvinism and how Lim Kit Siang becoming prime minister would destroy Malaysia, that the Malays would disappear, and the mosques can no longer air the azan.”

If it makes anyone feel better, Muhkriz said that he did feel guilty and so maybe one day, Wan Saiful will feel guilty too. But then again, Wan Saiful was one of the brights lights defending the Jasa budget of RM85.5 million, which was essentially a fund to demonise the DAP. 

Of course, spending RM85 million to spread the word, when you have the entire mainstream media at your disposal, is pretty redundant.

The rakyat was wondering how anti-DAP propaganda is going to benefit their lives and make life a little easier for those living on the margins in this pandemic. More importantly, could that RM85 million be used for something more tangible? Apparently, the budget was slashed in half, but you get an idea of how propaganda and cronyism go hand in hand.

Every Umno, PAS and any other Malay establishment figure knows that demonising the DAP is propaganda. They know that every time something goes wrong with their policies or to cover their behinds when it comes to the infighting in their political parties, blaming the DAP is an effective strategy that will distract from their failings.

The DAP can take cold comfort in the fact that whatever political wounds it self-inflicts will always be overshadowed by the virulent attacks against it by the Malay establishment. This is damaging to the country, but makes it easier to rally the political base.