"MCA" 2.0

COMMENT | DAP organising secretary Anthony Loke made a couple of strange points in the press recently. He said: "The debate on the direction of DAP is small and concerns only party members” and “While we are pluralistic in our thinking, we have never said that we must give up our cultural roots."

Both these points are part of a larger narrative that has plagued the DAP for decades and are the talking points of Malay uber alles political operatives.

Firstly, the direction of the DAP does not only concern party members but should be of concern to all Malaysians. How DAP’s internal politics and how members vote will determine the kind of political party that non-Malays - and let us be honest, non-Malays are the DAP’s base - would be asked to support.

The internal politics of the DAP would not be an issue if whoever led the DAP subscribed to the foundational ideas of the DAP instead of the propaganda and toxicity that has replaced such ideas and principles.

Therein lies the rub. The foundational ideas of the DAP and such ideas that were once promulgated by the old warhorses of the DAP, which Lim Kit Siang is perhaps the best example of, are no longer considered sacrosanct in the DAP.

It became about the vacuity of saving Malaysia, 1MDB and ejecting kleptocrats by working with political operatives who the DAP once accused of being the biggest thieves in the country. Blame shifting has replaced self-reflection any time the DAP is at a crossroads.

DAP's Honest Broker

Second, I have no idea what “cultural roots” means? Is it the “Chineseness” that Ronnie Liu was admonished for and how do these cultural roots jive with the Bangsa Malaysia malarkey that a certain section of the DAP likes to go on about?

These two points neatly fold into what Umno veteran Shahrir Abdul Samad said about the DAP not having a history of working well with “conservatives” because the DAP is intent on pushing secular values. Now, it is pointless quibbling when politicians use terminology and concepts that they are not familiar with.

Forget about the terminology for a minute, but what Shahrir said is factually wrong. The DAP has a history of kowtowing to Malay power brokers and mixing politics with religion. 

They have political operatives who use their faith as the foundation of their political beliefs and use religious talking points while campaigning or rejecting egalitarian policies when it comes to LGBTQ rights, for example, and pandering to religious policies all the while admonishing the base for rejecting such policies (in the name of compromise) because, at one time, the DAP rejected them too.

The reality is that DAP has bent over backwards to support pro-Islamic and pro-Malay policies, not to mention pro-Malay political operatives, all while being subject to the anti-Islam and anti-Malay propaganda that they should have tackled decades ago, instead of playing the victim card while engaging in the same behaviour they accuse the MCA of.

I would argue that Umno's propaganda that DAP is "anti-Malay" and "anti-Islam" was beneficial to the DAP because non-Malays flocked to their banner under the mistaken impression that secularism and egalitarianism were the bedrock on which DAP pursued public policy.

This is why no matter what the DAP does, no matter how much they bend over for the Malay political establishment, it will never be enough. This is why we have these tensions within the DAP. The identity politics in the DAP, like most forms of such politics, is reactionary.

Why? For years, the DAP demonised the MCA for colluding with the “ketuanan types”, only to practice the same kind of power-sharing when it was their turn in the hot seat, however briefly.

The DAP set the bar so high that any attempt to navigate through the corridors of Malay power were futile because the folks who voted for the DAP as a “secular” alternative to the race-based power-sharing model, become disappointed by the way how DAP fit so snugly into the role they politicised for decades.

In 2012, when debating with MCA president Dr Chua Soi Lek, DAP secretary-general Lim Guan Eng claimed: “We should not bow to fate and have the right to equality. We should not kneel and beg. We should be brave enough to stand and ask for it.”

Now, remember those words the old maverick said when defending his Malay bona fides: "We still have to give them, but what we gave to them was very small (compared to what the Malays got). But we could not say it then because then the Chinese would be angry."

Or remember the time when Lim arrogantly told MCA that its time was up, totally oblivious to the reality that his government was funding Malay-only institutions, the religious bureaucracy and Malay-only outreach programmes.

And he, as then finance minister - a castrated finance minister - was feuding about giving spare change (compared to what was given to assuage Malay grievances) to a Chinese educational institution.

Factional politics is part and parcel of the democratic process and the expression of which takes many forms. What is detrimental to the democratic process is when political parties do not stand for anything but engage in personality politics and single-issue campaigns to gin up the base.

There is all this talk of not going at it alone, but this is a strawman. Nobody is asking for the DAP to go at it alone. What the base wants, what they should want, is a party that, at the very least, attempts to conform to principles that could very well save this country, instead of pandering to political structures and all the while gaslighting its voting base.

COMMENT | You have to give it to Abdul Hamid Bador, he is going out with a bang. You have to wonder - with the way the PDRM is conducting business these days and investigating certain people who exercise free speech - if the former inspector-general of police will be on the PDRM’s manure list.

I have no idea why people would even ask what Hamid’s motives are for spilling the beans at this moment. What an absurd question. 

Here we have the top cop of the country attacking the political apparatus, making allegations against the home minister and political frogs, questioning the legality of the appointment of his successor and some people think that the big takeaways are his motives?

Hamid likes to think he is revealing all now because he ”…. was busy trying to fix internal issues”, but the fact that he held a press conference of this nature is evidence of his failures. When he first talked about the “cartel” which was out to topple him, he reassured everyone that he could handle them.

Read his statements here, where he said that he was going to handle the problems in the house and that there was no need for an RCI (royal commission of inquiry), as if the state security apparatus was exempt from public scrutiny and legal processes - "I have explained it, that it is within my control. Why I shared this issue with the public is because I want the public to know that I know what they know (about issues plaguing the force)."

It is not for the IGP of this country to “handle” a group of rogue cops out to topple him and in the process engage in possibly criminal behaviour. 

The fact that de facto Law Minister Takiyuddin Hassan publicly stated that these allegations should be handled “in house” is also the kind of political interference that the IGP has railed against before - but now seems to think is an acceptable outcome for rogue police officers whom he claims he wants off the force.

The collusion between the state security apparatus and the political apparatus as an extension of political power is not new, of course. Hamid laments the power-hungry nature of certain political operatives, the interference of the political apparatus which oftentimes undermines the manner in which the security apparatus discharges its duties is actually mainstream in this country.

What Hamid did was merely confirm – and yes I give him credit for that, whatever his motives – that the political apparatus is aligning itself with state security personnel for mutual gain. Nobody says “our boy” without the underlying understanding that profit (political or otherwise) and cooperation, are the foundation of such promotions.

You can bet that “our boy” would be more amenable to anything the political class wanted and all these pesky talks about independent police commission and any form of public accountability would be thrown out the window. In other words, what the rakyat are left with is a political apparatus and a state security apparatus, which are beyond political and public oversight.

Say what you like about Hamid, but at least he entertained such ideas. The PDRM these days seems more interested in going after someone for causing animosity between the police and the public, which is strange because the public has always been sceptical of the PDRM, even more than they are of the political class. 

Police corruption was not something Hamid was afraid to talk about and this put him far ahead of other police potentates who ignored the issue or scapegoated an entire community, like the Terengganu police chief did with his ideas of race and crime. 

Hamid rightly raised the issue of corruption in the police force and he does deserve credit for doing more walking than talking when it came to this issue. 

But of course, the beast (system) was more than Hamid could contend with. Either he overestimated his influence or underestimated his adversaries.

Not that the nature of the beast was hidden. When two high-ranking and retired state security personnel wage a very public war accusing each other of corruption and malfeasance, you have to wonder whether it is a miracle that this country did not become one of Donald Trump’s "shit hole" countries a long time ago.

What we were witness to was the power play that went on between two former high-ranking police officers, which no doubt crossed from the bureaucratic to criminal, if the allegations and counter-allegations are to be believed. 

It also highlights the shadowy nexus between organised crime and law enforcement with added racial overtones, which is naturally par for the course in this country.

Hamid has in past pressers made allegations of former senior officers, including former police chiefs, engaged in acts that destabilise the integrity of the police force. All this is a matter of public record. 

The public has a right to know what exactly is going on and the measures being taken to correct the systemic dysfunction in the state security apparatus. 

Unfortunately, the public knows that nothing will ever come of these allegations. We have a history of not doing anything and for handling things "in-house".

This is the milieu political, racial and religious that Hamid was operating in, and we are to believe he wanted to reform. The fact is that whatever political plays he made in service of those goals failed. 

And yes, when you are the IGP, politics plays a very big part in the job. It is the same in any functional democracy.

The problem is that we were a dysfunctional democracy, and now, because the PN government does not think we need to resume Parliament anytime soon, we are not even a democracy. 

As for his comments on the Indira Gandhi case, blaming NGOs for the lack of will on the part of the PDRM, is laughable, but I suppose par for the course when it comes to the racial and religious dynamics at play.

A report on why Israel has for so long refused to recognize the first genocide of the 20th century, and the moral cost of that refusal, is here: “Why has Israel not yet recognized the Armenian Genocide?,” by Jeremy Sharon, Jerusalem Post, April 25, 2021.

The mass murder of an estimated 1.5 million Armenians from 1915 to 1917 by the regime of the Young Turks in Turkey is widely seen as the first genocide of the 20th century.

It is also an event that has for long pricked at the conscience of the Jewish people, which suffered the horrors of the Holocaust, the worst genocide of the 20th century and of modern times.

Despite the mutual experience of genocide, the State of Israel, ever since its founding, has shied away from recognizing the Armenian experience, a state of affairs that activists decry but others assert has been and continues to be a necessary aspect of the Jewish state’s delicate diplomatic and security position….

A few hours after this report was published at the Jerusalem Post, Joe Biden did recognize the genocide, which the U.S., and Israel, too, ought to have recognized many years ago.

ONE MAN who has struggled for decades to advance this cause is Prof. Israel Charny, whose new book, Israel’s Failed Response to the Armenian Genocide, details how and why the Jewish state has refrained from acknowledging the atrocities as genocide.

The genocide itself was preceded by a failed Turkish assault during the First World War against Russian forces to its east, and Turkey’s attempts to capture the Azeri city of Baku.

The Young Turk regime subsequently blamed Armenians in eastern Anatolia for betraying Turkey and accused them of being a fifth column in the country seeking independence.

As a result, Armenian soldiers in the Turkish army were disarmed and then systematically murdered by Turkish troops, and irregular forces then began committing massacres of Armenian civilians.

The proximate cause of the Armenian genocide from 1915 to 1917 was Turkish fury at having failed to prevail over the Russians in World War I, and the scapegoat was easy to find: the Ottoman Empire’s Armenian minority. But it did not take a defeat in a war to let loose the hatred of the Muslim Turks for the Christian Armenians. Already, between 1894 and 1896, there were the Hamidian massacres of up to 300,000 Armenians, who were killed because some of them had dared to protest their treatment by the government of Abdul Hamid II. Other Christians, too, were the victims of the Turks at the same time, for no other reason than that they were Christians: at Diyarbakir, 25,000 Assyrians were slaughtered along with Armenians. The Turks did not need much of a reason in 1894, or in 1915, to start mass-murdering Armenians, and what we carelessly describe as a “cause” of the Armenian genocide ought to be called more accurately an “excuse” for those killings.

COMMENT | When I see all these activists chanting “Free Fahmi” and “Political satire is not a crime”, all I can do is shrug. Well, yeah kids, it is a crime here in Malaysia and you know that when Pakatan Harapan had a chance to ditch such laws, they chose not to.

It is convenient to blame the Perikatan Nasional (PN) government for problems this country faces, but when Harapan promised solutions to these problems, they never delivered. As always, blame-shifting and deflection will define how Harapan handles issues like these.

It is pointless laying the blame on PN because, ultimately, it was Harapan’s responsibility to repeal these laws because, for the Malay uber alles government, sedition laws were always tools in their box of dirty tricks.

Not only did Harapan throw free speech advocates under the bus, never mind the citizens of Malaysia, who think that such issues are important, they were toying with the idea of ditching the sedition law, but replacing it with another. One form of repression for another. Is this the best Harapan has to offer?

When Ronnie Liu was hauled up by the then Harapan state under sedition laws for posting pictures of Thais protesting against the Thai monarchy, you have to wonder, if Harapan could have prevented this by repealing such laws.

 But wait, under Harapan, a woman’s march was investigated under sedition laws, then there was the preacher Wan Ji Wan Hussin and of course who could forget the persecution of Fadiah Nadwa Fikri.

Keep in mind that these are the stories that made the news cycles. Meanwhile, the Harapan state was also considering laws that would make news portals responsible for readers comments, which was taking the stifling freedom of speech to a whole new level. 

You better believe that these issues are important to me because, in countless pieces, I have been warning that these laws that Harapan chooses to waffle on will come back and bite them on their behinds, but more importantly, the average rakyat who does not have the luxury of being politically connected, or have a social media presence, will feel the full brunt of these laws when speaking up on issues that affect every Malaysian.

These laws are enacted to muzzle the public but, more importantly, are vital tools in the “fear box” to remind the public that whatever they say or do against the state is always under scrutiny. 

You can never tell what you say or do is seditious or illegal because these laws are there for the convenience of the ruling elite, rather than any kind of traditional normative values or reasoning of a functional democracy.

So, of course, when Harapan was in power, there was all this waffling because suddenly they realised that having these instruments makes it easier to restrict dissent. This is why the world's smallest violin was playing – at least in my mind – when Amanah vice-president Mujahid Yusof Rawa questioned why he was being investigated under the Sedition Act for questioning the legitimacy of the current prime minister. 

Lawyer Syahredzan Johan, who is also the political secretary to Lim Kit Siang, said in 2015: "We are saying that we have certain principles that we adhere to as a democracy. Freedom of speech and expression is part of our DNA, so we hold on to these values. If we don't say something because we are afraid they will come after us, then we are saying that these values are not that important to us. Do we want to be the kind of society that allows the authorities to do as they please because we fear getting into trouble?” 

To be fair to Syahredzan, he was always on the side that wanted these laws abolished and he was sceptical of tinkering with them. 

However, the reality is these laws were used on the opposition and activists for years and those same people who felt the oppression of these laws chose instead to commit to some sort of political pacts with fascists instead of their commitment to repealing such laws.

When P Waytha Moorthy, then minister in the Prime Minister's Department, said this in 2019 – "However, I do agree that there are elements within the Sedition Act which should remain, which I believe may be applied in the Penal Code and so on." –  you have to wonder exactly what other pernicious laws that Harapan political operatives thought beneficial to them when they were in charge.

This would make their rejection of these laws hypocritical because when in power they suddenly see the benefit of such instruments, just not when the other party uses these laws.

Of course in typical wonky Harapan thinking, RSN Rayer (Harapan-Jelutong) said this: "Is there a proposal, before repealing the Sedition Act, to enact a new law that keeps the aspiration of the Sedition Act while ensuring that it cannot be abused?" This is absurd because the aspiration of such laws is, as Syahredzan rightly pointed out in 2015, is to "imprison the minds of citizens" and as such, abuse is the very definition of such laws.

If you really want to see the kind of legalese that the Harapan state was engaging in, you should read the spat between lawyers for Wan Ji and the Attorney-General's Chambers. In the same article, then AG Tommy Thomas said: "Upon assuming office on June 2018, I decided, with regard to alternative laws in our statute books (including provisions in the Penal Code), to only turn to Sedition Act as a measure of last resort.”

Marcus Hempel and Karsten Hempel

Hey, man, celebrate diversity! You’re sounding pretty racist there!

“Police scandal: Syrian kills 30-year-old – then police persecute the victim’s father,” translated from “Polizei-Skandal: Syrer tötet 30-Jährigen – dann verfolgt Polizei Vater des Opfers,” by Göran Schattauer, Focus, April 15, 2021 (thanks to Medforth):

In 2017, a young Syrian killed the son of Karsten Hempel (56) in Saxony-Anhalt. After the perpetrator was sentenced to probation, the police prosecuted the victim’s father for alleged plans for revenge. According to FOCUS-Online research, the investigators used illegal methods. Hempel calls for clarification.

A new police scandal is looming in Saxony-Anhalt. According to research by FOCUS Online, the Dessau-Roßlau police inspection tried to protect a convicted violent criminal from Syria and took illegal measures against a German father whose son had been killed by the Syrian. Police suspect that the victim’s father has plans to revenge against Syrians

Specifically, it is about a “threat approach” to the 56-year-old Karsten Hempel from Wittenberg. The resource is usually used by right-wing extremists, Islamists or hooligans in order to dissuade them from potential acts of violence at an early stage. Hempel’s case was about alleged plans for revenge against the now 21-year-old Syrian Sabri H.

Background: On September 29, 2017, the then-17-year-old Sabri H. had an argument with Hempel’s son Marcus, right in front of a shopping center in Wittenberg. Sabri H. struck him with his fist, the 30-year-old victim fell and died a little later from his head injuries. The wound on the lower jaw was caused by a blow that was “carried out with considerable force,” noted the forensic doctors in the autopsy report.

Verdict against Sabri H .: two years probation. Sabri H. was convicted for the brutal act in March 2020. Not for murder, not for manslaughter, but for “bodily harm resulting in death.” Two years probation, plus 120 hours of work – the juvenile criminal chamber at the Magdeburg District Court considered this to be appropriate. So Sabri H. stayed at large. And he still is today.

At the end of 2020, the police said they had verbally received an informant’s tip that Karsten Hempel wanted to take revenge for the death of his son and wanted to do violence to Sabri H. To this day, the father vehemently denies the alleged plans. “Dangerous speech”: Police officers came straight into the office

Nevertheless, two criminal investigators visited him in December 2020 at his place of work and held a “threat approach.” Hempel, who works as a construction manager, found himself pushed into the role of a criminal. His colleagues witnessed the strange situation, even if the actual conversation took place in a separate room.

The aim of the visit was to “prevent disruptions to public security and order,” said the police. Hempel should refrain from “commissioning or inciting persons” to “harm Sabri H.’s health or threaten him.” He, too, should refrain from acts of revenge. If he did, he was threatened with “further security measures,” including imprisonment. Karsten Hempel: Memories of gloomy GDR times

Hempel couldn’t believe his ears and was reminded of the darkest conditions of the GDR (East Germany). “I thought the Stasi method had ended 30 years ago,” he told officials. It was common practice in the East that the state reacted to unfounded denunciations from citizens and thus plunged innocent people into misfortune. But in a democratic constitutional state? When asked who the whistleblower was, Hempel received no answer.

However, the 56-year-old had suspicions. He assumed that the “tip” came from the circle of the convicted violent criminal Sabri H. – or even from the Syrian himself. Because it is true that father Hempel sought contact with Sabri H. in the aftermath of the criminal proceedings in order to inform him that he intended to have him prosecuted under civil law – with success. Civil lawsuit against Sabri H .: More than 25,000 euros for father

A civil chamber of the Dessau-Roßlau regional court sentenced Sabri H. in July 2020 to reimburse Hempel for all damage he suffered “from the killing of his son.” Specifically, the court awarded him 20,000 euros for survivors’ benefits and 5300 euros for legal fees. The sums stipulated in the default judgment are “enforceable” according to the court.

Karsten Hempel’s attempt to have the money due to him seized failed. At the beginning of December 2020, Sabri H. claimed to a bailiff that he had no savings, furniture or other valuables.

He also stated that he did not live at his regular registered address, but with a friend’s family. According to the probation order, he would have had to report this “move” to the Magdeburg district court, which he had not done. Karsten Hempel’s lawyer then asked the public prosecutor to investigate a possible violation of the probation conditions.

Hempel filed a criminal complaint for “false suspicion” It is obvious that Sabri H. felt disturbed by Karsten Hempel’s legitimate research. The fact is: at some point the State Criminal Police Office of Saxony-Anhalt received the information that father Hempel supposedly wanted to take violent revenge on the Syrian. Immediately afterwards there was the “threat approach.”

Hempel did not want to accept the unfounded and from his point of view illegal police measure. He lodged an objection and filed a criminal complaint against unknown persons – for “false suspicion, defamation and pretending to be a criminal offense.” Police admit mistake: measure was “illegal”

According to information from FOCUS Online, the father’s fight was worth it: the police had to officially admit the mistake. By decision of March 1, 2021, the Dessau-Roßlau police station informed Karsten Hempel that the police measure against him was “unlawful” and therefore “will be withdrawn.”

The reason given in the letter was that “there was no evidence of a sufficiently specific risk situation in the present case.” Thus, “the prerequisite for issuing a prohibition order (addressing the person causing the risk) was not met.” Internal police mails: “Get a cow off the ice”

From internal police e-mails FOCUS Online, it emerges that those responsible were aware of the legal problems early on. The Head of Legal / Personnel at the Dessau-Roßlau Police Inspection noted that one should “bake very small rolls” and try to “get the cow off the ice” as quickly as possible. In their assessment, the addressing of the threats went “far beyond what is permissible in this context.”

Another letter states that at the time the threat was addressed, there was “no sufficient probability that damage to … Mr. Sabri H. will occur in the foreseeable future, which would be attributable to the appellant (Hempel).” “A scandal”: father feels treated like a criminal

Putting it plainly, the police in Saxony-Anhalt never had a reliable suspicion against Karsten Hempel. Just because of a completely unsubstantiated “informant tip,” he was accused of plans for vigilante justice – and he was subjected to an illegal measure. “A scandal,” says Hempel. Although he was the victim of a violent crime as the father of a murdered child, he was “treated like a perpetrator” – and the real perpetrator Sabri H. was “classified as a victim.”

The 56-year-old emphasized to FOCUS Online that it was always about law and justice, not revenge. That is why he is not satisfied with the police’s withdrawal notice. He wants to see the entire investigation file on his case, including the sections that have been blacked out so far. Lawyer: If necessary, action for unredacted files

There, Hempel suspects, the police noted the name of the “informant.” Hempel’s lawyer has already informed the investigators that his client is entitled to “learn about horse and rider.”

If necessary, the complete files will be “sued for at the administrative court.”

So, how much more of this sexual abuse will the Malay community tolerate? How much more public humiliation and mental torture can the Malay woman accept? Her shoulders may be broad, her patience may be as good as any saint's, and her temper kept in check, but perhaps, the time has come for her to be more proactive and more vocal about the abuses against her peers.

The "period checks" being conducted on schoolgirls to see if they are really menstruating has nothing to do with religion. In Islam, a menstruating woman is not allowed to perform the ritual prayer, nor to fast. The religion does not force checks on people to see what is stopping them from praying. It does not force you to pray if you do not want to. It does not encourage others to pry into your affairs.

All this begs the question, does the perpetrator really know Islam? Or are the perpetrators using religion to play out their sexual fantasies?

Groping to see if the girls are wearing sanitary pads or having their panties checked is nothing more than sexual harassment. Snide comments, such as "Are you desperate for a penis?", were allegedly reserved for the girl who did not use sanitary pads but preferred tampons. Have some Malays lost their self-respect?

Why do we allow sexual predators to run wild in our schools? The chances of them being found out are low and they are probably never punished, even if they are exposed. It has taken 20 years for this scandal to be revealed.

The menstrual period check does not seem to be an isolated incident because the reports came from former pupils from a wide range of schools, races and religions. Both boys and girls were subjected to humiliation. Some boys alleged that their genitals were groped to see if they were hiding mobile phones. The practice continues today.

It is unlikely that officers in the Education Department were oblivious to the workings of the schools. They must have been aware of this abhorrent practice. The ministers may not have been aware of these period checks, but the school heads must. Did they think it was right? If they did, one wonders what sort of other abuses go on under their watch.

Do the teachers who took part in the period checks not realise that they are wrong? If that were the case, how badly educated are our teachers when they cannot differentiate between right and wrong. How well do they understand their religion - Islam?

Are the period checks part of an unwritten SOP, or is something concrete written in the manuals held at the ministry? How widespread is the practice of period checks in government or Mara schools? What about the unregulated tahfiz and religious schools? What other sexual abuses do they get up to?

Institutional abuse

If we had sex education in schools and proper religious education, these things may not have happened. Girls would be better informed. Still, many of these girls realise that it was sexual harassment.

Jim Lim, a Penangite and a former director of social services in a London borough with many years of working with troubled youths, said, "It's unbelievable that any person or any institution could sanction a religious diktat which allows the gathering of evidence by frisking young people.

“This is an institutional abuse of children in public and a crime against young people. (In UK) if girls were to report this to social services, it would be investigated. If it goes on in British establishments, inspectors would come in, close it down if evidence came out. If there is strong evidence, it would become a criminal case. Such practices are not tolerated in Britain. It’s a crime.

The fear and shame of public groping and show of panties force some schoolgirls to break the taboo of prayer whilst menstruating.

One man who condoned period checks tweeted, "How else are you going to check if girls are menstruating or not?" Are period checks a common aspect of Malay family life, in this new era of Islamicisation?

Religious education in schools needs an overhaul. Will the Education and Religious Affairs ministers scrutinise what is being taught? What is the quality of our teachers?

Will the period checks in Malaysian schools be stopped? Will the ministries of Women, Family & Community Development, and Education act immediately to protect our girls? Will the perpetrators be brought to justice?

Sarah Halimi

This decision by the Cour de Cassation, France’s highest court of appeals, to not bring Kobili Traoré, the Muslim murderer of Halimi, to trial because he had been under the influence of marijuana when he beat her nearly to death and then threw her out of the window of her Paris apartment, has provoked indignation and fury among French Jews and many non-Jews.

French President Macron was quick to express his own indignation, and his intention to have that law relied on changed. His response is reported on here: “French President Macron Seeks to Reassure Angry, Disappointed Jewish Community After Top Court Decides Against Trial of Accused Antisemitic Killer,” by Ben Cohen, Algemeiner, April 19, 2021:

French President Emmanuel Macron has called for a change in his country’s laws on criminal responsibility, following last week’s decision by France’s highest appeal court to excuse from trial the accused antisemitic murderer of a Jewish woman on the ground that his intake of cannabis supposedly rendered him temporarily insane on the night of the killing.

Speaking to the newspaper Le Figaro on Sunday, the French president was asked about last Wednesday’s decision by the Court of Cassation not to try Kobili Traoré for the brutal murder of Sarah Halimi in April 2017. The court argued that since Traore had imbibed what it termed an “acute delirious puff” on a marijuana joint that eliminated his “discernment” — or self-awareness — he could not “be judged criminally even when his mental state was caused by the regular consumption of drugs.” Macron argued that the use of narcotics should not be a reason to remove the criminal liability of an offender.

In American law, a defendant charged with the use of narcotics or alcohol before committing a crime does not remove or limit criminal liability; if anything, it is likely to increase the punishment.

What we know about the killing is that it was an antisemitic crime: Sarah Halimi was Jewish, and her killer knew that. He hated Jews. He identified her with “Shaytan” (Satan).

She was the only Jewish person in the entire apartment complex. That was all her killer needed to know about her. Had she not been Jewish, he would not have murdered her. He was particularly enraged, remember, by the sight of her mezuzah. He had grown up, as a devout Muslim, taught to hate Jews. He knew about the from his holy book, the Qur’an. As Robert Spencer notes, “the Qur’an depicts the Jews as inveterately evil and bent on destroying the wellbeing of the Muslims. All about Jew Hatred here....................

Traoré was both a drug dealer and a habitual user of cannabis. He was, in other words, used to it. He led the life of a normal criminal and welfare crook, battening on all the benefits the French welfare state lavishes on its migrant population, so many of whom are Muslim.

“Deciding to take narcotics and then going ‘like crazy’ should not in my eyes remove your criminal responsibility,” Macron stated during the interview. “On this subject, I would like the Minister of Justice to present a change in the law as soon as possible.”

Macron also sought to reassure France’s Jewish community that they had his understanding and sympathy. Jewish leaders reacted furiously to the court’s decision, with Francis Kalifat — president of Jewish representative body CRIF — tweeting, “now in our country, we can torture and kill Jews with impunity.”

“It is not for me to comment on a court decision, but I would like to tell the family, relatives of the victim and all our fellow citizens of the Jewish faith who were awaiting this trial, my warm support and the determination of the Republic to protect them,” Macron said. “In the Republic, we do not judge citizens who are sick and no longer have discernment, we treat them. But deciding to take drugs and then becoming ‘like crazy’ should not in my eyes remove your criminal responsibility.”

During a visit to Israel in Jan. 2020, one month after a lower court deemed that Traoré was unfit for trial, Macron told a group of French Jews in Jerusalem that when it came to the Halimi case, “the need for a trial is there.” This remark earned him the rebuke of the Court of Cassation’s top officials, who reminded Macron that “the independence of the judiciary is an essential condition for the functioning of democracy.”

In a separate development on Monday, Sarah Halimi’s brother confirmed that lawyers for the family would try to appeal the case before the European Court of Human Rights. “I will continue fighting, our family will continue fighting,” William Attal said in an interview with broadcaster I-24.

It was not smoking cannabis – which was a regular part of his routine, and he was long inured to being high — that led Kobili Traoré, upset about a family quarrel, to quite deliberately seek out Sarah Halimi. This wasn’t a sudden crazed outburst. There was calculation; there was malice aforethought. Once inside, he proceeded to beat her and then to throw her out the third-floor window.

This was not the act of a brain-addled “temporarily insane” drug addict. There was calculation in gaining entry to her apartment, there was malice aforethought in choosing the victim. It was the act of a Muslim who, in his long-accustomed marijuana high, and his blood boiling because of a family quarrel, had decided to take out his fury on the only Jew he could find, the sole representative in his building of the “Jews” he had been brought up to hate.

It was not Kobili Traoré’s inhalation that day of the cannabis that caused him to murder Sarah Halimi, but his inhalation, since childhood, of the antisemitic passages in the Qur’an.

Unless Biden or Kamala lose in 2024, she’s unlikely to get a second bite of that apple. But hope springs eternal in the Socialist fake Cherokee breast of a sleazy huckster.

Warren claims to hate billionaires, but she’s happy to show up at Soros’ little anti-Israel lobby group to spew hate at the Jewish State.

The US should consider “restricting military aid from being used in the occupied territories,” Sen. Elizabeth Warren (D-Massachusetts) said Monday.

“We should talk about the elephant in the room: America’s military assistance to Israel,” she said at J Street’s virtual conference. “I said earlier that I am committed to Israel’s security, and I am. I support military assistance to Israel.

Except that she actually opposes it.

Warren is going beyond past calls to restrict foreign aid by tying them to settlements, e.g. Bush I and loan guarantees. This isn’t a call to end civilian foreign aid, but military foreign aid.

Most of our foreign aid relationship with Israel is military. That means joint development projects, Israel buying US weapons, US defense contractors incorporating Israeli weapons programs, etc…

Israel has two major military threat vectors today. That’s Iran and the PLO/Hamas terrorists operating inside its own borders. Those terrorists are operating largely in the West Bank and Gaza: parts of Israel that Warren falsely refers to as “occupied territories”.

Most of Israel’s current military activity involves fighting to contain those terrorists.

Warren’s move would effectively shut down most cooperation with the Israeli military including, potentially, the various anti-missile programs which are meant to be used to intercept projectiles coming in from the so-called “occupied territories”.

The leftist politico then unleashed the usual lies.

“The West Bank is ruled by a corrupt and increasingly authoritarian leadership under [PA] President [Mahmoud] Abbas. While he has shown a genuine commitment to nonviolence, he has also consistently failed to take real risks for peace.”

Abbas has shown zero commitment to non-violence. That’s why the Taylor Force Act was passed to stop funding the PLO’s Pay-to-Slay programs.

But Warren has made it clear that she wants to turn the money spigot back on to the terrorists while preventing Israel from fighting them.

While acid attacks are commonplace in certain Muslim countries, they were not normative to western ones. Until immigration reshaped the UK.

Acid attacks in London rose from 162 in 2012 to 454 last year. There have already been 199 acid attacks this year. Five acid attacks just happened in London in the space of little more than an hour.

Newham is the London borough with the highest number of acid attacks. It also has the second-highest percentage of Muslims in the UK. 398 acid attacks occurred in 5 years in the area named as “the most ethnically diverse district in England and Wales”. 33% of Newham consists of non-UK passport holders.

But surely that’s some sort of random coincidence.

Except that the place with the third-highest number of acid attacks is Tower Hamlets. Tower Hamlets is a Muslim no-go zone. It has one of the smallest native British populations in the country. 35% of the population is Muslim. Most of those are Bangladeshis with a healthy sprinkling of Somalis.

There were 84 acid attacks in what has been dubbed “The Islamic Republic of Tower Hamlets”. Also, entirely by coincidence, Bangladesh has the highest rate of acid attacks in the world.

This may now be the highest-profile current acid attack in the US. And it involves a Pakistani Muslim young woman.

As CBS2’s Carolyn Gusoff reports, Nafiah Ikram is bravely speaking out after an incomprehensible attack. On March 17, as she arrived home from work, walking from her car, she saw a man watching from the corner. He ran up to her and threw a cup of liquid in her face.

“I started to cry and, like, I was panicking. I was like, ‘Dad, someone threw something in my face!’ And he was like, ‘Oh my God, it’s acid,’” Nafiah said. Acid burns are seared into her Arlington Avenue driveway, as are burns in her eye and throat.

“She was in the hospital for three weeks, and she’s still not able to eat properly. She can’t see anything good. Only one eye is working,” said her father Sheikh Ikram. “I can just see colors, but that’s it,” Nafiah said.

“It’s been a horrible nightmare for us,” said her mother Sherina Mohammed.

COMMENT | Lim Kit Siang recently asked Malaysians to ask themselves one question – “who is the 'Other' in the Malaysian context?” His answer to this question, his point of self-reflection if you will, was this:

"Is the 'Other' the Chinese and Indians to a Malay Malaysian, the Malays and Indians to a Chinese Malaysian, and the Malays and Chinese to an Indian Malaysian?"

As someone who has spent a decade attempting to figure out what it means to be “Malaysian”, I have to say this is the kind of propaganda I have been opposing all this time. Come one, in this context, like it is in many places of the world, the "other" is what the state defines.

What binds us as a society, the rules of engagement if you will, are the policies, rules and ideas that we subscribe to as a collective, even though we may subscribe to individual or community ideas of culture that include religion.

Hence, it is not a question of how individual ethnic groups view each other but how the state views diverse communities and how those communities interact with the state. Hence, if we subscribe to policies based on a value system we all share (regardless of ethnicity) and this is reflected in the governance of the state, it does not matter how each community views one another.

Now, when politicians ask us to ask ourselves questions, this really means that they do not have constructive answers for questions already known. I am not saying that Kit Siang is doing this, but generally, when you have to ask people who vote for you why race relations in this country are the way they are, then you, as a political operative, are part of the problem. 

And it is a pity because, for decades, Kit Siang was part of the solution. I was disappointed when I read his piece because it presents false equivalencies at every turn. Take this passage for instance:

"Not only the various races feel threatened, Islam feels threatened and the non-Islamic religions feel threatened."

Really? Does Islam feel threatened in this country? How? Have there been unilateral conversions that have ended up with kidnappings? Have there been religious figures who have disappeared? Have public and private spaces been intruded on by non-Islamic religions? Have non-Islamic religions banned certain words for Muslims?

Here’s the thing. Someone like me (and I am sure there are many people out there who feel the same way), I do not like the idea of vernacular schools. Never have. But over the years, the way racialism and religion have entered our public schools, folks have no choice but to send their kids to schools where faith and race may not intrude in a way in which we have ample examples.

Even the old maverick said that there was too much religion in schools. He did not do anything about it, of course, but then again neither did anyone who claimed that they wanted to save Malaysia.

And then there is this: "Every community is made to believe that its culture and ethnicity is facing an existential threat. But who is creating all these threats to all racial groups in the country?”

Who is creating all these threats? Well, the same people who for decades promulgated such racial and religious policies and the same people who claimed to be against such policies but folded when they sat on the political hot seat. Of course, we voted in successive BN regimes so yes, we also share the blame.

Absurd claim

I’ll give you an example of how disingenuous this kind of propaganda is. Here is Liew Chin Tong, describing the rise of Bangsa Malaysia, in the early days of Pakatan Harapan rule:

“There is a need to define what the 'New Malaysia' stands for. For me, it should at the least mean we see ourselves first and foremost as Malaysian citizens. For instance, I may be Chinese culturally but politically I participate in public life as a Malaysian, not as a Chinese.”

Political life in the Malaysian context is defined by constitutional provisions that are manipulated by Malay power structures to maintain racial and religious hegemony at the expense of the minorities. To claim that one participates in political life as a Malaysian is absurd when the majority ethnic group in this country participates in politics as Malays.

Never mind the lunacy of such a claim when the DAP made it very clear that the reason why they joined forces with Bersatu’s Dr Mahathir Mohamad was because they needed the “Malay” vote to save Malaysia.

The point is that “political life” was defined along racial lines, political strategies were endorsed along racial lines and the outcome of the 2018 election was because the majority Malay community was politically fractured. There is a reason why Liew talks about the majority of Malaysians that were happy with the results. The reality is that a majority of Malays did not vote for the Harapan coalition.

This is why when Malays hear all this talk about “Bangsa Malaysia” they either think it is horse manure because the actions of its promulgators are completely at odds with their rhetoric or so narcotised are they by indoctrination programmes that they view it as an existential threat to their identity.

Of course, this is why the establishment fears the youth vote because young people have too many problems of their own attempting to survive in a society and economy which was created to benefit a specific class of people while they are living under a shadow of religion.

In a recent piece, Kit Siang said, “One, however, must be realistic in that we must work with like-minded political leaders from other political parties who believe in the 'Malaysian Dream' for Malaysia to be a world-class great nation as the DAP cannot on its own form a federal government in Malaysia.”

I do not think anyone from other political parties believes in the "Malaysian Dream" as the way the DAP has defined it. Perhaps the problem is that even the DAP does not believe in the Malaysian Dream.

He used it in reference to his party, saying "The party need not dilute its Chinese-ness just because of the criticism from our political enemies. We have to safeguard the culture of the party.”

That drew charges from party colleagues of him being a toxic chauvinist, which in turn led Liu (above) to trot out the usual “misinterpretation” motivated by prejudice retort. This was followed by so-called party grassroots standing straight and tall holding signs that note that the DAP is for everyone. An ideological and personal squall, not gripping drama, it will pass.

But really, Liu, to throw into the mix of your ideal society and party more Malay-ness and Indian-ness, Iban-ness and Kadazan-ness, it’s too many “nesses” for me to take in.

I think I have enough of a problem with qualifying for sufficient “Chinese-ness.”

Right from the start, I was at a disadvantage. Dad was Hokkien. Mum spoke Hakka at home, and she was home-tutored in Mandarin. Cantonese was their shared dialect, so this Hokkien boy grew up speaking Cantonese, my Hokkien restricted to about two dozen words or so, a few of them not to be said in the presence of adults.

In the 50s, the academic bar to pass for better employment prospects was the Form Five Senior Cambridge, so I was enrolled in an English-medium primary school close to my home.

As my first grounding in the English language, when I was about five, dad also paid 30 cents a week to the Indian newsagent who delivered the daily copy of The Straits Times, for weekly copies of Beano and Dandy. Every Friday morning, I was up in the dark before dawn, dashing downstairs to look for the comics folded within the newspapers… occasionally distraught when the weekly shipment from England had been held up.

My first “story-book” was a collection of Aesop’s Fables, that imprinted on this impressionable mind the terms “dog in the manger,” and “sour grapes,” etc.

That led to Enid Blyton, Arthur Conan Doyle, my uncle’s complete collection of Edgar Rice Burrough’s Tarzan, Dumas, my father’s Agatha Christies.

My secondary school was named after a fusty, musty English queen, and the regimen was an English public school with a large strapping of Gordonstoun-like tough physical challenges. Excel or be caned. Excel and be caned anyway, call it character-building.

At the University of Malaya, I majored in English Literature, but was not allowed to take Chinese Studies as a minor. Why? Because I would have an unfair advantage over the non-Chinese in the courses. What advantage? I am illiterate in Chinese. Denied an opportunity to add to my “Chinese-ness,” because the borang said I was Cina, and that’s all they needed to know.

So, on physical facts of “Chinese-ness”, I am shamefully lacking.

My ancestry is as Chinese as it can get. Both my grandfathers were immigrant labourers from China at the beginning of the 20th century. Grandpa, on my maternal side, struck it rich in the tin lodes and veins in Kepong and Kampar, and sent for a child bride from China, my grandma.

He died young, an aunt suggesting that a contributing factor could have been governing his family of five wives and 18 concubines, 21 sons and 23 daughters.

If grandpa was an over-achiever in the virility stakes, I am underwhelming. Marrying late, my wife and I decided I was too old to learn how to change diapers.

But back to my grandpa. For those who are paranoid that they are not standing up in the world anymore, my mum told me that every night, in Ipoh or in Kuala Lumpur, before he left for his carousing at the opera and houses of repute, mahjong game, his dinner would include a pot of shark’s-fin from a restaurant delivered in a trishaw.

Yes, I can finally claim some “Chinese-ness” in my fondness for food. (I had a food and drink column “Fats” in The New Straits Times in the 80s.) It’s a truism – Chinese will eat anything that flies, swims, and prowls. Many species are threatened with extinction from the voracious appetites of over a billion Chinese who find life profuse with edible things.

Poach the dwindling numbers of awesome, sexually reticent rhinos for their horns because in simplistic minds the up-thrust horn means they can karaoke Lionel Ritchie’s “All Night Long.” This culinary crime is committed for what is overgrown rhino nostril hair glued together by snot.

The most ludicrous example of Chinese appetite adventure is some Chinese forefather, in a lost time, venturing into a pitch-black cavern, feet squelching and sinking into aeons of pungent guano and bird droppings, with swarming cockroaches and beetles, and possibly, a few poisonous reptiles underfoot, feeding on fledglings falling out of nests from the dark heights, rigging together several long bamboos, shinnying up it, avoiding a feathery winged rush of disturbed bats and birds escaping the intrusion, waving a flaming torch onto the walls of the cavern, seeing small plaques of coagulated phlegmy bird spit, splattered with organic cultures, matted with fluff and twigs, and say, “I think that will make a sweet dessert boiled with rock sugar, and it can be sold for a lot of money as a tonic for good health.”

COMMENT | The always-reliable P Ramasamy, in his retort to the old maverick’s claim that he is an extremist, said "For Umno leaders like Mahathir, DAP Chinese or Indian leaders should behave like the sycophants in MCA, MIC or Gerakan”, which neatly sums up the problem with non-Malay political operatives in this country.

Former prime minister Dr Mahathir Mohamad has, of course, fallen out of favour with the Pakatan Harapan vox populi but the reality is that he always had a hold on non-Malay power brokers who viewed him as someone who would lead them to the promised land of Putrajaya.

Observe how Mahathir’s rhetoric of some DAP leaders being “extreme” has been seized by the ketuanan crowd who are using it and the forthcoming DAP elections as some sort of referendum on the direction of the party. 

DAP central committee member Ronnie Liu is right. This means the Malay establishment is trying to cause friction within the DAP and the punchline is that the DAP is helping their cause by propagating the Bangsa Malaysia kool-aid.

It is easy to lay the blame on the Malay political establishment for the extreme religious and racial politics of this country, but this would be disingenuous. For years the majority of the voting public voted for BN and endorsed all sorts of religious and racial policies.

All sorts of excuses were made for not voting “opposition” and the DAP, in particular, were dismissed by the average voter as not having anything to offer to mainstream Malaysians, when in fact the DAP's commitment to those principles which would save Malaysia, was probably firmer during their "extremist" days than it is now.

When Opposition Leader Anwar Ibrahim was ejected out of Umno paradise, what he did, maybe not intentionally, was redefine the discourse on how non-Malays interacted with Malay power structures and this caused great distress in the Malay political establishment.

Remember what Ambiga Sreenevasan said during a forum titled "Institutional Reforms Committee (IRC) Report: Why the Secrecy?": “So I don’t recognise some of these people who have gone into the government and are now so afraid of the people who put them there. I find all that a little bit alarming.” 

So concerned with how they would look, non-Malay power structures chose to concentrate on the superficials of so-called "Muhibbah" practices and became willing sycophants to Malay politicians. The idea that non-Malay participation in the political process reflects a sort of equilibrium seems, to me, more placebo to calm non-Malay anxiety than any real reforms to the system.

Read statements made by political operatives before the Big Lie – that’s my term for the last general election – and read their statements during and after. Ambiga is right, there was fearlessness but now we know that it was all horse manure.

When questioned on the abandonment of progressive policies and ideas, they blamed the system, the deep state and even those questioning them, always backed by online mobs more interested in sustaining power than progressing reforms. The Malay political establishment did not do this, the non-Malays did.

When Bersatu attacked Liu and the DAP joined in on the attack, what was his crime? Forget about the fact that some claim he was merely carrying water for Anwar but look at his piece again, and what, Liu the so-called Chinese extremist, was saying. All he was calling for was Harapan to fulfil its campaign promises and pursue the progressive agenda it was voted in for.

Now, I had my thoughts on Liu's piece and laid out why his take on Mahathir was only half the problem. The other half was this – “Liu writes that Mahathir thinks he is all-powerful. The reason why he thinks this way is that nobody - certainly not from the DAP - has checked his power. They are too afraid that the coalition will break up. They are too afraid that Umno/PAS will take over the government. Or maybe, they are too afraid to lose power.” 

Recall how someone like Ramasamy is vilified whenever he brought up the fact that Harapan needed to be consistent on its stand when it comes to human rights, religious freedom and freedom of the press. These were issues that Harapan was supposed to hold sacrosanct and what we got were the further entrenchment of totalitarian values in the guise of maintaining religious and racial equilibrium.

When it comes to racial politics, minorities squabbling for the political interests of majoritarian stakeholders is painful to watch. Malays from either side of the political divide, at least sometimes, can meet halfway on those politically designed issues of race and religion. 

Throw in culture and you have Malay power structures at war, but not tearing each other’s eyes out like how the non-Malay component parties do in the service of gaining political power for their Malay overlords.

Do you wonder why the Malay uber alles government, or any type of hegemonistic government, is afraid of the youth vote? Because they know that the old strategies only work if they control the current electorate. This is the same reason why they fear freedom of speech and assembly. 

Demand more from the people who claim they want change and hold them to the high standards they claim they have.

The Great Ronnie Liu

COMMENT | In calling DAP central committee member Ronnie Liu "a Chinese chauvinist", Damansara MP Tony Pua is using the same term used by DAP's political enemies that the always pugnacious Liu was talking about.

I have no idea what Liu means by "Chineseness", which is fine because I have no idea what Pua and friends mean by "Bangsa Malaysia" or even "multiracial". I do know that neither is mutually exclusive when it comes to Malaysia.

I do not see the contradiction in Liu statements as reported in the press of the DAP sticking to its "Chineseness" while sticking to its multiracial political stance.

Otherwise, I would have to see the contradiction in DAP secretary-general Lim Guan Eng issuing his statement to the Tun Razak Exchange in Malay, English and Chinese. Then doubling down with a Chinese-only statement defending his original tri-lingual statement, as reported in the press saying: "Lim had defended issuing a trilingual statement, stressing the country's multilingualism."

If Lim famously said he is not Chinese but Malaysian, then why concern himself with issuing statements in anything other than the national language? Well, because maybe being "Malaysian" means embracing our diverse languages and keeping the rakyat informed by any means necessary.

Of course, it also means defending the diversity of our languages and culture from encroaching totalitarian and hegemonic power structures, which is what the state always attempts to do, claiming it is the will of the majority.

A couple of years back, I wrote of a Chinese student and her email that urged me to write about the suspension of the Chinese Language Society by University Malaya.

Here's a snippet from that piece:

"The young student wrote eloquently about what the society meant to her. While she did not elaborate on what dialect she was referring to when she wrote about the society, what she did make clear was how much she learnt about her culture and community and how it enriched her life. She was adamant that the society did not intentionally skirt whatever regulations they were in breach of, and she was extremely upset that the society was suspended."

Now is this young woman being "chauvinistic" in her outlook? Or is that term reserved for non-Malay political operatives who cause trouble to the Bangsa Malaysia group think, which states that non-Malay political operatives cannot talk about race unless it is the "Bangsa Malaysia" bunkum? Or is it only to be used by far-right hacks who demonise the DAP?

'Culture of the party'

The problem with the "multiracial" or "multicultural" narrative as espoused by the DAP is the negation of race and the hypocrisy of action(s) that precede it. It is always better to acknowledge your ethnicity and the reality of racial and religious politics in this country rather than put forward a hypocritical narrative that the non-Malays have to subscribe to in order to share power with the majority Malay community.

If what is reported in the press is accurate, the important takeaway from Liu's tirade is this: "We have to safeguard the culture of the party, as well as the party's constitutional spirit, pluralistic and democratic political struggle."

Again, I have no idea what Liu means by "culture of the party". Maybe he means it in the same way the now leader of the opposition and PKR president Anwar Ibrahim said during his numerous times of attempting to get the "numbers" to counter coup the current prime minister and babbled on about a "Malay core".

Since I do not notice any Pakatan Harapan, and especially DAP, big shots calling Anwar a Malay chauvinist, it is hypocritical to level the charge against Liu, while at the same time condoning the rhetoric and policies which favour one community over the other in the name of political compromise, while claiming we are all "Malaysians".

And this has always been the problem with the DAP. It has to ignore the racialists and sometimes downright racists policies and rhetoric of its partner but has to police its own and ensure party apparatchiks conform to the multiracial/multicultural horse manure, which it does not have to defend.

Where did that get the DAP? It got them to a place where Dr Mahathir Mohamad publicly castrated former finance minister Lim Guan Eng and spilt the beans of giving more to the Malay community at the expense of the Chinese community, but nobody could say anything because the Chinese community - the DAP base - would get upset. It is all a matter of public record.

Then the former prime minister accuses the DAP and MCA of being extremist, and political operatives have to go and "explain" to him why this is not the case. Never mind that his son, Muhkriz, had publicly admitted that when he was in Umno and whenever there were issues they could not handle, the establishment demonised the DAP as "Chinese chauvinists".

Never mind that in the recent audio-gate fiasco, Umno president Ahmad Zahid Hamidi says his "no DAP" spiel was purely tactical, and Anwar, the leader of the multiracial opposition, seemed fine with this. Now is Liu really regressive when he talks about race and is he the person who is damaging the DAP brand or is there something more at play?

Worst kind of spin

Pua claims that the chauvinistic label was applied to the DAP because for years it fought for the rights of the minority under the "brute majority" of BN rule and "the minority, in this case, was made up overwhelmingly of the Chinese, while the Indians made the bulk of the balance".

This is the worst kind of spin. Why?

Firstly, we know that the DAP was demonised as a political tactic by the Malay establishment. Secondly, it assumed that the rights of the minority are no longer in jeopardy; hence there is no need to fight for it or that the DAP needs to fight for it.

This, of course, is not true. If anything, the "rights" of the minority are always under strain even when Harapan was in power. As a member of Harapan, the fact is that the DAP was complicit in whatever policies that eroded those rights make it worse.

Of the young Malay leaders who have joined the party, Pua says: "Most importantly, they have found the new generation of top DAP leaders sensitive and cognisant of the fears, apprehensions and insecurities of the Malay community."

Really? The Malays feel that they are under siege, which is total bunkum, because the political establishment does everything in their power to ensure that they are not spooked and that entitlements programmes disproportionately favour them. These are the so-called Malay rights that everyone keeps babbling on about.

What the non-Malays fear is very real. The encroachment into our public and private spaces. The way how the religion of the state sometimes means children are kidnapped because of unilateral conversions. The way the state controls the words we can and cannot use. The way the state disenfranchises non-Malays from public education. The list goes on, Pua. These are fears, apprehensions and insecurities grounded in reality.

Running dogs

So Pua says that "MCA had 'Chineseness' themselves into oblivion today. They are completely at the mercy of the whims and fancies of the big-brothers, Umno, Bersatu and PAS who provide MCA with political life-support". 

This is exactly what the DAP did when they were kowtowing to everything the old maverick wanted, but did not have to rely on Malay partners for the Chinese vote. So the question then becomes is "Chineseness" the issue, or was MCA losing support because they were bending over for their Malay political partners?

This is why when DAP organising secretary Anthony Loke says that there are moves to dislodge "multiracial" leaning political operatives from the DAP, is the multiculturalism narrative the issue? Or is it that those who espoused such ideas did not stick to DAP's egalitarian, pluralistic ideas or live up to its constitution when dealing with the party's Malay partners?

The non-Malay political narrative post-May 9 has been one of backpedalling, reversals, sycophancy and Orwellian doublespeak because the weight of expectation collided with the realpolitik of Malay rule.

This is why the DAP's attack on MCA for supposedly organising a Jawi protest does more harm to DAP than MCA because when DAP had the power, they chose to do exactly what they claim MCA did all those years ago, which made them "running dogs".

COMMENT | "Audio-gate" is a prime example of how Anwar is his own worst enemy. Everybody keeps saying there is nothing illegal in that recording and that the “investigation” by the state security apparatus is unwarranted.

Well, yes to both, but this is what the state does. This is what the state always does. This is mainstream politics in this country. But more importantly, it is this kind of behaviour and political norm that Anwar, Pakatan Harapan and the “reformasi” movement were supposed to put a stop to.

Ex-senator Ezam Mohd Nor claimed there was nothing in the audio clip "which could compromise the 'reformasi' spirit that gave birth to PKR". Really? So you do not see anything morally dubious about two men, one under a cloud of corruption scandals colluding with another who claims he wants to get rid of a kleptocracy?

You do not see anything wrong with one man claiming the other handled the Umno general assembly well by cutting off avenues of dissent when Harapan and reformasi are supposed to be about freedom of speech and expression?

You do not see anything wrong with the "no DAP" part of the speech which was supposed to be "tactical"? After all, the DAP has been demonised by the establishment for decades and when they were briefly in power and bending over backward to their Malay counterparts, they were still demonised.

You think Anwar, a Harapan leader who was just chosen to lead the "multiracial" coalition against a Malay uber alles regime in the 15th general election, who seems to be going along with this anti-DAP propaganda, does not compromise the spirit of reformasi?

I mean everyone knows that portraying the DAP as “extremist” is a tactical move, but what does it say when all these political operatives are advising the old maverick Dr Mahathir Mohamad of how the DAP is not extremist, but this audio, if genuine, demonstrates that the leader of Harapan is fine with making deals with someone who continues using this tactic to secure power?

What happens when Harapan is embedded with these cretins? Oh wait, we already know what happens and how Harapan dealt with the subterfuge and infighting that led to the Sheraton Move which formed the Malay uber alles government.

I understand the “no Anwar” part but to jovially scheme with the leader of a kleptocracy to destabilise his own party in the hopes of securing political victory does not sound like the spirit of reformasi that folks used to shout about when they were trying to “ubah” (change) Malaysia.

People wonder: who made the recording? Maybe Harapan made the recording in the hopes of further destabilising Umno? Maybe Umno made it in the hopes of destabilising its current president? Maybe the Perikatan Nasional (PN) regime made it in the hopes of destabilising factions within Umno that are hostile to the PN? And round and round we go.

With regard to that last part, the state security apparatus always attempts to project an image of impartiality which is complete horse manure. In my piece about Tengku Razaleigh Hamzah knowing the game is rigged, he said as much in an interview with Sinar Harian:

"Read what Razaleigh says about not underestimating the establishment: 'Don't look down on the government because they have power, they have the television, radio, money and the media. They also have spy equipment. They know more than us. They know what we don't know yet. With that power, whether those in government will fall, I don't know.'

"Here is an establishment politician admitting the state controls nearly every avenue of expression and uses its intelligence services as a means of securing political victory. In any functional democracy, this would be verboten but here in Malaysia and perhaps Southeast Asia, this normalising of authoritarian measures as a means of political victory and a tool of economic and social stability is considered par for the course."

And really, even if this audio recording is real, if the establishment wanted to ignore it, it would. Remember when the videos implicating Economic Affairs Minister Azmin Ali first surfaced, what did the old maverick say about this?

“Obviously, somebody is trying to make use of me to achieve their purpose. This is not a usual video that you see before; this is purposely created in order to achieve certain nasty objectives to prevent somebody from making progress in politics.”

And all this scheming is not needed. We do not need a “big tent” coalition – although I think Harapan does not really understand what “big tent” means – or scheming with kleptocrats or making dubious alliances with god knows who to take down the PN regime.

Also, when Harapan says “kleptocrats” are not welcome, could Harapan give us a list of kleptocrats who are not welcome in this “big tent”? This way, people who support Harapan would be safe and secure in the knowledge they were not voting for kleptocrats or alleged kleptocrats, even though in the last general election, folks who were deemed kleptocrats were embraced by the Harapan faithful and indeed one of them became prime minister.

All that is needed to bring down this regime are MPs - no matter from which political party - to declare if they support the current prime minister or not. At this time, Umno is fractured to the point that various potentates and their proxies are waging war in the press. Can you imagine any kind of working relationship between Harapan and Umno at the moment?

Keep in mind what the prime minister said on the campaign stump in the Sabah state election: “The Bersatu president added that should he no longer qualify to be the prime minister, he has two options - to step down or recommend that the Agong dissolves Parliament.”

Aren't Harapan supporters sick and tired of this nonsense, which only demonstrates how intellectually and morally bankrupt the 'reformasi' movement is?

Doesn't the Harapan base just wish the opposition would concentrate on rebuilding and strengthening alliances within the opposition instead of attempting to forge alliances with members of the old regime, like what the Sheraton traitors did?

As long as Harapan continues playing this game, this hurts their electoral chances more than the forces aligned against them.