Tuesday, April 01, 2008

Racial or Class Politics

Parti Pesaka Bumiputera Bersatu (PBB) of Sarawak has 14 MPs in Barisan Nasional and Sarawak BN had 30 MPs.

But they were not happy. PBB deputy president Datuk Abang Johari Tun Opend lamented that they were unfairly treated.

"This is the first time the party had no Malay Muslim minister in the Federal Cabinet."

There was Muslim Ministers and Malay Ministers in the Federal Cabinet but not Sarawak Malay Muslim minister.

"We do not demand and I am not pressuring," says Abang Jo as he was popularly referred, but definitely PBB would like to have more federal ministers.

"If there is any consideration for Sabah to have more post in the Federal Cabinet, we hope the PM will also consider Sarawak."

"I do not want to play racial politics but I hope that there is some consideration for this. We leave it to the PM to make his decision."

Certainly, our Prime Minister is in a new dilemma. 6 Sabah Umno MPs had recently met up with PM to discuss about more representations at the Federal Cabinet. The group was led by Datuk Bung Mokhtar Radin, the sexiest-driven MP of all times. The other 5 are: Datuk Ghafur Salleh, Datuk Abdul Rahim Ismail, Datuk Salleh Tun Said, Tan Sri Pandikar Amin Mulia and Datuk Yusof Yacob.

But Sabah state Umno secretary Datuk Yahya Hussin issued a statement today stating that the 6-MPs are not representing Sabah Umno and the views expressed by the 6 was held by the state Umno as a personal view and did not reflect the views of the state Barisan Nasional or Umno.


In Malaysia, we now have a new dilemma. We don't just have Bumi and non Bumi issues, or Muslims and non-Muslims issues and classification. We now have Sarawak Malay Muslims, Sarawak non-Malay Muslims and Sarawak non-Muslims and non-Malays. We also hear of Selangor Indian vs Perak Indian in the DAP Sivasubramaniam saga where Subra held that the Perak Exco is not being represented by an Indian Exco from Perak such as him and Sivakumar, who can take care of the Indian community's interest. But during the election campaign Sivasubramaniam told the electorates that he would represent all races of people of Buntong, Perak. He won the seat because all the various races voted for him. Now he says he is representing the Indian community's interest because there was shout of Makkal Shakti. Should we non-Indians stop shouting Makkal Shakti?

Apart from these events we also see the Malays from Umno using the NGOs to demonstrate and conduct street protests to show their concerns that their race may not be well represented in the Perak state Exco because there are more Chinese Exco members. But they are all Malaysians and they are suppose to represent everyone, every Malaysians and every races.

The Chinese have never gone to the street protesting that there are more Malay Federal Cabinet Ministers from Umno and that they would be scheming to destroy the Chinese race. What the Chinese had always asked are that Umno and BN should be speaking as Malaysians representing Malaysians of all races, seeing things and issues as involving all Malaysians, deriving policies to benefit Malaysians of all races, and protecting and taking care of the interests of Malaysians of all races, not just Malays, and most of all, any affirmative policies to eradicate poverty and uplift the living standards of the people must include people of all races, irrespective of color, creed and religion.

Sadly, 50 years after Merdeka, we Malaysian Politicians and elected representative are still chained by racial politics and thus divide the people into classes, fully segmenting the social fabric, raising social tensions at the price of harmony and peace.

Every elected representatives are fighting for the crumbs!

19 comments:

Anonymous said...

What these newly elected YB seems to forget is that the rakyat who had put a cross for their party on 8 Mac 2008 was a multi racial rakyat. Driven by desire to see a change after 50 years of BN which had just become insensitive to the rakyat. Time to show who was the BOSS.

The new Cabinet by Dolah is again a reflection of that insensitivity. He probably had the coming UMNO elections ONLY on mind and nothing else matters.

An eg will be MUHD TAIB appointment. This was a shocker. Besides that Australia thing, he was also charged in Kuala Lumpur Courts for some corrupt practises subsequently. Though was an acquittal (Judge Wahab Patail brother of AG Ghani Patail ? ) the outcome of the story was equally interesting in seeing the generosity of the man in saying that he had transfered properties to his driver? What happened to those properties subsequently?

Maverick please do some research on this as will be interesting reading.

We the rakyat are living harmoniously with each other. It is these bloody politicians who come around again now blowing such trumpets on race and plays up the racial sentiments. Actually it is their SELF INTEREST now that they are trying to advance.

Why forget that on 8 Mac 2008 it was every race vote that had made thou a YB subsequently?

Sicko

1 April 2008

yapchongyee said...

I believe UMNO still has not awakened to the reality that the Malays have rejected their racist brand of nationalism. To be truthful, I myself have not yet come to believe that the Malays have registered their rejection of UMNO. The Malaysian model of race based politics was in fact a powder keg waiting to blow up into a typical guerrilla led insurgency; because the lesson of history is that when people have no means to support their family, they will take the law into their own hands. This is a rule of natural law, as we can all see what is going on in Africa and Latin America. The situation in Malaysia was at the tipping point and just a slight nudge and we will be in the middle of such a debilitating insurgency, that will drain the resources of the nation and turn Malaysia into another basket case.

If we will only find the courage to admit the truth that the NEP had no chance of succeeding; because the NEP was a programme of exclusion; and those who held the power of implementing the policy had a vested interest to keep the benefits of such a crazy scheme to themselves. The Chinese was never at any point to blame for the lack of progress of the Malay race. The blame should sit squarely on the shoulders of UMNO leaders. If those in UMNO who held the power of dispensing government largess had any care to improve the fortunes of the Malays, they should have manage the programme in a more responsible and honest manner, but instead they restricted the benefits to their own small clique; hence government largess were given to only connected families. This restricted the programme to too few candidates and the quality of recipients were very low. Malaysian scholarships went to recipients who chose the easy courses of study that had no practical value in the job market, resulting in a colossal waste of scarce resources and it produced a culture of indifference; and it also produced graduates who could not find jobs and had to be absorbed into government service of pen pushers, a total waste of money.

The election of 2008 is a defining moment. For the first time in 50 years history a crucial section of the Malays had come to realize that change had to come to save Malaysia from UMNO. This turn of events at this moment is a mere illusion because UMNO is still the Federal Government and in the next election UMNO will massively stuff the ballot boxes. If I may say so, the most important institution for a coup d’tat is well placed and entrenched by UMNO judges and my namesis is that fat woman judge Zainon binti Mohd. Ali and from my own experience with Judge Zainon binti Mohd. Ali, either through ignorance of the law or sheer disrespect of the law will dare to decide my wife’s petition in breach of the penal code and hence had herself committed several crimes. This piece of comedy is unprecedented in all of legal history anywhere in the Commonwealth.

This morning I read an article in Malaysians Unplugged on Dato Seri Anwar, and the author raised issues whether Dato Seri is or is not the Anwar of before his incarceration on trumped up criminal charges. I believe this line of enquiry is both futile and irrelevant. We just cannot assess a man’s character under any circumstances. I had some one who I held as a dear friend for over 65 years and I just was unable to know that he was all along one of my worst enemy. However, the point that I want to put across is that in politics and the choice that we ordinary man in the street has to make to vote in a good government does not require that we know Dato Seri or not.; ALL THAT IS REQUIRED OF US IS TO ACCEPT OR DENY WHAT HE SAYS HE WANTS FOR MALAYSIA. If what Dato Seri wants for us is what we as voter wants, then it is Dato Seri who we will vote for as our government. Is Dato Seri a truly a good man ? That question is to me, not relevant. I have never ever met Dato Seri but what he wants for Malaysia is what to my mind what I want and to all Malaysians I can only say that UMNO’s policy of race, with emphasis for Malays as the superior race is WRONG AND WILL BE NON PRODUCTIVE FOR MALAYSIA.

I dare say that our Malaysian founding fathers like the Tengku even as he kicked out Singapore from the Federation realized that what Lee Kuan Yew said made sense and yet he felt that the Malays wanted a race based Malaysia and he acceded to their demands; and now after 50 years of independence both the Tengku and lee Kuan Yew are both right, and to say the least Malaysia took the wrong path. To this point in time (50 bloody years) Malaysia will have a “window of opportunity to get back on the ‘rail”. Contrary to UMNO’s and the Malays misled by UMNO Malaysia has not progressed at all and if I may say so myself, Malaysia had regressed because Malaysia has a 3rd world education system and Malaysia has descended into a spiral of LAWLESSNESS. You will disagree but ask yourself if you had any laudable achievements in these 50 years ? Singapore had nothing but dirt and of course a predominantly Chinese and Indian population; and they have gone into such tremendous race into the front ranks of developed nations BECAUSE SINGAPORE HAD A MODEL THAT IS INCLUSIVE, NOT EXCLUSIVE.

I had said earlier that after this 2008 election Malaysia merely has a WINDOW FOR CHANGE and we all are hanging our hopes on an Anwar led coalition to bring about change, This change is merely a hope because it can still de-rail. Affirmative action is an illusion that is difficult to wean off and may still return to de-rail our hopes. THE MAIN AND No ! priority is to restore a first world judiciary so that the laws will be respected and strictly enforced. What is the use for the government to legislate when the courts will not respect the laws ? To entrench an ethical, honest and corruption free judiciary, the PKR led government must totally dismantle the UMNO machinery that has been put in place to hold an iron grip on retention of power and government.

My the No. 1 issue in my list of priority is to remove the number of UMNO judges on the bench of the High Court and for that purpose, I recommend my wife’s petition and the abuse of power that was perpetrated by Judge Zainon binti Mohd. Ali will be the first act to restore independence of the judiciary on the saying, “kill a chicken to scare a monkey”.

CK said...

malaysian for all....

still a long way to go....

let's pray for it, so tat we can c it happening in our life.

Yan said...

Diversity is our strength as someone had said before?? Nah! In fact, this should be our weakness as a nation.
We are unlike USA where diversity is truely their strength. We are more like (former) Yugoslavia, though we still have not come near to the final melt down where they fight a civil war along ethnic interest.
Perhaps we could manage it better as separate entities since most of our politicians (BN or Oppositions) advocate own ethnic interest rather than national inetrest?? Donot accuse me as a separatist, this is not my intention. 50 years after independence, we still have this kind of politicians leading us into a self-destruct path. When can we be like USA (a truely melting pot of races) though not a perfect one.

lucia said...

yeah sad. i had also blog on this issue of racial politics today. how on earth do we achieve bangsa malaysia when our very own politicians are so racial?? sad.

Anonymous said...

Malaysia is truly DIVIDED !!

Divisions, sub-divisions, sub-sub-divisions ...

Wonder when is it ever going to end?

Or, perhaps it can never end ...

Anonymous said...

Ask Pak Lah to revive the Minister for Sarawak Affair and Minister for Sabah Affair posts lah.

Jefus said...

Sabah and Sarawak politicians have awoken to the reality that they are the glue that holds BN in power.

Pak Lah / UMNO / BN are still in the illusion that they are the alpha political in the Malaysian political landscape.

If their learning curves do not show a steep bend soon, they will soon be unemployed.

Jefus said...

alpha political party (oops)

Anonymous said...

tsk... tsk... politician buatan malaysia

CK said...

that shows that all BN parties are against one Malaysian identity.

speechless.

Anonymous said...

Curtain after Curtain in the Stage.
GE curtain with more Rakyats on the face.
After Ge, Politicians returned to their normal faces.
They are Politicians to play in the Stage.

When Ethics is never an issue in Malaysia
Politicians are FREE to flip-flop the Characters they want to play along with the change of

Curtains in the stage!

yapchongyee,

For time being, can you ask chicken to kill chicken to scare a Monkey?

Anonymous said...

It's worship of racial politics that spawns class politics no end in Bolehland, each mutually supporting the other.

Maverick SM said...

Sicko,

I will do some research, ok.

Yapchongyee,

Malays did not reject Umno for their brand of racist policies; they reject the corrupts. The Chinese and Indians have rejected MCA, Gerakan, PPP and MIC as they had proven to be "chow-kow".

CK Tan,

I agree; still a long long way to a Bangsa Malaysia; but a journey of a thousand mile starts from a first step forward.

Yan,

You are right; diversity isn't our strength; it is our dilemma.

Lucia,

We have only a prayer.

Gan,

Ya, truly divided because of 50 years of ingrained culture of divide and rule by BN.

Jefus,

Sabah and Sarawak are trying hard to get something because they know they had an opportunity when Pak Lah is a weak position.

CK Tan,

Ya, all BN parties preferred division by race.

Sharing,

Your poem is getting more complex and ambiguous. hehehehe

Unknown said...

WOWWWW...WOOOOOWWWW....WWOOOWOWWWWW

now everybody wants to be a MALAY!

interesting. Sarawak Malay, Sabah Malay, Kelantan Malay, and one day we will see Sri Lankan Malay wants a representation in Malaysian Parliament just because they have "Malay" after their name.

dont get shocked that in future year 2020, Monkeys will have MONKEY MALAY sitting in Malaysian Parliament.

that is for sure gonna happen!

Maverick SM said...

Wits0,

That's our Malaysian dilemma.

Ling Ling Chatt,

In a weak govt, there's always the power grabbers.

Anonymous said...

Mave, as part of the effort to counter elitism and class, stop the award of titles which seem to have contaminated just about every politician in the BN governance. A vain feature that spells meaninglessness by surfeit and from public experience.

Maverick SM said...

Wits0,

I have to agree with you; but our culture is about honorifics and gaya...style and title are ingrained behavior.

Anonymous said...

Say it outright, Mave. Malaysian culture is blardy extraordinary VANITY! Hahaha!