"Whatever we wish to achieve in the future, it must begin by
knowing where we are in the present - not where we wish we were, or
where we wish others to think we are, but where we are in fact." - Thomas Sowell (Economic Facts and Fallacies)
COMMENT So,
let me get this straight. Bersih leader Ambiga Sreenevasan believes
that racial politics should end and the way to end it would be to engage
in more... racial politics? National
Indian Rights Action Team's (Niat's) rather self-serving list of
demands, I say self-serving because one of the components of the three
cabinet ministers post and four deputy ministers reserved (for Indians)
would not only include elected representatives but also (surprise,
surprise) those appointed from NGOs.
Question. If a Chinese or
Malay NGO candidate/elected representative has done "more" for the
Indian community that an Indian candidate, would the said individual
still be considered for the ‘Indian-only' post? I would bet my
last ringgit that if Pakatan Rakyat (if they ever come into federal
power) were to announce such a strategy, they would be received with
open arms by a certain section of the Malaysian voting public who claim
to be interested in a race-blind society but who in reality understand
the code Pakatan uses to demonstrate its commitment to the idea that
their racial expectations would be met in a more "honest" manner by a
non-BN government.
I don't think the plan is "too idealistic", I
think it's downright myopic, cynical and detrimental to any sort of
"racial harmony" that oppositional types like to say is part of the
‘change' agenda and the kind of racial nonsense Umno-BN has been
peddling for decades. Can you imagine the fallout if this were a group
of Chinese NGOs having a list of demands for the government?
The editorial warlocks over at Utusan Malaysia and
the Perkasa thugs would be having epileptic fits and Umno would be
leaping for joy at the unexpected windfall of actually being in the
Pakatan position of doing nothing while their adversary shoot himself in
the foot. Poor
DAP, while their golden boy Penang Chief Minister Lim Guan Eng has to
go out of his way to calm Malay nerves that nobody in his party would
ever seek the highest office in the land, here we have Indians NGOs
being satisfied with second best and worse of all a position given to
them by their Malay masters.
It's funny, actually. Lim has to
fend off allegations from a rival political party (MCA) that he is
giving false hope to the Chinese community with regards to leading this
country, all the while proving an extremely effective elected
representative for the state he runs. Indians, or those claiming
to represent them, on the other are so marginalised that they do not
even pose a credible threat to the powers-that-be.
Yet another racial formula
Apparently the Niat booklet explains that the marginalisation of the
Indian community was due to under representation in the government.
Apparently two former prime ministers agree with this claim. Really?
I believe the Indians are marginalised because they continued to vote
for inept corrupt leaders who bilked them with the sacred cows of
religion and culture and an apathetic Indian middle-class who didn't
give a damn about their community. All this set the stage of an eventual
class conflict as expressed by the ‘mandore' sentiments of Hindraf.
(This opinion drew much flack when it first appeared in my 'The slaying of our sacred cows' piece)
And if the two former prime ministers thought that under representation
was the cause of the marginalisation of the Indian community, why
didn't they do anything to fix it? I mean if it was easy a putting a
couple of token Indians in positions of power, which would in turn ‘fix'
the Indian problem, they why not do it?
The
answer is simple. A marginalised and fractured Indian community served
the interests of the ruling elite. The Umno racial formula and the
complicity of the Indian ‘mandores' ensured that the Indian vote bank
would be bought over by short-term racialist gains. What this
silly list of demands is attempting is another kind of racial formula.
And why not? If anything, Chinese and Indian support of Pakatan is not
really based on any egalitarian foundation but rather that their
racialist expectations would be better served by an alliance which is
not as corrupt and (here's the hilarious part) racist, as Umno.
Nobody in Pakatan (with a few exceptions) dares put forward the idea
that a non-Malay could ever lead this country but Pakatan supporters
make the appropriate noise when it comes to meritocracy and race
blindness when it is politically expedient to do so. The usual
justification is that the Malay community is the majority and only they
can decide if and when it is palatable for a Malaysian regardless of his
or her race to ascend by popular will to the highest office in the
land. So don't rock the boat. The goal is to be led by a
forward-thinking Malay and banish the hated BN from Putrajaya.
Yup, and once there, we can still play the same racial game with ideas
of the sort espoused by Niat but coming from Pakatan no doubt it would
be more palatable. And once this happens we will unfortunately once
again, get the government we deserve. Ambiga praises this
initiative as proposing solutions rather than a list of problems, but
what if the solutions are as bad as the problems? How
does having a Department of Minority Affairs and Development help
minority communities here in Malaysia? Has the Women's Affairs
Department helped women in Malaysia? Has the Orang Asli Department
helped alleviate the problems faced by the indigenous peoples of this
land?
I would argue that all these ‘minority' departments have
just added to the bureaucratic nightmare which is the Malaysian civil
service and has become the breeding ground for the despised cronycrats. I was of course smirking at the suggestion that banning the sale of
alcohol in convenience stores would help ‘curb' alcoholism in the Indian
community. Didn't PAS attempt this dance before? Interesting
isn't it, how these religious types (and I'm assuming religious types of
every flavour had their say in this list of demands) always resort to
enforcing their value system on others instead of accepting the reality
that when it comes to social ills like alcoholism, the aspect of
personal responsibility should be front and centre of any effort to curb
the problem.
Provocative ideas
Why not champion some of the more provocative ideas which have been out there for decades? Here are a few. Dismantle the federal bureaucracy which is there to provide employment
for a specific racial group, which in turn nurtures as sense of
entitlement within this section of the Malaysian polity. Dismantle the
NEP (New Economic Policy) and institute a class-based affirmative action
programme. Halt state/federal funding for vernacular/religious
schools. Re-establish English as the medium of instruction in school,
with Malay being a compulsory paper. Add Mandarin and Tamil to the
compulsory list. Do away with the race-based quota system when it comes
to educational opportunities.
Curb
the powers of religious institutions, especially if they attempt
through religious dogma to undermine the relationships between the
diverse religious communities in the country. Concentrate on rural
development as a means of raising the standard of living instead of
viewing them as ignorant vote banks. These are just a few ideas
that have been floating out there for decades and not solutions.
Solutions come about if people are willing to consider these ideas as a
basis for possible solutions that would lead us out of this racial
quagmire we find ourselves in.
Perhaps if we vote for people who
believe that these ideas are sound and that it should at least be
attempted after decades of following our Pavlovian response to racial
hot-button issues, maybe it would lead to a situation where the
‘majority' has no hang-up as to who leads Malaysia. Maybe it
would lead to a political climate where NGOs don't have to propose
race-based solutions to problems caused by raced-based preoccupations in
the first place.
If anything Niat secretary Arun Dorasamy (right),
this is "too idealistic" and not your demands, which is merely playing
the same race game repeatedly and hoping for a different outcome.
Understand now, that both our ideas would no doubt draw flack from a
certain section of the Malay community nurtured into believing that
their very survival depends on the game being rigged in their favour. But
the difference is that Niat's demands is in effect threshing away in
racial quicksand worsening the situation while the ideas I'm
highlighting are an attempt to grab a vine to pull us out of this mess.
The tragedy is this election is for the average Pakatan supporter, it
is a choice between the lesser of two evils (as some too comfortably
claim). Perhaps this is why Niat's suggestions would at the end of the
day be implemented if Pakatan ever comes into power (even though it is
mocked now) and the ideas I talked about would be consigned to the
rubbish bin. Change is only meaningful if it involves sacrifice
and nobody wants to rock the boat when the port of Putrajaya is within
reach. Malaysiakini
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