May The FORCE be with Malaysians

December 17, 2010

OPINION

May The FORCE be with Malaysians

by Praba Ganesan

A third force is an option for those neglected by the ideas of the two imposing sides. Enough support and you can organically achieve either to inch into the debate and then the process of change like the Australian Greens, or become kingmaker like Israel’s Jewish orthodox and Arab parties, or join government as a junior member like the British Liberal Democrats.

Neglect is a subjective term, and in politics it joins other common subjective terms such as momentum, pragmatism and compromise. But the analysis in Malaysia falls when the assumption is made that Pakatan Rakyat (PR) and Barisan Nasional (BN) are equals in an impasse, resulting in the “neglect” of many and therefore fertile for another political movement.

Master Yoda: The Force behind Malaysian Voters

First, the former is on its first term running four states in the country. Before that, BN has only seen two states at any given time run by other people.

Second, saying any state or federal government would be run exactly like BN, therefore creating no change through voting for PR, is both disingenuous and unfair.

Penang and Selangor have worked under trying conditions, spent very carefully and won the praise of neutrals. But even if you are the most cynical, then you have to say the states are nowhere heading to collapse due to naïve administration, which is the fear with any debutant government.

Third, BN is willing to push the full extent of its legal and not-so-legal powers to sustain a grip-hold of the country. The Machiavellian nature of the Perak power grab and starving of PR lawmakers of resource, legal recourse, fairness in legislative bodies, media access and police neutrality render everyone living off scraps to participate in the democratic process.

This is David and Goliath. We are better off making a three-way fight? Can David handle the kung-fu kicks of a Johnny-come-lately, even if he is equally keen to throw the punches at Goliath?

Fellow columnist Datuk Jema Khan presented the difficulties of being an UMNO PM at the moment and that not many would do better in his place.I’d readily disagree because the question is couched falsely, leading us to a series of dead choices.

Starting with, most of us wouldn’t be an UMNO PM of Malaysia, we’d be a PR PM or third force PM or just PM, and therefore we would not have to compromise nor accept the glaring contradictions of an UMNO reality.

Some say, including this writer, that a progressive UMNO PM is an oxymoron. Ending with, no one should enter politics if they think their ideas are invalid, and no one should then move to political leadership if they are convinced they do not have the mantle to lead, lead all the way to the top.

Ambition is the juice for politicians. But more so to this present analysis, the PM and his gang are bullies. They’ve defended the indefensible over and over, even if evidence and common sense scream in a well of abandon under their conference table.

For decades people have argued that the BN spends its way to election results, overwhelming those “neglected” between elections with goodies. However for years, like Europe before the printing press, the claims were rejected outright as malicious.

So when information finally became rife and enough diplomas adorn the living room of voters, BN says that the ceiling on spending is only for candidates, not the party.

Further, without decent funding every non-BN lawmaker struggles to have a legislative team, research officers and to meet the needs of their electorate. This is not the case for BN lawmakers, they’ve got the money, and funny enough they do not need the legislative team or research officers.

Because they do not have to propose or critique new or old law, they are given their orders to vote, they vote as told. The research officers are superfluous by extension.

They really don’t have to think. In fact the success of a BN backbencher is built on not having a backbone. Just ask S. Sothinathan, he has thoroughly learnt his lesson, after being suspended for speaking up for Malaysian medical students in Russia.

More so, BN leaders, from top to bottom, including a PM with a Facebook to engender a friendlier look, have conspicuously been quiet when asked if they would surrender power peacefully if the electorate voted them out.

This is the reality that those outside BN face in Malaysia. The real climate in Malaysia is to go in the opposite direction of BN. It is not pro-Pakatan Rakyat, Third Force or the soon-to-emerge Fourth Force.

That is where the support really lies. The surge in membership for parties opposed to BN is a surge against BN. To remove BN from power is akin to destroying the fictional Star Wars’ Death Star. There is a small window and everyone has to ask what really matters most. You attack them first, and if you fail we will try tactics is a non-starter. It won’t work.

So you ask, do those out of power all agree with each other? Datuk Zaid Ibrahim just stormed out of PKR and there are gaping holes in the ideology mismatch of the DAP and PAS. And those are just the appetisers.

The things that divide all the forces opposed to BN are immense, but their singularity which overrides everything is that they are all fighting for political breathing space.

Just like before in Marcos’ Philippines and the Shah’s Iran. It is true the disparate forces — lefties, commies, democrats, Islamists, etc — worked to oust a dictator only to find one wing of the movement, the Islamists, taking over government eventually.Or when the Bolsheviks edged out the Mensheviks after the Russian Revolution of 1917.

But they do not play down the evils of the Shah or the Tsar, nor ignore the reality that the giant is only overpowered by a national inertia.

Two things are Hadrian’s Wall for BN opponents.The basic parliamentary system in Malaysia, or the first-past-the-post rule, encourages the incumbent to divide his opponents rather than improve his own appeal.

The elections in Peninsular Malaysia were littered with three-way fights until 2008. BN candidates emphasise their cross-appeal even if superficial to beat the seemingly exclusionists DAP or PAS. Majority wins mean more than either, not more than all others in total.

For the long-term future of the third or fourth force, a more proportional representation system is needed. A substantial support within a constituency or across the nation gets you political representation. Include too preferential voting, where your vote can be transferred to your second choice — allowing those who vote for PKR to be able transfer their vote to PAS or Zaid’s renamed Kita.

There are more and more means and reforms to make sure that the voice of all voters are heard all the time, and not just at elections.BN does not believe in them and will not endorse any reform which may dilute its power stock.

So the only way even the 1 Million Malaysians against the megatower can have seats in Parliament, either in the Dewan Rakyat or a more empowered Dewan Negara, is if there are reforms.

Reforms will only be possible when BN falls. The other challenge is, government change is impossible without non-BN parties cutting into the absolute advantage BN has in Borneo. That advantage is extremely difficult to mount currently, and will only increase in degrees of difficulty — if that was ever possible — if there are more players crowding for support.

Which is why former Sabah PKR chief Zaid’s Kita makes the BN guys smile. Christmas came early for them.

I’m tempted to say that Zaid is doing the very thing he condemned senior PKR leaders of — his new party has accepted his application, changed its name and elected him president in days. Were democratic processes fully observed to allow their members to consider Zaid’s membership let alone have sufficient time to make an informed choice?

I’ll back down, now. I back down because people have to decide that there are many who are different from them, and that this is not a problem.

There is no need for any of us to agree on all things. A democratic society defends that right. But we have to decide who are competing with our ideas, and who are threatening our right to have ideas.

Which is why there is no need for the various players to back down from their present decisions.

Zaid should stay as Kita president, and they deserve to see where that goes. Azmin Ali is PKR number two and Datuk Seri Anwar Ibrahim is like Ultraman’s brother in the sky with a penchant for trouble.

PAS has the conservatives and its diet Coke-Erdogans. Lim Kit Siang just has to accept his son may be going great guns in Penang, but there is no way to think his systemic rise is independent of his grip of the party.

They just have to remember the Death Star hovers over them all the time, threatening everything valuable to them. And then talk about the future.

–www.themalaysianinsider.com (December 16, 2010)