Is the time ripe for a Green party?

The Green Party, which aims to be colour-blind, while admirable has a long road ahead as a political entity in multiracial Malaysia.

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Is the grass greener on the other side? The yet to be registered Green party is out to show that the grass is indeed greener on the other side. But the question everyone wants to know is whether the country is ready for a colour blind party.

One, man who is thoroughly convinced that we are, is the founder of the Green Party, Azalan Adnan. His aim is to have a party where neither race nor religion plays a part.

But Azalan and his party will have to travel a road riddled with race-based parties.

The biggest culprit of this race-based politics is of course Umno. At every opportunity it trots out the Malay agenda theme and they get more vocal at their general assembly.

Without a doubt, race-based politics has caused social polarization in our society.

We have been parceled into racial and sometimes religious groupings, all championing our own interests and ‘rights.’

This has caused deep divisions between races and religions, in another word – disunity – which is ironic when we hear that all political entities aim “is to unite.”

The problem is each political party (or NGO) naturally wants to unite a certain group first, then only on to the second step of uniting with other groups, for example the Deputy Prime Minister’s now  famous “I am a Malay first and Malaysian second.”

Race-centric parties

With so many parties entrenched in racial politics, the obvious questionis : Can we ever have a truly non-race or colour-blind political party in Malaysia?

Umno is very Malay-centric, although it is multiracial in Sabah for accepting non-Malays, PKR has been trying very hard to be the best model of multi-racialism but is still essentially a Malay party (which by the way has alienated the Indians) and PAS is the hardcore Malay/Islamic party.

The DAP, MCA, Gerakan are the Chinese parties, while MIC are the Indian brand of the many race-based parties in the peninsula.

It is quite similar in Sabah where STAR, PBS, Upko, PBRS and SPF are shamelessly “KDM-based multiracial parties.”

Local “Chinese-based multiracial parties” are SAPP and LDP. They are now challenged by purely Chinese peninsular parties such DAP, MCA and Gerakan.

Gerakan have interestingly enough now conveniently converted themselves into “Chinese-based multiracial parties” the moment they stepped into Sabah.

Sabah is the most racially diverse state in the country with over 30 ethnic and sub-ethnic groups.

Local Sabah Chinese parties, SAPP and LDP, have long claimed to be “Chinese-based multiracial parties” as well, but lately SAPP had started to make an attempt to become a “non-race” or colour-blind party.

In a recently published article, Wilfred Gaban, an SAPP protagonist rebutted my argument that SAPP was still a Chinese party regardless of the party leaders’ insistence on it being “multiracial”.

My argument was that the opposition’s force would be best achieved through a combination of several race-based parties in a the new STAR-led coalition called United Borneo Alliance, ala BN and PR.

Gaban disagreed, saying that “knowing the evil of race-based politics it is prudent not to simply fall for such narrow concept (un) less you wish to recycle the same (thing into the) future …(from) the past”.

He also assured that SAPP is a model of “multi-racialism, equality and justice for all race[s] and religions…. To make Sabah great once again (with) a sustainable political and economic foundation for Sabah…. To ensure Sabah becomes economically strong, we must follow a new pathway that is intelligent and one which will benefit all the people of Sabah.”

But while high idealism for true multiracialism is admirable, practicality is a whole different piece of cake.

Perfect or pure multi-racialism is just not possible in Sabah or even in the whole of Malaysia, as proven by the absence of such a political entity to date.

Azalan ‘s fledgling Green Party of Malaysia (GPM) which aims to operate without any racial inclination, is already being met with doubt as to its ability to attract support.

Environmental issues are still outside the range of the political concerns of Malaysians.

GPM’s main objective is to work with environmentalists to fight for environmental conservation.

GPM can proceed to be a true non-race party, but it can’t do much without support.

Another reason why a party can never be purely non-racial is that people will ook at who the party’s president is.

The racial identity of the party is invariably tied up to the racial identity of the party chief, and his identity determines more than 50 percent of the party’s identity regardless of how many other leaders of different ethnicities are under him.

And there is hardly any possibility of a party chief having a multiracial identity. Can you imagine a Malay, Chinese, Indian, Kadazandusun or Bajau rolled into one personality with a name like Ahmad Wong Gansau Krishnan for instance?

Even one with a multi-blood parentage would still be seen more as from one race, what more if there the weight of his religion has become the core element of his persona.

Perhaps, one way for a multiracial party to be created is to have several people from different racial groups sitting as co-presidents.

Co-presidency is not illegal and was in fact practiced in the first Upko (Sabah political party), with Donald Stephens and GS Sundang agreeing to be co-presidents after the merger of Unko and Pasok Momogun in 1964.

The other reason for this near-impossibility of creating a non-race based party is the undeniable dynamics of race and religion as political factors.

This not peculiar to Malaysia, all over the world there are race based parties. From Africa to Europe to the USA race based parties still play still play important roles in politics.

In the case of Malaysia, racism started long before Malaya became independent, and as soon as the British departed from the Jesselton harbour in 1963, Sabah’s politics was demarcated between Mustapha Harun’s Muslims, Donald Stephens’ Christian Kadazans, Sedomon Gunsanad’s and G.S. Sundang’s Dusun and Muruts.

Race and religion cannot be denied or buried under any amount of idealism and noble definitions. In fact, denying it could spell disaster for a political movement!

As such, any dream of creating a truly non-race political party will remain a dream for a long time to come. Of course, many parties may continue to claim to be “multiracial” or “non-race” but such play acting for political branding and expediency will not change the people’s perception of what they really are.

The writer is a former chief editor and proponent of the Borneo Agenda under State Reform Party (STAR).