For politicians, it’s only about power

The politicians forget that it is us, the rakyat, who decide on their fate. It is us who decide if we want them to govern us.

I read that a blogger (I am sorry but I cannot bring myself to utter or write his name!) is going to stand as an independent against Anwar Ibrahim in Permatang Pauh.

What does he think this 13th general election is going to be? His road to glory, fame and wealth?

Do wannabe politicians no longer measure their ability to succeed in the electorate that they intend to contest by their ability to serve the rakyat? By their ability to present themselves as candidates deserving of the rakyat votes? Are elections a joke now?

And why does he want to contest?

Not to better the people’s lot! Not to serve his electorate! No! He wants “to expose more alleged sex videos during the campaigning period”.

How insulting is this to the constituency that he will contest in? Does he think that they would prefer sex tapes to food on their table? Is that now what budding politicians should strive to do?

How do Barisan Nasional and Pakatan Rakyat choose their candidates? Winnability, they say. The electorate be dammed!

What matters is winning the election. And if this is the public façade that these politicians willingly allow us to see, imagine what they will do within the four walls of their political enclave in order to ensure that they do win.

Do you not worry at the things they will do, the intrigues they will indulge in and how “winning” will excuse any act, however foul as long as it will ensure “winning”? What madness is this?

How are we to choose our representative that we send to Parliament to represent us? How do these candidates translate “winnibility” into votes for themselves and for the party that closes all eyes to anything else but the getting of political power?

It would seem that both BN and Pakatan are now seriously descending into an orgy of handing out cash through BRIM or any other plausible avenues in the name of helping the rakyat.

There are promises of cheaper petrol, cars, promises of more gutter politics, promises of burying each other in god knows what.

Anything but nation building. Anything else but the common good of our people and our nation.

Anything else but decent, open, responsible and good governance.

Winning at any costs

Look at the Malaysia we have today: a blogger could even think of challenging the leader of the opposition because he thinks that the “sex tapes” he has is reason enough for him to do so.

A national debt of over RM502 billion and still this BN government keeps making beggars of its own people because it keeps giving out cash handouts.

And a Pakatan opposition that now joins this irresponsible BN government in the race to give out more to the people.

And over all this Najib and Anwar reigned. They reigned as the chief proponents of this “winnibiity” factor that they want to see among the candidates they chose to represent their political coalition. To what end?

They do so because they themselves want to win government – at any costs!

And in all this they forget that it is we who decide their fate. We decide if we want these politicians to govern us.

We decide if we want Perkasa, if we want another Abdul Razak Baginda, any more Three Datuks, any more pipsqueak two-bit blogger who thinks himself qualified to stand for Parliament when all he has are sex tapes. We decide whether we want the ISA, the Printing Presses and Publications Act (PPPA). We will decide the content of our mainstream media and what our television stations will broadcast.

We decide all these and if these politicians forget, it will be at their peril.

But then you may ask me if we decide all thse, then are we to decide between Anwar and Najib only? Are there no other alternatives?

No, not for now. But if we put into place an effective two-party system in which the balance of power is the people, there you have it: a government in power by the grace of the rakyat.

And that is what we must do. Judiciously we must put into Parliament a balance of power that can only be tipped with the consent of the rakyat and not tipped by what vested interest and money will want them to do.

CT Ali is a reformist who believes in Pakatan Rakyat’s ideologies. He is a FMT columnist.