MB today, PM tomorrow

Do you honestly think Umno Baru and the Election Commission (EC) will reform and accommodate the rakyat’s wishes?

COMMENT

GE13 is not about the rakyat and good governance, but is about maintaining the status quo and one man – Dr Mahathir Mohamad. The rakyat was only a means to his end.

Now that GE13 is over, Mahathir and Najib Tun Razak, the prime minister designate of Malaysia’s illegitimate government, can continue the most important political battle of their lives; Najib must satisfy his addiction to power and money, whilst Mahathir needs to establish his political dynasty.

Their common enemy is Pakatan and they were willing to stop Pakatan’s progress by any means, including cheating, bribery and intimidation.

Umno Baru kept the rakyat on tenterhooks, waiting for GE13, then robbed them of their right to make their vote count. Umno Baru robbed us of our destiny and our children’s future.

How can Malaysians trust Umno Baru? Najib made several promises to the Chinese community before GE13 and entertained them with Psy and the Bond girl. A few days ago, he insulted the Chinese community and questioned their gratitude.

If the economically sound Chinese are treated with disdain, good luck to the likes of P Waythamoorthy and his rag-tag band of Indian followers whose MoU is not worth the paper it is written on.

Is there any point in mounting a legal challenge against the alleged fraud in GE13? Our judiciary was corrupted by Mahathir. Perakians are still fuming over Najib’s coup d’état. They would probably trust a shaman more than they trust the Malaysian courts.

Does the wife who has been betrayed by her philandering husband believe his promise that he will not see other women? Will the person who readily accepts a RM50 bribe refuse to receive larger sums? Did the cheat who copied other people’s work and then falsified his degree, ever do an honest day’s study? Do you honestly think Umno Baru and the Election Commission (EC) will reform and accommodate the rakyat’s wishes?

Mahathir criticised the Pakatan rally in Kelana Jaya and said that the opposition could not accept defeat. Malaysians abhor corruption and violence but Mahathir has difficulty acknowledging this.

The task of this EC is not to facilitate free and fair elections in Malaysia. Its main objective is to secure a win for Umno Baru at any cost. The election is also a time for Umno Baru cronies to make money, either by supplying ink or advertising.

How many millions of ringgits of the taxpayers’ money was spent on the useless indelible ink? How many millions of ringgits did Najib spend on advertising? Was the public purse used to fund Umno Baru adverts? Without a doubt!

Before GE13, the EC refused to investigate allegations of phantom voters and other voting irregularities. The National Registration Department (NRD) and most other government agencies also appeared to act for Umno Baru.

Azmin is wrong

Project IC is the brainchild of Mahathir and this election has seen a Bangladesh, Indonesian, Filipino, Pakistani and Burmese tsunami.

When Pakatan gets to Putrajaya, the heads of the EC and the NRD should be arrested and charged for being accomplices for Mahathir’s acts of treason.

We must act now, whilst the momentum is strong, to demand a re-election. If we do not, Najib, Mahathir and Umno Baru will feel emboldened.

If we wait for GE14, Umno Baru will have raised the art of vote-rigging to such a high level, that countries like Zimbabwe will want to learn from us.

Pakatan’s Azmin Ali has distanced himself from the Kelana Jaya rally and he tweeted: “The rakyat are tired with politics that are over the top. Accept results. Scrutinise yourself. Admit weaknesses. Move forward. Focus on the rakyat, not yourselves.”

Azmin is wrong. Accepting flawed results will set a bad precedence. What sort of example are we teaching our children, if we condoned cheating, corruption and violence?

After GE13, Wan Saiful Wan Jan, the CEO of the Institute for Democracy and Economic Affairs (IDEAS) said, “I am too afraid to say if the flaws affected the results.”

“……….but I personally believe that we should accept the result, it is credible as of now… partially free and not fair……….If we don’t, where do we go from here?”

Wan Saiful cannot pussy foot around the issue of electoral rigging. It he says they are partially free, then it means that GE13 was not a free election.

What sort of values would we be passing to our children if we did as Wan Saiful suggested and ‘accepted the results’? What does that say about IDEAS, an organisation which supposedly promotes democratic affairs?

Wan Saiful asked, “Why are we cheating? There must be bigger problems in our society if we do that……..We cannot find any proof of fraud….. I believe that the results of GE13 is credible.”

Is Wan Saiful unaware that Najib lives in denial and refuses to deal with the bigger problems afflicting our society? Wan Saiful is naïve to think that the EC made their fraudulent tactics glaringly obvious.

The EC employs subtle methods. For instance, the EC separated voters into separate queues – one for the elderly and one for the young. The old people’s queue took 15 minutes to move but the ‘young people’s queue averaged 3 – 5 hours before they could cast their votes.

Younger people would probably vote for the Opposition and perhaps, the EC attempted to wear down their resolve. Many young people walked off before they had voted.

Ideas for IDEAS

Wan Saiful also said, “I accept the results because I do not see how else we can move forward. I’m more interested in strengthening the institution, rather than criticising it.”

One would expect the IDEAS CEO to be more decisive and determined, especially in a dictatorship like Malaysia.

How does Wan Saiful propose to strengthen the EC which exists only to promote Umno Baru interests? Allegations that no election since 1969 has been clean are rife.

Why should the EC and Umno Baru agree to correct the rigged constitutional boundaries, i.e. gerrymandering? Why would Umno Baru want equitable representation when they know will lose?

If IDEAS is short of ideas, I have three for him:-

• The EC should declare the results invalid and demand a re-election.

• Najib should resign as PM and only operate in a caretaker function until the revised GE13 election.

• That overseas Malaysians start petitions to be handed to the leaders of the countries in which they live and work. (One petition has been started in Washington DC). Najib thrives on a glowing report in international circles, and a bad press will dent both his ego and his image.

Inaction by Malaysians will have tragic consequences. Today, Mukhriz Mahathir is menteri besar; tomorrow, he will be prime minister. You and your parents suffered under Mahathir, but your children and grandchildren will fare no better with Mahathir’s son.

We cannot be angry with Mukhriz, who is a pitiful puppet used by his evil father. It looks as though Mahathir’s legacy is a poor copy of the Kim dynasty in North Korea.

Mariam Mokhtar is a FMT columnist.