Same old regime, same old tune

With the same regime helming Umno has left the writer pondering if the the ruling party is able to steer the country out of troubled waters and into the course of betterment.

COMMENT

As always, our Prime Minister Najib Tun Razak never fails to amaze us!

Give the newly-elected Umno top leadership line–up a chance to prove their capability to make the national transformation agenda a success, he says. We have a transformation agenda for the nation he says.

InsyaAllah, we can do it, he says. Have we not heard all this before? As Tom Jones says: “And then those funny, familiar, forgotten feelings started walkin’ all over my mind.”

Let us not waste our time over that, which is of the past. This newly-elected Umno top leadership line-up is not even of the present – it is of the past.

Let me try to put into context what had happened to Malaysia in the past. Sometime during the regime of Dr Mahathir Mohamad, Umno launched a covert cultural counter-revolution to feed the minds of the Malays that race and religion, above all else, would be their salvation.

That all the Malays needed was to reiterate their rights under Ketuanan Melayu to make them top dog among the others in Malaysia. The Malays do not need education, economic advancement, or honest hard work, and that certainly not any concept of 1Malaysia – race and religion would get them everywhere.

How successful Umno had been in making this revolution work can be seen today. The Malays now make up 60 percent of the population and growing at a rate that the non-Malays would find alarming because in time, the sheer numbers of Malays will obliterate any need for consensus on issues of national importance – only what matters to the Malays matters.

The religion of Islam today dominates all things Malaysians and even sought to dominate any judicial deliberations where non-Muslims were in conflict with Muslims.

These are not claims made by Umno – these, as you and I know, are stark realities.

This newly-elected Umno top leadership line-up gives notice to all of you out there that more of the same would be dished out ad nauseum. The bullies never left town.

Through ways and means of Umno that we are now familiar with with the survival of the Malays becoming one and of the same. This paradigm had been skillfully interwoven into the very fabric of the Malay race – more so among the urban population than in the rural.

It would be difficult today to find Malays who are prepared to forgo political dominance. At best, the Malays were prepared to talk about meritocracy and the sharing of political power with the other races but they do so on the premise that the numerical advantage that the Malays had over all others would ensure that the Malays would politically dominate.

Sinking ship?

Such had been Umno’s success in the cultural counter revolution, which had made each race look inward for their own survival hence, the proliferation of political parties that were fixated on the politics of self which Umno excelled while others were still in the process of learning the ropes, so to say.

The sweeping social media phenomena had an impact on aplenty in a number of countries – Malaysia was not spared, either.

Today, if you have a computer or smartphone, you could dig out information on Rosmah’s favourite handbags to the RM3 million home of the trophy actress girlfriend of a minister in Najib’s cabinet with images included.

For those who followed the 24/7 news cycle it would seemed that Armageddon was looming. Yes, Armageddon neared but it would first have to visit Egypt, Libya, Syria, Somalia and maybe even the US and a host of other countries before blowing over our soil.

But what is true is that Umno would now have a fight on their hands – there would be enough of us citizens today who understood the ramifications of that counter-revolution Umno had started many decades ago.

We knew that it had taken root among our people and that was why Umno had an iron grip on the government for over half a century but at what cost?

For me, personally, the costs had been the breakdown of my family unit because wealth came too soon and we were unprepared to handle that wealth. This family tragedy had been repeated in many Malay families and the tragedy worsened when the husbands and wives were parted because new-found wealth invariably brought about the breakdown of marriages because of infidelity and/or trophy wives.

For many Malays, a whole new way of life had come. Some good and some bad but more often than not, decency and filial piety got thrown out of the window. For a race that looked upon its leaders and elders for guidance in life, it was impossible to ignore what Umno leaders did in the name of race, religion and culture.

Observe Mahathir. In him, we have an 88-year-old who took not to religion or assisting the less privileged than him as his remaining life’s work but instead chose to chase after political relevance for reason that only he knew best.

At a time when there was general disgust in the manner he had conducted himself while he was the prime minister because the public had become more aware of his doings then. But if God has not given Mahathir the grace to understand what was expected of him…who else could?

All the sweeteners for the Malays, the few billions for Memperkasakan Ekonomi Bumiputra (MEB) included, would have to be paid for. All the handouts to the Chinese, Indians, Sikhs and whomsoever else Najib had been generous with before the elections including the less privilege would have to be paid for. The Goods and Services Tax or GST would pay for them all, perhaps?

Let us just watch how Najib Tun Razak would steer this Ship of State dubbed the SS Malaysia with SS the abbreviation for “sure sangkut” or “sure to be in the bind” against the tide.

For certain, he had pushed the Budget through parliament regardless of what the opposition hurled at him. He has also again request that we be patient and wait for the transformation to come post budget day.

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