Of poor Malays & Martin Luther King: HOW LONG? Not long before Umno-BN is toppled by its own people

Today, Jan 19, is a national holiday in the United States. We are celebrating Martin Luther King's birthday. King would have been 86 this year. The reality, as we know, is that he was only a very young 39 when he was murdered by a white racist.

The reality also is that through King's courageous actions - his willingness to challenge authority, to be beaten and jailed, and to face death threats many times over - he never hesitated to stand up for what was right.

Influenced by Mahatma Gandhi and his theory of non-violence, King not only challenged the corrupt and illegitimate acts of the political authorities, he also challenged the silent majority to stand up for what is right.

That is why we honour him every year, and why our country has built a monument to him, standing between those of Abraham Lincoln and Thomas Jefferson.

I know that like me, many Malaysians admire King.

I don't know whether the new film ‘Selma’ will be shown in Malaysia or not. It has just been nominated for the Academy Award as Best Picture of the Year. The film shows King as a man who is fallible, but who nevertheless was able to separate his own personal failings and misgivings from the mission that he had set for himself and his people.

Martin Luther King

It shows a man who kept going forward - no matter the challenge, no matter the personal threats, no matter the self-doubt, no matter the family problems.

Reminiscent of M'sia

At the end of the film, King arrives at the State Capitol building in southern Alabama to confront the white power structure. He makes a speech on the Capitol steps. It was interesting to watch, because some of the lines reminded me of the situation in Malaysia today. So I went to the Internet and read the actual speech he made.

It is called his ‘How long, not long’ speech, because he said this

“How long? Not long, because no lie can live forever.

"How long? Not long, because you shall reap what you sow.

“How long? Not long, because the arc of the moral universe is long, but it bends toward justice.”

King talked about how the white elites of the South used racist rhetoric and laws not only to keep the blacks down, but just as important, to also "bamboozle" and confuse the poorer whites into voting for them.

The corrupt white elites wanted their poorer cousins to believe that their rule and laws would improve the lot of the white race. The white elites needed to spew their racist rhetoric to get votes and keep themselves in power - so they could keep themselves and their friends and cronies rich.

As for the poor, less educated, rural whites, they believed what the white elites had to say. Their lives were not getting that much better, so they needed a reason why. They saw the black man and his demands for equality as a threat, because the elite told them it was.

The Umno elites

And when the "northern liberals" got involved in the discussion (in Malaysia, think of them the same as human rights NGOs or meddling foreigners), the anger of the Southern whites mounted.

But the downtrodden whites believed what the powers had to say, so they kept on voting for the white political elite. They kept on supporting special privileges and laws for the white race, because they believed - despite years of evidence to the contrary - that it would help them. Vladimir Lenin would have called such people "useful idiots."

They also thought they were entitled to those special privileges, because they believed in white supremacy. Sort of like "ketuanan putih." Whites in America called it "white privilege."

But after years and years, nothing ever changed. The white elites got rich, but the poor whites stayed poor.

And then the cycle began again. When the poor whites wondered why they still were not doing well, the answer came back from the elites. "Blame the blacks. Blame the Northerners. Blame someone else for your misfortune - but never blame us. We are here to defend your rights."

Comparison with Malaysia?

Dr M

I have often thought about the poor Malays, and how they are told time and time again by the Malay political elite (read Umno) that their race and their religion are under threat, so vote for us. We will protect you.

In Dr Mahathir Mohamad's days, the threat came from the Americans, the ‘orang putih’, the World Bank and International Monetary Fund, Wall Street, and other evil "people in the West who want to recolonise us."

Under Najib, the threat is now the Chinese tsunami, the opposition, and anyone who spouts Western, humanist, or liberal views.

Yet I have one simple question. Umno has run Malaysia for 57 years. The government, the civil service, the schools and universities, the courts, the press and television, the military, and the police are over 90 percent Malay-controlled. The Umno government decides who in the business world gets the contracts, which too often are "no-bid."

Jakim, Jawi and other Umno controlled-government religious affairs offices decree what the sermons are every Friday in the mosques.

So it's a very simple question. When Umno has ruled and controlled the country for almost six decades, how can the Malay race and the Muslim religion be under threat? Why are the Malays still poor overall, when KL has more millionaires than any city in the world?

How long? It is something to think about on Martin Luther King Day.

JOHN R MALOTT is former US ambassador to Malaysia.