Zunar says his political cartoons will remain funny

So what will you draw after this, I asked him. With Najib out of power and Rosmah unlikely to buy more diamonds or Birkins, where will he get new material for his political cartoons?

“Oh, that I"ll find easily,” replied Zulkiflee Anwar Ulhaque – or Zunar to his Malaysian fans.

The widely-anticipated criminal trials of the former Malaysian first couple will offer rich material that keeps him busy for a while, he said. Beyond that, there"ll be plenty of scope for political humour with the present government, he insists. 

“In fact, there should be more opportunity than ever, given the liberal environment we"ll be operating in,” said Zunar. Then he mischievously added a kicker: “But I can tell you, in terms of a caricature, I'm going to miss Rosmah.”

“I don"t mind if Najib goes and Rosmah stays,” he said, cracking me up.

It was 10 in the morning in New York and I had just dropped the kids at school. In KL, it was 10pm and Zunar had just returned home for his first phone interview since discovering the previous day that he had been taken off the Malaysian immigration's travel blacklist. News that he was free to fly again coincided with another special occasion - his 56th birthday.

I asked how he felt about his new-found freedom. “Happy, of course,” he said. “Relieved, too. But still, it's a pleasant surprise, because it happened so fast. On the very first working day of the new government!” 

He said he decided to check his travel status after learning with amusement about the flight ban placed on Najib Abdul Razak and Rosmah Mansor instead, and wondered if innocent people like himself had been taken off the blacklist.

He couldn't believe his eyes when the two magical words returned on his search: “Tiada halangan” (No restriction). Previously it was “Sila rujuk ke pejabat Imigresen terdekat” (Please refer to the nearest Immigration office). 

“I said what?! I thought I had keyed in my ID number wrongly. So I tried once more. Again, it was 'Tiada halangan'. It was like 'Wow!'"

While the travel ban itself had been lifted, Zunar legal woes aren't exactly over, at least on paper. He has nine sedition charges against him. Yes, you read that, right, nine sedition charges  – a record for any individual in Malaysia.

Many were for cartoons he tweeted in 2015 depicting Najib as the presiding judge in the jailing of rival Anwar Ibrahim. Zunar's trial on the sedition charges has been slated for November. If convicted on all, he could serve up to 43 years in prison.

With the change in government, he expects the charges to be dropped soon but is willing to wait if not. “This government is just days old,” said Zunar. “We shouldn't expect too much so fast from them. Just because they"re able to move fast on some things, we shouldn't take them for granted on everything. 

"(Prime Minister) Dr Mahathir Mohamad has already said that he wants things done by the book or the rule of law. But based on the speed with which my immigration status cleared, I expect quite a lot of reforms.”

Even before the reset of his travel status, Zunar had filed a legal challenge to the Immigration Department's decision to blacklist him. The travel ban came after a widely-publicised exhibition of his cartoons in Geneva, which angered Najib's inner circle. Zunar lost the first round of his legal battle on the travel ban at the High Court and is awaiting appeal at the Federal Court.

Despite his movements no longer being restricted, he intends to pursue the appeal in the hope of securing a landmark ruling favourable to all who had been victimised by the BN regime for voicing legitimate dissent.

“The grounds cited for my travel ban were 'Special reasons'. How is that acceptable? I want the Federal Court to make a ruling that it's fundamentally unjust from civil liberties point to use 'Special reasons' to ban a person from travelling. This is to ensure such things never happen again, even with future administrations.” 

He said he also wanted to seek justice for the artistic community. “No government should be allowed to arbitrarily make rulings based on its or leaders' interpretation of artistic expression or cartoons they may not like. It's totally wrong.” 

Zunar does only political art, a rarity in Malaysia where cartoonists often dabble in more than one genre. Bursting into public view during the pro-Anwar Reformasi days, he became famous for his “Mahafiraun” (great pharaoh) caricatures, which then targeted then prime minister Mahathir, on whose watch Anwar was first jailed for corruption and sodomy in what many still believe were trumped-up charges.

There wasn't social media in the early Reformasi days as today. 

Outrageous humour

Malaysiakini was Zunar's regular outlet then, and e-mail was another way for fans to share his work other than buying his books. Yet, his stature as a political cartoonist grew, winning him a profile in 1999 in the Wall Street Journal.

More global recognition came when he received the Swiss Foundation Cartooning for Peace Award last year in Geneva. Earlier, in 2015, he won the International Press Freedom Award from the Committee to Protect Journalists.

Zunar has also been a prominent international speaker on political cartoons. At home though, he was viewed as a rogue by the former government. He was detained for sedition in 2010 – a year after Najib entered office – and again in 2015 on similar charges. Other harassment included the banning and confiscation of his books and regular raids on his office by the police. A mob faithful to Najib even disrupted his exhibition in Penang last year.

All these have made Zunar increasingly outrageous in both his humour and attack on Najib. “Man of Steal” and “Sapu-Man” were ingenious tags he came up with to portray alleged super-thefts by the former prime minister.

For Rosmah, he devised gems such as “$27 million Cincin” (the value of a pink diamond ring which the US Department of Justice alleged was purchased with stolen public money for the self-styled First Lady of Malaysia) and “1200 Rambut” (again the value, this time in ringgit, of a hair-job the FLOM had apparently ordered on state expense).

His inimitable cartoons and subsequent legal challenges have made Zunar a cult hero in Malaysia, celebrated not only by the so-called 'Anwaristas' but also secretly by people in government, earning him a kind of national adulation hitherto reserved for Lat, the country's art giant.

The Wall Street Journal, in its profile of Zunar, said even Lat admired him. “So simple, yet so punchy” it quoted Lat as saying of Zunar's style, adding that sales of the political cartoonist's books were just as impressive. 

Things have been looking better for Zunar. Three days after the election, he was invited, for the first time in years, to officiate at a local cartoon festival. Zunar also plans to use his celebrity status to help aspiring and fellow artists. He estimates there are at least 500 active and professional cartoonists in Malaysia, and says more may be drawn to the political genre after this. 

“Youngsters wishing to be political cartoonists should get proper support. But I'm not good at organising forums or things like that, so I will let others do that,” he said, chuckling.

“I will lend my support instead in motivating people and campaigning newspapers and other media to lend space for such cartoons. Political cartoonists should also be well-read and knowledgeable in order to satirise political happenings and bring them to public knowledge.”

But how will he work in the new, liberal era? Will he draw critical cartoons of Anwar someday? “I will continue with my work to criticise the government of the day,” he said. “I will not hold any public office or be partisan to any political party.”

“I believe in going after those in power. But I may need to change my perspective, focusing on people"s interaction with the government and how that's changed, rather than just targeting politicians.” 

He was also ready to cut the new administration some slack, but not too much. “We need to acknowledge that we've just had a regime change. I need to be fair in giving time to the new government to clean up the huge and deep mess left by Najib.

"It's going to be a very big task to rid the civil service of corruption and rebuild the nation from zero. So, the government deserves a short honeymoon, in my opinion. Like everyone else, I'll be scrutinising its 100-day report card.” 

'Satu kali lah'

I moved the discussion to the just-concluded election results. Did he expect such an outcome?

“Frankly, I didn't think there"ll be a landslide win for the opposition. I thought it was going to be close, a tough fight. Even so, before the results were out, I knew there was a difference in this election versus others.

"The difference was the Malays. A month before parliament was dissolved, they were really speaking out against the government. Previously, they either kept quiet or just voted "dacing" when the time came.

His confidence for change also grew as the Malay community adopted a mantra he had not heard before: “Cuba satu kali lah, tengok apa jadi.” (Try it once, see what happens)

It wasn't just a catchy line, he said. It indicated a mindset. “From people in the street to Grab drivers, even those working for the civil service, everyone was saying it. Previously, the Malays were just scared of change. This time, they felt the rot had gone too far and change was absolutely vital.

"That tells you the rakyat is ready to take power back into its hands anytime it feels things are going wrong or not working. It is also a warning to the present government. If they repeat the same mistakes of the BN, they will face the same fate.”

I shifted the subject to Mahathir. Are you a fan now, I asked. “Well, you know the history between us,” Zunar replied. “I attacked him a lot in my drawings during the rreformasi days. But you have to look at the greater good in the man.

"Umno had become the root to all evil and he had enough conscience to realise that and bring down the party he once fought so hard to preserve. Above that, I think Mahathir is on a crusade to right all his wrongs. And he really wants to hand over to Anwar when he's done.”

Anwar, since his release, has said he wasn't in a hurry to succeed Mahathir. Many still doubt all is well between the two men, with Mahathir not making any promises on how long he'll stay this round after his earlier stretch of 22 years in office.

But Anwar said the elder statesperson must be given time to achieve his immediate objectives – which included bringing to justice the perpetrators of the 1MDB crimes.

“It may take a year or slightly more, it's up to him,” Anwar, who was deputy prime minister from 1993 to 1998, said. “I'm not in a rush.” Zunar concurs, saying the 92-year-old, already the world's oldest ruler should be allowed to finish what he's started and, accordingly, hand out tasks to whomever he wished.

“I understand the need for consensus,” Zunar said, referring to the recent dismay in some circles over what they viewed as unilateral cabinet appointments by Mahathir. “But I also think the PM has the prerogative to pick the people he wants for each job, and we should respect that. Let Tun do his work. I can see his sincerity this time.”

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BARANI KRISHNAN writes about technology, energy and, occasionally, Malaysian affairs. He is a native of Kuala Lumpur, who now lives in the Greater New York City area with his wife and two young children. -Mkini