The PAS-UMNO Merger - The Triumph And Convergence of Ignorance

Zahid openly called for PAS-Umno merger at rally organised by both parties

Dear Hadi, God willing, under my leadership, let us bercantum (merge).

"Let us merge, let us set aside our differences in the name of Islam, Malays, Malaysia and bumiputera," Zahid said to applause from the crowd in Pasir Salak, Perak last night.

My comments :  Zahid's capitulation is solid evidence that Umno is dead both as a party and in its purpose. Zahid now wishes to merge with the most backward and foolish poltical persuasion on earth - the religious party. 

This is the lowest point for Umno - it cannot go any lower than this.

But thanks to over 30 years of an ideology infested education system (now getting worse) and a similarly ideology infested government machinery, the Malays who belong to Umno, Pas, PKR (and possibly Amanah) see a convergence in their increasing 'indoctrination' - towards religion and race.  

This convergence is actually a retreat from the real world - a result of their continuing failure to progress up the economic ladder and their distance from what would be considered 'social advancement'. 

The Deputy Prime Minister (from PKR), who is a medical doctor educated in Scotland, saying that FGM is acceptable in Malay culture and her earlier conciliatory attitude towards child marriage is evidence that all that education and just being present on the surface of the earth in the "drone and clone civilisation of the 21st century" has not really moved her out of her regressive beliefs.

30 years ago the idea that Umno will even think of a merger with Pas would have been met with ridicule by most Malays.  Umno represented the best chance for the Malays to catch up not only with the Chinese and Indians but to catch up with Alphonso de Albuquerque who invaded Melaka in 1511, the unnamed Dutch who ruled Melaka for far longer than the Portugese or British, and the most recent British who taught us all how to speak English.   It was simply "catch up" time for the Malays and Umno was the best vehicle to move them forward into the 20th century.

It was a fantastic idea in social re-engineering to remove tens of thousands of Malay kids from the weak and debilitating environment of the kampongs and force feed them a modern education,  good food and new ideas in the residential schools or sekolah asrama penuh. Plus (to an extent) they learnt the discipline of being timely. Their sekolah asrama environment which was quite sanitized from the kampong mentality was able to create a new Malay with confidence and self esteem to be part of the 20th century.  Along the way hopefully they had discarded FGM and child marriages. Or so we thought.

Then something more nefarious happened - not just to the Malays but to all Muslims all around the world. This was the religious creep of creepy religion from the Middle East. Beginning in the late 1970s Wan Azizah became among the earliest Malay girls to wear the tudung in public.  Her husband joined UMNO in 1983 - Dr Mahathir's biggest mistake.  In the early days as the wife of a new Minister she always looked silly being the only girl wearing a tudung at official functions.  To even the playing field her husband introduced the tudung into the schools. Then the universities. Religiously (and consequent to that, socially as well) the Malays have been going downhill ever since.  

The kampong has crept back into the sekolah asrama, the education system and the government amchinery.   Now as Deputy PM Wan Azizah says FGM is ok and dismissed child marriage as 'a state matter'.  With due respect Kak Wan, you are ignorant on both counts. 

Zahid Hamidi - who is now proposing a merger between Umno and Pas - was and still is - a protege of Anwar Ibrahim. That means Muslim Brotherhood as well for certainly Brother Anwar is a protege of the Muslim Brotherhood. The Muslim Brotherhood's Yusuf Qardawi is also his religious and spiritual mentor.

So there is a convergence now in the 21st century Malay psyche that  

• Pas is good
• Umno is good
• the Anwar part of PKR is good and 
• Amanah is good
• and Bersatu too 

because all of them have now become quite the same or not really different from each other. 

Across the Malay political spectrum, there is the commonality of failure, the fraternity of underachievement which has led to this convergence in the Malay psyche - economically still backward, socially regressing and religiously in lock step with the Middle East, the Brotherhoods, the Salafi-hoods and whatever.  

Certainly not 21st century yet. Now going past the 20th century - but in the wrong direction.  

Zahid's proposal for the UMNO-Pas merger will no more be met with ridicule.  It could turn out to be the main item on the menu. It has their Halal sticker.