“Politics is a matter of choices, and a man doesn't set up the choices himself. And there is always a price to make a choice. You know that. You've made a choice, and you know how much it cost you. There is always a price.”
- All the King's Men by Robert Penn Warren
The upcoming Johor election will determine how the base is feeling about the DAP. All politics is local, of course, but rational Malaysians dissatisfied with how DAP has managed non-Malay issues in the era of Madani are going to see if their views are validated or rejected in this upcoming election.
Parti Bersama Malaysia, which is targeting five DAP seats, is going to discover if they have a chance of being part of the political process in this country or will they be consigned to the bin, merely a convenient online distraction.
Anecdotally speaking, I know many non-Muslims who are fearful of the Green Wave and would rather just vote for the lesser of two evils, and they believe DAP is still the best chance they have to ensure that their interests are taken care of.
They would rather the non-Muslims not rock the Madani boat. And believe me, I have much sympathy for that sentiment. As a long-time DAP supporter told me, “… there is a time to rant, and there is a time to vote”.
Of course, this is why things never change or rather, political parties believe that they need never change.
Building empowerment
This is also why Parti Sosialis Malaysia's S Arutchelvan, arguing for a progressive bloc, writes – “We need to stand to put our policies forward. We need to show that we are talking about systemic change, not just changing leaders or parties. We need to build empowerment at the grassroots; the very work that PSM has consistently done.”
It is not that political operatives do not want to sell progressive ideas to their base, even though they live progressive/liberal lifestyles and the religious bureaucracy does not hassle them; it is that they want to keep existing narratives alive so they can profit from them politically.
Arutchelvan is correct when he points out that PAS and DAP use racial narratives, but more often than not, the latter is a defence against the former.
Increasingly, when non-Malays vote, they vote because they want their communities to be left alone. Every time a non-Malay votes, it is in the expectation that whoever they vote for will constrain the religious and racial excesses of mainstream Malay politics. This involves issues from closing down non-Muslim businesses to unilateral conversions to destroying places of worship.
We are really not talking about deep policy issues but merely democratic instincts of self-preservation. This is probably why non-Malays latch onto any Muslim personality who makes the right noises about issues they consider sacred. This is why the non-Malay vote is considered secure in the Pakatan Harapan coalition.
The mandarins of the DAP must be really grateful for this election because it puts the kibosh on the whole deadline thing.
Elections have consequences
The Malay community has choices that non-Muslims do not. Now, while these choices may be more of the same, the reality is that they can punish incumbents and political parties that claim to represent them.
This is why folks say elections have consequences. Malay power brokers understand that it really does not matter what they do because the DAP support base will not punish DAP, unlike the Malay majority polity, who have demonstrated their willingness to shift their support to whatever reactionary Malay/Muslim party they think best serves their interests.
But keep in mind they also thought about this in MCA. What destroyed MCA was not DAP’s propaganda but the acceptance by a large voting demographic of the Chinese community that no representation in the government is better than MCA representation.
This is why we get folks talking about how DAP makes a better opposition for the non-Malays than when they actually occupy seats of power.
The online harassment of third-party candidates, as well as the demeaning of so-called mosquito parties and outliers speaking against the double talk of DAP, is a testament that the non-Muslims have shot themselves in the foot when it comes to viable alternatives to legacy parties.
This is an ethnocracy where all these proud defenders of bangsa (race) and agama (religion) run to DAP and the non-Malays when they need our help and then take a dump on us when they feel confident enough that they have suckered their community into voting for them again.
Afraid to take chances
What we are dealing with here is a new political terrain where there are no truly progressive political parties in the mainstream establishment.
Yes, we could hope for independent candidates and outlier coalitions, but people are too afraid to take any kind of chances, which is what these legacy parties are banking on. This is about fear.
Prime Minister Anwar Ibrahim is very well aware that although on social media, non-Malays rant and rave, the reality is that when it comes to the ballot box, they will vote for his factotums because they believe that flawed as he is, there is no alternative.
For people I have spoken to who are dissatisfied with the way things are, they do not really blame Anwar. They blame DAP for not speaking up. After all, Anwar, they say, is taking care of his community, but why is DAP kowtowing to everything?
This, of course, directly opposes how Perikatan Nasional voters think. They have seen Malay politicians brought down by the will of the people and by factional ideological blocs.
They understand that the individual is less important than the political parties that they support or from which they can withdraw their support.
More the pity that the non-Muslims do not have this advantage. - Mkini
S THAYAPARAN is Commander (Rtd) of the Royal Malaysian Navy. Fīat jūstitia ruat cælum - “Let justice be done though the heavens fall.”
The views expressed here are those of the author/contributor and do not necessarily represent the views of MMKtT.
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