Umno a poster boy for race relations? Yeah right - The Malaysian Insider

There's an old riddle, a joke really, that riffs the idea that a double negative is a positive. It goes like this, when is a double positive a negative? When you say yeah right.

The new joke is, of course, when Umno deputy president Tan Sri Muhyiddin Yassin said today that the party is a poster boy for race relations.

“We have learnt our lessons well in managing race relations in the country. We have gone through some tough times, but generally good sense prevailed.

“While it is true we are the poster boy of race relation in a multiracial country, we must work harder to manage that,” said Muhyiddin, who is also Deputy Prime Minister, while delivering his closing address at the fourth Umno international forum today.

While he can conveniently forget old race riots such as May 13 which involved a number of political parties in 1969, can he forget recent racial incidents that have blighted Malaysia's peace and harmony?

How about the infampus cow-head protest in Shah Alam in 2009 which Umno minister Datuk Seri Hishammuddin Hussein had defended even when the protesters were in the wrong?

Is that an example of fine race relations?

Let's not forget the recent brouhaha over the Allah ruling. Did Umno handle it well to the satisfaction of all parties?

Umno dominates Barisan Nasional (BN), the coalition founded from the ashes of the Alliance that survived May 13. How is that for race relations when almost everything in this country is about race?

Muslim unity is about race, in fighting off the figment of their imagination that other races, even the Jews, want to dominate Malaysia at the expense of the majority of Muslim Malays.

Is a siege mentality a fine example of race relations?

It is easy for Muhyiddin to say that the government is all for better race relations and national unity as Putrajaya had set up the Global Movement of Moderates and the National Unity Consultative Council (NUCC).

But as one wag puts it, such panels are just window dressing without much power to ensure the country remains in peace and harmony. Especially when there are Umno politicians who condone and consort with those who hold extreme racial views such as Datuk Ibrahim Ali.

Perhaps Muhyiddin is right in saying that Umno is a poster boy - in not managing race relations well. It used to do the job better, but that was long ago when its leaders were confident and preferred to think of themselves as Malaysians first.

That isn't the case now, is it?