Eric Loo, fz.com

A friend emailed a photo story on May 3 of "foreign workers" arriving at the Low-Cost Carrier Terminal, KLIA, in Sepang. It said the workers were being brought in to vote for Barisan Nasional (BN). Phantom voters!

READ MORE HERE

To join or not to join the Cabinet, either way is a dead end for MCA. All I can say is, why the brainless bet in the very first place? In the absence of support from the Chinese community and recognition from the government, MCA’s future is bleak.

Tay Tian Yan, Sin Chew

Up till this second I still do not have much idea why Dr Chua Soi Lek made the decision of not joining the Cabinet.

And why the presidential council, central committee and general assembly all rushed to echo the decision in unison.

What I was trying to say is that it was a very imprudent political gamble, one of inconsiderate “show-hand.”

It is a kind of gamble that puts your life at stake, one that is committed only under specific circumstances: You either have all the best cards to yourself and are sure the opponent is absolutely no match for you, or you are pretty sure your opponent is only feigning confidence to make believe he has the best cards whereby he does not.

But if you do not come close to the above requirements, your show-hand bet is purely suicidal.

Chua Soi Lek’s 2011 gamble with the Chinese voters of Malaysia, betting MCA’s withdrawal from the government if the party won fewer than 15 parliamentary seats, was of bad judgement.

What cards did MCA have in hand?

1. Back in 2011, things were not quite going in favour of MCA, and there were no signs the party would perform any better than in 2008.

2. “Pakatan Rakyat” was the trump card in the hands of Chinese Malaysians, so the “out of Cabinet” decision (read: threat?) would not work.

3. MCA had limited remnants of its influences and support base, and was in no position to place such a stake at all.

It wasn’t the right time when things didn’t go your way to put a bet, more so an all-or-none show-hand.

But, the big-time gambler in Chua Soi Lek cajoled him into making such a foolhardy bet without giving the slightest thoughts for the forte of the party nor the realistic intent of the Chinese community.

The bet that shunned the appraisal for possible consequences accelerated the demise of MCA.

I was wondering. Why on earth did the right-minded souls in MCA’s presidential council, central committee and central delegates just ingest the motion without digesting it?

Didn’t the idea flash past the mind of any what would befall MCA if the Chinese voters didn’t buy its idea?

It is easy for a defeated gambler to quit the table while conceiving a comeback plan later.

While Chua can just call it a day and bow out, what about the party he is leading? Does it have to wind up its business as well?

To stay out of the Cabinet means foregoing political power, leading to the obliteration of whatsoever residual influences the party might still have now. But if it changes its mind and joins the government, be prepared for a quicker death.

To join or not to join the Cabinet, either way is a dead end for MCA. All I can say is, why the brainless bet in the very first place?

In the absence of support from the Chinese community and recognition from the government, MCA’s future is bleak.

Politics is no gambling party. In deciding every single move, a political party must first and foremost take into consideration its feasibility, possible consequences and ways to tackle them. If Plan A fails, there is always a Plan B or Plan C to back up.

If the step would possibly lead to a disaster, it has to be avoided at all costs!

Dr Mahathir, despite being the hard man that he was, would never abandon the component parties. He was always loyal to his allies even if he knew some of them to be corrupt or were no longer useful to the coalition. Friendships mattered to Dr Mahathir. He did not use people and then forget them later.

Zaid Ibrahim, TMI

We know that Tun Dr Mahathir Mohamad had little say in the naming of the new Cabinet. This wasn’t because he didn’t try. Indeed, he was rebuffed by the prime minister who suddenly felt strong and energised by his so-called new mandate after the election.

Barisan Nasional (BN) likened Datuk Seri Najib Razak to a rock star, and put posters of him in all constituencies during the campaign period as if he were the most popular politician to ever grace this country. Now he is continuing on the same path with his list of new ministers.

It matters little what Umno or the Barisan Nasional (BN) think because it’s a list who will keep him at the helm for the next five years.

This is why I think Dr Mahathir has lost his influence, or at least the will to fight back. He must be disappointed with this turn of events, for, in his 22 years in power, he never once dispensed with Umno or BN during a general election as if they didn’t matter.

He never traded on his personal popularity or put up posters of himself as Najib has gleefully done. To Dr Mahathir, it was always about Umno and the Barisan, and not the personality of individual leaders.

Dr Mahathir, despite being the hard man that he was, would never abandon the component parties. He was always loyal to his allies even if he knew some of them to be corrupt or were no longer useful to the coalition. Friendships mattered to Dr Mahathir. He did not use people and then forget them later.

It must be painful for him to see Najib embracing people like Datuk Paul Low and P. Waythamoorthy, whom Najib met just three weeks before election, practically abandoning the MCA and MIC who have been steadfastly loyal for over 55 years. This is not the Alliance or the Barisan spirit. This is a massive ego trip on a temporary high.

So it’s up to Dr Mahathir’s son, Datuk Paduka Mukhriz Mahathir, and Deputy Prime Minister Tan Sri Muhyiddin Yassin to redeem the glorious past and remove Najib at the forthcoming Umno general assembly (that is, if they still have the Umno-BN spirit in them).

Many Umno members think Najib is due for some payback at the November assembly, even though members are not normally very demanding. They are easily satisfied if the leaders take care of them, making them feel important and making sure their opinions count in the big decisions of the party. Najib, however, abandoned the counsel of the members during the election and chose instead to trust Datuk Seri Dr Jamaluddin Jarjis and the “war room operators”.

READ MORE HERE

There are many good reasons for English-medium schools to be reintroduced, chief of which must surely be the language's neutral status whereby no one can claim ownership to it.

Wong Chun Wai, The Star 

It is unhealthy for race relations when the student population in Chinese schools is 99.9% Chinese, Tamil schools is 100% Indian and national schools, dubbed Malay schools, is 80% to 90% Malay.

SERIOUSLY, the government should allow the use of English as a medium of instruction in schools again. If there are Chinese and Tamil primary schools alongside national schools, there is no reason for Malaysians not to have other options.

At present, the other option for better English proficiency is in private schools, which allocate more time for the teaching of English despite following the national school syllabus. However, it is an expensive option that only a few can afford.

Why should the right of Malaysians to study in English-medium schools be enjoyed only by those who can afford to study at international schools?

There are many good reasons for English-medium schools to be reintroduced, chief of which must surely be the language's neutral status whereby no one can claim ownership to it.

Older Malaysians who went to English-medium schools can testify that it was in such an environment that they made many friends of all ethnic backgrounds.

The English schools, as they were popularly referred to, were neutral grounds and were real cultural melting pots.

Friendship cultivated at primary school level among Malaysians of different races and religions would always be strong and deep. Our current primary school system basically does not provide such opportunities for our young ones to mix.

We do get to mix with one another later on in life, but working relationships that are untested or superficial are not true friendships.

Older Malaysians can narrate long stories of how they used to sleep over at their friends' homes, eating with their friends' families and parents of their friends treating them like their own children. These friendships continued even after they went to university, entered working life, and got married.

These are the kinds of friends who would be part of the wedding entourage, either on the side of the bride or bridegroom.

I am now 52 years old. I believe I was among the last batch of Malaysians who had the privilege of being taught in English.

While some may dismiss what I have said as elitist or an attempt to glorify English at the expense of the national language, let me set the record straight. In Form 6, I opted to study Malay Literature and sat for the exam in Upper Six, which was then called Higher School Certificate and is the equivalent of the STPM today. It was also the entrance exam into local universities. I also studied Islamic History.

During my first year at Universiti Kebangsaan Malaysia, I also chose Malay Letters as one of my three majors. At UKM, it is also compulsory to pass the Islamic Civilisation course, which was a basic course on Islam. I have also amassed a huge collection of books on Islam in my private library, and the works of Malay artists like Yusuf Ghani and Ismail Latiff continue to inspire me.

I dare say many of our politicians and leaders of so-called non-governmental organisations, who loudly make statements with racial overtones, do not even have such credentials.

But the point I am making is that more and more Chinese parents are sending their children to Chinese primary schools because they believe the standard of teaching and discipline in these schools is better. For the same reason, the number of Malay students at such schools has also increased.

But most Malay parents send their children to national schools where they form the bulk of the student population. Over the years, the national schools have been seen by many Chinese as becoming more religious in nature.

It's a Catch 22 situation. If the Chinese are shunning national schools, then the students in these schools would be predominantly Malay.

The Federal Constitution guarantees the position of Chinese and Tamil schools. No politician, whether in Barisan Nasional or Pakatan Rakyat, would dare to make any statement against these vernacular schools.

But the reality is that it is unhealthy when the student population in Chinese schools is 99.9% Chinese, Tamil schools is 100% Indian and national schools, dubbed Malay schools, is 80% to 90% Malay!

It is meaningless to talk about 1Malaysia when our children have no friends of other races in their formative years! Many Malaysians in their 30s and 40s now are already in this situation.

Just ask Malaysians at random how many real friends of other races, not colleagues, customers or bosses, they have. Be honest.

Is it any wonder then that the Malays are incredulous when they see Chinese Malaysians who can't speak Bahasa Malaysia well or even refuse to speak Bahasa among themselves?

The Chinese, on the other hand, still wonder why some Malay quarters continue to ask what else the Chinese want when they find that some policies are working against them and make them feel discriminated.

This is happening because race relations have taken a beating. The various races are not talking or trying to understand one another. Each side only sees its own viewpoint without appreciating that in a complex and plural society like ours, no one group can have its way completely.

We have churned out bigots in our schools. It also doesn't help that the various races are only watching channels in their own languages on Astro. The only time they probably watch the same channel is when an English Premier League football match is on.

If we are serious about restoring the standard of English in schools and improving race relations in this country, bring back the English-medium schools. Let Malaysians choose.

Umno is up its tricks to ensure that future generations remain firmly in its grasp by keeping them intellectually challenged and incapable of thinking 

The DAP would not have won in many of its 38 seats had it not been for the support that it had from the Indians and the Malays as well. Many of the educated and the open minded Malays from the working class voted for the DAP but did not shout about it to their kampung kin. The figures would not have crossed the winning mark had it not been for the large number of Malaysians who returned home just to vote.

by P Dev Anand Pillai, FMT

I had always participated in the workings of general elections since the time I was a staff in the Suruhanjaya PilihanRaya Selangor in the early 90s. Being a Polling and Counting Agent (PACA) in 1999 and 2004 general elections gave me the insight as to how it all worked at the end of the day. But this time, it was different, what I witnessed was a coming together of the whole country with a motive to change the federal government for the first time in history, friends from overseas whom had almost given up on their country of birth had made time to return to try to make the change happen. It would have, had it not been for massive fraud by the custodians of the elections themselves, the Election Commission, who were in cahoots with the  police.

We had prepared ourselves after being alerted that there could be a high number of foreign voters trying their luck at our voting centres and true enough they came in buses, vans, jeeps and even police vans with police protection to vote in our elections. Most of these workers had dubious looking NRICs, some with very pale looking old versions of our identity card and they seemed so confident of knowing what to do. Some even had their “saluran” numbers ready at hand with them as they alighted from their vehicles. The police and the Election Commission officials welcomed them as though they were old friends knowing very well that this regime can only be saved by foreigners who will one day rule this country through the loophole in the constitution which will allow them to be Malays constitutionally. It is indeed a sad state of events for us the citizens of this beloved land of ours.

DAP’s victorious outing

The Democratic Action Party had sowed the fruits of labour which they had been diligently working on for the past five years since 2008. The Ubah and Ini Kalilah theme caught on with the people of both East and West Malaysia and made the people ready to see for the first time in 56 years a change of government at the Federal level and a change which many in their heart of hearts thought will bring about a more just and fairer Malaysia. Winning 38 parliamentary seats was indeed a record for the DAP which brings about the question of why was this called a “Chinese Tsunami” and why did the regime allow the Utusan Melayu headlines to read” Apa lagi Cina Mahu?”

It was more of a Urban political awakening by the masses who were exposed to the other side of the coin and whom had given up on the one sided state propaganda that the pay TV stations portray of the ruling BN regime. The DAP would not have won in many of its 38 seats had it not been for the support that it had from the Indians and the Malays as well. Many of the educated and the open minded Malays from the working class voted for the DAP but did not shout about it to their kampung kin. The figures would not have crossed the winning mark had it not been for the large number of Malaysians who returned home just to vote. Some of them were coming back to their old housing estates after nearly 20 years to just vote. There were a vast number of Malays who attended ceramahs by the DAP and were well aware of the facts when it came to the state of the national debt, the level of money siphoning from federal projects by cronies, the state of corruption and simply a show of arrogance and lavishness by the ruling elite. These were not lies and fairy tales it was there for all to see in the social media.

The Chinese had for decades hoped that they could level the playing field but had to always content with an openly biased system which appoints referees (civil servants at management level or also known as little napoleans) whom are always partial and openly biased towards the Malays. But then when they saw for the first time in 2008, the joined effort of the three main opposition parties of DAP, PAS and PKR which caused a huge dent on the armour of the BN, they realised that there is a new dawn if a two coalition system is firmly entrenched in our system. They witnessed how Lim Guan Eng turned a lacklustre performing economy in Penang to one that was worthy of praise by the many international bodies and institutions whom are watchdogs of economies. With a prudent way of management and a open tender system, the people found that the delivery system and the effective leadership of the Chief Executive of the State was admirable and most of all, he does not keep quite when Umno tries to bully him.

Candidate choice by the DAP

Though it still has the tag that it is a Chinese chauvinistic party, but in reality in many areas where the constituents were mostly Chinese, non-Chinese candidates were accepted and fared well for eg in constituencies like Klang, Kota Alam Shah, Raub, Labis, Ipoh Barat, Batu Gajah and Cameron Highlands, the people voted because of their believe in the party, hope that the PR coalition brought and a chance at unseating the federal government. Most of all, the people have now become very  conscious about who the candidate is and what is the candidate’s ability. Therefore a lot of effort must be put in to nurture the next generation in the respective constituencies that have been won. Care must be taken not to just appoint political secretaries and assistants but people of ability who have the positive draw of the people. If a candidate is to be parachuted in, then the parachuting must take place earlier and the candidate must be able to adjust themselves to the people and their aspirations.

PKR’s good showing

PKR is slowly but surely becoming a party that is being accepted by the masses and this is where new talent can be nurtured. New parliamentarians like N Surendran and G Manivanan, who will never be accepted in parties like the MIC have proven that in a multi-racial party like the PKR, if the right strategy is used and the right approach of reaching the people with issues of national concern, a difference can be made. If not for the rampant, open and blatant cheating that took place, there would have been more seats to PKR’s tally of 30. The people are ready and have already accepted a two party coalition and have given their trust to PR to administer states after seeing what the PR is capable of and the people, whilst being receptive to the governance of the PR, have also shown that they can boot out a PR government like what we saw in Kedah, signs of which we already being seen when a weak Chief Executive was appointed.

As the revered leader of the Malays had said, only the smart, highly educated Malays will vote for the DAP, which means that Umno accepts and acknowledges that its main voter and support base are made of the uneducated and the ill-informed masses who flock to the Sheppard when monetary handouts are given. It can be safely said that despite a vast number of Malays seen lining up to collect the BR1M handouts, not much turned into votes. It goes to show that the people have matured and this group is definitely not what Umno would like to see. The more educated the people get, the more Umno has to be worried. Thus by making the education system very inept to deal with current global demands, Umno is making sure that the future generations remain firmly in its grasp by keeping them intellectually challenged and incapable of thinking. But a vast number of Malays have seen how this destroys the younger generation and have learnt to reject this handout culture and are beginning to brave it out on their own, knowing that handouts keeps them eternally enslaved to Umno.

READ MORE HERE

I feel sad that this country does not accept me, but I feel sadder for my children who will still have to face the same.  

Kee Thuan Chye 

“On this date, we are embarking on a move to recolour the nation’s historical canvas with colours of unity. This is our motherland. From this day on, no one can tell the Chinese to go back to China or the Indians to go back to India.”

This is the best, the most positive, people-unifying statement to come out in decades. And it did not come from a leader of the ruling Barisan Nasional (BN).

It came from 20 civil society groups, led by Solidariti Anak Muda Malaysia (SAMM) headed by Badrul Hisham Shaharin and student group Solidariti Mahasiswa Malaysia (SMM) headed by Safwan Anang, as they marked May 13, the tragic day in 1969 when racial riots broke out and drove the races apart, with a call for an end to racism.

A teacher told me that when she read the statement reported in a newspaper, she burst into tears. It was particularly emotional for her because she had personally experienced being told to go back to China.

This was about 30 years ago when she had newly arrived in Kuala Lumpur from a small town up north, and was riding in a taxi. As she tried to explain to the taxi driver where she wanted to go in halting Malay, the man was repulsed by her lack of fluency in the national language. He bluntly told her to go back to China.

The remark shocked and humiliated her, but she was too afraid to say anything. Since then, she has lived with the wound without hope of healing. The decades that followed made it worse – as politicians of the ruling party played the race card to divide and rule, as the media reported more incidents of Chinese being told to go back to China and Indians to go back to India. As if they were not citizens of the country. As if they were merely tenants in the home they helped to build.

Even today, although the 13th general election is over, the silly season is still going strong as pro-BN figures, including a former judge and the Perak Mufti, make statements that are overtly racist and divisive.

Speaking at a forum last week, former Court of Appeal judge Mohd Noor Abdullah accused the Chinese of betraying the Malays because they largely rejected BN. He said they were plotting to seize political power.

He said, threateningly, “When the Malays are betrayed, there is a backlash and the Chinese must bear the consequences of such a backlash.” He called for the Malays and Bumiputeras to have a two-thirds presence in key sectors like education, the civil service and business. “Arrange it in such a way that from today, every business will have a 67 per cent share ready to be taken up by Malays,” he urged.

He also called for the terms “Chinese” and “Indian” to be abolished and replaced with “non-Malays” and “non-Bumiputeras”. Disdainfully, he regarded the Orang Asli as “our cousins” and the Sabah and Sarawak Bumiputeras as “our relatives” while the others “are just our neighbours because they came to menumpang (squat) here”.

This is divisive and akin to calling the Chinese and Indians pendatang (immigrants), another derogatory reference they have had to suffer. It echoes the insult former Penang Umno leader Ahmad Ismail inflicted on these communities after BN’s electoral debacle in 2008. Now, in the wake of BN’s worse performance this time, Mohd Noor appears to be an Ahmad Ismail clone. The only difference is that he’s not a politician, but it’s still not acceptable.  

Politician or no, his vindictive tone contrasts starkly with that of SAMM, SMM and like-minded organisations. But more than that, Mohd Noor is patently wrong in concluding that Chinese rejection of BN amounts to a betrayal of the Malays.

You can only betray a party to whom you owe loyalty. And in a democracy, you don’t owe loyalty to any party unless you are a member of that party. And even then, you are still a citizen in your own right so you can vote against your own party if you think it has not been doing a good job. You are entitled to vote for a rival party that you think can deliver good governance. 

More important, BN does not own the country or the government. It is merely the government of the day. You owe your allegiance to your country, not to BN. So all that talk of betrayal is utterly misleading.

Read more at: http://news.malaysia.msn.com/elections/fill-our-motherland-with-the-colours-of-unity 

Malaysian PM turns to old foe's allies for help

John Berthelsen, Asia Sentinel

Malaysian Prime Minister Najib Tun Razak has appointed what amounts to a survival cabinet, turning to allies of former foe Abdullah Ahmad Badawi to fend off intra-party challenges in the wake of the May 5 election, in which the opposition actually won the popular vote but was thwarted from taking power by gerrymandered constituencies.

Some of the appointments represent a sharp about-turn by Najib from the policies of former Prime Minister Mahathir Mohamad and the deputy prime minister, Muhyiddin Yassin, whom an outraged Mahathir is said to be attempting to goad into trying to push out Najib immediately as prime minister and head of the United Malays National Organization instead of waiting until the October party Annual General Assembly. Although the opposition has pointed to the appointments of Shahidan Kassim and Umno secretary-general Tengku Adnan Tengku Mansor as indications of Mahathir's clout, the opposite seems to be true.

"(Mahathir) made a last ditch effort to block Nazri but Najib went ahead anyway," a well-wired source said. "Najib realizes he needs Khairy and (Badawi's) support in case the Mahathir and Muhyiddin forces move against him in party polls in October or November this year."

Read more at: http://www.asiasentinel.com/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=5421&Itemid=178 

The most insidious racism is just so ingrained it's involuntary. It's about the fact no one responsible for the decision even saw the existence of the problem. 

Waleed Aly, The Age 

As opening lines in letters go, ''I find you deeply offensive'' is pretty direct. Fair enough. I suspect lots of people do. It's a natural consequence of media work. But then my anonymous correspondent decided to explain why: ''You are foreign, you shall always be so. Piss off back to whatever Middle Eastern sink hole you blew in here from.''

There's nothing surprising about this. There's nothing even particularly rare about it. Some version of that letter arrives every few months or so. This one was particularly unvarnished - complete with references to my wife and ''half caste kids'' and cheerful threats of the inevitable return of the White Australia policy - but the message hardly varies: this isn't my country and my public presence is unwelcome, either because I'm a Muslim, or because in some racially determinable way not a ''real'' Australian.

I've been accused of everything from taking elocution lessons, to changing the spelling of my name to appear deceptively Australian before I unleash some Trojan conspiracy. Apparently Aly is roughly equivalent to Smith. They're onto me.

I have almost no emotional reaction to this kind of goonish racism. It's simply too ridiculous to engage me. In fact, I'd completely forgotten about this most recent letter until racist ranting hit the headlines this week following yet another racist diatribe on a Sydney bus that was captured and posted to YouTube.

It's at least the third such case in about four months. Hence the fresh round of debate on Australian racism that always seems to follow the same unedifying pattern.

First comes the shock, as though such incidents reveal something we never knew existed. Then comes the argument over whether or not Australia is a racist country. To be frank, I don't know what the argument means. Every country has racism. Precisely how much do you need before a country itself is racist? Is it a matter of essence or degree? Do we judge it by surveying legislation, newspapers or behaviour on public transport? And even if we can answer those questions, then what?

That argument is a dead end. It's more about a condemnatory label than the substance and nature of Australian racism. The real question isn't about which adjective describes us. It's about how best to identify and respond to the racism we inevitably harbour.

Debating the meaning of the occasional racist tirade doesn't help answer that. It's just not that helpful to take extreme individual behaviour as the starting point on an issue like this. Sure, it's troubling. Sure, it's more common than we like to admit. Sure, it's a problem. But it's not the problem.

The racism that really matters in Australia isn't the high-level, weapons-grade derangement that winds its way via YouTube into the news. The truth is we can't compete with Europe for hardcore white nationalism or the US for white supremacist movements. We can't compete with Asia or the Middle East for the maintenance of an explicit, institutionalised and sometimes codified racial hierarchy.

Our racial and religious minorities aren't having their communities torched (though the occasional building has been firebombed), and our handful of far-right politicians aren't leading political parties that attract 20 per cent of the vote.

No, our real problem is the subterranean racism that goes largely unremarked upon and that we seem unable even to detect. Like the racism revealed by an Australian National University study, which found you're significantly less likely to get a job interview if you have a non-European name. The researchers sent fake CVs in response to job advertisements, changing only the name of the applicant. It turns out that if you're surname is Chinese, you have to apply for 68 per cent more jobs to get the same number of interviews as a Anglo-Australian. If you're Middle Eastern, it's 64 per cent. If you're indigenous, 35 per cent.

Read more at: http://www.theage.com.au/comment/curse-of-australias-silent-pervasive-racism-20130404-2h9i1.html 

Why would Umno want to rid itself of a leader who won an unwinnable election for Barisan Nasional? 

Almost two million Chinese voted for Pakatan – largely for DAP really. They voted for DAP in the hope that Pakatan will form government, and that DAP will have effective control of that government. This is NOT what you or I think but this is what a vast majority of the Malays think. It is irrelevant whether it was Umno that put that thought in their mind or whether they worked it out for themselves.

CT Ali, FMT

If Pakatan Rakyat expects Najib Tun Razak to accept defeat at the polls graciously, why don’t they graciously accept his victory at the very same polls?

The 13th general election is a done deal. A 44 seat margin win is emphatic! The loss or gain of a few marginal seats would not have made a difference to the final outcome of this 13th general election.

This is not an election where the popular vote of the people determine who should form government. When Pakatan submitted itself to the electoral process, it must do so in its entirety.

This means accepting that the party with a simple majority will form government – an anomaly that would have applied equally to Barisan Nasional or Pakatan Rakyat.

That it favoured Barisan Nasional is moot. This is a separate issue of rampant gerrymandering to be addressed later.

There are also concerns about voting irregularities and we know that Pakatan faced significant restrictions on access to the media but there is a process to resolve those vexing issues of voting irregularities and that process, however tainted, should start now while BN goes on with the business of government.

The allegations that the Election Commission conducted itself with dishonor by doing the bidding of its political master is an issue to be addressed at a more opportune time – not now!

In the final analysis there are enough people who believe that BN has done a satisfactory job and deserve another term in government.

Will Pakatan and Anwar Ibrahim be magnanimous in defeat and proceed with the next business at hand – that of assisting the authorities to investigate any irregularities in the 13th general election, and start its onerous duties as the Opposition to a weakened and bloodied BN government?

In the end there is no gain for BN as they lost eight seats to Pakatan, but give Najib credit for taking BN through a harrowing 13th general election.

Why would Umno want to rid itself of a leader who won an unwinnable election for Barisan Nasional? It was an election that was Pakatan’s to lose. And lose it they did!

The race card

The elephant in the room that Pakatan refused to acknowledge was the race factor. This is not about whether you or I are mature enough to NOT make race a factor.

We have already established the fact that we do not want race and religion to be a factor in determining the manner in which each and every one of us will be treated by our government.

Meritocracy should rule the day. Unfortunately the reality is that a critical mass within the Malaysian population will make race and religion their criteria in deciding who should govern Malaysia.

Almost two million Chinese voted for Pakatan – largely for DAP really. They voted for DAP in the hope that Pakatan will form government, and that DAP will have effective control of that government.

This is NOT what you or I think but this is what a vast majority of the Malays think. It is irrelevant whether it was Umno that put that thought in their mind or whether they worked it out for themselves.

That is what the critical mass within the Malay community thought would happen if Pakatan won the election – and guess what they did to counter that possibility? They voted for Umno.

Yes Lim Kit Siang won the battle in Gelang Patah but Pakatan did not win the war against BN.

Kit Siang going into Gelang Patah was exactly what Umno needed to get the Malays on side – and they had the DAP to thank for it. DAP spooked the Malays into voting for Umno.

The big losers

The biggest loser of the 13th general election was MCA and PAS.

Najib had nothing to do with MCA being rejected by the Chinese. MCA leaders did it all by themselves without any help from anybody.

READ MORE HERE

For the sake of this country, the writer hopes his entire analysis is rubbish, and that he will be proven absolutely wrong and a pessimistic idiot.

Before moving on let me just clarify that this analysis is not meant to monger fear or accuse the government of anything. It is a hypothesis based on my historical analysis of post-election trends in Malaysia, and as with all hypotheses, is unproven and certainly not set in stone.

By Ong Kar Jin, FMT

May 13 has arrived and passed with no major incidents. For many Malaysians who sit uneasily with the date, there is a culpable sense of relief. However, is the threat of a nationwide disturbance over?

Is it possible still in this day and age for something on the scale of the May 13 riots to reoccur?

Before moving on let me just clarify that this analysis is not meant to monger fear or accuse the government of anything. It is a hypothesis based on my historical analysis of post-election trends in Malaysia, and as with all hypotheses, is unproven and certainly not set in stone.

This article seeks to analyse and answer two main questions:

How possible is it to have some sort of disturbance that will spark unrest?

What form might it take?

Through a careful examination of past incidences of civil unrest in Malaysia, three incidents in particular stand out for their scale, their impact on the political narrative of Malaysia, and their nature.

The three incidents I speak of are the May 13, 1969 riots, the 1987-1988 Operation Lalang and judicial crisis, and the 1998 sacking of Anwar Ibrahim and the subsequent Reformasi movement.

In considering the events leading up to, during and following the events, three key traits stand out.

Internal Umno struggle

Firstly and perhaps most importantly, all three incidences have taken place in the foreground of internal Umno struggles.

In Dr Kua Kia Soong’s thesis of May 13, he posits that the riots were in fact a coup d’état initiated by the ascendant Malay capitalist class under Razak to replace the Malay aristocratic class lead by Tunku Abdul Rahman.

The validity of Kua’s statement is subject to debate, but the swift and stunning reversal of fortunes that Tunku Abdul Rahman suffered cannot be discounted as coincidence. Even if the riots were not facilitated by the top leadership of the right wing of Umno, Razak certainly made full use of the opportunity to grab the reins of government.

Recently, Gerakan veteran Dr Goh Cheng Teik and ex-Umno strongman Mohd Tamrin Abdul Ghafar came out to clarify that May 13 was indeed an internal coup orchestrated by irate Umno members against Rahman.

The 1987-1988 Operation Lalang also had similar internal rumblings. In fact, the judicial crisis roots lay in the dismissal of Umno as an illegal organisation due to complaints from Tengku Razaleigh’s Umno Team B.

The same goes for the mass arrests that followed the Reformasi movement. Again, it was an inside Umno fight between then deputy prime minister Anwar Ibrahim and Dr Mahathir Mohamad.

Time and time again, Umno leaders especially those from the right wing have shown that they are more than willing to externalize internal struggles to distract people from the real issues and to eliminate opposition.

Come this October, Umno internal elections will be held, and it will be a titanic clash between the reformers under Najib Tun Razak and the Mahathirists under Muhyiddin Yassin’s tutelage.

The first shots have already been fired by Mahathir, calling Najib’s performance a “disappointment” and openly stating before elections that given a slim victory Najib should give way to deputy Muhyiddin.

Need for consolidation of power

The second trait is a need for constitutional/ law changing. As we all know, the last time Umno was in government with a minority of the popular vote was in 1969. Post-1969, constitutional amendments made the EC beholden to Barisan Nasional and various laws such as the Sedition Act were strengthened.

Similarly, in 1988 the threat from the Semangat 46’ coalition formed posed enough of a threat to the Umno hegemony of power that the Mahathir felt was necessary to cripple the judiciary and rob it of its independence.

These changes in law to consolidate Umno dominance have however often been met with significant opposition. It is because of the backlash that comes with these changes in the institutions and dilution of the rule of law that such exercises have needed to be preceded by mass arrests/ unrest preventing any coordinated response.

The Reformasi movement of 1998 was rife with similar arrests, but with a firm 76.56% of seats, BN could comfortably continue its gerrymandering, mal-apportionment exercises.

One must also bear in mind that due to 1998 being led by Anwaristas, it took on a different nature.

At the end of this year, there will be a re-delineation exercise that threatens to entrench BN firmly in power, no matter what the popular vote turns out to be in GE14. Civil society, opposition politicians and proactive citizens have already begun raising awareness of the exercise.

The rakyat, especially urban folk, are acutely aware of their rights and attendance at rallies such as the May 8 Kelana Jaya rally have shown that from here on escalation of civil action can be only grow.

It would require a major distraction on an unprecedented scale to divert attention away from the re-delineation exercise.

Incitement of racial sentiments

The third trait that has preceded such incidents is the exacerbation (or in some cases manufacturing) of racial sentiments.

This has largely been the domain of the government-controlled mainstream media. In 1969, the mainstream media reported Labour Party processions as shouting “Malai-si!” and provoking the Malays.

However, such accounts are doubted and are contradictory to the foreign press accounts that reported the procession as a show of “discipline” and “genuine restraint”.

In 1988, Utusan Malaysia blew the issue of Chinese educationists out of proportion. What followed were the mass arrests of not just prominent members of Dong Zong but also of activists and opposition politicians.

In 1999, BN blew up fears of Islamisation, loss of non-Malay rights etc to secure a win despite losing the popular vote of Malays to the Barisan Alternatif.

Now the racist rhetoric has reached an all-time high. From Utusan Malaysia’s “Apa Lagi Cina Mahu” (What More Do The Chinese Want?) , an ex-judge’s warning of backlash against the Chinese, to PM Najib’s “Chinese Tsunami”, all Umno media seems to be blasting out racism at every avenue.

READ MORE HERE

Khairy has weathered the storm. Even his political foes and detractors acknowledge that he deserved a ministerial post, citing his loyalty to Umno when he was being sidelined and the number of times he responded in the name of the party in facing off the opposition and NGOs in debates and what not.

Mohsin Abdullah, fz.com 

In short, pretenders to the Umno Youth crowd (should Khairy want to defend it, chances are he will and won't go for higher posts, at least for now) would think twice before mounting a challenge.  

Read more at: http://fz.com/content/finally-kj 

We cannot ignore the obvious: vote buying is rampant in all our elections because there is no shortage of vote sellers. Anyone who sells his or her vote clearly does not understand or appreciate the democratic institutions that so many Filipinos have fought so hard to attain.

Manila Times 

This is one of those proposals that crops up every so often, but which never goes anywhere because too many sectors slam it as anti-poor, anti-democratic, and anti-populist.

It may be all of the above, but it is also a sensible proposition when you get right down to it.

Who, after all, has a bigger stake on the future of the country than the working men and women who fund the government’s day-to-day operations with their taxes?

And what of the millions of poor Filipinos who cannot pay taxes? opponents to the proposal will ask.

This is precisely the point. All they have to do is to work their way up to taxpayer status, and voila! They can become active participants in all the electoral exercises. They don’t even have to be among the top taxpayers either. Anyone who pays a minimum amount of taxes— say P1,000 a year in basic income tax—can qualify to become a voter.

We cannot ignore the obvious: vote buying is rampant in all our elections because there is no shortage of vote sellers. Anyone who sells his or her vote clearly does not understand or appreciate the democratic institutions that so many Filipinos have fought so hard to attain.

Call them the masa if you wish. They are the ones who keep dynasties in power because they refuse to fight for a better quality of elected leadership. They are the ones who elect con men to public office on the premise that they would do the same things if they were given the chance to become mayors, senators, governors, congressmen and yes, presidents.

Another impossible condition
Add to this requirement another one that will have human rights groups up in arms —only those who can read and write should have the right to vote.

This, too, is another sound proposal that deserves serious consideration once the emotional arguments are set aside.

This can be implemented not in the next elections, but somewhere down the road. Those who say that it is an anti-poor proposal should be reminded that poverty cannot be used as an excuse to get an elementary education. The government’s conditional cash transfer (CCT) program sees to it that the poorest of the poor may not use their economic state as an excuse to deprive their kids of an education.

For one, education is free nationwide. And secondly, they receive cash from the government on the condition that their kids of school age be enrolled.

Read more at: http://manilatimes.net/index/index.php/opinion/columnist1/47396-what-if-only-taxpayers-were-allowed-to-vote