Resolving contradictions within Pakatan Rakyat
Apang, Hornbill Unleashed
The Barisan Nasional or BN is the “known devil” among large sections of Malaysians, while to others, the BN seems to be angelic. In electoral terms, there will always be a certain percentage of voters who are hardcore BN supporters, however astonishing the contradictions displayed from the top to the bottom of the BN ranks.
Similarly, within the Pakatan Rakyat or PR, there are loyal supporters, but sharp contradictions too.
I do not wish to touch on the religious issue. This is not because I am scared to wonder into the unknown. On the contrary, too much is “known” simply by going through the mainstream media (MSM) and on ever more frequent occasions, the non MSM too.
Instead, I am venturing into a hidden area – and yet not so hidden after all.
Take the issue of two leaders of Perak DAP, with the exposure of the unsustainable and untenable Kelantan lands and logging deals. It is most unfortunate that the DAP leaders could only use the supposed “legality” of the deals as an excuse to justify the inexcusable.
History has taught us that when a fundamental principle is breached, no amount of justification is tenable, unless they want to take the voters as fools.
Time tested principles mean just that – they have withstood the challenge of time. So with the principle that business and politics must not mix, there is no “BUT”, unless you want to project your ridiculous self as holier than others.
It should have been unacceptable – period – because as political leaders, you cannot justify yourselves being involved in business, least of all the dirty logging business, even if the forest monoculture is repackaged as “replanting”.
After all, the DAP is on record as the most vocal opponents, and rightly so, during the UMNO/BN-dominated political era. The DAP took the most highly principled stance against BN’s crony capitalism.
So PAS and DAP really have exposed the contradiction between the principle that they once championed, and the murky world of the logging business. But do not be mistaken: I am no holier than they in what I am writing. I merely point out how PAS, DAP and the PR as a whole will need to answer for its actions, as a political pact.
Let me be more specific now.
On just one day, 28th December 2012, the mainstream and non-mainstream media reported something very much symbolic of the evils strangling Malaysia – our treatment of the original inhabitants of Malaya and Borneo. Malaysiakini, and The Star online, reported on the plight of Orang Asli in Malaya in regards to self-determination and survival. We used to be able to pinpoint government disrespect and disregard of the “first people” of Malaya and Borneo as being firmly in the BN domain – but this can no longer be exclusive to the BN. After all, we know that in Kedah and Kelantan at least, under the PR government, the disrespect and disregard shown to the “first people” are similar to those practised by the BN.
How else can we interpret the condescending and pathetic views of the Kelantan Exco, in having the cheek to highlight – in a sickening fashion – that the Orang Asli refused to work for “RM300 to RM500” per month, condemning them for being “choosy”? This was pitiful at best, and at worst, it was downright characteristic of a BN-type mentality. This BN-aping is a more accurate interpretation of such attitudes towards the original inhabitants of the peninsula. If such is the attitude of the existing PR in government, then Borneo natives have the legitimate right to question what life would be like if the PR formed governments in the two Borneo states.
After all, to those in the two states who are in the know, it is an open secret that a few “elite” native members of the PR are questioning the extent to which PR has been supporting land rights in the two Borneo states, as reflected in the number of court cases brought by Native Customary Rights (NCR) landowners. These PR “native leaders” are worried that when the PR takes over as governments in the two Borneo states, they might find judicial obstacles in their efforts to replace BN cronies in exploiting the rights of native land owners.
How can we differentiate them from the BN, when the principle states that what are the fundamental land rights of people must be respected, irrespective of which coalition forms the government?
It is no longer a matter of “natives” versus “non-natives”, a fake division cynically propagated by those political opportunists trying to revive “Dayakism”, or lately “Borneoism”, to trap the masses with emotive means.
It is not difficult to dissect such opportunism by the elites to review how the Dayaks or the Borneo elite native leaders who, when they were previously within the BN, were marginalising and dispossessing the very people they are now championing as being oppressed.
It is a simple matter to observe how many of the present day “champions” of Dayak rights or Borneo rights are the very same people who were very much involved in plundering the two resource-rich states for themselves as members of the BN in the past.
As far as the facts are available, the plundering in those days, and the corruption now, are targeted against the same people, the marginalised native landowners.
