Bumi varsity quota not racist, says Dr M

Malaysiakini

14 December 2009

Keturunan Malaysia:

Please Tun (Dr Mahathir Mohamad), no one is saying we should not help the "poor" but what we are saying is why at the expense of those who are more than well-qualified but have to unfairly suffer from the lack of a level-playing field. Most are poor too but their only sin is because they are not "sons and daughters of the soil".

Ahmad Kamal:

(1) Affirmative action policies are temporary special measures as a matter of principle. (2) It is quite difficult to justify continuous affirmative action for an ethnic grouping that constitutes a majority of the population. (3) Are Malays and natives of Sabah/Sarawak equal in their bumi rights?

Some years ago when Tun was in government, there are already views that Malay support to university places should be restructured in terms of private financial support and not government support per se. Get back to the drawing board please. The 13 general election is on the horizon.

Jbss:

Mahathir has conveniently forgotten that it was because of this racist policy that prevented good non-Malay students from entering state-run universities/institutions so more private institutions were forced to be set up to cater for the growing demand for places of learning in higher institutions and at great expense to the non-Malay students.

The demand for places in private institutions has grown so much and enrolment has multiplied, this old cunning fox now uses this as the basis for the 'apartheid' policy which has been in place for decades!

Rationalise it in whichever way you like, it is official discrimination, racist, apartheid-like because it deprives other citizens (based on their ethnic origin) of equal opportunities to enjoy education at state-run institutions of higher learning financed by the taxpayers' money.

Kee Thuan Chye:

Not all non-Malay parents can afford to send their children to private universities. Many are forced to work harder to earn the money to provide higher education for their children. This has been their unenviable lot especially from the time Mahathir took over as PM. It's easy for him to talk; he does not know first-hand the plight of non-Malay parents.

Kgan:

"Mahathir added that the extra attention and opportunities given to the bumiputeras did not mean that the other races were sidelined."

This is like saying that the apartheid system in South Africa did not marginalise blacks. Non-Malay parents have to save and scrimp to send their children to private universities because opportunities in public universities are so lacking for them. Even if they can get in, they are given less desirable courses. Is this discrimination or not?

Mahathir, you bloody racist, the time when you can spew out some rubbish and expect it to be accepted wholesale by a fawning press is over. If you can't say anything right, keep your mouth shut and save whatever dregs of your tainted legacy is still left.

Doc:

The issue of bumi quota in the public universities has not been such a hot topic as in the past. Public perception of public universities are to mass produce graduates where quantity is important not quality.

Non-bumis over the years have realised the importance of a good education. They save their earnings to put their children into good and reputable universities (locally or overseas) for two reasons. The first is in ensuring their children are better qualified and have the edge when entering the job market, thus earning a higher salary. The second is for migration purposes.

Louis:

TDM said that the bumis cannot afford fees in private institution. He must be joking. Why must a bumi want to spend his own money when he could easily get scholarships? I am very much poorer than many Malays, but I managed to put my children through tertiary education with my meagre income.

I have witnessed with my own eyes, bumiputeras driving Mercs, BMWs, Volvos and Honda Accord are using scholarships to put their children to universities. I bear no grudges if such scholarships are given to poor Malays in the kampung.

The irony is that it is those rich Malays who are manipulating the political system so that they will enjoy those privileges while hoodwinking the poor in the kampung to support them.

Multi Racial:

How could a former PM talk like this? If we want to help those weak in their study, this is not the way. You will only make thing worse for them. Unfortunately there are those Malays who can compete with non-Malays anytime and anywhere but are now seen as part of those who were helped by the government in their education.

The time has come for the government to put things right. All the mistakes done by past administration has to be stopped before it is too late. Focus on quality and not quantity. Focus on Malaysians, and not just one race.

Boonpou:

If there is a level-playing field, do you think the private universities in Malaysia would have such high non-Malay enrolments. Do you think non-Malay parents enjoy borrowing money from whichever sources to send their children to these private universities?

It is sad that a man of your age are still trapped, to borrow a phrase from the late Syed Hussein Alatas, in this "myth of the lazy natives [Malays]" mentality. Of course, we know that you are not entirely that stupid or have gone senile. All along you have capitalised on this myth to advance your own political career and racist agenda.

At the end of the day, how much longer could you indulge yourself in such immoral agenda? Most decent Malaysians are no longer haunted by this colonial myth. We do not need to have a Malaysian Oxford, Cambridge or Harvard in order to feel that we can think.

Foo Wy Len:

Dr M, please explain that to my daughter who has all As in her SPM, and yes, she is in a private university, and yes, every single sen is paid by me from my saving as a poor school teacher!

Colour of the Wind

"Think you own whatever land you land on
Earth is just a dead thing you can claim
But I know every rock and tree and creature
Has a life, has a spirit, has a name
Think the only people who are people
Are the people who look and think like you
But if you walk the footsteps of a stranger
You learn things you never knew
You never knew

Have you ever heard the wolf cry
to the blue corn moon?

or ask the grinning bobcat why he grinned
Can you sing with all the voices
of the mountains?

Can you paint with all the colors of the wind?
Can you paint with all the colors of the wind?

Come run the hidden pine trails of the forest
Come taste the sun sweet berries of the earth
Come roll in all the riches all around you
And for once, never wonder what they're worth
The rainstorm and the river are my brothers
And the heron and the otter are my friends
And we are all connected to each other
In a circle, in a hoop that never ends

Have you ever heard the wolf cry
to the blue corn moon?
or ask the grinning bobcat why he grinned
Can you sing with all the voices
of the mountains?
Can you paint with all the colors of the wind?
Can you paint with all the colors of the wind?

How high does the sycamore grow
If you cut it down, then you'll never know
And you'll never hear the wolf cry
To the blue corn moon
Or whether we are white or copper-skinned
We need to sing with all the voices of the mountains
Need to paint with all the colours of the wind
You can own the Earth and still all you'll own is earth
Until you can paint with all the colors of the wind"

A song by Vanessa William

'Keling' - they helped make this country great

Mohd Idris Hassan
11 December 2009

I refer to the Malaysiakini report Of noisy Indians and 'keling' blood: Utusan strikes again.

The attacking of fellow Malaysians by the mainstream media Utusan Malaysia because of their race is unwarranted and most uncalled for. I remember in the late forties when I was a little boy living in my hometown of Raub, Pahang.

I used to pass road gangs of Tamil labourers toiling in the midday's scorching sun from dawn till dusk. Armed with only picks and shovels, they would be hacking at solid rocks to carve out roads along the mountain side.

They had no proper attire, just a withered white towel tied in turban form on their heads. They would wrap rags around their spindly legs to prevent the hot molten tar from scalding them as they went about their chores.

Yet they had time to smile and wave at passing cars. They used to be referred to as 'coolies' and their slave-like living quarters as coolie lines. My late father used to tell us that most of the roads in Malaya at the turn of the century were built solely by Indian labour.

They toiled in the malaria-infested rubber estates, living with their families in filthy inhuman conditions. The white 'tuan' treated them like slaves and allowed them to indulge in drinking toddy to forget their woes .

Yet again it was the same coolies called 'toties' who serviced our bucket system latrines until the early sixties as there were no takers for this job from the other races. I have seen for myself these 'toties' cleaning the rubber tubs at a stream not far from my house with their bare hands.

In short, when there was any dirty, menial job to be done, it was this Tamil coolie, then often called by the derogatory term 'keling', that did it for us.

Now times have changed and their offsprings have made much progress in all fields and want to take their rightful place in our society .Let's not pour scorn on them and laugh away their pride.

As a soldier I know that many of my Indian/Tamil friends who fought and died for this country . They all are a part of those who stood by us during the good and bad times, they have helped make this country great.

A country which rightfully belongs to all Malaysians.

Let's talk about racism

Sim Kwang Yang
12 December 2009

We all know that the politics of race has always been the bedrock of Malaysian political culture in the last six decades. The success of the early Alliance and then the Barisan Nasional coalitions comprising race-based parties was due in large part to the electorate's acceptance that Malaysian power-sharing was based on the negotiation between races.

Politicians and their parties fighting for the rights and interests of their race have been the ideological orthodoxy all these while. Nobody would think of calling any ministers or political parties 'racist”, because racism was perhaps deemed politically correct.

Things must have really changed when we witness in recent days the great Malay nationalist icon Dr Mahathir Mohamad and senior Umno cabinet minister Mohd Nazri Abdul Aziz trading personal insults in public, calling each other “racist”.

All of a sudden, the terms “racist” and “racism” have become bad words, as they should be long ago. The question is: What makes a person a racist, and what is racism?

Wikipedia gives the following definition of racism:

“Racism is the belief that race is a primary determinant of man traits and capacities and those racial differences produce an inherent superiority of a particular race. In the case of institutional racism, certain racial groups may be denied rights or benefits, or get preferential treatment.

“Racial discrimination typically points out taxonomic differences between different groups of people, although anyone may be discriminated against on an ethnic or cultural basis, independently of their somatic differences. According to the United Nations conventions, there is no distinction between the term racial discrimination and ethnic discrimination.”

Earnest Gellner would argue that there are differences between the idea of “race” and “ethnicity”, the former emphasising on the mythical bond of blood ties and the latter relying on common cultural heritage. But that is another topic for another time.

Emergence of racism

Looking back in history, the first time that racism first assumed political significance must be when European powers encountered strange peoples from other cultures in far away lands at the beginning of empire building a few hundred years ago.

It also coincided with the beginning of the emergence of the modern nation-states and the fall of the old empires in the European continent.

The technologically and militarily superior Europeans were certain to be Eurocentric in their judgement of these so-called “barbaric, primitive, and pagan races” in Africa, North and South Americas, and finally Asia, New Zealand, and Australia.

Towards the end of the 19th century, Social Darwinism was already in vogue in Europe, with thinkers trying to apply the Darwinian theory of natural selection to human races and individuals, when the theory was originally used in reference to animal and plant species. Fortunately for our human species, this faulty theory is all but abandoned today.

Then, in late 19th century Europe, Dr Francis Galton practically invented the science of eugenics, the study of selective breeding so as to improve the human stock.

Eugenics gained a respectable following in the 20th century, and the core idea of the genes somehow determining the moral and intellectual character of the human individuals was accepted en masse by Hitler's Nazi ideology.

That is the underlying philosophy of racism - that some races are superior to others by virtue of their superior genes.

For fear that their superior German Aryan blood may be polluted by the inferior blood of the Jews and other minority groups, Hitler ordered his Final Solution that saw the genocide of six million people.

Partly because of the global guilt over the holocaust, the United Nations formed after World War Two made it a point to pass the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, and made it morally incorrect for any nation or groups to persecute or discriminate anyone based on creed, religion or race.

But the political appeal of primordial tribalism was still too great to be resisted. As an instrument for mass mobilisation, as an anchor for personal identity, and as a mythical pointer to the collective destiny of the community, “race” hits at the nadir of our guts immediately.

After World War Two, the survival and glory of the race were the rallying cry of many groups in those former colonies of the Western imperial powers all over the world. They used the ready-made ideology for their brand new nationalism in Africa, Asia, and South America, alongside the revolutionary slogans of the communists.

Out of Africa II

It was thus that the early founding fathers of Malaysia were drawn into the power of racial equations, and Malaysian politics has always been racial since then.

The person who laid down the theoretical groundwork for the Malay nationalism as narrated by Umno is none other than Dr Mahathir Mohamad through his magnum opus 'The Malay Dilemma'.

In his article 'Racism: Towards Year Zero', Dr Kua Kia Soong has this to say about Dr M's theoretical work:

“Mahathir is obviously not familiar with the philosophy of the social sciences; otherwise he would have known that 'race' as a concept has been discredited in social science years now and any social scientist worth his/her salt would not dare to air such racial theories in respectable centres of learning.”

Kua is right of course. Not only is racism banished from the social science, it is also exiled to the margin in politics in developed liberal democracies, and ultra-right nationalist groups seldom get the public support to take government power.

The tenets and dogmas of racism have also lost much of their credibility because of the advance in the physical science, especially in the science of genetics.

Until today, there is no scientific proof that our genes have any determination over our intelligence, our moral character, or our mental capabilities. I would even posit that scientists will never succeed in this mission impossible as long as humankind cannot resolve Rene Descartes' bifurcation of the human individual into mind and matter.

In contrast, recent studies in genetics have shown that the genetical differences that determine the physical variations among the various races are negligible in our collective genome!

Two recent studies also show that all human races are descended from a small band of homo sapiens in the plains of Africa.

One study named Out of Africa II traced the footsteps of all humans to a small group of new human beings in Africa slightly more than one million years ago. Through archeological and other evidences, they trace human's migration over land bridges made possible by climate conditions from Africa to other parts of the world.

The other theory called the Eve Theory takes advantage of the fact that the chromosome materials are transferred unchanged from the mitochondria of the mother to the daughter. By studying and comparing the mitochondrial genes of all women all over the world, these scientists claimed that they can trace the ancestry of all human groups to one woman in Africa, whom they named Eve.

This is the latest paradigm concerning the origin of our human species.

It exists only in our minds

In short, “race' and “ethnicity” are cultural construct; they exist in our language and our mind only. They do not exist objectively like the sun or the moon, or like the living species called homo sapiens.

That is not to say that the terms “race” and 'ethnicity” have no meanings and should be discarded. They have rich meaning in our cultural history, and have allowed us to build up a beautifully diverse depository of cultural and historical narratives that form our collective human civilisation.

But as the ideological basis for political action, the temporary success of racism and racial politics is exceeded only by their intellectual and theoretical poverty. They may prevail for a while, but in the long run, racial prejudices and racial hatred will not be able to stand the test of historical time.

The sooner Malaysian politicians, community leaders, public intellectuals, commentators and opinion makers veer away from racist and racial conversation, the better it is for the democratic future of all Malaysians.

After all, we are all brothers and sisters of one human race.

Forum speakers flay 'Ketuanan Melayu'

Aidila Razak
12 December 2009

The concept of Ketuanan Melayu (Malay supremacy) and the Social Contract is a political ploy used by the ruling coalition to remain in power, argued DAP vice-chairman Tunku Abdul Aziz Ibrahim.

“If there is such a thing as a Malaysian social contract, it is one that has nothing to do with (Malay) privileges but instead outlines the government's responsibility to protect its people,” he told an audience of about 80 people at the Annexe Gallery in Kuala Lumpur today.

Abdul Aziz were one of four speakers at a 90-minute forum alongside UKM social scientist and Sisters in Islam stalwart Noraini Othman, Malaysian history expert Clive Kessler and Petaling Jaya city councillor Richard Yeoh.

The forum entitled 'The Myth of Malay Supremacy' was organised by Research for Social Advancement (Refsa), which is also headed by Yeoh.

According to Abdul Aziz, what people perceive as the social contract is actually an understanding by the country's founding fathers that to “live together, we must work together”.

“Our founding fathers were men of liberal ideas and never thought of special privileges for Malays,” he said.

Abdul Aziz also noted that Malaysia, as a nation, is still a work in progress as the country has yet to find its own identity due to non-inclusive policies.

“There is only a reasonable chance for everyone to have a common Malaysian identity if we all feel fairly included by the policies which govern us… not when people feel that Malaysia is largely a Malay-centric place,” he said.

1Malaysia concept 'vague'

When asked if the 1Malaysia concept addresses the issue of a shared identity, Abdul Aziz said the idea championed by Najib Razak is very vague and that even the prime minister has failed to explain.

Tunku said that DAP's 'Malaysian Malaysia' is one that “does not discriminate nor endorses the torturing of its citizens.”

He however added that while the phrase has been used heavily by DAP, it has been his personal belief even before he joined the party last year.

Tunku also said that the Malaysian Malaysia concept when it was first introduced by then People's Action Party leader Lee Kuan Yew in the 1960s, there was still a lot of distrust among the various ethnic communities due to vast economic disparity.

This is a view shared by Noraini, who said that the concept is appropriate now as there is a large proportion of middle-class Malaysians who are “ready… to be a part of a nation as equal citizens.”

She conceded however that there is still a psychological barrier, in which many Malays still feel they are not ready to let go of their crutches.

This is a vicious cycle where people are kept in a sort of feudal captive mindset,” she said.

Noraini, who is the co-author of the book 'Sharing the Nation', added that the very concept of Ketuanan Melayu make her cringe as it evokes “notions of enslavement”.

In Malay classical terms, the word 'ketuanan' implies lordship over captives, which is a pre-feudal concept that is out of sync in 1957, 1963 and today,” she said.

Like Abdul Aziz, she warned against falling into the “trap” of Ketuanan Melayu, which she deemed as a “political project.”

Origins of Ketuanan Melayu

According to Yeoh, the term 'Ketuanan Melayu' first came about in a speech by former aide to then prime minister Dr Mahathir Mohamad, Abdullah Ahmad, who in 1989 said that Malays should be dominant in political leadership.

"It was a fairly benign speech and most of us have no problem with it, but it has been to mean Malay supremacy by some Umno leaders who don't necessarily know what it means,” he said.

He also said that the term should also be taken in context, as it came at a time when Umno was "at the throes of dispute” with Tunku Razaleigh Hamzah actively challenging Mahathir's leadership.

Yeoh added that the constitution only provides for special privileges for Malays in areas which already existed prior to independence, and that no new special preferences were to be added.

He contended that such affirmative policies may have actually weighed the Malay community down.

“Malays would achieve all that they have achieved, and maybe even more, without this divisive term that is Ketuanan Melayu,” he said.

Meanwhile, Kessler added that what the country is currently experiencing is the third dispensation of the Merdeka agreement made by the founding fathers, the first of which came in 1969 and the third in 1972 with the New Economic Policy.

“(The second dispensation) began to die in 1999… but continued to live on unnaturally from 2004 when the government thought all was forgiven, until what happened in (the) 2008 (general election),” he said.

It is therefore the hope, he said, that this third wave will “embody the spirit of the Merdeka agreement”, which had the purpose of developing an “inclusive and pluralistic” nation.

Indeed, Klesser argued that the second deputy prime minister, Dr Ismail Abdul Rahman had once said that “the unnatural continuation of (affirmative policies in aid of the Malays) would be an affront to Malay dignity.”

Home Ministry virtually encouraging tragedy to happen

Richard Teo
8 December 2009

Racist Remarks by Utusan
Any other mainstream media writing what has been written by Utusan Malaysia would have lost their licence to publish a long time ago. For some time now they have been writing inflammatory articles to incite the Malays to riot and perhaps cause another mayhem similar to the one that happened on May 13 1969.

But this Umno-controlled media seems to have a carte blanche right to publish articles that are seditious and inflammatory and yet does not even receive a warning from the Home Ministry.

This ploy to incite the Malays to hate the non-Malays on the one hand and to preach the '1Malaysia' concept to the non-Malays on the other hand is a desperate strategy by Umno to unite the Malays against the perceived threats of the non-Malays while subtlety reaching to the non-Malays with their rhetorical concept of a '1Malaysia' merely for electoral support.

One cannot imagine that Utusan Malaysia could have taken the bold step to write its inflammatory articles without the tacit support and agreement from the Home Ministry.

By condoning and allowing Utusan Malaysia a free rein to publish racist and inflammatory articles, the Home Ministry must bear full responsibility should any untoward accident occur as a result of their publications.

An impartial and responsible Home Ministry would have nipped in the bud this wanton act of sedition rather than allowing it to continue inciting hatred . By allowing Utusan Malaysia to continue fanning racial hatred through its publications, the Home Ministry is virtually encouraging a tragedy to happen.

The Legend of Dr. Mahathir
And looking back at Dr Mahathir Mohamad's 22 years of tenure at the helm of the nation, it is not difficult to comprehend why we lost so much money through looting by his family and his cronies.

His favourite moneymaking trick was to launch mega-projects and privatisation of government companies. His many mega-projects were fronts to dish out negotiated tenders to his children and cronies whereby sweet deals were quoted with price many times its actual value.

The more projects he launched and the more expensive the projects, the higher and better the profits which were accrued by the beneficiaries. And when his son's venture in the shipping business failed, he unhesitatingly used a government vehicle - the Malaysian International Shiping Corporation (MISC) - to bail his son out.

Bank Bumiputra which was a government-owned bank gave millions of unsecured loans to Mahathir's cronies and in the end all of them ended up as non-performing loans (NPL). In the end Petronas' oil money was used to bail out the bank. Similar bail-outs were later repeated for MAS, Bank Rakyat, Perwaja Steel and countless other GLCs.

His lack of business acumen saw the country lose heavily when he tried to corner the world tin market. It was conservatively estimated that his brief foray in the speculation on the tin market cost the nation a loss of RM20 billion.

There are still a lot of Malaysians who are foolishly ignorant of Mahathir's woeful tenure. He was not only a corrupt dictator who would not brook any dissent but he was also a racist too. Many of the instituitions which were created during his tenure had racist overtones. The Mara colleges (MRSM), UiTM and Biro Tatanegara were all his creations.

They all had one thing in common - they all catered for only one race with the exception of Mara colleges (*only matriculation course but not university courses) which later opened its door to allow a 10% non-bumi entry. The rest all had a racist agenda.

In short, time and history will not judge Mahathir favourably. His 22-year tenure saw the crumbling of all our government institutions which were once the pride of Asia. The judiciary, the attorney-general's department, the police force, the ACA, the civil service and virtually every instituition which was the cornerstone of a democracy became subservient to the executive.

Not only did they lost their independence and became servant and slave to the executive but they also lost whatever shred of integrity that they had.

It would not be wrong to credit Mahathir as the PM who destroyed the very fabric of Malaysia's democratic institutions which till today still bear the 'hallmarks' of his imprints.

How racist are we all really?

By P. GUNASEGARAM
11 December 2009

The answer to and the reasons for that will provide real clues to what we should do to reduce racism in our midst.

THAT tirade and tiff between former Prime Minister Tun Dr Mahathir Mohamad and Minister in the Prime Minister’s Department Datuk Seri Nazri Aziz, does little to illuminate things in the ongoing debate about whether to change the curriculum of the Biro Tata Negara (National Civics Bureau) courses.

But their ongoing conversation – if you could call it that – over the media does provide some clues as to the underlying problems over those so-called “unity courses” that NCB has been conducting over the years.

In his typical style, Mahathir attempted to turn the tables on Nazri, who had called him a racist in response to Mahathir’s comments that the contents for the NCB course are, well, suitable for all Malaysians.

Malaysian politics have been rather racial right from the start. The three parties in the original Alliance which gained independence represented the Malays, Chinese and Indians, with Umno being the most dominant.

After the race riots of May 1969, the politics of race became much, much more pronounced especially with Umno’s attempts to redress the imbalance against Malays by drastic measures. It was that which laid the basis for those NCB courses, which often had the agenda of raising awareness of Malay rights, often to the exclusion of Malaysian ones.

It was, according to some of those who attended these courses, rather racial if not racist and while there were some non-Malays who attended these courses, the composition was predominantly Malay and dealt mostly with Malay rather than Malaysian issues.

There could have been yet another agenda. Umno derives its power from Malays and it was necessary for it to continuously court that from the Malays. There is little doubt that the NCB courses were used for this as well. If Umno’s coalition partners did not object, it was because Umno was dominant.

But things are changing. An increasing number of Malaysians are realising the dangers of racial division and lack of unity and feel the need to do something about it – something that will make all Malaysians feel they belong.

Somewhere along the line, we must realise that fighting for Malay rights (or Chinese, Indian, Kadazan, Orang Asli etc rights) does not ever make us more nationalistic — fighting for Malaysian rights does. There is no such thing as a Malay nationalist just as there is no such thing as a Chinese or any other but a Malaysian nationalist.

The day we all realise that, that is the day we will start thinking of ourselves as Malaysians first before anything else. That’s not an easy mindset to build because you have to destroy first the false edifices of more than half a century which extolled championing the rights of individual races.

History teaches us that all of us were at some time or other “pendatang” – it’s a question of when. Even the orang asli came here from elsewhere. Science tells us that we may have all descended from the African Eve tens of thousands of years ago.

And genetics tells us without a doubt that there is no inherent difference in our genes that makes us different in terms of intelligence or ability from anyone else.

Under our skin, our language, our religion and our culture we are much more similar than most of us realise. Education should make us realise all these beyond a shadow of a doubt.

When these are the true lessons that we choose to impart to our children, the process of integration becomes so much easier – we simply point out to them that we re basically the same and that our differences are artificial and perfectly surmountable.

You can debate about how much to help Malays and other disadvantaged communities and how you should go about this so that there is maximum benefit to the community as a whole instead of privileged groups and individuals.

But you should not have to debate about whether you or I or the other is more Malaysian. You are either Malaysian or you are not. The Constitution provides for only one class of citizenship. Measures put in there for the sake of social redress don’t count in terms of citizenship. Period.
A complete revamp of not just the NCB course is necessary but a dire need to change the entire way we look at race and Malaysians. We must emphasise national aspirations and de-emphasise racial ones. We must treat Malaysians equally.

If we help all disadvantaged Malaysians we automatically help disadvantaged communities more. That should be the basic thrust of policy — to help all Malaysians irrespective of race so that eventually race matters little and racism dies.

P. Gunasegaram believes in this quote from Freidrich Nietzsche (1844-1900): Insanity in individuals is something rare – but in groups, parties, nations and epochs, it is the rule.

Of noisy Indians and 'keling' blood: Utusan strikes again

Abdul Rahim Sabri
10 Dec 2009

The Umno-owned Malay daily Utusan Malaysia has once again trampled on racial sensitivities, earning it another two more police reports.

The reports were filed by MIC Youth's racial integration bureau chief MT Padmanathan and PKR Batu Youth member V Ravindran with the Sentul police headquarters in Kuala Lumpur this morning.

Both parties were incensed by a column published yesterday under the heading 'Alkishah India di India dan India di Malaysia' (The tale of Indians in India and Indians in Malaysia).

Among others, the writer Zaini Hassan said Indians in India and Malaysia are "loudmouthed and always making noise."

He then zeroed in on DAP MP M Kulasegaran for 'making noise' over the special privileges accorded to the Malays.

Zaini penned: "Dia tahukah apa yang dia cakap? Tapi yang pasti kenyataannya itu cukup sensitif dan akan membuat kumpulan lain marah. Tapi seperti biasa orang Melayu marahnya tidak lama."

(Is he aware of what he is saying? One thing is for certain, his statement is very sensitive and will anger others. But as usual the anger of the Malays will not last for long).

"Tak apalah. Orang Melayu tidak seperti orang India, walaupun ada juga Melayu yang darah keturunan keling (DKK), tapi darah Melayu yang lembut banyak menguasai mereka."

(Never mind. The Malays are not like Indians, although some of them have 'keling' blood, but the 'soft' Malay blood in them is more overwhelming).

Noisy...that is their culture

In the article, Zaini also related his experience in visiting India recently, where he witnessed the hustle and bustle of the densely-populated nation.

"India tetap India. Orang India ialah masyarakat yang begitu unik. Jika kita sering tengok wayang Tamil atau Hindi, itulah budaya mereka. Kecoh, kecoh dan kecoh."

(India is India. The Indians are unique. If we watch Tamil or Hindi movies, that is their culture, noisy, noisy and noisy).

"Namun, kita di Malaysia pun ada orang India. Kecohnya pun lebih kurang sama. Mereka ini rata-ratanya terdiri daripada ahli-ahli profesional, peguam dan kini menjadi ahli politik."

(There are also Indians in Malaysia, and the noisiness is about the same. These are the professionals, lawyers and now politicians.)

Last year, Zaini had also attacked DAP MP Teresa Kok, whom he accused of ordering a mosque to lower the volume of its Azan prayers.

The issue had even led to her brief detention under the Internal Security Act.

Kok, who denied the allegation, subsequently filed a suit against the writer.

Public apology sought

In his police report, Padmanathan said the article contained elements that degraded the Indian community.

"Utusan Malaysia has crossed the line. Such statements not only ridicule the Indians, but have the potential of stirring racial unrest," he said, adding that Indian Malaysians are enraged by this.

Padmanathan urged the writer to publicly apologise to the Indian community here.

Meanwhile, Ravindran stated in his police report that the article reeked of racism and went against the 1Malaysia concept espoused by Prime Minister Najib Abdul Razak.

Also present was DAP's Teluk Intan parliamentarian M Manogaran.

This morning, Human Resources Minister and MIC vice-president Dr S Subramaniam also criticised the daily for using offensive words.
Hindu Sangam also upset

In another development, Malaysia Hindu Sangam president RS Mohan Shan also urged Utusan Malaysia to apologise over its insensitive report.

"We want a public apology," he said.

He also countered Zaini's statement that Indians here were troublemakers.

"We are not troublemakers. We are willing to work with anyone. Zaini is the troublemaker," he said.

Mohan also defended Kulasegaran as a legislator who was defending the rights of the Indian community.

"You cannot consider him as a troublemaker. He and the rest of the Indian legislators were only defending our rights."

Small case, sick joke

Dean Johns
9 Dec 2009

Try as I do every week to poke fun at the antics of Malaysia's clownish Umno/BN government and its cronies, I confess that, as my old blogger buddy Ktemoc recently pointed out, I sometimes lose my sense of humour. Like this week, for example.
However hard I strain to see the funny or 'punny' side of outgoing MACC chief commissioner Ahmad Said's comment that "Teoh Beng Hock's case is nothing. It's a very small case", I'm afraid I can't raise so much as a ghost of a smile.

In fact the best I can manage is a snort of contempt. As if it wasn't shameful enough to serve as the figurehead of Umno/BN's latest fake corruption-fighting body, Said has further personally and professionally disgraced himself with this crass attempt to make light of a case of suspected murder by his MACC henchmen.

At least I'm not alone in my failure to get a giggle from this gruesome remark. Lim Kit Siang, for example, blogged that Said's statement was "heartless and grossly insensitive", especially following his earlier and equally outrageous comment that "if people investigated could not withstand the pressure and jumped from the building, there was nothing that MACC could do".

Said might well be jumping early from his job, and laughing all the way into prosperous retirement, but if he lives long enough the joke could eventually be on him. Come the day that enough of the Malaysian people stop choosing to see the Umno/BN regime as some harmless national and international joke, and finally vote or force it out of office, chances are the nation will finally get a government that's serious about investigating and prosecuting 'small' cases of political homicide.

And as every law officer should know, there's no statute of limitations in cases of murder, or any amnesty either, for that matter, and this applies not just to the actual killers but also to their accomplices and accessories.

So for those of us who get a chuckle out of seeing politically-protected criminals getting their just desserts, there's a touch of gallows humour in the prospect of someday seeing some Umno/BN murder suspects go on trial.
'Small' cases, indeed

I'll personally die laughing the day that the 'small' case of Teoh Beng Hock's killing case is opened for genuine investigation followed by the trial of genuine suspects in front of a genuine court.

Ditto the small case of Altantuya Shaariibuu about which the elusive private investigator P Balasubramaniam, aka Bala, is still making "frivolous" allegations against Prime Minister Najib Abdul Razak.
And then, of course, there are countless cases to be made against members of the 'royal' Malaysian police concerning suspicious deaths in 'shoot-outs' and in custody.

But of course the eventual outcome won't be as jolly as the one I'm envisaging, as the moment a respectable government looks like gaining office in Malaysia, all the Umno/BN goons with the guiltiest consciences will use their ill-gotten gains to fund their getaways to greener pastures.
Meanwhile, the grim comedy grinds inexorably on, as horribly hilarious as ever, with Najib endlessly repeating his ridiculous 1Malaysia slogan and the irrepressible Dr Mahathir regularly stealing the limelight with his customary madcap remarks.

The latest inspiration for Dr M-style drollery, it seems, has been somebody's suggestion that Australia be asked to supervise the conduct of future Malaysian elections.
While no doubt well-intended, and motivated by a well-founded distrust of Malaysia's Umno/BN-biased Electoral Commission, I must say that I'm with the Mahathir in considering this idea ludicrous. Not, as the good doctor typically does, on racial grounds, but for purely practical reasons.

Intervention in any nation's internal affairs is a job for the United Nations, not for Australia or any other individual country. And in any case, Australia has enough problems keeping tabs on its own crooks and opportunists, especially those in property development with friends and contacts in state and local government, without taking responsibility for anyone else's.

The best Australia can do, in my opinion, is to welcome as many Malaysian migrants, students and visitors as possible, for as long as they're happy to stay here. Which brings me to one thing about Umno/BN that I've recently found at least mildly amusing: Najib's call for Malaysian expatriates to return home and help build a better nation.

I asked a young student I know whether he planned to move back when he finished his course, and he was so shocked, taken aback and lost for words he just laughed. Thereby expressing how a great many fellow overseas Malaysians must feel about repatriating to the kind of place where law-and-order and justice are a standing joke, the press is a pack of lies and evasions, and organisations like Biro Tata Negara (BTN) are paid with public money to promote racial division and distrust.

However, as much as I sympathise with Malaysians, including my wife and daughter, who wouldn't go back to live there if you paid them, I think it's a terrible pity. Because many of those who have returned, or have chosen to stay despite everything, may well prove the nation's salvation.

If serious journalists like Steven Gan and Prem Chandran hadn't come back, for example, there would be no honest alternative to the laughable 'mainstream' media. And if all the opposition politicians, bloggers, activists and other serious opponents of the joke Umno/BN government hadn't either come back or stayed put all along, Malaysia would be in an even more desperately derisory state than it is now.

A situation that's admittedly hard to imagine when the government's such a basket-case that its so-called 'anti-corruption' commission can get away with calling the death of a suspect in his officers' custody a 'small case'.

But I fancy that more Malaysians are, like me and my old mate Ktemoc, finding it increasingly difficult to see the funny side. And looking forward more than ever to the eventual day when we all enjoy the last laugh on the jokers of Umno/BN.

BTN: Divisive, racist, politically-motivated

Mariam Mohktar
5 Dec 2009

For me, the seeds of poison were planted decades ago.

Just before I went overseas to study, I was sent for ‘orientation’ at a Mara hostel to ostensibly prepare myself for life abroad.

That weekend was a blur, and I recall four things:

1) Blocked toilets and flooded communal bathrooms.
2) Basic food, thus a friend’s sister dropped off much needed rations of chocolates and ‘kacang’.
3) How to wash your ‘smalls’ (underwear) in a cold country and have them dry by the next morning.
4) We assembled in small groups for out-of-door talks, in the school grounds. We were told that the Malays were the most supreme race in the world, we were God’s chosen few, that the others were insignificant. We were warned about certain elements in our society and abroad, determined to undermine Malay excellence.

It was never meant to be a question-and-answer session and the lecturer omitted to qualify his contentious and contemptuous statements.

Just like my peers, my mind was focused on going overseas. In essence, we simply 'switched off'. Moreover, we hardly experienced any racial issues at our convent school.

Did I come out of that orientation a better person? Did I pick up new skills and ideas? Of the four things, the first two are just facets of Malaysian life; the third has been extremely practical, whilst the fourth left me disturbed and has lain fallow, until now.

After reading about the BTN (Biro Tatanegara or National Civics Bureau), I fear that much venom has been perpetuated. I may also have unwittingly experienced the inception of the BTN.

Ties have eroded
I am reminded by my grandparents and parents that after the last of the midnight chimes had heralded the arrival of Aug 31, 1957, everyone was ecstatic. It was a stirring moment.

Malays grasped the hands of Chinese, Indians embraced Malays. With ‘Merdeka’, Malaysians felt energised.

Fast forward to present-day Malaysia and the scene is stupefying. Malays eye the non-Malays with contempt and derision, whilst the non-Malays are consumed with frustration and resentment. A never-ending nightmare.

The ties that cemented us 52 years ago have eroded. Instead of acting as one, our differences have been emphasised; our similarities have all but diminished.

The new slogan, 1Malaysia, is a vain attempt to patch-up our differences. There is little point in using this sticking plaster to mend a wound that is deep and suppurating.

If we are instructed to be ‘one’, then something is wrong. If we are drilled to behave in a particular way, to be seen to be united, then this is a veiled and tacit acknowledgment that all is not well.

Somewhere after independence, we lost our focus. We took our eye off the ball.

We allowed ourselves to be massaged and manipulated into submissiveness by those who purported to lead us, but who have done us much damage - physically, spiritually, morally, financially, emotionally.

We are now a bunch of apathetic people who have to be led by the nose, who grumble only in private but hide any dissent in public. We are cowed into inactivity, resigned to our fate.

Why do we allow racism, corruption or inequality, practices which are unacceptable in the wider world, to prosper here? Why do we accept that when something goes wrong, no one is made accountable? Why is there a poor system of checks and balances? What happened to leadership by example?

The silent majority
The BTN is alleged to be divisive, racist and politically-motivated. The public is outraged; but politicians seem blind to these facts.

The deputy prime minister and the women, family and community development minister both deny the allegations. But what do ministers from the other component parties of BN say? Their silence speaks volumes.

Some ministers claim that the courses instil patriotism and are harmless. In their view, segregating participants into specific groups of race and ethnicity, followed by humiliation, is considered not divisive. They may need to reassess their values.

Others say that the BTN is being revamped. Or upgraded. Or changed. Whatever. The truth is, the BTN runs counter to the ideals of a united Malaysia. It is time we dispensed with our politicians’ knee-jerk reactions in their pathetic efforts to ameliorate the breakdown in public confidence.

How can the Umno information chief assume the role of BTN programme head? This is a conflict of interest. How does he isolate his political affiliations? He cannot possibly assume neutrality.

I have not experienced the BTN programme and hope that I never will.

When questions with political and religious undertones are incorporated, that is reason enough for the BTN to cease to operate and function.

When non-Malay Malaysians are chastised for their ‘immigrant’ status and are condescendingly told to be grateful to the Malays, that is wrong.

When only the contributions of the Malays are recognised for bringing peace and prosperity to the nation, that is positively abhorrent.

When Malays are warned not to mingle with non-Malays, when only Muslims are to be respected, that is despicable.

It is a mockery that 1Malaysia has boiled down to mean 'belonging to only one race'. And the shocking thing is that many Western-educated middle class Malays believe it.

Like the vines of our jungles, the BTN is strangling the ideals, aspirations and uniqueness of all Malaysian peoples.

I have been accused of being a traitor to my race, and religion just because I state what is obviously unfair, undemocratic and lacking in morals and principles.

I suspect they disapprove of me, mostly because I am a woman and a Malay, and dare to speak up about prickly issues. But I admire these people. At least, they are willing to express their views, however vile they may be. Unlike, the silent majority.

For these are the ones I appeal to, and who I wish would make a stand and do more to champion change, if only for the good and love and future of our nation.

In the final analysis, ‘1’ more person, might make all the difference