Background
After (post GE-12) having read the various blogs, one of the most prominent factors established and readily acknowledged to have influenced the results of the election that was the impact of the alternative media. However, when I voted on the basis of ‘Any Body but BN’, I was then yet to be exposed to the alternative media for any inclinations.
All this while, at any general or by election, my wife and I without fail voted for BN; I never gave two hoots on the profile of the candidates from either the BN or its opposition. I am a Melayu born in Perak while my wife, also Malay, is from Johore but we have been residing in Ampang, Selangor for more than 20 years. We are not UMNO members but generally supported the objectives of BN and UMNO. So I and my wife are considered among the (3 over million) silent majority.
However, since the past 3-4 years, I consistently encountered numerous adverse comments from a number of people (business associates, friends and relatives) who were directly and indirectly affected by certain actions from people connected with the top leadership. Most potent was the inability to appreciate or comprehend how a young man now about 33 years could exert so much influence on the business and politics of the country and be among the riches man in the country. The young man is none other than SIL. Similarly, I was told about the excessive gluttony, influence and interference of the other members of the 1st family.
Leadership and Governance
As a professional, I have been quite involved in the restructuring and management of ailing companies. I have always found that the top management particularly the CEO as the persons primarily responsible for the unfortunate state of affairs of these companies. These companies have been found lacking including amongst other factors; lacking in upholding the best practices of good corporate governance (transparency, risk management, corporate disclosures etc), the minimum check and balances and the management’s inadequate structure and most importantly inability and incapable to respond to market forces and changes.
The culture in these organizations normally followed the whims and fancies of the CEO and his key managers. However, there were many instances of external interference of the major shareholders as well as other unseen but influential hands (including unofficially appointed personal advisers) which seriously and adversely affected the decisions of the CEO and top management. Consequently these companies naturally went to the docks.
Politics within a company and that at National level do have many similarities. In most dire situations, to resuscitate these ailing corporations, very often the CEO has to resign for new blood to be brought in to facilitate relevant changes in revitalizing the companies. With the appointment of a new CEO particularly with good acceptable credentials and the expectations of a revamped management team would be a step forward to restore confidence to the companies’ stakeholders.
In this beloved country of ours, in tandem with the international environment, the Government and corporate sector enthusiastically advocates good corporate governance; it tantamount to gross hypocrisy of the government if its leadership do not fit the standard of good governance it so promulgate. That the 1st family apparently benefited and overindulged in such negative excessiveness resulting in massive misuse of powers, extreme nepotism, cronyism and corruption does not jell well with the masses especially those who are professionals.
General Perception -Examples
As a good example, I remembered very clearly about an incident which happen a couple of years ago. During a break at an association meeting held to discuss issues relating to good corporate governance, there suddenly erupted a cynical laughter about PM denying in the press that his son did not get Government contracts when it was in the papers a few days earlier that a company closely connected with his son had successfully secured a contract jointly with some other bidders. I guessed I was not the only one stunned with the PM’s statement. The general consensus at that moment was ‘He (PM) does not know what he is talking about; he thinks we can be fooled so easily. People are not stupid anymore’.
Then another surprising comment came out from one of the members ‘He sleeps a lot; in one incident, reporters had to sit and wait for about an hour while watching the PM doze off in the middle of a press conference; he should have fixed another time (instead of making the reporters wait). Thereafter, I sought confirmation from other trustworthy sources including from previous government servants who worked under PM. The confirmation was positive; that indeed it is his way/ habit.
About a year ago, one of my Chinese neighbors moved into his new house. When I asked him about his business, he replied that his business was in
About two years ago, when I made a site visit at KT, a client showed me the venue for the monsoon games. With utter frustration, he lamented ‘ini semua contract kita sini tak dapat, semua itu KJ dengan geng sapu habis, hai ya’. When the Trennganu MB dispute arose recently, I could easily understand why MPPR appointed someone else instead of incumbent proposed by the PM.
In their quest for more and more lucrative contracts, the 1st family apparently grossly interfered in the administration of the country. Such truth does not coagulate well with the practices of any good governance. The once pride of our country, the civil administration which several members of my family were previously attached to, seemed plagued by these outside interference. Apparently such instances created much anger to these public servants. The credibility, integrity and the good name of our public services department has been grossly damaged.
So I became more and more disappointed with PM and his family, wondering as many others “Was PM aware of these acts of his SIL; how could PM allowed it if he acclaims himself to be ‘Mr Clean’; did the PM directly or indirectly benefited?” Extreme nepotism and cronyism at the highest level seemed to continue so visibly. Nothing…..nothing concrete came forth in the media to convincingly reject such conclusions or serious enough to prove that such rumors were indeed false and malicious. Why? I still ask till to-day.
PAS and PKR
Personally, I had always reckoned PAS as a counter party to check on UMNO in ensuring that UMNO would not be over zealous on material/ worldly objectives less they forget the hereafter. One of my late brothers was a very staunch supporter of PAS but fortunately we were able to discuss political issues with ease. I still have the impression that PAS alone as it is may not have the necessary leadership and capability to manage our country so multi-racial and progressive. PAS, in advocating some sought of welfare system, to my opinion, may not truly protect the rights of the Malays within a capitalist system in comparison to UMNO for obvious reasons.
PKR (Party ‘Komunis’ Rakyat), I opined, cannot ever represent the true interest of the Malays as they have leaders and members coming from other races with a philosophical bias on (democratic) socialism.
Racial Based Politics
Racial based politics in this country, as I understand it, is very much alive and currently ever growing bolder. The more I read the bloggs and the commentaries posted, the more I sensed it and sometimes my blood just boil when I come across articles or comments which do not fit my way of thinking and of belittling my race. But that is our freedom of speech and for sure breeds well for the continuance of the BN structure per revamped.
Racial politics exists in almost if not all countries. To say racial politics do not persist in US,
Grassroots’ Predicament
The gluttony of the present leadership seemed to have filtered down to the ranks, the grassroots. Already I had heard the tone of many of the ordinary members of UMNO, especially the ‘not well to do’, blatantly saying ‘if the 1st family can take all, why should they not take too’; the personal interest of the grassroots have been severely compromised in priority to the party’s. But can you blame them when the leadership has set such examples.
The perception to ordinary non UMNO people like me, UMNO’s supposed image and credentials as a ‘defender of Malay rights etc’ has been badly battered. Fortunately, a serious and perhaps most desperate attempt to reform and overhaul UMNO is being addressed to re-make/re-shape UMNO relevant to to-day’s demands. With the uttermost of urgency, UMNO has to be suitably repackaged, restructured from top to bottom and inside out, both in form and substance, to make its destiny once again acceptable to all Malaysians. I am more than confident that this can happen, even if it results to a phoenix rising from the ashes.
Hypocrisy??
I have been taught to look towards my leaders as examples. Of cause, for Muslims, the best example to follow is the Prophet (PBUH) and that is why when anyone ridicules maliciously the Prophet, Islam and the Quran, we Muslims just loose our ‘cool’. That’s the reason we Muslims as Malaysian consumers should adhere the call to boycott Dutch products following the release of Geert Wilders’ Fitna. In some other countries, the display of the Muslim faith has been more forceful in the form of violent demonstrations. God Willing, the international pressure against Wilders will force the Dutch people themselves to ‘execute’ the bastard within their midst; I called Wilders a bastard for the simply reason he has been forewarned by so many quarters including the UN and his own country not to release the blasphemous film but Wilders, being worse than ‘biadab’, still proceeded. The most interesting part about the local boycott was that the pronouncement was first made by none other than TDM before others including PAS came forward and joined the bandwagon.
In our country, a leader had promoted a new concept of Islam under the name of Islam Hadhari and that concept even appears in the text books which my school going children read. I would expect the leader to lend us his example but such was not the case; he had done so only in one occasion in leading the congregation prayers when he took office…….. I just dare not comment further, it’s too shameful.
My trust in the UMNO/ BN leadership had then since deteriorated; I felt grossly betrayed by the 1st family. Such was the culmination of my extreme prejudice against the present leadership and of particular the 1st family prior to polling day.
The Final Straw – My daughter, the aspiring silat exponent
To add to the ‘ramblings and doodlings of an unsettled mind’, a disgusting incident happened during the national silat championship competition in 2007 involving my daughter who is an aspiring silat exponent.
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This incident displayed unjustified acts against my daughter which tantamount to incompetence, arrogance, ridiculing, lust for power, sombong bodoh, penindas minda, dejections by 3 culprits, supposedly educationists, as well as almost the entire JPWPKL contingent at the 2007 National Interschool Silat Competition including the teachers as officials/ coaches.
In short, the relevance to the country’s present leadership is simple; no body, even the administration of her school dared question in detail the incident. As apparently happening in UMNO, nobody dared to displease the leadership and as voiced out by its dissidents “Something is wrong with our leadership”.
It is no co-incidence that our PM is the Penaung of Silat Gayung Malaysia (SGM). I hear that there are persons in the high level in the Ministry at Putrajaya in the Silat Co-curriculum representing GSM. My daughter is from another silat discipline. Could that be amongst the reasons for no action taken on my complaint against the 3?
I cannot but wonder at the similarities of the negative attitudes and characteristics of the said educationists as well as the stance of the institutions in comparison with that of the present top leadership; the negative aspects of the top leadership seemed to have easily assimilated to the ground. Is it just like the S.O.B George Bush saying ‘either you are with us or you are with them’ and you can find his followers especially the new cons readily adopting such ridiculous statement merely to satisfy their self interest and cravings? Come to think of it, there’s a lot of similarities between George Bush and our PM- to Bush, he repeatedly ‘we are winning the war in Iraq’, to PM he is convinced ‘We have a strong mandate to govern, just 8 short of 2/3majority’, so naively he repeated as though the masses are blind
It is most sad, yet shameful and sickening, to acknowledge that even in our school co-curriculum, the inside politics is so dirty and permitted to adversely affect the well being of our future generation. The numerous shortfalls in Silat as a school curriculum would be illustrated in my subsequent postings. Definitely nothing is wrong in the art of Silat or it as co-curriculum but, oh gosh, some of the ‘educationists’ involved……UGH…so shitty. Damn, damn, damn !!!! I have totally disregarded the recent issuance of the report card of the MOE; if the Minister condones the actions of such educationists, where is the effective implementation of the stated Malaysian Education Policy in relation to resource development in particular the objectives of ‘Silat for All’.
IF INDEED THE PRESENT LEADERSHIP APPARENTLY HAS SET A VERY BAD EXAMPLE FOR OTHERS TO FOLLOW, THEN IT IS MOST UNHEALTY FOR OUR FUTURE GENERATION.
A prelude to the story will be posted tomorrow, I am sure anyone would definitely be concern.
Just Before Polling Day
Just a couple of days before polling day, I had dinner with some ex-colleagues including two Chinese who warned me to extra careful after casting my votes because the overall results were expected to be bad for BN and that there could be some disturbances. They also suggested me to keep some extra provisions just in case.
Kelantan, they said, had already gone to the opposition while BN candidates were not allowed to go to garner votes in certain places because of the massive disappointment against the ruling party. Indian voters were expected to vote against BN because of the Hindaf issue. Many people apparently were angry about the gluttony of the SIL and other members of the 1st family. PM was considered weak and did nothing constructive except sleep.
I was caught by surprise when one of the Chinese colleagues commented ‘let the old man (TDM) come back to the helm; even if TDM does nothing is okay with him’….Hmm that bad a perception of the public? My friend seemed so fed up with the 1st family. Perhaps he felt so because he had to slog in a financially distressed company, getting his pay only about 5 days after the month end and yet jealously seeing the 1st family grabbing wealth by the millions with the least of effort.
Subsequently after election, I was told by another friend that 9 out of 10 of his friends (all professionals and traditional loyal BN supporters) in a government owned organization voted for the opposition this time round; reason – so pissed off with the leadership and the 1st family; piss off with 4TH FLOOR, piss off with blatant nepotism and cronyism etc…etc…etc…wow…the list of shit seemed endless.
Was BN truthful in saying they were unprepared for the colossal losses? A massive vote of protest was already so clearly written on the walls. Didn’t BN get reliable feedback from their market intelligence especially the special branch? What game was BN playing; kidding themselves? Sack PM’s advisers, said Lim Keng Yek. Whoever they are, anyway I would say ‘kick the fellows’ and ‘Whack them buggers’. Even with their bosses and compatriots, these so-called advisers continue playing ‘masters of deception’ manipulating disinformation and propaganda to promote their selfish interest. So every day, the advisors gave PM the most comfortable pillows to sleep soundly and slam the ‘Do not disturb’ sign outside his bedroom.
On Polling day - No second Thoughts
On polling day 8th March 2008, after a light breakfast, my wife and I hurried to the polling station. Without any second thoughts, I just went to the polling station, had my particulars orderly verified and then cast my vote for PKR and PAS as a protest against the present leadership, all over in just about 15 minutes. Perhaps subconsciously, I voted in adherence to the call by TDM, the senior statesman whom I truly admire and have full respect and trust, to have a strong opposition. As I walked away I wondered how many of the silent majority would vote my way. My constituency is a strong traditional BN area with Malays making up the bulk of voters.
Thereafter we quickly went to my brother’s house on the other side of town to chat on family matters before arriving back by early evening. None of my household was then allowed to venture out of the neighborhood on their own until further notice, taking heed of my friend’s advice.
No Regrets but Concern
No regrets re my voting decision. My present concern is since BN (or Pakatan Rakyat should that eventually ever happen) do not have a 2/3 majority, the politically changed landscape and the prolonged uncertainty and political infighting will not bring much good to the country. I hear that those foreigners who had or have been investing on the basis of a secure, stable and safe political environment have already fled the country; the expectation is for the local share market (
Like any individual born in this world,
1. Will our unique country/ economy survive with resilience in the next 2-3 years, will it be able to withstand the uncertainties and votality in the international markets if uncertainty in the local environment continues. My understanding is that the worst (from the international market vis a vis the recession and credit crisis in US) is yet to come.
2. Will the people we voted to power continue to advocate ‘small things pleases small people’ rather then focusing on the greater issues. Can our politicians (for that matter any politician) be trusted to take care of our interest?
3. No strong government (2/3 majority) means continued uncertainty and the country will likely be a prey of foreign powers (please exclude beings from outer space in my definition) knowing the US administration, together with all its intelligence and counter intelligence agencies including the Mossad) are just grinning and waiting at our doorsteps because they ‘love’ our country. Maybe I watch too many action movies with conspiracy theories but the reality is there and I dread such reflections.
4. It’s good to talk and believe about having a two-party system is good and the way forward for our democratic system but if the result is a weakened Government and the political environment remaining uncertain, the economy is likely to come under further stress. Is right for me to dream on? I am concern about my children’s future in our beloved country. Is it a simple case that ‘we can’t have the cake and eat it’? But again reading some blogs and their commentaries, apparently many want to have the whole cake.
As an ordinary populace, I have more than enough democratic freedom to move with ease in my every daily life. I am not one of those who would advocate unlimited freedom – Like Geert Wilders or the European Unions’ freedom of the Press re the publication on the cartoons of the Prophet nor do I wish to see individuals and couples sun bathing in the nude at their back yards or justifying killing thousands of innocent Iraqis in the guise of freedom. Those types of democracies and freedom advocated by the west and especially the
As a Muslim, I appreciate advocating the vision of an ideal Islamic State, my utopia but I have to be reasonable and practical, I live in a multiracial country with many shortfalls – I have to appreciate that living in this bountiful country of ours is only a temporary abode. I am just a traveler in time and I have to make the best of it before it’s time to answer to Almighty (on all my deeds and actions), sooner or later.
I must admit I am no ‘super being’ and I can only do so much although at times I tend to forget (‘Melayu mudah lupa?’).
My hope grows every day as a concern citizen that the prevailing uncertainty fades soon enough and that the future for my kids would be as bright as it was for many of us.
END
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