Most of the Hindraf leaders are lawyers and if you believe the news, one of them Uthayakumar has just registered a new political party called Parti Hak Asasi Manusia or Paham.
This comes after the formation of the Malaysian Makkal Sakthi Party (MMSP), led by former Hindraf national coordinator R.S. Thanenthiran.
There is also a rumour floating around that another Indian leader is planning for another party.
At least half a dozen parties are chasing the support of the 7.8 per cent of Malaysia’s population of Indians who made up slightly more than 10 per cent at the time of independence. The really bad news is that in about a decade’s time, the Indian population will fall to below 5 per cent.
So you can clearly see that with more Indian-based parties and an Indian population (in percentage terms) going down, the political voice of the Indians is going to be a whisper.
The basic problem is the failure of the MIC. For a long time, the MIC had a monopoly of Indian support but along the way, since the 1980s, it had squandered its support among the Indian population due to its inability to stand up to Umno and deliver government support to the community. Tun Dr Mahathir Mohamad’s strongman politics had no place for the MIC since it was unable to get its act together.
It did not help that the Indians did not “control” any constituencies, and at best were a significant majority in about seven to 10 parliamentary seats. In any case, a series of financial scandals in MIC and internal fights ended with the party totally dominated by a single person.
By this stage it was almost impossible to revive the MIC as all the talented Indian professionals had either left the country, sacked/expelled from the party, joined the opposition (especially the DAP and PKR) or joined NGOs. As a joke went: if you want to attend a gangster meeting, go to a MIC meeting.
It took the Indian community nearly a decade to find its new champion — Hindraf. It was only logical that since the Indians did not have a political platform, they would turn to religion as the primary mobilising force. The destruction of Hindu temples and related issues on religious freedom and body snatching were just the right cocktail mix to ignite the Indian population.
The most interesting bit was that nobody, and I mean none of the mainstream political parties (including the MIC), saw Hindraf coming. When Hindraf staged the demonstration in front of the iconic Petronas Towers, people suddenly realised that a new political force was in town. The rest is history.
No matter how racist Hindraf is, the truth is it forced both the government and the opposition to look at the Indian problem in this country.
Unfortunately for Hindraf, at the height of its popularity, it did not play its cards well. The ISA effectively broke its back and it did not have a strategy to deal with it.
The BN paid a heavy political price but it was a price worth paying since the MIC could no longer deliver the votes. The IPF was also unable to get Indian votes.
Umno knows that in order to win back the Indian voters, a new Indian party has to emerge. It tried before with the Malaysian Indian United Party (MIUP) but it did not work.
Hence it is relatively generous when it comes to approving new political parties that target the Indian community.
This high-risk strategy works well. It will split the Indian community politically but also allow the most talented new Indian leaders to emerge outside of the usual suspects of the MIC, IPF and PPP. If they can prove they can get Indian support, they can later be co-opted into the BN or remain an ally of the BN outside, like the IPF.
Where does this leave the ordinary Indian Malaysian? The short answer is that the Indian community will now actually get politically weaker in the short term as all these parties fight among themselves to see who can command the support of the Indians.
Unless you have a clear champion like what Hindraf was two years ago, the Indian community will end up neither here or there for the coming decade.
MI
02/07/09
This comes after the formation of the Malaysian Makkal Sakthi Party (MMSP), led by former Hindraf national coordinator R.S. Thanenthiran.
There is also a rumour floating around that another Indian leader is planning for another party.
At least half a dozen parties are chasing the support of the 7.8 per cent of Malaysia’s population of Indians who made up slightly more than 10 per cent at the time of independence. The really bad news is that in about a decade’s time, the Indian population will fall to below 5 per cent.
So you can clearly see that with more Indian-based parties and an Indian population (in percentage terms) going down, the political voice of the Indians is going to be a whisper.
The basic problem is the failure of the MIC. For a long time, the MIC had a monopoly of Indian support but along the way, since the 1980s, it had squandered its support among the Indian population due to its inability to stand up to Umno and deliver government support to the community. Tun Dr Mahathir Mohamad’s strongman politics had no place for the MIC since it was unable to get its act together.
It did not help that the Indians did not “control” any constituencies, and at best were a significant majority in about seven to 10 parliamentary seats. In any case, a series of financial scandals in MIC and internal fights ended with the party totally dominated by a single person.
By this stage it was almost impossible to revive the MIC as all the talented Indian professionals had either left the country, sacked/expelled from the party, joined the opposition (especially the DAP and PKR) or joined NGOs. As a joke went: if you want to attend a gangster meeting, go to a MIC meeting.
It took the Indian community nearly a decade to find its new champion — Hindraf. It was only logical that since the Indians did not have a political platform, they would turn to religion as the primary mobilising force. The destruction of Hindu temples and related issues on religious freedom and body snatching were just the right cocktail mix to ignite the Indian population.
The most interesting bit was that nobody, and I mean none of the mainstream political parties (including the MIC), saw Hindraf coming. When Hindraf staged the demonstration in front of the iconic Petronas Towers, people suddenly realised that a new political force was in town. The rest is history.
No matter how racist Hindraf is, the truth is it forced both the government and the opposition to look at the Indian problem in this country.
Unfortunately for Hindraf, at the height of its popularity, it did not play its cards well. The ISA effectively broke its back and it did not have a strategy to deal with it.
The BN paid a heavy political price but it was a price worth paying since the MIC could no longer deliver the votes. The IPF was also unable to get Indian votes.
Umno knows that in order to win back the Indian voters, a new Indian party has to emerge. It tried before with the Malaysian Indian United Party (MIUP) but it did not work.
Hence it is relatively generous when it comes to approving new political parties that target the Indian community.
This high-risk strategy works well. It will split the Indian community politically but also allow the most talented new Indian leaders to emerge outside of the usual suspects of the MIC, IPF and PPP. If they can prove they can get Indian support, they can later be co-opted into the BN or remain an ally of the BN outside, like the IPF.
Where does this leave the ordinary Indian Malaysian? The short answer is that the Indian community will now actually get politically weaker in the short term as all these parties fight among themselves to see who can command the support of the Indians.
Unless you have a clear champion like what Hindraf was two years ago, the Indian community will end up neither here or there for the coming decade.
MI
02/07/09
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