At a recent seminar held for civil servants in Putrajaya attended by Najib’s long-time political secretary Shahlan Ismail, a book authored by Seri Setia assemblyman Nik Nazmi Nik Ahmad entitled Mendepani Zaman was severely criticized as being "disloyal to the Malay cause".
According to Prof Ramlah Adam of UiTM, who was the guest speaker, the premise of the book which calls on Malays to be courageous and forward-looking was wrong. She told the seminar that the Malays were not safe under the social contract but under constant threat of being 'toppled' by the Chinese and the Indians.
“Her main point was that the book is the result of a liberal thinking Malay who does not appreciate his own race's history and struggle. She wasn't really attacking his political affiliation but more on the messages the book carried. She considered Nik Nazmi as one of the successful Malays who have forgotten their roots and how the rest of the race is still struggling and poor,” an attendee of the course told Malaysia Chronicle.
“Many of us were stunned because she spoke right after Najib’s right-hand man talked about 1 Malaysia in his opening speech. And the undertone of racism was obvious even in the 1Malaysia segment. For Ramlah, her main grudge was that Malays still needed the ‘tongkat’ or crutches but the Chinese and the Indians are fighting them even though they, and here it was obvious 'they' meant Umno, has been kind and fair to all the races since independence.”
No explanation asked, no opportunity of defense offered
A program of the event held in late July (scroll below) showed Ramlah was given a 1 ½ -hour slot to speak on the book Moving Forward: Malays for the 21st Century , while Shahlan preceded her with a speech on 1Malaysia, People First, Performance Now.
“As the book’s author, I was never offered the chance to explain or to defend my writing. Yet the Najib administration is tarring me as anti-Malay and pro non-Malay. I understand this is common practice in Putrajaya – they don’t even have the courtesy to invite the author to listen to the discussion,” Nik Nazmi, who is also the PKR communications director, told Malaysia Chronicle.
In her discourse, Prof Ramlah suggested that the non-Malays were selfish for objecting to economic handicaps the Umno government insists it has built up for the Malays in the New Economic Policy. However, many financial experts and oppositions leaders have refuted the Umno claim, pointing out that out of the RM54 billion in equity granted to the Malay community since 1957, only RM2 billion remained in their hands, with the bulk of the assets sold and the funds siphoned out by the Umno elite through over-priced and failed mega-projects.
“Malay supremacy is a slogan used by a small group of Malay elites who are cheating the Malays as a whole for their own interests. After 53 years in power, the Malays and bumiputera are still neglected. The 30 percent Malay-bumiputera equity has yet to be met. Of the RM54 billion equity and shares for bumiputera, only RM2 billion still belong to them,” PKR president Wan Azizah (pic, below) revealed in November.
Opposition Leader Anwar Ibrahim has also furnished evidence that 96 percent of the poor people in Malaysia were Malays despite the Umno claims that it was due to its pro-Malay policies that the community had prospered.
1Malaysia not to unify but to keep the races divided
Prof Ramlah also questioned why the MCA-controlled TAR College was still allowed to exist now that the government has allowed the establishment of University TAR or UTAR. She pointed out that when Malay college ITM became a university or UiTM, the college was dissolved.
Her ultra-Malay
stance substantiated arguments that 1 Malaysia was a political tool aimed to create a false sense of inclusiveness and power sharing in the Umno-dominated Barisan Nasional coalition. Only the packaging was new but the ultimate aim of 1Malaysia was still to ensure that Umno retained political power at all costs including in Najib's own words "crushed bodies", "lost lives" and "ethnic cleansing".
“We have always warned that 1Malaysia was a political slogan and a subversive one that we believed was designed by Zionist propaganda experts in APCO. 1 Malaysia says one thing to one race – it is multi-racial and inclusive when the audience is Chinese or Indian or Kadazan-Dusun-Murut. But when it talks to the Malays – then it becomes like Perkasa and Utusan and this is why after 2 years, 1 Malaysia is still not credible because people can see it is just a false front,” Gopeng MP Lee Boon Chye told Malaysia Chronicle.
“And the blame for pulling wool over the people’s eyes should not be limited to Umno, but extend to MCA, Gerakan and the other BN components. They are calling on the people to accept a slogan that pretends to be unifying but actually promotes Malay supremacy and religious bigotry. How can we ever close the racial divide in Malaysia or perhaps that is really the ultimate goal of Umno and APCO - to keep the races perpetually divided by promulgating Malay supremacy just like Pauline Hasnson's OneAustralia.”
Even at Christmas
Boon Chye may have hit bulls-eye. At a Christmas tea-party at Archbishop Murphy Pakiam's (pic) residence, Najib put up a show of religious pluralism by visiting a Chiristian celebration. However, news soon leaked that Church officials had been asked to remove all signs of Christian sysmbols such as crosses, crucifixes and stop performing any prayers during Najib’s visit.
Playing good guy in Utusan is a veteran but junior-ranking journalist, Hata Wahari. In his capacity as president of the National Union of Journalists, Hata has not hesitated to trash his own bosses. So far, he has escaped the sack despite several strident attacks against his daily's racist editorial stance.
“This is the classic example of mind games and subversive propaganda. Say one thing to one race and another to another race. Play bad guy and then play good guy. But what is the real truth?” PKR vice president Tian Chua told Malaysia Chronicle.
“Finding out is actually not difficult. Malaysians just need to ask themselves these questions. Is it possible for a Prime Minister not to be able to control his aides, like in the Christmas tea-party incident? Is it possible for an Umno president not to be able to rein in his top editors at Utusan when a lower-ranking journalist can slam them left and right? At the end of the day, what is clear is that 1 Malaysia has multi and conflicting messages. Does any one of us have any doubt that the underlying and main one will always be the Umno message of racial supremacy and religious bigotry for the purpose of political hegemony?"
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