Malaysia was never truly a democratic country. The election process in the country is far from democratic. In a more authentic democracy, a registered citizen is entitled a ballot paper with which he or she can cast his or her vote to elect a representative to speak on his or her behalf in Parliament
In Malaysia, the semblance is there, where people do go out to the polling stations and cast their votes. But that is as far as it goes. The people seem to have no further say. The rest is dictated by the ruling UMNO-BN coalition and this has been going on for 54 years.
While most democracies in the world go through change of government on a regular basis - Japan for instance has had a change in Prime Minister every 2 years, Malaysia has practically stuck with the same government since Independence.
Malaysia belongs to Malaysians, not UMNO-BN
It has been argued that a stable government is crucial for a progressive nation yet, stability does not necessarily mean the same government every other election. And this is the main problem in Malaysia. The same government has been in rule for 54 years which has led to the formation of a totalitarian rule.
Every main-stream newspaper in Malaysia is under pressure to conform to the GOM’s standards due to the yearly need to renew their printing licenses. Utusan Malaysia is UMNO-owned, The Star is MCA's, TV3 and almost every other 'private' television station is owned by a pro-UMNO outfit. RTM is directly under the government, while Bernama is under the Information Ministry. Even cable network, ASTRO is owned by Ananda Krishnan, a close friend of former premier Mahathir Mohamad.
The Judiciary, Malaysian Anti-Corruption Commission and the police answer to the Prime Minister. To further compound matters, the Prime Minister is also the 1st Finance Minister and has direct say over the management of the nation's coffers.
And to keep all this in place, the Election Commission works for the ruling government thus ensuring that the democratic process is skewed to keep the UMNO-BN elite in power.
And all this will come into play to ensure Najib Razak obtains his mandate to lead come the 13th General Election. This is what it is all about, Najib Razak has no democratic mandate to lead Malaysia as Prime Minister. He is a care-taker Prime Minister who only assumed the role after ousting Abdullah Badawi in 2009.
There are no direct elections for the people to choose their Prime Minister - not in Malaysia. The Prime Minister is always the head of the main-holder in the BN coalition - UMNO. Thus, what ever model Malaysia is built on, it is one totally controlled by UMNO with mere head-nodding by the other partners in the coalition.
Politcal hegemony and totalitarian rule
This totalitarian rule has kept all things under UMNO’s thumb for 5 decades years and anything that crops up that attempts to rock the boat will quickly be suppressed.
It is in this context that Bersih is such a danger to the UMNO elite. It is not a Pakatan plot as painted by parties aligned to UMNO. Instead, it is the voice of the people rising up to state their minds.
This liberation to speak up goes against the very foundations to a totalitarian government. Control is no longer in the hands of the government but now rests in the minds of the citizens. Citizens should never question their rulers, and rulers know best how citizens should live, think and conform to. And Bersih goes against all this.
Bersih opens up unimaginable possibilities for the citizens to express themselves and their wishes. It empowers like-minded individuals to think for themselves. If change is needed, then change will be initiated by the citizens. And once citizens make the connection from thinking to action, UMNO-BN is in trouble.
Once they are used to the freedom of thinking for themselves, citizens will vote for it this is the threat to the UMNO elite.
The UMNO elite sees Bersih as a vehicle that would galvanise and empower the citizens of Malaysia into think and thinking is a bad thing in a totalitarian government. Thus, Bersih needs to be put down and put out and it is no wonder that UMNO-BN has to cook up one excuse after another to justify why Bersih must be stopped.
There is no threat from Bersih to national security, in fact there is no threat at all - period. UMNO-BN knows this, it is evident when none of their apparatus can get their story straight on why Bersih is a threat to national security.
The Police hatches a story about a Communist revival, Perkasa is now yelling that it is Pakatan behind the march, Utusan Malaysia now blames foreign agencies for funding the July 9 march and once again tries to turn it into a Christian conspiracy.
But none of their reasons are true. Instead the real threat of Bersih is that it allows the citizens of Malaysia the opportunity to finally think for themselves what, how and who they should elect to represent them in Parliament. And this is taboo to the UMNO elite.
"You may chain my hands and shackle my feet, but you shall not enslave my thinking,
because it is free." - Khalil Gibran
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