Khairy VS Mukhriz Mahathir

LIKE it or not, Umno Youth deputy chief Khairy Jamaluddin will find himself back in the spotlight at next week’s general assembly.

Two years ago he was booed when he catapulted to the Youth’s number two post uncontested when no one – not even the very senior members in the movement – were willing to take on the son-in-law of the Umno president.

At last year’s assembly, he made an impressive turnaround.

A year of good, hard work with the grassroots won him their hearts and minds – and he was warmly applauded and cheered.

This year, Khairy is in an unenviable position.

The reason?

Tun Dr Mahathir Mohamad, who has come out with his guns pointing at the current leadership and administration, has put the 30-year-old Khairy in the line of fire.

The former Umno president and prime minister of 22 years had alleged that the famous son-in-law was all too powerful and influential, and even interfered with government business.

People with business proposals, he claimed, had to see Khairy to get approval – even though the Oxford graduate held no government position.

When questions were raised about ECM Libra’s acquisition of government-linked Avenue Capital Bhd, Khairy promptly sold his entire 10.2 million shares in ECM Libra for 65sen per share, suffering a loss of RM200,000 in so doing.

This, he said, was because he did not want the company’s reputation to be affected due to some quarters questioning the manner in which he bought the shares.

Khairy, married to Nori, the only daughter of Prime Minister Datuk Seri Abdullah Ahmad Badawi, was also the brunt of gossip.

At an Umno Youth division meeting three months ago, Khairy had to dispel rumours that he was involved with actress Maya Karin.

He also ran into a spot with the MCA Youth wing not too long ago over his comment that if Umno were weak, non-Malay political parties in the Barisan Nasional would take advantage, and make demands.

So while the affable Youth chief Datuk Seri Hishammuddin Tun Hussein will probably deliver – as always – a “safe” address without rocking the boat on Tuesday morning, it is Khairy’s winding-up speech at the end of the day that people will be waiting for.

Khairy is a polished speaker. The question is whether he will address the questions and attacks against him. Or will he ignore the criticisms and just move on?

This will depend largely on what the speakers say during the assembly.

While all Umno Youth divisions have pledged unwavering support to Abdullah as party leader, some have stood on opposite poles with regards to Dr Mahathir.

When Dr Mahathir renewed his attacks against Abdullah after their meeting before Hari Raya, a Youth chief from Terengganu called on the former president to quit Umno, and the Kepala Batas Youth chief called for him to be stripped of his posts as advisor to Proton and Petronas.

This riled the PJ Utara Youth chief enough for him to call for a press conference to defend Dr Mahathir – only to postpone it at the eleventh hour because the Umno supreme council was meeting that very day to discuss the matter.

Tension was somewhat defused when the supreme council decided that no action should be taken against Dr Mahathir. But emotions remain high.

Umno Youth has pledged not to gag their speakers – but told them they must maintain decorum.

“Differences in opinion are normal. It is to be expected. Speeches may be passionate but there should be no name-calling,” Abdul Rahman said.

“Criticisms can be made in a dignified manner. People can do it in all sorts of ways – through kias (metaphors), pantun, sajak, syair (forms of poetry), for example.”

Another famous son in the Youth exco, Mukhriz Mahathir, will also be closely watched at the assembly.

He has understandably jumped to the defence of his father a number of times. He has repeatedly said that the questions his father had asked were not being answered.

Tun Dr Mahathir Mohamad, who is being treated at the National Heart Institute (IJN), plans to take complete rest for several weeks, including staying away from the Umno General Assembly on Monday. "I Want to Rest after this." said Tun Dr M.

"I want to rest...not making any statement...hope the (Umno) assembly runs smoothly," he said in an interview with Bernama and Radio Television Malaysia (RTM) Saturday, two days after being admitted to the IJN after complaining of chest pain at home.

With Dr Mahathir still recovering in hospital after a mild heart attack, speakers might go slow on bashing the former leader. But will they go easy on Khairy?

MCA welcomes PM's views on meritocracy system in higher education

VS

Johor Umno Tables Motion To Reject Meritocracy At Assembly.

The MCA welcomed the Prime Minister's view that the Government's meritocracy system in higher education and the use of English to teach mathematics and science should continue.

Its president Datuk Seri Ong Ka Ting said both were good systems as they have been beneficial to the community.

"I feel that the meritocracy system should stay as it has already proven itself to be workable," he said during the Ipoh Barat MCA division's 57th anniversary dinner here on Friday night.

Meanwhile, The Johor Umno will table a motion to reject the use of meritocracy and teaching of Mathematics and Science in English in the debate on the motion of thanks on the President's speech at the party's general assembly next week.

The Johor Umno, at its convention last Sunday and Monday, passed a resolution to reject the meritocracy system used in public institutions of higher learning because it did not benefit Malay students.

It also opposed the use of English in the teaching of Mathematics and Science on grounds that the system resulted in the gap in examination performance of urban and rural schools.

The spirit of Barisan National ??


Rocky Bru wrote : WE ARE NOT MORE CORRUPT NOW...
We are only perceived to be more corrupt, that's all.


Dollah Badawi has questioned Transparency International's latest corruption index and said here that "we do not need other people to tell us of the situation in our own country".

"We can assume that since the index is based on perception, it therefore differs from reality." - Abdullah Badawi (NST, "PM: Speed up graft trials")

The 2006 index, released early this week, saw Malaysia slipped five big rungs to 44th position. Just World president Dr Chandra Muzaffar has blamed Dollah, who vowed to combat corruption three years ago, for refusing to compel politicians and their families, including his own son whose companies seem to be doing extremely well since he became the PM, to declare their assets.

The PM blamed the poorer index on the slowness of the courts in trying corruption cases and, believe it or not, the "freer" Press. According to the same NST report, Dollah said "it was possible that others perceived corruption had not decreased due to the greater openness in the media which has been actively reporting corruption cases".

Dollah did not seem to have a problem with the country's better position on the UNDP's human development index, though.
(Source : Rocky Bru blog )

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There Can Only Be A "Pivotal" Malaysian Nation
( Written by Farish A. Noor )

With the UMNO General Assembly just around the corner, it is clear that the race for leverage and pole position within the party has already begun. UMNO being what it is – an ethno-nationalist party with a political agenda based primarily on a race-based form of communitarian politics – it would hardly be a surprise to us by now if some of the more vocal leaders of the party were to play to the gallery yet again. We have already been treated to the sordid spectacle of UMNO leaders reaching for the keris and brandishing it in public for the sake of making a statement. Likewise we have been reminded of where UMNO’s true loyalties lie by the proclamations uttered by some of its leaders on thorny issues such as the New Economic Policy (NEP), the privileged status of the Malays and the place of Malay identity in the constellation of Malaysian politics.

Now, yet again, we have been reminded of the inherent sectarianism and parochialism of the party thanks to the statements uttered by some of its leaders, notably Datuk Abdul Ghani Othman, chief of UMNO Johor. While delivering his policy speech in the state of Johor recently, Datuk Ghani bluntly stated that there should be less talk of ‘bangsa Malaysia’ (the Malaysian nation) as such talk would only lead to confusion and political uncertainty. He insisted that the concept of an abstract Malaysian nation would merely lead to a ‘mish-mashing’ of the different racial identities and groupings in Malaysia, and that there was no justification for some parties to call for the creation of a Malaysian nation in the first place. Datuk Ghani’s qualifying remark was one that seemed to sum up the mind-set of many an UMNO leader today: “Even if the term bangsa Malaysia were to be used” he argued, “it must only be applied in the context of all the peoples of Malaysia, and with the Malays as the pivotal race”.

Accompanying this remark was a train of essentialised notions about the traits and characteristics of the Malay people, as well as ‘the Malay way’ of doing things; which may presumably include not questioning the status of the Malays as the ‘pivotal race’ of Malaysia.

At a time when the nation should be thinking of new ways of re-imagining itself and its place in the world, it is sad – nay, pathetic – that such narrow-mindedness should prevail among some of its political elite. While the younger generation of New Malaysians are looking for ways and means to bridge the divisions of race, ethnicity, language and religion, the old guard are still harping on about the good old days and the good old ways when this land was referred to as ‘Tanah Melayu’ (Land of the Malays). So once again we are brought back to the homespun colonial fictions of the not-too-pleasant colonial past.

It is ironic, to say the least, that the very same party that claims the right to wear the mantle of anti-colonialism would be the first to reiterate the manifold contradictions of colonial historiography and colonial anthropology and ethnology. Part and parcel of the British colonial enterprise in Malaya (then later, Malaysia) was the systematic re-writing of its history to privilege one ethnic-racial group over others. By the mid-20th century when it became patently obvious to all that the colonial enterprise was about to reach its agonizing climax, Britain (like the other European colonial powers of the time) sought an effective exit strategy from its colonies east of Suez; and in the Malaysian case came up with the blueprint for what would eventually be known as the inter-racial elite compromise between the elites of the various ethnic-racial communities.

Yet was it ever the case that there was such a thing as a ‘Malay’ race per se, understood in purely essentialist terms? If one were to revisit the colonial census of the 19th century, it is clear that the very idea of ‘Malayness’ was not only vague (a ‘mish-mash, as Datuk Ghani might put it) but also far from essentialised.

It is clear, both from the colonial census and the historical records of the many community-based associations that sprung up during that period that the people of Malaya did not see themselves as fixed ethnic blocs or racial groups. In fact up to the early 20th century the category of ‘Malay’ was just one sub-category in a wider group of ethnic identities. Alongside those who called themselves ‘Malay’ were other groups summarily labelled as Javanese, Bugis, Makasarese, Sumatrans (ranked as Minangs, Acehnese, Lampungs, and others), Jawi Peranakans, Arab Peranakans, Indian Peranakans, Chinese Peranakans, and so on. Nowhere was the concept of Malayness presented as a given, static, essentialised fact. If anything, territorial loyalties were paramount and the people of the land referred to themselves as ‘Johorese’, ‘Kelantanese’, ‘Kedahans’ first and foremost. One might add here that the categories of ‘Chinese’ and ‘Indian’ were likewise nowhere as simplified, as the communities that would eventually be grouped under these general headings were then defined as Hokiens, Cantonese, Hakka, etc; and Punjabis, Bengalis, Tamils, Ceylonese, etc.

It was with the passage of time and the development of the colonial state that the various communities were lumped together into neat and homogenous blocs, conflating differences and reducing the communities to essentialised categories like ‘Malay’, ‘Chinese’ and ‘Indian’. Seen from this critical perspective, the invention of the ‘Malay race’ was in fact a by-product of Western colonialism and imperialism in Malaysia!

Yet since 1957 this nation of ours has laboured under the oppressive fiction that there exists such a thing as a homogenous, fixed and essentialised ‘Malay race’, which can only be defined artificially via the legal instrument of a constitutional definition.

It is upon such instrumental fictions that the Malayan (and later Malaysian) nation-state as built, though it has to be remembered that once this elaborate political fiction is placed in a broader historical context the Malaysian political experiment is seen as a relatively short episode. For centuries the peoples who have lived in this land have seen themselves as mixed, each being a multifarious nation and an assembly of ‘races’ on his/her own. A cursory reading of the complex biographies of the ‘great Malaysians’ of the past (before the very idea of Malaya/Malaysia was even mooted) would show that most of them recognised, and even valorised, their hybrid identities. Consider the biography of Munshi Abdullah for instance, regarded as the father of the Modern vernacular Malay novel, who was of mixed Peranakan heritage himself. Likewise the same could be said of men like Syed Sheikh al-Hadi, Sheikh Tahir Jalaluddin, Ibrahim Yaakob and others: All of them were of mixed parentage and all of them were and remain true Malaysians.

Yet today when the fundamental contradictions of racialised capitalism in Malaysia are coming to the surface and when it has become clear that the fiction of racial difference can no longer be sustained, it is precisely the most sectarian, conservative communitarians in our midst who clamour for a return to the politics of racial difference and ethnic compartmentalism, solely for the sake of preserving the status quo.

How long can this fragile balance be maintained before the very socio-cultural fabric of Malaysia rips itself asunder? Faced with the realities of a globalising world where parochialism of any form – be it religious or ethnic-racial – would be detrimental to the health and future of a nation-in-making, the falsehood that is at the heart of Malaysia’s racialised political culture has to be exposed for what it is.

Ethno-nationalist politicians will undoubtedly find it hard to change their spots and stop themselves from playing to the gallery. The clarion call of ‘the Malays in danger’ rings sweet in the ears of those conservative ethno-nationalists for whom the keris is a potent symbol of power and hegemony. But Malaysian society today is more complex, plural and hybrid than ever; and it is the complexity of Malaysia that may well save it in the long run, opening up cultural and historical bridges to other countries (not to mention the rising Asian economies of India and China) in turn.

Those who call for the protection of the Malays as the ‘pivotal race’ of Malaysia fail to note these political realities and the historical subtleties that render such ideological over-simplification useless and futile. Yet in the weeks and months to come, as Malaysia heads slowly towards a political crisis that seems to be on the cards for all, it is imperative that we remind ourselves that the only thing that can still keep this country together is the abstract idea of a universal Malaysian citizenship, premised on the belief and conviction that there is, and has always been, a complex and hybrid Malaysian nation after all: despite what the history books and keris-wielding politicians may tell you.

(Source : The Other Malaysia )


Malaysia Abdullah Ahmad Badawi Tun Mahathir Anwar Asia Khairy