BATU PAHAT, Sept 22 – Datuk Zaid Ibrahim has told Pakatan Rakyat lawmakers to show political maturity and shake off fears of being unpopular by supporting the Barisan Nasional government’s policies if they were beneficial to the people.The former Umno minister also urged Prime Minister Datuk Seri Najib Razak to take a firm stand on sensitive issues that touch on race and religion, even if his deputy, Tan Sri Muhyiddin Yassin, was against it.
This, he claimed, were the main ingredients needed if the country wanted to break free from divisive and race-based politics to achieve national unity.
In a summary of his speech on national unity delivered at a function in Batu Pahat tonight, Zaid (picture) stressed that leaders from both sides of the political divide needed to stop their petty bickering and show some political maturity by standing together on longstanding issues that needed to be resolved.
“A show of unity would send the right signal that elected representatives are the ones who decide on policies for the rakyat and not some theologian or bureaucrat.
“I believe the opposition must support the government when it is good for the people,” he said.
Zaid, who is now the Pakatan Rakyat coordinator and a contender in the PKR deputy presidency race, also said that bipartisan support in Parliament should be encouraged as it was a reflection of a mature democracy.
“This is especially when the government needs help in dealing with certain difficult issues,” he said.
He expressed disappointment that PR lawmakers had kept silent when the Najib Administration wanted to present three bills in Parliament to resolve sensitive, outstanding issues – the Law Reform (Marriage and Divorce) Act 1976, the Administration of Islamic Law Act 1993, and the Islamic Family Law Act 1984 – in early July last year.
The bills were aimed at clearing up some of the ambiguities in the country’s legal system pertaining to jurisdiction issues surrounding the Syariah law and common law, which have oftentimes caused much difficulties to families engaged in divorce matters, religious conversions or custody battles.
“Unfortunately of course, the Rulers Conference deemed it fit to review the bills themselves first and hence, the effort of the new Prime Minister was stopped and we have heard nothing since then.
“But still... PR parliamentarians had not taken the opportunity at the time to support the BN and the new PM to resolve these issues,” he lamented.
Zaid added that it was easy to talk about the intention to unite the nation and to come up with a to-do list on how to achieve it but finding a strong enough political resolve to do so was difficult.
“And this is where PR and BN must show some political maturity. It will be a test for [Prime Minister Datuk Seri] Najib [Razak] on the one hand and PR leaders on the other, on their commitment to national unity and political stability.
“The nation awaits to see an effective and responsible leadership to guide them through an uncertain future. This is the real challenge to all present political leaders,” he said.
Zaid claimed that former prime minister Tun Dr Mahathir Mohamad’s model of politics - to reign by securing and maintaining power at all costs – is contrary to the reconciliatory politics needed for nation-building.
“Najib’s new formula is 1 Malaysia. Will it work?” he asked.
Najib, he added, needed to take a firm stand when handling difficult issues pertaining to the racial diversity of the nation.
“The long walk that will really test the mettle and sincerity of our leaders is the handling and managing of difficult issues. Matters like the special position of the Malays under Article 153 of the Constitution, the position of Islam under Article 3, the equality of all citizens and religious freedom... these are issues that need to be clarified with honesty.
“A firm stand must be taken by Najib, even if his deputy (Tan Sri Muhyiddin Yassin) is against it. No pussy footing, no fudging to please only certain groups.
“Only a clear articulation of the government’s stand on these issues will coalesce into national building blocks of trust necessary for unity,” he said.
It has often been speculated that there was no love lost between Najib and his deputy Muhyiddin, who has been accused by the opposition as being a hindrance to the Prime Minister’s 1 Malaysia goals.
Although both men have denied a friction in their relationship, Muhyiddin’s controversial assertion once that he was a “Malay first and Malaysian second” has continued to stigmatise the BN administration as being fractured and falling apart.
Zaid also bleakly pointed out that Malaysia had only regressed over the past few years, claiming that the country could now hardly be called a “united nation”.
“Unity has deserted us. We need only to open the newspaper to see how one race is being pitted against another, or religious issues that are being played up so openly to antagonise or demean one group against one another.
“Teachers have become purveyors of sick ideologies. We need only to go on the internet to be bombarded with blog postings or video clips that scream bigotry and intolerance,” he said.
In recent days, the country was hit by a slew of racially-charged issues, further fuelled by bickering between political leaders in the BN leadership.
Among the issues were the racial slurs uttered by two school principals, one in Johor and another in Kedah, who had allegedly insulted their non-Malay students in front of their schoolmates.
While the opposition and many leaders in MCA and MIC spoke out to condemn both principals however, the BN government was seen as acting too slowly in resolving the issue.
Najib in fact, was criticised for remaining “elegantly silent” in the matter.
What was most disappointing, Zaid pointed out tonight, was how political leaders continued to stay non-commital, refusing to acknowledge the severity and the impact of such open displays of intolerance.
“Our leaders have stayed totally impotent in the face of such an onslaught. In fact now, the divisive politics of the BN are detrimental to the long-term goals of the nation. It is also detrimental to BN’s own wellbeing,” he said
Last week a television channel carried out a sting on Indian Godmen, which established what some people had always suspected, that owning an alleged hotline to God comes along with certain material benefits on the side. The bearded visages were not only serene with self-realisation but also shining with canny worldliness as they spoke expertly of power projects, tax dodges and money laundering. A few week ago, the cricketing world was rocked when we finally saw evidence of what we had suspected all along- that fixing was an integral part of the sport. The sting as a method of uncovering truth has gained enormously in currency in the last few years and has served to convert into pictures what were doubts in our mind and in doing so, has provided a new way of bringing dishonesty to book.Santosh Desai
20 September 2010, 12:20 PM IST
Or has it? In a majority of cases, when we look back on some of the most sensational stings, we see little evidence that they had any significant long term impact. The political skulduggery by way of horse trading and fund collection has not changed even slightly in spite of more than the Tehelka sting that revealed politicians in their true colours. Corruption by public officials continues unabated and even Shakti Kapoor is back into making films (sort of). Even in the case of the Godmen, this is hardly the first sting of its kind, and it is unlikely that this will have too much long term impact.
Arguably, what these doses of shock-truth are doing is to gradually make us accustomed to the venality that lies under the appearance of normalcy. By seeing concrete evidence of the worst case scenarios we carried inside our heads as possibilities, we are converting our view of the world into a more cynical one, where our worst fears are increasingly likely to come true. Given that in most cases, there is little that we can do to set things right, knowledge of what is wrong becomes a source of entertainment rather than a trigger for meaningful action. The truth gets trivialised and is used for titillation, rather than as basis for meaningful change. Systemic dishonesty does not get dismantled just because we become aware of it- there are many highly visible acts of corruption in India that all of us see in our lives everyday ( just go the nearest RTO or District Court) that are not even slightly affected by our knowledge of their existence.
The movement towards transparency-as-consumer-product is part of a much larger trend than the device of stings alone. The democratisation of the cameras has spawned a million eyes that can record events wherever they might happen. Nothing is guaranteed to be safe from the prying eyes of this device and technology is making these gadgets more and more unobtrusive. In any case, in the surveillance society we are moving towards, we are under the watchful gaze of each other in some form and manner, all the time. The internet makes everyone an acquaintance of everybody else either deliberately or otherwise and with youtube, not only are our gaffes not ignored, they can be viewed again and again by millions and commented upon by all and sundry. The reality show too derives its popularity from its ability to extract the truth from its participants as they are made to give concrete form to what would otherwise have been thought bubbles in their head. In virtually every show of this knd, participants are made to reveal what they really feel about each other. Shows like Sach Ka Samna in particular work to confirm that we carry a jungle of socially inappropriate ideas in our head and often act accordingly.
So are we moving towards a more honest world by shedding our many hypocrisies? Isn't it better to know the truth than to dread it? Or will such a sustained onslaught of truth make us immune to it? Does the awareness of our moral fallibility in some way serve to legitimise it? Already there are many actions that a few years ago would have been seen to be inappropriate that are now commonly accepted as part of our legitimate behaviour. Promoting oneself too visibly, for instance , would have been socially unacceptable behaviour that would attract widespread comment. Today, it is a full-fledged industry. The mixing of business and sport is another arena where sustained interaction has created a new legitimacy for the commercialisation of sport and the 'owning' of sportspersons by business tycoons.
Perhaps we need to retain some of our illusions about the better side of human beings. Society depends on the appearance of moral order rather than its actual practice. Honesty is useful in homeopathic doses for then we consume its intention rather than its reality.The more we become aware of the fact that no cow is holy and that all feet have a bit of clay in them, the easier it is to accept the dismantling of any standard of behaviour. When we start evaluating actions primarily on the basis of their effectiveness rather than their appropriateness, we create a culture of pragmatism that is assertive as well as bottomless. The opposite of dishonesty is in all probability, not honesty but brazenness. Hypocrisy bridges the gap between who we should be and what we are . The need for pretences is our saving grace for in doing that we acknowledge the moral standard to which we are all held. Of course, this is arbitrary, and even dishonest, in that it turns a blind eye to our many failings, but it keeps the necessity of honesty alive.
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