NST Editorial: Cleaning up Umno
THE expressions of displeasure, charges of selective prosecution and insinuations of hatchet jobs over the disciplinary board's decisions on Tuesday show how complex and combustible the task of lancing the boil of endemic vote-buying in Umno is going to be.
To suggest the possibility that some of the principal actors in the drama have been sacrificed on the altar of political expediency may be seen as casting aspersions on the board's motives. Nevertheless, there is little point in pretending that this thought has not crossed people's minds. However, since the board seems to have grounds to believe that their "agents" have acted improperly, its decisions must be supported. Given that unethical practices involve the tacit, if not explicit, support of a cast of others, if there is to be blame, then it should certainly be shared. Moreover, if Umno wants to be seen as a clean party, as its future president says it must, it is in the best interests of the party as a whole that the highest standards of probity be seen to apply.
The first steps on the road to redemption are always the steepest, and there is the risk that all that dirt and filth from the clean-up could sink the party's standing even lower in the public eye. There is also the double jeopardy of the personal cost to those who have been tainted and the risk of deepening the party's internal fissures. But these are risks that have to be taken, because the bigger risk for the party is rejection by the people, as Datuk Seri Najib Razak has observed. It is in light of this honest and realistic assessment that his appeal to make sacrifices and to clean up the party must be noted. It is no longer a matter of restoring personal honour but of rebuilding public trust in the party. It may not be something that those who believe in their own innocence, and those who have doubts that those who have been investigated and punished have done anything wrong, may want to hear. Nevertheless, it is something that they need to hear, lest they have forgotten that all power ultimately come from the people, not just from party delegates.
Umno has no choice but to make the strategic decision to take strong and decisive remedial action on its own. Otherwise, the hope of rebuilding its credibility will be forlorn. Failure to match the rhetorical promises with appropriate action would only invite the public to prescribe even more bitter pills at the next polls.
