Deceit of Malaysian Secularism

It always amazes me that when the establishment wants to inspire the common people of Malaysia they always invoke God and the Agong. 

By batsman

 

This is true of the National Anthem and it is true of the Rukun Negara. The reality of power however is greatly different. Our constitutional democracy is based squarely on secular principles. When the British helped us frame our constitutional institutions and structure, there was no consideration at all for the religious concerns and traditions of our people apart from some declarations and some largely ceremonial legislation. Instead, secularism was imposed and religions were shunted aside, even suppressed and kept obediently in place. They have copied the social mores and values of an advanced western civilization and imposed them on us – a struggling 3rd world country still valuing its spirituality. 

It would seem that this is for our own good. Unfortunately, we are not to know about it. Instead, we are inspired by invoking God and the Agong in our songs and in the oaths we pledge regularly when we are school children and continuing this regime as adults under BTN training. This is how the secularists treat common Malaysians – exercising (and frequently abusing) power while hiding behind God and the Agong. 

It would seem that this is standard operating practice when exercising political power in Malaysia. Take for example the squandering and theft of billions of Ringgit Malaysia in MAS. We are told that MAS corporate management is a model new Malay corporate leadership. The vision of skill and competency is invoked. Some may even say that the vision of a superhero Malay corporate leadership was sold to the common people of Malaysia while billions of Ringgit Malaysia was squandered and stolen behind the scenes. 

Closely related to this is the invoking of the concept of Ketuanan Melayu to inspire the common Malay man in the street. Malays are told they are the masters and to be masters, they must throw their support blindly behind UMNO. Only then can they continue to be masters. However, behind the scenes billions of Ringgit Malaysia is squandered and stolen from the Bank Rakyat scandal to the Bank Bumiputra scandal and from thousands upon thousands of crony contracts and APs. 

As if these were not enough, weaved in between we have the Cooperatives scandal, the Perwaja scandal, the Scorpene scandal, the MIG scandal, the OPV scandal, the MRR2 scandal, the PKFZ scandal, oil royalties scandal, the upcoming Ipoh-Rawang double track scandal, etc. While the land rights of the Malays are invoked in Malay reservation land, a whole swathe of land in south Johore is sold away to foreigners. 

When it became convenient for the secularists in UMNO to take away the powers of the Malay Rulers, they did so by blackening the name of the Malay Rulers using their control of the media. However, when it suited the secularists of UMNO to use and hide behind the name and prestige of the Malay rulers, they charged people indiscriminately with sedition and betrayal. 

In the meantime, Hadhari is invoked in the minds of the common Malay man in the street that if they continue to blindly support UMNO’s version of Islam, they can all be civilized and progressive and well off. 

I submit that this is all the machinations of deceitful secularists toying with and manipulating the spirituality of Malaysians. By invoking Ketuanan Melayu, God and the Agong, they try to become more powerful than all 3 put together. All dissent is suppressed and all who complain have the fear of the secular police beaten into them. 

This is the result of our spirituality, our morals and our ethics being compromised when we accepted and adopted a foreign and artificial secular system when our country was born. What was natural to us and part of our being was thrown out in favour of a system that suited the west more but which was artificial and foreign to us. 

Now that it has been part of our lives for the past 50 odd years, corruption and sin is also a very large part and parcel of our lives. In the meantime, the race bogey is invoked to scare ordinary Malaysians and the threat of another May 13 constantly repeated. This is not the work of honest men of some spirituality. This is the work of deceitful secularists who have lost their spirituality. 

These secularists know very well that our constitution is firmly anchored on secular foundations, yet they continue to insist that our country is an Islamic country. This has fooled quite a few dumb persons to come to the defense of the hidden secularity of UMNO and caused quite some confusion. But this confusion is exactly what they want since it allows them to exercise a monopoly of power behind the scenes and using this monopoly of power, steal from the country at will while the people become divided and quarrelling amongst each other. 

So far, quite a few persons have railed and complained about the disaster such a state of affairs will lead the country. Not much thought has been expended on what to do about it besides trying to achieve a healthy 2 party system with effective checks and balances. 

In a way, we are like farmers who have become dependent on artificial pesticides and fertilizers to grow our crops. If we give up these poisons, we risk suffering a collapse of our livelihood, yet we are slowly but surely being poisoned if we continue to use artificial pesticides and fertilizers. Not a good situation to be in. 

I guess the best we can do is to slowly find effective natural alternatives and slowly use them in place of the artificial poisons. 

In our political and social life, we can do the same. We need to re-discover what is natural and effective for our society. We need to recover our spirituality, our honesty and our decency and one of the ways we can do this is to appoint captains of religion to our Senate instead of the usual bunch of useless secularists. 

With spirituality in our Senate, we are saying that we wish to give primacy to our spirituality and that we want corruption and sin to be expunged from our political lives. 

What then should we do about corruption and sin in our social and economic lives? I guess that requires more expenditure of thought and may be suggested for discussion in chapters 2 and 3 to come. 

This does not mean that our social and economic lives are to be neglected. It means that without political power, any improvements we try in our social and economic lives will be fighting against the tide especially so when there are corrupt and greedy men with monopoly of power sabotaging our efforts and stealing from us as well as from future generations.