Mix and match: An amalgamation
(Malaysian Mirror) Isn’t it a shame that some leaders have to be ‘told’ to ‘attend activities organised by other races’. Many will be asking whether after 53 years of independence, we are more fragmented than before.
AT the recent Barisan Nasional retreat at Janda Baik in Pahang, the Sungei Besar Umno chief, Dr Mohd Khir Toyo, claimed that Prime Minister Najib Abdul Razak ordered all Umno leaders to attend activities organised by races other than their own. The aim was purportedly to win support for the coalition, principally from the Chinese community and also to prevent leaders from being confined along racial lines but to allow mixing and matching.
Unfortunately, this directive has given the impression that thus far, few of the leaders have practised positive integration. Many will be asking whether after 53 years of independence, we are more fragmented than before.
Others will be appalled to know that leaders have to be ‘told’ to ‘attend activities organised by other races’. This surely is a sad indictment that past policies have failed to achieve what they set out to do – the interaction of the various races that make up multicultural Malaysia.
Perhaps it is also time to ask: are the Umno leaders unable to think and act on their own, to reach out to other members of the community who aren’t Malay? Can they be so helpless?
Read more at: http://www.malaysianmirror.com/the-mirror-says-detail/18-the-mirror-says/39591-mix-and-match-an-amalgamation-
