Is the MCA relevant?

MCA vice-president Datuk Donald Lim Siang Chai has proposed that a Chinese version of Perkasa be organized to counter the Malay right-wing group’s alleged racial assaults against the Chinese.

Lim has even indicated that the Kuala Lumpur-Selangor Chinese Assembly Hall should play such a street-fighting role.

In response, Perkasa leader Ibrahim Ali has labelled Lim “a dangerous man” for allegedly promoting racial tension.

It is simply hilarious to see the two attacking each other as being racists! The blithe of the pot calling the kettle black is surely entertaining.

Lim has argued that it is not proper for the MCA to take the role of challenging Perkasa as it is a political party and such a function is best left to an NGO to deal with. What illogical nonsense is this?

With such people in the top leadership of the MCA, it is almost certain that the days of the party are numbered.

The so-called reform and revamp of the MCA to redeem its role as the representative of the Chinese community in the ruling Barisan Nasional coalition are obviously not happening.

Any party with a morally soiled leader at the top, accompanied by other foolish leaders with weird and bizarre ideas like the proposal to set up a Perkasa-type Chinese group, and the endorsement of legalized gambling, has lost its reverence and relevance in the nation-building process of our country.

If a party purportedly representing the Chinese community survives only on the support and goodwill of the non-Chinese vote, then it has become insignificant, inefficacious, and ineffectual to the community, in fact, irrelevant.

Ibrahim Ali has the impudence to warn Lim that the MCA can forget about enjoying the Malay votes if it continues its current leadership style. Such an impertinence and effrontery to the party are surely the result of its own combination of brazenness, arrogance and stupidity.

Donald Lim’s blunt reaction to Ibrahim Ali and Perkasa is typical of the unthinking obtuse knee-jerk response that puts the party in a fatuous and witless position in the eyes of the people, especially the educated middle-class people in the urban areas. It is the inbecile party cretins that put the MCA in such an embarassing position.

The MCA cannot claim credit for the liberalization of several previously ethnic-centric policies, such as the blanket awarding of scholarships to all students who had obtained nine or more As in the SPM examination.

Anyone with a bit of wisdom and intelligence will know that such a concession is basically caused by the success of the opposition parties, especially the DAP, which have gain substantial support from the urban, mostly Chinese, voters.

It is not that the MCA fought and won these concessions for the Chinese, but simply because of the increasing fear of the Barisan Nasional leadership that without making such a compromise, the opposition Pakatan Rakyat’s target of taking over control of Putrajaya after the next general election will be a reality.

Currently, the MCA is merely an appendage to Umno, and its survival, as Ibrahim Ali pointed out, is dependent upon the support of the Malay voters. The party claims to have a million plus members. If this is so, than even its own members had voted against it at the previous general elections. Some in-depth studies on the number of votes the MCA obtained from the Chinese-majority constituencies will confirm this.

Prime Minister Datuk Seri Najib Razak is apparently worried that the MCA would not be able to deliver the Chinese votes to the Barisan Nasional at the next general election, a very important one for him personally as he needs a massive electoral mandate to consolidate his power base in his own party and in the Barisan Nasional coalition.

Hence, Najib is making more frequent visits to the ground, particularly the urban non-Malay areas, and announcing various acceptable and agreeable people-centric policies, programmes and projects to neutralize the possible issues the opposition may raise at the next general election.

The withdrawal of the sport-gambling licence, the blanket approval of scholarships, the compromise on the permits for controlled items, the hold on the goods and service tax (GST), the granting of financial aid to vernacular schools and religious institutions, to name the major ones, are geared towards appeasing the people, a positive attempt at winning their hearts and minds.

Can the MCA honestly say that it is its efforts that such concessions are won for the people? No one outside of the MCA leadership believe that the party has the capability, and the credibility, to fight or bargain for such concessions for the people.

It is obviously the fear of a powerful alternative coalition that can possibly oust the ruling Barisan Nasional, especially Umno, from power that the Barisan Nasional has no choice but to placate the people.

The MCA, if it continues with its current style of leadership, practising nepotism and cronyism, is a liability to the Barisan Nasional and will cause more erosion of the Chinese support.

Moreover, the quality of the party leadership is certainly questionable, with dubious sort of persons talking nonsense and making a fool of themselves and the party.

The precarious situation the MCA is in now is certainly pitiable, given the fact that it was once a great and powerful representative of the Chinese community in the government with leaders such as Tun Tan Cheng Lok, Tun H.S. Lee and Tun Omar Ong Yoke Lin, leaders who have sparkling credentials, absolutely impeccable moral, and irreproachable reputation.

Is the MCA relevant today?