Inner – Party Power Struggles

By batsman 

In order to strengthen opposition parties against saboteurs, provocateurs and dirty trick campaigns, I hope the following discussion will help. Many are confused with the mess in PKR and the mess that threatens to envelop the DAP in Selangor and Perak. The DAP being an older and more experienced party will probably already have more tried and tested members who can understand what I am going to say, but with the influx of new members since the tsunami of 2008 the political polio virus that has been viciously injected into the ranks of the PR will still find victims who have no immunity yet.

Confusion reigns because people have difficulty handling not only ethics which is multi-layered and multi-dimensional but also loyalty which has the same confusing characteristics. In a sense, by going through the tests and trials of politics, one becomes more matured and stronger because one is better able to handle complex issues such as ethics. justice and loyalty. Of course going through one of RPK’s aptitude tests also helps. 

Loyalty has many layers and dimensions such as loyalty to spouse, loyalty to family, loyalty to community, race, religion and country, etc. and within each of these may be found more layers and dimensions. Being obsessed with just one tends towards single dimensionality and hence fanaticism, but being weighed down by too many leads to indecision and inaction. 

Hence for our purpose, the discussion has to be limited to just loyalties to self, friends, party and ideals. In real life, one has to go through the pain of self-examination as well as examination of the motives, loyalties, actions and words of others in much more labourious and disciplined manner. By being just aware of these things already makes one more self-aware and self-assured therefore gaining some form of maturity and immunity against dirty tricks. 

One must start with loyalty to one’s ideals. If such ideals are endangered by corruption and suppression, one has to seek the best party which matches these ideals such that these ideals may be protected by common united action of the many with like mind and ideals. Such a party then becomes the avenue for expression and activation of one’s ideals. 

Since one has to act in concert with others, some loyalty is due to friends as well. Finally there is the loyalty towards self. 

Within a party, all these loyalties have to be well-balanced and well-matched. Unevenness creates problems within the party. For example if one to too obsessed with self, then loyalty to ideals, friends and party suffers. This is usually not acceptable to those around the guilty party. 

In the extreme cases selfish individuals with no potential within the party turn into frogs while selfish individuals with great potential within the party may turn into dictators. Selfish individuals with middling potential within the party may be turned into saboteurs and spies against their own party by subversion. 

On the other hand, if one is obsessed with loyalty to the party, there is a danger of fanaticism, abuse and injustice being committed. Worse still if one is obsessed with self and ideals, the party turns into an instrument to advance one’s megalomania as we have already seen in some famous politicians. 

Obsessive loyalty to friends tends to lead to cliques and gangs (often secret) being formed within the party. Secret cliques tend to cause the top leadership sleepless nights since their loyalty cannot be determined with any certainty until they come out into the open. 

There is no replacement for use of good judgment in all of these considerations. Judgment has to be used all the time and without any suspension even in periods of comfort and inactivity. In periods of crisis, there is a tendency to jump ahead based on false or incorrect assumptions, so it makes sense to use good judgment and be prepared even before the crisis strikes. Your own motives and loyalties as well as of those around you have to be understood, placed and positioned even before the crisis strikes and then reviewed from time to time. 

If things can be saved, then discussion and negotiation has to be done. The communists call this process “struggle”. Loyalties then have to be re-balanced and re-matched, failing which some one has to be ejected or placed in isolation because he is now considered to be unsalvageable for the party’s purpose – at least for the length of isolation. This pre-supposes that a new “struggle” is on the cards at a future date. 

This also raises the possibility that the party itself may be turned from its original ideals by a different set of leaders. This is clearly seen in UMNO which tries to fool people that it is still true to its ideals by fanatically pushing concepts such as Ketuanan Melayu, but in actual fact has turned into a party of powerful, self-seeking, abusive and corrupt bureaucrats. 

All these sound complex and confusing when the concepts are just being grasped but with familiarity and practice, they become 2ndnature. To give some better insights, let us now consider some real life examples. 

In the DAP, a secretive Justice Reform Group has been formed. Such secrecy itself already suggests that its ideals and loyalties may conflict with established and accepted norms. This is still not a bad thing since new ideas are often viewed as dangerous. However after much campaigning and a new set of leaders have been elected, there is still no movement to re-unite to strengthen the party for challenges ahead. Any outstanding differences now need to be pushed into the background and revived only in the next round of “struggle”. 

Instead the differences seem to be set into stone. This means the party now looks permanently split. Further the newly elected leadership is being questioned and its authority undermined without even giving it a chance to prove itself. Old scores refuse to be pushed into the background with a new set of leaders. This can only mean that the DAP has been infected with a small dose of the political polio virus and danger of permanent injury is very real. 

This does not mean that the new set of leaders are not an exclusive clique themselves, but they have been elected and they must now be given the chance to prove themselves. (If I may be so bold as to suggest – by seeking to redress the valid grievances of their rivals among other things.) 

So honest DAP grassroots members must now question their loyalty to the party against loyalty to friends and/or ideals –  which is more important to them? I must suggest a retreat from the brink before real permanent damage is done. Otherwise the ground is being fertilized for provocateurs to do their dirty work more successfully. 

In PKR’s case, demonstrators come out in defiance of an order to cool things down. This is already defiance against the leadership and the loyalty of the demonstrators to the leaders is in question. They claim loyalty to the party and wish to save the party from the evil manipulations of the leaders, so they cast aspersions about the homosexual ties between 2 top leaders of the party in their protest banners. 

This is a vicious and destructive act and only supports trumped up charges against DSAI. By seeking to destroy the leadership of the party without offering a viable alternative, such demonstrators are clearly bent on destroying the party itself and not just seeking justice against elections fraud as they claim “in a peaceful manner”. (On the other hand, at the very least Zaid offered himself as a viable alternative leader. Heeheehee) 

The net result looks like an attempt not to voice grievances but to create negative public perception not just once but in repetition. One must therefore question where the loyalties of these demonstrators lie. 

Inner-party power struggles will always exist in political parties whether in PKR, DAP or UMNO. However, the manner in which these power struggles are conducted do reveal the ethics and loyalties of the players. If they are sporting, well-balanced and mutually respectful between the players, it would seem that the political party itself is united and of one mind. 

Often, there is concern about how such inner-party struggles are conducted. It could mean that the party is not yet fully matured and the loyalties of its members are not well-balanced. It however does not necessarily have a strong connection to whether the ideals of the party are in trouble especially if party elections look like wretched poverty stricken affairs. 

In fact, embarrassing inner-party struggles which are successfully kept away from the public eye and thus successfully escaping bad public perception may actually show up a stronger clue that the ideals of the party have been compromised a long time ago, and that such compromise is now fully accepted by a fully corrupt bunch of members. This is especially more suspicious if party elections are super grand affairs that show off obscene wealth and power.