Does the DAP Need to Reform Too?

By batsman 

The DAP is on the roll. Its election successes and good administrative record in Penang are provoking panicked calls for 1Melayu 1Bumi after Ketuanan Melayu seems to have lost its appeal in rallying extreme Malay nationalism.

The ideas behind the Malay Dilemma are now seen not as a saviour of the Malay race but an excuse to prolong the crony trap and chronic corruption. Malay privileges no longer reach far enough into the Malay masses to be sufficiently influential and UMNO has been reduced to giving tiny handouts and goodies only during elections. Malay privileges are even blamed for a Malay dependency syndrome and lack of competitive dynamism among Malays. 

So does the DAP need to reform? It has offered to merge with SNAP. This may be seen as some sort of reform and a credible attempt at broadening its support base. Obviously the DAP has to change to accommodate SNAP, but will this be sufficient to form the next federal government? 

Again obviously not. Even TDM says that no group can get all that they demand and RPK says that even UMNO cannot form the federal government without the support of other BN component parties. RPK also says that it is impossible for PAS to form the federal government on its own so there is no possibility for Malaysia to become an Islamic state in the foreseeable future – only the possibility to create better opportunities for a more moral and more decent social and cultural environment (my addition). 

Do all these facts and opinions need to be taken into account by the DAP? Or is the DAP content with its heady successes of the moment? 

Again obviously PAS and PKR are no longer in the position to take strong and risky initiatives to strengthen the PR alliance. The DAP is in the best position of the 3 to do this but will it do so? Offering to merge with SNAP is a good beginning and shows promise, but perhaps there is more that can be done. 

The DAP still clings on emotionally tightly to its secularist positions. However even this is under threat by fast changing circumstances. Its alliance with PAS is already a tacit admission that it is able to cooperate with a party that combines religion with politics. This undercuts its purely secularist position. If it insists on a purely secularist position, it cannot form any working arrangements with PAS. Practical matters often force compromises on the emotions. 

In addition it has attracted some form of Christian support. Although Christian leaders still insist on staying away from party politics, the realities of the Malaysian situation tests this insistence continually. Rank and file Christians are already joining the DAP and there is a great likelihood that the pressure of their religious demands will work its way into DAP policies in spite of the DAP’s secularist stance. In Britain, Tony Blair has already been accused of allowing his Christian loyalties to influence his political decisions in a big way when he was PM. Much as they like to deny it, this is a common occurrence in British politics. 

The DAP therefore needs to take realities in Malaysia into account. The people of Malaysia have deeply held religious beliefs and copying western secularism blindly in terms of separation of religion from politics is something unnatural. Even the westerners cannot practice it in its pure form and need to resort to hypocrisy and cover-ups. 

RPK further says that Malaysian politics is characterized by 2 political groups vying for the support of the people. The people themselves are not really involved in the political process in a meaningful way except to cast their votes every 4 or 5 years. 

With this in mind, if the DAP wants to broaden its appeal as a national party with multi-racial support, it should also re-look at its purist or fundamentalist form of secularism. UMNO has long since already taken the needs of its Malay nationalist support base into account by cynically using religion to strengthen its political support in spite of its secular nationalism. The DAP would be silly to stick rigidly to its fundamentalist form of secularism and shut out religious groups. 

There are as many types of secularism as there are democracies. Religious groups may be allowed to play a limited role in the political process – mostly in inter-faith councils, but also possibly, by appointment into senatorial positions. By such means it further encourages ordinary people to take part in the political process if in a limited way. 

If necessary safety measures can be put into place such as if the inter-faith councils get stuck or the senate gets stuck the whole thing reverts back to the Lower House of Parliament. 

Hopefully by such reforms both in political parties as well as national institutions, Malaysians do not have to get stuck in purely ideological and theoretical disagreements, but are able to engage in solving practical issues on the ground through discussion and negotiation. 

I believe this is one of the better ways to break the stalemate and to move forward, both within the PR itself and within Malaysia as a whole. There are of course other not so good ways, if we do nothing and wait for things to solve themselves, or worse – wait for UMNO to solve the problems.