Before and after Political Tsunami preparedness

ARCHIVES 2011

By admin-s On Apr 25, 2011

By Kuo Yong Kooi

Yes, the aftermath of the Sarawak election has proven that the Pakatan opposition is a real contention force to the BN government; but as some political analysts have rightly pointed out, that was not classified as a Tsunami because the quake was too small to cause a “political” Tsunami.

So, when will the political Tsunami happen? It will happen when the country is either bankrupt like Greece and Ireland or near bankruptcy like Spain and Portugal.

Basic commodity price hikes will also be a major factor. It was initially reported that the “food price hike” was the spark to the Jasmine revolution in Tunisia. As for Malaysia, the right time will come when those factors are ripe and ready. Until then, the opposition has to be prepared for this eventuality.

Taking this scenario as a possibility, one then has to reassess ones’ strategies preparing for the political Tsunami and the aftermath. Very highly likely, Pakatan government will inherit a near bankrupt or bankrupt state coffers when power changes hand. If when taking over power under these conditions are not remedied quickly, chaos might prevail because Malaysia still have lots of foot soldiers of the die hard UMNO, PERKASA and other ultra Malay chauvinist groups that can cause chaos let alone trying to work out what the military would do under these circumstances.

Preparation before the Political Tsunami

Moving on from a marriage of convenience to a real marriage between PAS and DAP/PKR.

The people still perceive that PAS and DAP are at opposite ends of the political spectrum. How then can the differences of their highly contentious issues be ironed out so as Pakatan emerges as a solid alternative in their policies as a government in waiting? We are not just talking about clean, efficient and fair government that Pakatan has been drumming on in all the “buy” elections and the Sarawak election.

Alternative to the Western development model

I would like to suggest DAP and PKR to seriously reconsider their beliefs in subscribing to a “Western economic development/industrialisation” model. PAS had to some degree been constantly addressing and questioning the social, moral and psychological implications of rapid industrialisation on Malaysia’s Muslim community. Unfortunately they are only addressing the issues by imposing the classical Islamic world view as an alternative. PKR and DAP are mainly addressing the fair, efficient and clean alternative government but still strongly subscribe to the same economic development model that most industrialising countries are pursuing including BN.

If the brains of Pakatan are open to re-look and adopt an alternative to the Western Industrialised development model, this I believe will be a real marriage between PAS and DAP/PKR. In fact if this alternative to the Western development model is seriously followed through, Malaysia will lead the developing worlds in addressing the real issues of the planet in this century. The eminent ecological crisis.

World Bank president Robert Zoellick in mid April 2011 stated that the world is a step away from a full blown economic crisis due to rising food prices and oil prices. This is just one aspect of the economic world view that the president of World Bank is concerned with. If we tie in the other warning signs that had been constantly coming to the fore like:

Environmental: greenhouse effect, climate change/global warming, air and water pollution, excessive logging that cause soil erosion, loss of biodiversity and flash floods … etc
Food Security: The fast speed of industrialisation of countries in Asia and other developing countries converting massive amounts of fertile land to industrial estates hence reducing it’s capacity to produce it’s own food for consumption. The remaining fertile land is used to plant crops to supply the newly developed bio-fuel industries and market. Over-fishing that has caused dwindling of sea resources hence dwindling ocean’s bio-diversity.
Quality of life: Health and well-being issues like Obesity/lack of exercise, mental health, stress, diabetes/hypertension, excessive consumption of drugs (including pharmaceutical or recreational drugs and alcohol). Rapid increasing rates of cancer. Newly emerging diseases like autism, H1N1 … etc
Globalisation of multinational companies and globalisation of people’s lifestyles in the advent of the latest development in computer technology. Unsustainability of economic growth shown in the latest Global Financial Crises (GFC),

All these issues, when fit it into a big puzzle, are telling us that we have to take another road to development. These issues are linked as one cannot address a single issue on it’s own. If one tries to address one of the issues on it’s own one would be branded as a fundamentalist, foolish and irrelevant to the modern society.

Unfortunately PAS has been protesting on issues like moral degradation, alcohol consumption and Valentine’s Day which does exactly that, being seeing by a modern Malaysian (be they Malay, Chinese or Indian that lives in a big city) as fundamentalist and irrelevant to the modern world. Even DAP and PKR cannot agree with PAS on these matters.

This goes true to all other religious organisations around the world as they lack the mental complexity to deal with modern development issues. They interpret the issues of the day according to the traditional texts written in the Bible or the Koran which was written centuries ago to deal with issues centuries ago. The green parties in the West which constantly addresses only environmental issues are being criticised as narrow minded and lack economic credibility.

Let us just put the environmental debate aside as most logical thinking people would start to see the big picture if they catch up with regular news concerning the environment. One of the recent ones, for example like the United Nation global convention on climate change, yes it is positive that the world is trying to address this particular issue; but as mentioned earlier, trying to resolve one issue will only be a band aid solution to a bigger problem. The real problem is that we are subscribing to an economic model that assumes the environment is free for us to use and abuse. It also assumed that the resources are unlimited – a science that based on the old paradigm of we humans are the controllesr of the universe.

For those who still think that climate change is not a proven science yet, I would like to ask these people whether is the “economic theory and practice of today” an accurate science? Please don’t get me wrong. We cannot go back to the times where we used to live in caves or on trees. There is a need for economic development but not to the extent of neglecting everything else.

Some technological fixers would say, well sooner or later scientists will design batteries or solar powered cars to reduce greenhouse gases. Yes, that is definitely on the pipeline. But what about all the other environmental problems at hand?

Take a few examples like aluminium smelter industries that poison the water and the air. Mining of ore and its consequence pollute both underground and surface waters. Where would we dump the unused poisonous batteries? Where do we dump the “so-called” clean energy of nuclear wastes? Are we prepare to have one mammoth disaster after another like Chernobyl, Bhopal, Fukushima, Long Island, Alaska, Nigeria and the Gulf of Mexico oil spill? Are we prepared to landfill all the wastes from mobile phones, computers, tyres, cars and plastics? These products will ultimately leak their toxic materials onto the water table and hence poisoning us in the long run. The questions can go on and on.

All technological fixes will lead to more pollution in the process of producing the “so-called” green solution products. As far as fixing the environmental problems and still subscribing to the same world view that create that problem in the first place is the same like Ibrahim Ali and Dr M saying that Malays were here before the orang Asli, hijacking the word pri-bumi used in PERKASA. They also ignore all the other parts of history before Parameswara and the Melaka Sultanate state. The whole world view itself is distorted and on a wrong platform. Whatever social solution they suggest will cause more chaos and more divisions in a multi-ethnic Malaysia.

Quality of life : Health and well being issues

Human development: Human beings are spiritual beings and are not mere intellectual robots. We aspire to industrialise our country like the West partly because of colonial influence but mainly because we believe that the Western materialistic lifestyle gives us physical comfort and a satisfying lifestyle. In just one generation the rapid development of modern technologies have totally uprooted our traditional lifestyles. I remember during my childhood days where every household would have their gods in the centre of the house and now the Television and computer gods are in the centre of every household. I think this rapid shift in lifestyle in such a short time in our lives do drive some people into religious fundamentalism. I was one of those people who saw lots of shortfalls and the hollowness of aspiring to a merely material existence. I turned to Buddhism for my salvation. I can totally relate to our Muslim friends when they suddenly dress up like a Taliban. I am a Buddhist Taliban (Tele-ban; ie does not have TV at home).

The Yin and Yang of nasi lemak and padi farming

DAP and PKR might say “evolution” has designed the human body for manual tasks. Medical scientists in fact will point out that a variety of manual tasks is best for optimum functioning of the body’s muscles. However PAS might argue that “Allah” has made us what we are and we are here to walk the path to full fill “Allah’s wishes”. Most people get caught in arguing the finer points of whether it’s god’s will or evolution and continue arguing from there. The real issues are clouded with the raw emotions of those arguments.

Here could be the points of agreement between PAS and DAP in terms of the human well-being at this point in time in history. We look at the human society and the living conditions we are in today. The new emerging industrialising economies are creating new job opportunities for the masses that require you to sit down like IT, call centres, accountancy, engineering design and others.

All the hours of non-manual activities will definitely have a strong impact on our bodies physically and thereby affect our mental well-being. After sitting eight hours at work we sit in a car for another hour or two in a traffic jam and when we get home we sit for another hour or two catching up with news or soap operas on TV or spending more time on the computer using the new media to catch up with news or socially. These daily non-physical activities are the reasons why we have an explosion of diseases like diabetes, obesity, depression, heart diseases, asthma, and a long list of other “industrialised” diseases.

PAS might argue that modern industrialisation is the real evil where it has taken away time for a Muslim to fulfil the basic daily prayers. More dangerously it is creating all the social ills of the Muslim society seen today. Looking at it from another perspective, spending time for prayers is to stop from all the “busy-ness” of life and that reduces stress. As for their posture during prayers, it looks like doing yoga to me. So they get a bit of physical exercise.

Prayers as I interpret it is like Chanting. Directing the mind towards “Allah” as PAS people might argue. This I agree too as it releases the mind from the stresses of the day. I would prefer meditation but each have their own way of dealing with life’s stresses. As for the modern scientists’ and economists’ point of argument, this is a good activity to reduce stress, hence possibilities of reducing budget spending on stress related diseases in the hospital. “Prevention is better and cheaper than cure”.

If we go full steam ahead with Dr M’s Wawasan 2020. We will also inherit all the by-products of the new diseases of the industrialised world, not just the tall skyscrapers and F1 car race at Sepang. If DAP and PKR sees this as not a viable road to take, then a road to balance economic development with human development could be a possible answer to bridge the gap between the opposing factions in the coalition.

Putting human development on equal footing with economic development is no easy task, but I seriously think it is a worthwhile project because it will at least try to address the environmental and social issues of our time. If the direction of Pakatan is clear in taking another road of development, then the details of the projects can be hashed out as Pakatan has got control of a few states where they can experiment on these ideas.

Details like redesigning the housing estates where there are public spaces to do recreational activities to combat obesity, community organic gardens for health and well-being and addressing the food security issues with large scale mix cropping of fruit trees not just mono cropping like palm oil and the list can go on.

Traditionally, nasi lemak is a great Malay dish when most of us were working in the farm as the lemak was not a problem. But now eating the traditional dish regularly with non-manual work sitting under the air condition can be deadly. The same with the Chinese autumn festival. It is autumn in China, but not autumn in Malaysia, my friends. The moon cakes are designed for autumn weather. As for our Christians friends, Santa Claus wearing his snow suit during Christmas is totally inappropriate for the weather conditions in Malaysia. How about wearing batik instead?

So, to follow the road to industrialisation was the right and the “in” thing to do 30 to 40 years ago. With new facts and statistics emerging lately, one should reconsider an appropriate course of action, isn’t it? As for PAS, one should try not to “traditionally” argue their Islamic point of views like ban this and that. Take for example the argument that alcohol can be used differently using statistics of diseases, road death toll, domestic violence, hospital budgets used to address the alcohol problems.

I guess I better switch off the computer and have a break from writing this article for the glare is really affecting my eyes lately.

Kuo Yong Kooi

Currently work as a Qi Gong and Yoga instructor in Melbourne residing as a permanent resident.