Eschewing change, Umno keeps to the president’s men
The Malaysian Insider
Yesterday’s Umno polls have thrown up one fact – that nothing has changed even with a new electoral system and talk of transformation in the Malay nationalist party.
The vice-presidential and supreme council line-up shows almost the same old faces. No one new or with exciting ideas has received enough votes to break into the chummy old boys club that is the Umno supreme council.
But the Umno-owned newspaper Utusan Malaysia talked about “winds of change blowing” through the party in its weekend edition Mingguan Malaysia today, citing the strong support for Kedah Menteri Besar Datuk Mukhriz Mahathir.
The 48-year-old son of the popular Tun Dr Mahathir Mohamad received 91 votes, just nine short of Datuk Seri Hishammuddin Hussein, who managed to retain his vice-presidency.
Would that be a change, considering that Mukhriz represented the hopes of those who long for the good times under Dr Mahathir’s leadership?
Would that even be a transformation for party president Datuk Seri Najib Razak?
The fact is, the Umno grassroots followed their division leaders, keeping most of them and their peers in power in the latest party elections.
There is virtually no change in the leadership from division level except for those who retired or those who had lost badly in the general election. The warlords remain in power from division right up to state and national levels.
The grassroots have in effect endorsed the status quo and are happy with it, and if anything, the support for Mukhriz is just an expression for the previous status quo before Tun Abdullah Badawi’s short rule.
Umno members would be deluded to believe talk that the winds of change had blown through the party in the elections. Instead, Najib has cemented his hold on the party as most of his preferences went through, some for the second time since he took power in 2009.
Change in Umno will not come from within for a long time until there are more new faces than old in the supreme council and office bearers.
