Mahathirism: The Cancer that Plagues the Nation (Part 1)

What Mahathir really did was plant the seeds of revolt that got the Chinese further estranged from the Malays in the years that came. 

Raggie Jessy

It seems to be the law of physics that one should hear the loudest of mouths rather than the most intelligent of people. But here in Malaysia, we’re dealt with a paradox; we get to hear them both and yet, find ourselves getting deeper and deeper into a state of perplexity.

On the 5th of July 2014, Tan Sri Muhyiddin Yassin cautioned ethnic communities against tearing into one another with racial and religious polemic. The Deputy Premier seemed to paint a bleak picture of the future as he foretold of riots should the Chinese, Indians and Malays begin suspecting one another.

It appears that Muhyiddin may have done the whole nation a service by admitting that the very fabric seaming races together was fluttering on the flagpole. Now that’s saying it as it is. And none could have said it better than Muhyiddin, who came to the fore telling us how our chickens may one day come home to roost should Ali, Wong and Muthu persist in taking the piss out of each other.

1. Planting the seeds of revolt…

But saying it as it is may not necessarily be the Martin Luther thing to do in Malaysia. No. You can’t just skip merrily around town accusing the Malays of being racist chauvinists for telling the Chinese to ‘balik Cina’. And neither could you walk up to a Chinese saying, “The Malays prefer that you be bundled together with your kin and deported straight to China in a tongkang.”

No. That would be utterly seditious. It would, because your freedom ought to end where my nose begins. In Malaysia though, it really depends on whose nose we’re talking about. That is to say, the limits to your freedom are open to interpretation and very much dependent on who is doing the interpretation.

Sometime last year, the Attorney General‘s chambers (AGC) closed its books on Dato’ Ibrahim Ali (of Perkasa) for threatening to torch bibles when clearly, his outburst had infuriated the Christians and threatened to engender enmity and hostility between the Christians and the Muslims. Now, all you need is a few more Ibrahims on hailers, and you’re all set to touch off a riot, the one Muhyiddin seemed to caution us about.

It was ironic that the AGC played the ‘torching of the Bibles’ issue down. It appears that the AGC viewed Ibrahim to have acted in the name of Islam, and saw his actions to be those of a person out to protect the sanctity of Islam. All the same, the AGC’s bent may have had to do with the Islamic state status being accorded to Malaysia by certain dignitaries, the most notable of all being Tun Dr. Mahathir Mohamed. As a result, Ibrahim was never charged for sedition.

But what if a certain Jack were to insist that Malaysia isn’t an Islamic state? What if Jack were able to establish that the accordance of such a status had led Ibrahim to believe that he was entitled to torch bibles? Would Jack be charged with sedition? And assuming that he would, will the AGC bother to establish Jack’s motives, the same way it did Ibrahim’s?

We’ll just have to ask Mahathir to fill us in on this. You see, it wasn’t until Mahathir declared Malaysia to be an Islamic state on the 29th of September 2001 that Muslim groups began posturing themselves behind him, intensifying their calls for non-Muslims to observe their limits. Put differently, they cautioned non-Muslims against provoking the Malays by insisting that Malaysia was a secular state.

Back then, Mahathir acknowledged that his views would come as a shock to many. According to him, people in the West “considered a fundamentalist as someone who is violent and did all kinds of bad things,” adding that such a perception was wrong. As Mahathir put it, it wasn’t necessarily a bad thing to be a fundamentalist. So apparently, Malaysia isn’t just an Islamic state, but a fundamentalist one. According to the former Premier, it was UMNO’s position that Malaysia had the requisites to regard itself as an Islamic fundamentalist state.

Mahathir’s remarks appeared to follow a challenge laid by the late PAS president, Dato’ Fadzil Nor. Fadzil dared Mahathir to declare Malaysia to be an Islamic state in Parliament. Now, you know Mahathir. You dare him to a debate, and he’ll come right at you with kung fu chops.

So never in his wildest dreams did Fadzil expect Mahathir to do what he did next; he had several thousand Gerakan delegates sitting with their jaws dropped to the ground as he stood on the rostrum declaring Malaysia to be an Islamic state. And it wasn’t just any Islamic state he was at, but a fundamentalist one. It was Gerakan’s annual delegate’s conference, and Mahathir was there delivering the opening speech.

A party with a preponderant Chinese representation, Gerakan was simply a bargaining chip for Mahathir as he cajoled Muslims from across the board. He got Muslims to resign to the idea that UMNO politicians had the Chinese meeting them halfway on the Islamic state issue. Fadzil wanted Parliament, and Mahathir gave him Gerakan. And right about then, Fadzil knew that he’d been upstaged.

But then, what about the preponderant Chinese representation in Gerakan? How could one account for the fact that Mahathir came off unscathed after having told the Chinese that they had been playing ball with Islamic fundamentalists all this while?

Well, that’s where Mahathir aced it. He left it squarely to the discretion of constitutional experts and the Chinese, declaring that non-Muslims had the right to regard Malaysia as a secular state. So it was an ‘aye’ and a ‘nay’ to the Islamic state concept.

And that’s precisely how Mahathir inveigled a free pass to the Islamic state concept from the Chinese without having them run around his podium like demented Mafias on ecstasy. The Chinese, undoubtedly pissed, were more or less subdued by the fact that Mahathir hadn’t really put things one way or the other. In other words, Mahathir never really did say it as it is. He didn’t, because saying it as it is may not necessarily be the Martin Luther thing to do in Malaysia.

But then, what Mahathir really did was plant the seeds of revolt that got the Chinese further estranged from the Malays in the years that came. And he did this right before handing over the reins of government to Tun Abdullah Hj. Ahmad Badawi.

To be continued…