Anwar’s brave new world
When one looks at Anwar Ibrahim’s support for the Muslim Brotherhood, exemplified by Malaysia’s giving material aid to Hamas, the World Economic Forum (WEF), the US, and expression to join BRICS, one could easily see paradoxes here.
However, this may not necessarily be the case. There is an integral web between all the above movements, organizations and alliances.
Indeed, there is a relationship between the World Economic Forum (WEF) and the Muslim Brotherhood. One doesn’t even have to go too far to see that members of the Muslim Brotherhood have spoken at WEF meetings in Davos on many occasions. One gets the impression there is some admiration from the WEF leadership for the ability of the Muslim Brotherhood to gain power and control their societies. This has been labelled by The Washington Post columnist David Ignatius as the phenomenon of “inclusive elitism”.
The Muslim Brotherhood is alive and well within the WEF. Amr Darrag, a member of the Muslim Brotherhood’s Political Committee, is a high profile member of the WEF. The president of Turkey Recap Tayyip Erdogan is a member of the WEF. Erdogan has temporarily boycotted WEF meetings over the Palestine issue. Qatar, a strong supporter of the Muslim Brotherhood holds WEF forums on a regular basis. The speaker of the Tunisian Assembly Rached Ghannouchi, co-founder of the Ennahdha Muslim Democratic Party is also a member of the WEF.
There are a number of people within the Muslim Brotherhood and its affiliates as members of the WEF. So, its not surprising Anwar Ibrahim’s cabinet also has almost a dozen WEF members.
Thus, there should be no surprises at Anwar’s enthusiasm to support BlackRock’s involvement within the Malaysian economy. BlackRock is a strategic partner of the WEF and closely connected with the National Endowment for Democracy (NED), which supported him on the long journey to power.
