In the last two decades, corruption fuelled the government more widespreadly than the two decades before that. With the anti-corruption agency defanged, those in government and the civil service believe corruption is a perk of office, how could it be otherwise? Dato' Seri Abdullah Badawi has not yet taken office, but there are commission agents and others out there making deals for projects in which a hefty percentage of the project's cost paid up front for "Pak Lah". Until now it was for "Doc", or "Dr Ling" or "Dato' Samy" or a named chief minister or mentri besar. Those in office do not want to leave office for two reasons: one, they are ignored the day after leaving office; two, the gravy train stops. The latter is more important, which is why the likes of Dato' Seri Ling Liong Sik or a Dato' Seri S. Samy Vellu, or a Datin Rafidah Aziz, or a BN cabinet minister or mentri besar or chief minister, cling to office at whatever cost to their personal integrity or future.

That kind of money cannot be corruption or the illgotten gains of money politics, but a perk of office. His successor in Selangor, Dato' Seri Mohamed Khir Toyo, rails against corruption and money politics, but is his hands clean? The state is rent with his new found wealth. When the state executive council, the state cabinet, has to decide on land applications an licences of all kinds, and the BN parties has need for more money than the law allows for elections, the leaders are tempted with corruption every minute of the day. No one in office is immune from it. The law against corruption and misuse of office is so drafted that unless the Prime Minister authorises prosecution, it is a dead letter. He acts only if he is challenged. So, his former deputy prime minister, Dato' Seri Anwar Ibrahim, is in jail but not Datin Seri Rafidah Aziz, Dr Ling, Tun Daim Zainuddin, Dato' Seri S. Samy Vellu, many a state mentri besar, senior civil servants and others.

Did the Malaysian international trade and industry minister, Datin Seri Rafidah Aziz, tell a lie when she recounted, in Kuala Lumpur, what happened to her on 14 November 2002 at Sydney airport and when she arrived for the World Trade Organisation (WTO) minsterial meeting and at the Novotel Homebush hotel where the ministers were put up. She refused to allow her hand luggage checked by Customs, when the police dogs were brought in. This would not have if she had put her luggage through the metal detector. Why did she not? An Australian trade ministry official took her bags and gave it to the driver of her official limousine. At the hotel, the hand luggage was handed to a Malaysian official who would not let it through the metal detector. The security insisted.

DATIN SERI Rafidah Aziz is furious Australian air port security did not recognise here, and horror of horrors, wanted police dogs to sniff her luggage to make sure she carried no contraband. The stupid fools! Did they not know who she is? She who but for the Grace of God would be prime minister after Dr Mahathir? She throws her weight around all the time, so what she did in Sydney is not new. She said she told airport officials, she, a Muslim, forbade dogs, but graciously allowed her luggage, unlocked, to be manually checked. She had arrived in Sydney on 14 November 2002 for the World Trade Organisation ministerial meeting when this needless flap occurred.

When the Malaysian international and trade minister, Datin Rafidah Aziz, led the Malaysian delegation to the WTO talks in Sydney this month, she creates a political storm only she, and Malaysian political leaders, could. Why is obvious. She is used to having her way in Malaysia, she is fawned, dined and sent off with expensive presents when she makes an appearance, with a coterie of officials and political aides to smooth her arrogant ways. This is the way of Malaysian cabinet ministers and chief ministers: the Malacca chief minister, Dato' Ali Rastam, asserts, in a mea culpa for the police summons he got for speeding on the interstate highway, that those with high powered motor cars, especially if a perk of office, should be exempt from high way speed limits that mere voters have to abide. The then chief minister of Selangor, Tan Sri Mohamed Taib, arrived in Brisbane a few years back with RM2.4 million worth of foreign currency in his brief case, did not declare them because this graduate from the University of Malaya said he did not understand English! He is now a vice-president of UMNO, a king maker, and one of those who insist English must be brought into the curriculum.

Puteri UMNO caught on like wild fire when it was formed. The Malay working woman and mother, cut out of mainstream UMNO Wanita by the heavy-handed Datin Rafidah Aziz and her makchiks. Puteri UMNO was formed so this important -- and most active -- segment of Malay society does not seek other avenues, like PAS, if they want to be in politics. Its arrival forced even PAS to revise its own belief that the woman's place is in the home. Ironically, as PAS moves forward to give women an unaccustomed place in its leadership, UMNO denies them. Young working married women and single mothers, cut out of the political mainstream, rushed into Puteri UMNO. They became a force in byelections, upstaged the Wanita makchiks.

Other political developments force the Prime Minister into a corner. His statement he is not a candidate in the next general elections evoked little shocked response. Unlike his earlier anouncement. At that time, UMNO leaders rushed to the platform at the UMNO hall at the Putra World Trade Centre, including famously Datin Seri Rafidah Aziz, who lost her shoes in the scramble, to ask him to retract it. This time, UMNO called for calm and accept it for as the UMNO vice president, Dato' Seri Najib Tun Razak said, "because he had thought about it at length and is quite firm on the matter". The UMNO supreme council neither discussed it with Dr Mahathir or amongst themselves about it, but it reflects the UMNO feeling it is doomed without a new leader -- and soon. This exclude the jokers: The Pahang mentri besar, Dato' Seri Adnan Yaakob, believes the unbeatable of Dr Mahathir and deputy UMNO president Dato' Seri Abdullah Ahmad Badawi, could lead BN to another win and greater heights, and so he should remain. He forgot to mention that without the Prime Minister's protection, he is yesterday's man.

The Prime Minister, Dato' Seri Mahathir Mohamed, insists his cabinet is at the cutting edge, not chopping block, of Malaysia's development and progress. He does not say it is in the same league, no doubt, as Perwaja Steel, the Employees Provident Fund, Renong, United Engineers Malaysia, Petronas, Telekom, MAS, Putra Jaya, all synonyms for Malaysia's "development and progress". But hear him out: "This cabinet of ours, which we know and other's don't, is more relaxed than those of other countries. Sometimes we hear raucous laughter in the Cabinet as if they are not serious and are just attending a social function." He implies that others like Mr Goh Chok Tong, Mr Tony Blair, Mr Atul Bihari Vajpayee drool at the prospect of having the excellent Malaysian ministers in their cabinet as Dato' Seri Ling Liong Sik, Dato' Seri S. Samy Vellu, Datin Rafidah Aziz, Dato' Seri Syed Hamid Albar, Datin Shahrizat Jalil. With them around, Malaysia's future is in good hands. No doubt theirs too. No doubt it is. Which is why they insist on staying on in the cabinet even after they have long begun their retirement in office. So they could be auctioned off to the highest bidder from foreign countries who need them.

This frightens UMNO, especially amongst the Wanita leaders. It is not only Datin Shahrizat who fears challenges like this. The Wanita UMNO leader and federal cabinet minister, Datin Rafidah Aziz, also cannot shake off the probability that a popular PAS woman politician could well take her on. They are vulnerable. Politics in UMNO and the National Front is so fraught with danger that defeat is a final end to a political career in a party that is a shadow of what it once was. Long used to having their own way, they suddenly find that they are not as popular as they thought they are. Now they cannot go to their constituencies without unwelcome questions asked of them. And all it needs to shake them off their stupor is to have a stray wind that suggest they would be challenged by forces they could not control. And this in a political party its leaders say is in absolute control. But battles are often lost for want of a nail. Would Miss Nurul Izzah then plunge into battle? She might or she might not. But the odds are she would.

Haji Taib Azamudden, in a press statement, said when he was "Grand Imam" of the National Mosque, he came to know, or was consulted by the parties, of sexual peccadillos by UMNO leaders, Federal cabinet miniters and state chief ministers. He did not name names, but pointed directly at them. So large a list it was he said it was easier to name those cabinet ministers and mentris besar uninvolved! What he recited had been the stuff of political gossip for years. Most related to sexual trysts but one is accused of corruption, another of an UMNO cabinet minister's brother involved in drug trafficking. What he said refers to the UMNO secretary-general, Tan Sri Khalil Yaakob; the four UMNO vice presidents -- Dato' Seri Najib Tun Razak, Tan Sri Muhiyuddin Yassin, Tan Sri Mohamed Taib, Datin Seri Rafidah Aziz; the Perlis mentri besar, Dato' Seri Shahidan Kassim; the former Malacca mentri besar, Tan Sri Rahim Thamby Chik; the former federal cabinet minister and former Selangor mentri besar, Dato' Seri Abu Hassan Omar; the head of the National Fatwa Council, Dato' Ismail Ibrahim; and Dato' Zainuddin Mydin.

But Dato' Seri Najib became an useful ally in his perennial search for a successor, and he was brought back to defence. He closes his eyes to what the minister's wife does. In Malaysia, all is forgiven if on the side of He Who Thinks He Is Lord Of All He Surveys. Corruption it is if you and I or Dato' Seri Anwar did but not those basking in the Great Man's benevolent gaze. So, Dato' Seri Anwar goes to jail for what the MCA president and transport minister, Dato' Seri Ling Liong Sik, is lauded. Sergeant Senapang bin Peluru goes to Sungei Buloh or Kajang for which Datin Seri Rafidah Aziz goes to Putra Jaya.

I would not have written the article if he had appointed a finance minister at least before he left. The usual names crop up -- Dato' Seri' Abdullah, Datin Rafidah Aziz, Dato' Seri Najib Tun Razak, Tan Sri Muhiyuddin Yassin, Tan Sri Azman Hashim, Tan Sri Abul Hassan Sulaiman, Tan Sri Nor Mohamed Yaacob -- but whom UMNO wants he would not appoint, and whom he wants UMNO would disallow. He cannot ride roughshod over UMNO. He now thinks of Dato' Mokhzani of the bin Mahathir clan. This brought a flurry of emails caked in filth to question if my parents were married when I was born. He would not, indeed cannot, fill that vacancy. That whilst he may be in physical control by reason of the awesome power and feudal aura he has, he steadily and surely loses his grip. The New York Times has an article yesterday of how Sept 11 saved Dr Mahathir. It did. He is more autocratic than ever. But the short term gains he got from that, when he swiftly branded the fundamentalist Muslims who do not support him and UMNO as terrorist-inclined threatens to backfire.

Pak Lah (1364)   United States (636)   Straits Times (412)   Samy Vellu (224)   Putra Jaya (200)   Chief Justice (200)   Saddam Hussein (188)   Vincent Tan (164)   Civil Service (154)   Parti KeADILan (148)   Islamic State (118)   Johore Bahru (100)   Sungei Buloh (94)   Bukit Tinggi (88)   Abdul Razak (80)   Pengkalen Pasir (68)   Ting Pek (64)   Armed Forces (59)   Soviet Union (58)

Malay Dominance (58)   Yong Teck (56)   Hong Kong (56)   Human Rights (56)   Syed Hamid (54)   Puteri UMNO (52)   Islam Hadhari (52)   Royal Commission (51)   Hussein Onn (51)   Rafidah Aziz (48)   Indian Congress (48)   Open House (44)   Vision Schools (44)   Shah Alam (44)   Malay Unity (42)   Chua Jui (42)   Abdul Taib (42)   Ampang Jaya (36)   Ras Adiba (36)

Osama Bin Laden (36)   Nik Aziz Nik (20)   Ling Liong Sik (18)   Lee Kuan Yew (18)

High Court Judge (14)   Wan Azizah Wan (9)   Lim Kit Siang (9)   Megat Junid Megat (8)

Mahathir (2960)

Anwar (2399)