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The Hamids Continue At War To Reflect A Larger Malaise

I wrote this for my column in the latest issue of Harakah, out today.

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Harakah

15-31 August 2002

Column

The Hamids Continue At War To Reflect A Larger Malaise

M G G Pillai

THE MALAYSIAN GOVERNMENT'S Islamic face, more political than ever, is about upstaging PAS at its theocratic agenda. But that is stymied at the parlous state of its Islamic institutions, none more than Tabung Haji, the once-well run organisation to help Malaysian Muslims make the Haj. It grew phenomenally, which with efficient management, that its success attracted predators. There is this unfortunate but ingrained belief that cash rich government bodies are there for any politically well connected businessmen to take over, and for those with lesser ambition, to bleed it dry. The Prime Minister, Dato' Seri Mahathir Mohamed, found this to be only too true, after the rot set in, and appointed a man he trusted, and trusts, Dato' Seri Abdul Hamid Othman, who restored morale and confidence to turn Tabung Haji eventually to what it once was.

The 1999 General Elections put paid to that. Dato' Seri Hamid lost his parliamentary seat, and since he had completed his maximum six years as senator, could not remain in the cabinet. In his place, in the cabinet and at Tabung Haji, came the former Malay school teacher turned chief mullah for the armed forces with the rank of Brigadier, Dato' Abdul Hamid Zainal Abidin. Dr Hamid Othman became the Prime Minister's adviser on religion matters. The pair went hammer and tongs at each other, the resultant warfare all but destroying Tabung Haji's financial and commercial competence, with predators encouraged to privatise the money-making operations. This reorganisation is so the brigadier mullah could put his impramateur and remove all traces of his nemesis' successes. The man is so insecure he would not allow his predecessor's name mentioned in his presence.

He brought in new management, at outrageously inflated salaries, to reorganise Tabung Haji. All he did was to reduce morale in Tabung Haji, with key staff, especially in top management, told to leave or left on their own. It racked up huge losses by disturbing the structure of some of its subsidiaries. With the result that all projects, once proceeding on time, are now behind schedule or abandoned for want of management or direction or both. The eventual penalties for this could run into hundreds of millions of ringgit. The staff structure is skewed and gone berserk. Assistants to general managers are paid three times more, the new men and women brought in as part of a management package, cutting corners and costs with such horrific abandon that the integrity of Tabung Haji, as an institution, is at risk. A general manager with a monthly salary of RM8,000 was foisted with an assistant paid RM25,000. The general manager left. And left a lacunae in the operations.

The Tabung Haji revamp is done with no thought to its outside links, with subsidiaries merged for no reason than to make it profitable to privatise. This lack of synergy is compounded a helplessness and a fear for the future amongst the staff. One byproduct of this is bad staff relations with with the unions, which makes for difficult working conditions; another is this belief that the old management were cronies of Dr Hamid and ought to be sidelined or removed. A deliberate victimisation is so serious that the Prime Minister's Department now investigates it. This typical accountant's approach to profit and loss gutted what Tabung Haji stood for, and threatens to land the National Front government with more than a huge headache.

Dr Mahathir is caught in the fallout. He is critical of the retired brigadier mullah, and has all but insulated himself from him. It is Dr Hamid Othman who has his ear. This makes the animosity between them all the more acrimonious. When Dato' Hamid Zainal Abidin's daughter was married, the one notable personage uninvited was Dr Hamid. He goes out of his way to isolate any in Tabung Haji thought to be close to Dr Hamid. Dr Mahathir knows that if this continues in this fashion, Tabung Haji could turn out to be a monumental flop, one he cannot afford to in his new found fervour of Malaysia as a fundamentalist Islamic state. More worrying for him must be that the Audit Department, the Public Services Department, and the Anti-Corruption Agency have all moved in to investigate. Much of what is done under present management is outside the legally mandated procedures for statutory bodies.

This fallout is so serious that it strays into every aspect of the National Front (BN) government's continuing forays into religion, its battle with PAS, the Lembaga Tabung Haji and its subsidiaries, and the Majlis Ugama (religious council. Its larger Islamic plans must necessarily be on hold if what takes centre stage now is how it manages its Islamic institutions. Of these, Lebaga Tabung Haji is the most important. If that is the prize this feuding Islamicists fight over, it must redound on this continuing battle of the Hamids. It is an epic battle which reflects the broader political fight amongst the Islamicists. One is a political, modernist Islamicist with a Ph.D. in Islamic affairs and a degree from Al Azhar, the other an obscurantist, sometime Malay school teacher who by a stroke of circumstances rose to be the head of the ulamas and ustadzes in the armed forces with the rank of brigadier. It is not one that would end easily or without egg on BN and UMNO politics.

There are other forces that complicate and accentuate this war of the Hamids. One key figure is the minister's political secretary. This intelligent shadowy figure is the mainstay of the minister's inner circles. He is widely blamed within the Tabung Haji top management for much of the rot in it. He had visions, they say, of eventually becoming the Tabung Haji CEO. That failed when the new management was brought, with the CEO brought in from Danahart for no reason than that he is a buddy of two well placed Malaysians in the Prime Minister's inner circle. He is paid RM35,000, and one of his first takes on taking office is to "buang kerja" (sack) the old CEO. This was followed by a witchhunt which saw the departure of most of the senior management, voluntarily or by force. The cronies of the new management are now in place, with salaries of between RM15,000 and RM30,000 a month, Tabung Haji all but severely paralysed.

This war of the Hamids unfortunately accentuates this. No one can intervene in this battle of the mini-giants. But what happens at Tabung Haji can be traced to this. Dr Mahathir must move but he is caught with his own problems of his own cabinet ministers and supporters defying him with impunity. His policy directive to have science and mathematics taught in English has brought the coalition partners, and the three major races split from within and with each other. His cabinet is at odds with him over how the country is to be run, and he cannot afford to have another cabinet minister defy on a matter as important as this.

Nor can he tell the two to not go on their destructive vendetta. What happens in Tabung Haji today reflects these insecurities, the destructive infighting between the two men who matter uncontrollable, with Tabung Haji drifting in a typhoon rudderless and leaderless. What started off as a genuinely popular means to have Malaysian Muslims make their pilgrimage to Mecca is now a conglomerate so divested of its original aims that in the political and commercial machinations that of the interests of those who save with it for the pilgrimage is forgotten.

M.G.G. Pillai
pillai@mgg.pc.my