MGG Pillai Commentary View

<< Previous || Next >>

A Malaysian cabinet minister throws her weight in Australia

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.

Malaysian cabinet ministers and chief ministers and high-ranking politicians forget their writ ends when they leaves Malaysia. They travel on diplomatic passports, which they assume give them the right to unhindered safe passage through countries. It does not. This right is only to the diplomat accredited to a country. All else would have their right of passage smoothed but it does not exempt them from customs, immigration and police checks. A Thai diplomat accredited to the United Kingdon is in jail for drug smuggling in the United States. He could not plead diplomatic immunity. Datin Seri Rafidah forgot that in Australia. On arrival, she refused to allow her handbag to be put through the scanner nor allow it searched manually and by dogs.

An Australian foreign ministry official stepped in to avert a standoff. At the hotel, she refused another police check. The foreign ministry intervened. But the police officer there stood his ground, lined up 45 men and the sniffer dogs and said if she did not, he would order all delegation leaders and guests at the hotel out for a painstaking total search at the hotel. Finally, she was forced to sign a personal undertaking that she did not have on her any contraband or drugs or other banned items. She is not used to be treated this this. She has several charges of corruption against her, but she is a cabinet minister, close to Dr Mahathir, and so it is pushed under the carpet. She is the women's leader in UMNO, hopes to be finance minister before she retires, but one expects Malaysian cabinet ministers to be so fouled. No one raises an eye brow. It is expected of them.

Malaysia-Australia ties, at the best of times during the Mahathir regime, is akin to Canberra walking on diplomatic eggs. The Malaysian prime minister, Dato' Seri Mahathir shoots off the hip, sometimes deliberately, to annoy the Australians. He knows of Australia's weakness to bend over backwards to accommodate Southeast Asia, in a desire to be accepted from strength as one of them, and he exploits it to the full. Whenever a Southeast Asian leader, Dr Mahathir especially, criticises Australia or its leaders, the Australians scramble to ensure the fragile ties are not made worse by an intemperate reaction from Canberra. Look at Australia's describing him as a recalcitrant leader. It was translated in Malaysia as "kurang ajar", and in the ensuring tit-for-tats, Australia, in mea culpa, went to extraordinary lengths to explain why it is misunderstood.

This Rafidah Aziz affair comes at the heels of another bilateral problem. The Malaysian high commissioner in Australia, Mr Arshad Hussain, at this time is at the centre of a scandal in which the wife of a locally recruited Malaysian filed a police report that Mr Arshad raped her. The Australian Police asked for his immunity to be lifted. But after official pressure, the Australian Police decided to not take the report futher. It intends to take the case no further. Mr Arshad told the Police it was an unintended and accidental pat on the bottom. The husband is under pressure to have his wife withdraw the police report, but she is adamant she would not, insisting she knows the difference between an accidental pat on her buttocks and rape. The police to keep the bilateral peace has all but dropped the case.

What makes this somewhat bizarre was that a Filipina lodged a similar report when he was ambassador in Manila: she alleged rape but he said he had accidentally bumpted into her well-endowed breats. And, when a young diplomat in Phnom Penh, he turned up at a diplomatic function with five under-aged Cambodian girls in tow, and shortly after an Australian ambassador was recalled after having been found to be a paedophile. But he had earned Dr Mahathir's trust and kudos for his able handing of the Abu Sayyaf kidnap. So he was reassigned from Manila to Canberra. The foreign minister, Dato' Seri Syed Hamid Albar, is furious and wants to recall the ambassador. But that cannot happen if Dr Mahathir decides if he should be where he is.

But this Malaysian arrogance is what will bring this country down to its knees. Ministers assume Parliament is a rubber stamp. Policies are announced, like the policy on English, as an afterthought after declaring opening a goldsmiths. Parliament is not informed nor are policies debated because the Mahathir government insists it is elected by the people, it can do what it likes, and Parliament is there only to tell the world Malaysia is a democratic nation. Hundreds of billions of ringgit are spent by cabinet fiat, Parliament is kept in the dark, and the Speaker is quick to snip any attempt to have it discussed.

When the cabinet brings bills to Parliament, as the constitution requires, it is rushed through, on certificates or urgency, in a day or two, with the bills given to MPs a few hours before the debate. And when MPs decide that being in Parliment is a waste of time, the Prime Minister, no less, is quick to berate them for their dereliction of duty. The New Straits Times would not report Parliament debates as it should, but it has a box in its parliamentary coverage which shows the presence of MPs at different times of the session, and occasionally have editorials criticising MPs for their dereliction. The executive have taken full control, insist upon no oversight, and the resulting arrogance is what causes Datin Rafidah Aziz to behave as he did in Australia. And given the proconsular role of cabinet ministers in Malaysia, the Sydney affair is not considered important to make it into the country's mainstream media, all of which incidentally is owned by one or the other of the parties in Dr Mahathir's governing National Front coalition.

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