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UMNO GA 2003 - III: The Last Hurrah?

THE OLD MAN WAS IN FINE FORM. He did not disappoint. As always. He let loose his feelings, in this, his penultimate speech at an UMNO General Assembly. The end is in sight. The UMNO president went into it with all hands flailing and warned UMNO and Malaysia of the perfidy of the Anglo-Saxon powers, which he did not identify but any who did not identify them as the United States and the United Kingdom is better off in a lunatic asylum. What a speech it was! He did not mention or refer to his deputy, who takes over from him in four months, by name or title, though he did his nemesis, now confined to his wheelchair in Sungei Buloh prison, offhandedly, and gave few any doubt he would hold office until the day he retires. It put paid to the belief of some of his cronies and aids that without him the country, and they, would suffer irreparable damage. If persuasion and hectoring was not enough, there were the copious tears, when he talked of the future of the UMNO he destroyed.

Should he have given the speech the focusee he did? Should it not have been a nostalgic look at what he has, and has not achieved, accept his mistakes and the credit, and look at the future in the hands of those he chose. For make no mistake of it: every one, even those of the other National Front (BN) partners, he chose. He must take responsibility for the mess in UMNO and the poodle the BN has become. He is one who demands his respect. No one challenges him without losing out. He made enemies of every one of his chosen deputies: Tan Sri Musa Hitam, Tun Ghafar Baba, Dato' Seri Anwar Ibrahim, even Dato' Seri Abdullah Ahmad Badawi. The first two went quietly, but the third did not. And the fourth is unhappy at the cavalier treatment he received at his hands.

That we would know and accept, when sobriety reigns, caused his decline from a powerful leader genuinely liked to one who had to rule by fear and threats. No one had his finger nails plucked out forcibly, nor is one thrown into Kamunting detention camp for speaking out against government policies, but the fearful hint of what could happen if one strayed from the perceived wisdom of UMNO and its president confines Malaysian politics, democratic as it is, into the straitjacket it is in. After all, if he could sack, detain his just sacked deputy prime minister, and close a blind eye when the Inspector-General of Police no less pummelled him into a wheelchair, and insist, without proof, he is a homosexual, could he not against one of us? But it had, for an important section of the Malaysian political community, the Malay, the opposite effect: they rose in high dudgeon to protest. That remains. All he has done is to stay one step ahead of the Malay, led by the man in a wheelchair whose political stock rises in inverse proportion to his infirmities.

He does not now even seem to be master of his own self. He was forced to release the Reformasi 6 by the Anglo-Saxon powers he rails about. There is much truth in this. It is difficult now to see how Dato' Seri Anwar Ibrahim can be denied bail, as he desires, on 14 July 2003. The pressure is too hot. He understands the political implications of not kowtowing to this pressure. It was the British and United States ambassadors in Indonesia in 1965 who had a still unclear role in unleashing the bloodbath that killed a million Indonesians to overthrow President Sukarno, and bring in its wake an Anglo-Saxon friendly government. As released official British and US documents now reveal, the then British ambassador, Sir Andrew Gilchrist, gloats about the extent of the bloodbath and gave enough clues of his involvement. The US ambassador, Mr Marshall Green, had come to Indonesia from South Korea, where he had presided over the military coup which brought General Park Chung Hee to power, and with it a clear hold on its economy. It is Britain and the United States that caused the conflagration in Iraq. So he had no choice. His attack on the Anglo-Saxon powers must be viewed with this background in mind.

But how would this be viewed by the Malay hinterland? My first reaction, listening to his speech and reading the translation of it, was of a churlish man leaving office with an incoherent mishmash of vacuous thoughts that he should have kept to himself. That could not be more misleading. That would be to misread him. He finds, as he winds down, he is in the same boat as President Sukarno, President Saddam Hussein, the Myanmar junta, the North Korean regime, and of what could happen to Malaysia if he misjudged the Anglo-Saxon mood. It is in the nature of Western colonialist practice that those not of the Caucasian race are better off as hewers of wood and carriers of water, with no right to rise above their station, and be grateful for their poverty-stricken existence. That has not changed in 500 years.

He spent 70 minutes harping on Anglo-Saxon perfidy. It was an emotional outpouring of his fear of this Great Demon of his to destroy this country, if not today then tomorrow. The countries of the world are expected to fall in line with this power. If Europe cannot get along with Washington and London and are therefore consigned to the doghouse, why should not Malaysia or Mauretania? His understanding of this is deep, and he believes it. But he cannot get his team to go along. Whatever you might say of President Sukarno, or President Tito, or President Gamel Abdel Nasser or President Kwame Nkrumah, or the Indian prime minister, Pandit Jawaharlal Nehru, they kept the Western powers and the Soviet Union at arms length while they developed at their own pace. But when the Indian deputy prime minister, on a visit to Washington, is prepared to commit an Indian army division to police Iraq, it reveals India's departure from its nationalist and internationalist ideals for an immediate advantage.

There is in Malaysia pressure for an Anglo-Saxon base to monitor Muslim terrorist movements in Southeast Asia. Australia asked for permission. It was granted. When Dr Mahathir returned from an overseas holiday, he was incensed enough to order it cancelled. Dato' Seri Abdullah Ahmad Badawi had approved it. He had to go to Perth, ostensibly on a holiday, to explain. Now the United States wants it. It needs one in a Muslim country so it can show at least one Muslim country which objected to its adventure in Iraq is concerned enough to allow it. It would not in the four months to October. Would it after that? Almost certainly, yes. There is no serious interest in Malaysia's long term goals, only for short-term gains.

That fault must go to the good doctor himself. He had acquired in his 22 years in office a persona of a Zeus on Mount Olympus. His autocratic nature, and the speed with which he removed cabinet ministers and civil servants for opposing or contradicting him led to a "monkey see monkey do' culture, which does not know how to react to crises, or plan long-term policies. Still, he could have been more magnanimous. He still could at this speech at the end of the assembly on Saturday, 21 June. But would that be too late?

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