MGG Pillai Commentary View

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A tale of two Malaysian visitors to Jakarta

MALAYSIAN POLITICS DOES NOT travel well: it is too fragile to face the oft strident questions and comments about it that the Malaysian media ignores it unless they are of fulsome praise of its leaders. Let there be a major conference of world-shattering importance: all that matters for the slavish Malaysia media accompanying the Prime Minister is the hackneyed speech he utters; he is the centre of all attention, the issues unimportant unless he raised it.

Criticism of Malaysia is ignored, his routine courtesy calls on world leaders, full of anodyne remarks, is banner headlines in the Malaysian media and main news on prime time television and radio. The National Front (BN) government once controlled what is said in the Malaysian media. The internet political sites, media and weblogs shows up the sycophantic media coverage with a different view of the proceedings. But the lesson is not learnt. The official media coverage has not changed, is widely not believed, the irrelevance of the coverage shines through like a bright sun on a cloudy day.

Malaysian politics overseas was once limited to UMNO political clubs; they alone amongst Malaysian students overseas are allowed to partake what is official banned for students and undergraduates. They attend UMNO general assemblies, often take part in debates, and the luckier ones are picked for a political career in UMNO on their return. This for some arcane reason does not breach the ban on party politics for undergraduates. Last week, a Chinese undergraduate from the University Sains Malaysia in Penang was punished for campaigning for an opposition candidate in the last election. Nothing would have happened if she had campaigned for a BN party.

But Malaysian politics is most active in foreign countries that Malaysian cabinet ministers dare not meet Malaysian students overseas for fear of having to answer the intrusive political questions Malaysian journalists should be asking but often dare not. One gets the distinct impression that they are afraid to meet students overseas. Why they should be I cannot fathom: After all, the power to withdraw scholarships and bursaries is a powerful weapon in its armoury.

Or is it? It does not frighten any more. The BN loses ground every time it does. The Malay is not pleased to learn his child's scholarship is revoked for asking unanswerable questions about official policy. What changed it so dramatically is the Anwar Ibrahim saga. The Malay is incessed that Pak Sheikh is destroyed politically and humiliated culturally. If the BN wanted to destroy him, it should have killed him; but it lost its nerve. It pays the price. He is out of prison, is without doubt Malaysia's most charismatic and populist politician, holding the BN at bay at home and abroad. He is now all but untouchabe.

If anything untoward should happen to him now, say what happened to Ninoy Aquino in the Philippines, it could unleash forces beyond the government's control. He weaves in and out of the country throwing his barbs and taunts so forcefully uttered that the government is unable to, or would not, respond. It ignores him, hoping against hope he would go away. But he carves out spheres of influence around the world which forces the government's hands.

Tomorrow, the deputy prime minister, Dato' Seri Najib Tun Razak, arrives in Jakarta for a general border committee meeting. On Tuesday, Pak Sheikh arrives for a five-day private visit. One is an official, the other a private, guest of the Indonesian vice president, Mr Yusof Kalla. The two Malaysians, personally and politically, are like daggers drawn. The prime minister, Dato' Seri Abdullah Ahmad Badawi, who has an informal alliance with Pak Sheikh, worries about what could happen, and unusually has allotted a dozen men from his office to surround Dato' Seri Najib in Jakarta.

These general border committee meetings have a three-decade history, have no political impact, are aimed at reducing tension along the border, usually over territory but began life as a co-ordinating body to control the influx of communist irregulars along their borders. Pak Lah must ensure the two men do not meet, though that, given their intractible hostility to each other, is unlikely. But he cannot be too sure. In short, Malay politics intrude into national and international policy.

President Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono would meet Dato' Seri Najib but not Pak Sheikh. It is put out in Malaysia as an insult to Pak Sheikh. Why should it? One is deputy prime minister, the other a former deputy prime minister. One gets official honours, the other does not. But what should upset Dato' Seri Najib is the respective roles he and Pak Sheikh would play as guests of the same man. One has the barest of an official programme, correct in protocal, the other a full private one of much warmth.

Mr Kalla was one of those who looked after the Anwar family when he was in prison. That he is Indonesia's vice-president does not alter that that but one Dato' Seri Najib cannot understand. What must rile the deputy prime minister is that his past – and role in politically destroying Pak Sheikh – catches up with him.

UMNO ignores Pak Sheikh, hoping he would stumble. But he looms large in its present individual and collective memory. He carves an agenda that is rooted in opposition, with a clear view of what he wants, whilst Pak Lah and Dato' Seri Najib are caught in their petty political squabbles, with nary a view to setting the country right. What Pak Sheikh has to say is pointedly ignored, when it should not be, but the inconsequential rantings of Pak Lah gets banner headlines.

All it does is to show Pak Lah up as lightweight and inconsequential. He deserves better. But the BN-controlled mainstream media is caught in private agends of those who run them, and widely disbelieved. They will not accept that Pak Sheikh makes news. So the people get it from other sources. And it redounds on Pak Lah. Would the mainstream media change? Do iron trees blossom?

Whether Dato' Seri Najib likes it or not, he jumps into the hornet's nest when he lands in Jakarta. He will have the official courtesies, but not the private warmth reserved for Pak Sheikh. He does not have a moment's rest these days, having to watch his back from several corners, not part of the team he is deputy leader, straitjacketed in the maelstrom of growing UMNO irrelevance. Yet the blame is his if his visit to Jakarta brings honour instead to the officially designation UMNO traitor. He understands his plight but can do little.

UMNO puts more effort to sideline him than Pak Sheikh. Could he survive this? He plays it safe, believing this would take him to the highest post in the end. He is deputy prime minister for his refusal to take risks. He is, to put it bluntly, to UMNO what Dato' S. Subramaniam is to MIC: ineffective, expects the top post to fall to him without effort, but with a party president whose eye roam to another. But if he were to act with verve and confidence – like, for instance, calling on Pak Sheikh in Jakarta – he could perhaps have a new lease of political life. Would he do it? Do pigs fly?

M.G.G. Pillai
pillai@streamyx.com