MGG Pillai Commentary View

<< Previous || Next >>

The Selangor mentri besar on the hot seat

THE SELANGOR MENTRI BESAR, Dato' Seri Mohamed Khir Toyo, is hunted like a cornered rat. Few in UMNO shed a tear for him, and fewer if he is sacked. UMNO wants him out. He has his supporters, notably the former prime minister, Tun Mahathir Mohamed. If he is forced out for that, the new UMNO president, and Malaysian prime minister, Dato' Seri Abdullah Ahmad Badawi, would know what Dato' Seri Khir does: uneasy is the head that wears the crown. The usual reasons are not enough. Abuse of power and corruption are expected of those in office. If Dato' Seri Khir has to be sacked for that, so should all elected officials.

So a crisis is manufactured to whet the public apetite for political murder. The UMNO-controlled "Utusuan Malaysia" newspaper cast the first stone: a series of articles that reported on the denudation of the forest reserve that encircles the Bukit Cahaya Seri Alam agricultural park, how 35 companies linked one way or another to Dato' Seri Khir had destroyed a third of that in less than 20 years – from 3,145 acres (1,1285 hectares) in 1986 to 2,116 acres (858 ha) in 2005.

Utusan Malaysia and his UMNO detractors reasoned rightly that others would join in this very public political assassination. It worked. Dato' Seri Khir had to cut short his official holiday at public expense in the United States – officially it is a study tour; in practice, as the Malacca chief minister, Dato' Seri Ali Rastam, would tell you. it is anything but a paid holiday at public expense, and often paid for by business men granted contracts or projects in the state – and the UMNO leaders who met him at the airport were there to pick his entrails.

They knew UMNO would cast him to the wolves, hedged their bets, and hoped they would be selected to replace him. In the past 35 years, Selangor had had four mentris besar, of whom only one – Dato' Seri Hormat Raffei – left office with his head high: one went to jail, one was forced out after he was caught with RM2.4 million ringgit worth of foreign currency which he did not declare to the Australian customs, and Dato' Seri Khir would be for his mishandling of the Bukit Cahaya Seri Alam park.

He puts on a brave front. He denied the Utusan Malaysia reports, which in his view relied on his political enemies in UMNO jealous and envious of his brilliant success as mentri besar. He insisted the forest reserve surrounding the agricultural park is intact and has suffered no ecological damage. It did not wash. Pak Lah flew over the denuded area and saw the destruction for himself, and ordered him to take "swift and severe action".

It is an open secret that he controls, through proxies, several of the 35 companies involved in the rape of the forest reserve. One company, Lebar Daun Development Sdn Bhd, even tried to buy political support by contributing RM3 million to Yayasan Penyanyang, the favourite charity of the prime minister's wife, Datin Seri Endon Mahmood. She showed it to her husband, who discovered its links to Dato' Seri Khir and asked her to return the cheque.

It should have warned the mentri besar that all is not well. He ignored it. A straw in the end, he decided as the former deputy prime minister, Dato' Seri Anwar, thought when a scurrilous book about him was published in 1998, and went about as if he was in total control. But Selangor UMNO bayed for his blood. It felt he has not playing the games according to long established rules, that the loot be shared, and though it backed him, the knives were out. He annoyed more people than he should have, he did not understand the changing mood of his people, that his statements of intent treated with the derision Pak Lah's are.

The Kampung Medan racial incidents made him out to be a Malay racist (unfair, but that is how it is when the mob takes over), an Islamic fanatic after Jawi, the state's Islamic watchdog, raided an entertainment outlet, arrested and harassed the Muslim patrons, with both Muslims and non-Muslim baying for his blood, and ignores the housing needs for the poor. It is an open secret that the low cost houses are given to the National Front (BN) leaders, who sell them for double and pocket the difference.

When Utusan Malaysia published the articles on Bukit Cahaya Seri Alam part, he stood naked. An unlikely coalition of disparate interest groups, political parties, secular and religious groups, UMNO leaders led by Pak Lah, united to demand his dismissal. It gets more support by the day. He is now a political pariah. You cannot find an UMNO member who backs him and be quoted. The mainstream newspapers, all controlled by UMNO or other BN member, having scented blood, sharpen their knives for the kill. He would not even be allowed to retire with dignity, as his predecessor, Tan Sri Mohamed Taib, could. The political climate requires he be driven driven out of office.

How did he land in this mess? Tun Mahathir plucked him out of obscurity at the urging of his son, Dato' Mokhzani. Once in office, he believed he had made it. He had high ambition. He wanted to be UMNO Youth deputy leader, but Pak Lah's son-in-law, Mr Khairy Jamaludin, wanted it more. The suspicion grows that his political problems began when Mr Khairy decided Dato' Seri Khir should be a political eunich when party elections are due in 2007. But the former UMNO treasurer, Tun Daim Zainuddin, is widely believed to be the instigator of the Utusan Malaysia reports. The details do not matter. But once the allegations stuck, and he could not explain them away, all rushed in for the kill, Dato' Seri Khir's political future is all but over.

Helping this along is the rising power of the Internet weblogs, where individuals could express as they cannot elsewhere, and the mainstream newspapers, whose only aim is to support the government, would not print any letter critical of those in office, unless it is about Kelantan, where the opposition Parti islam Malaysia or PAS is in power. As the Sabah chief minister, Dato' Seri Musa Aman, only know too well, the weblogs reveal the arrogance of the elected official, and where the until-now impotent elector can voice his frustrations. But he is in better luck, though all he can buy now is time, though not that he in the end is forced out of office. Pak Lah's future as UMNO president is grouted on backing Dato' Seri Musa, as it would by dismissing Dato' Seri Khir. The heat is off the Sabah chief minister for now. But not the Selangor mentri besar.

If he does not leave quietly, his fate could be of Dato' Harun Idris who refused to resign when ordered to, and was jailed for corruption. He cannot expect any deal now. If he does not resign, he must be charged in court. He does not know from where the attacks come. And if another high profile as his misdeeds at Bukit Cahaya Seri Alam should surface, even Pak Lah could not save him from prison. Pak Lah has decided the agricultural park is too important for Selangor to abuse, and wants Dato' Seri Khir to hand it over in perpetuity to the federal government.

The Federal constitution forbids this. Only the ruler-in-council could, followed by an act of parliament. The federal authorities pressured Selangor to cede in perpetuity the land that is now Putra Jaya, and it raised political shackles between UMNO and the palace. Dato' Seri Khir cannot cede it without the Sultan agreeing to it. Another issue rises: is the removal of Dato' Seri Khir a devious political ploy for the centre to own the agricultural park?

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