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UMNO: Sinking With Pleasure Into The Quagmire

UMNO'S EXTRAORDINARY general meeting next week (18 Nov 00) to amend its constitution is its last chance to return to the Malay cultural heartland, its power base. But it would not. The amendments isolate moribund and decaying oligarchic leaders. forcing UMNO and its members further into its arrogant, self-induced impotence which cannot be cured even with political Viagra. The UMNO vice president, Tan Sri Muhiyuddin Yassin, and his team toured the country for proposals how to strengthen UMNO. But the UMNO supreme council rejected the one significant proposal it brought back from the bondooks: that the President be elected not by the 2,000 delegates but by the office-bearers of the branches and divisions -- all 30,000 of them. The party leaders, they believe, only wanted reassurance that what they proposed is what the ground wanted. The UMNO rank-and-file do not care what happens now.

One division leader accuses UMNO of not taking their views into account. Those standing for elections in the supreme council must continue to obtain minimum nominations -- 30 per cent of divisions for president, 15 for deputy president, eight for the vice presidents and two per cent for supreme councillors. Before the Prime Minister amended the party constitution to prevent challenge to his position, all it required was two divisional nominations for any post. Instead of elections every three years, only one would be held in every parliament, a year after general elections. So, UMNO's fluffs its only chance to put matters right, after if fell fould of the Malay cultural code when it destroyed its deputy president, Dato' Seri Anwar Ibrahim, now in jail for 15 years, convicted of sodomy and corruption. He had to be convicted if only to save the Prime Minister's skin, and so he was, after he was assaulted by the Inspector-General of Police after his arrest two years ago. It is this which makes UMNO members lose their confidence in their leaders.

UMNO wants change but not its leaders. The Buggins turn of electing its leaders sinks it further into irrelevance. So, the proposed changes sink it deeper into the quagmire. If supreme councillors and division heads are not chosen as candidates in the next general elections, they could well just not campaign. This sort of rebellion occurs before every election. In November 1999, several just moved to the opposition PAS. With the leadership legally fossilised, this would be normal. And if they are candidates, the rank and file who do not want him would rebel. Either way, UMNO as a party withers away. Already, divisional and branch leaders are disbelieved or distrusted or both, and UMNO members rush to their mentris besar to sort out their problems.

The mentris besar therefore acquire a more potent power in the state than the Prime Minister from Kuala Lumpur. More so in the wake of the dispute over petroleum royalties in Trengganu and the Putra Jaya transfer in Selangor. The next general election would be won or lost by how well they manage their states. Several in office are forced upon the states because the Prime Minister wants them. The office gives them power but in a contested environment as now, this forces him to take sides. This did not matter in the past because the Prime Minister was invincible then but now now. The recent appointment of Dato' Mohamed Khir Toyo in Selangor is a case in point. He is an unknown, with no political or other skills, but is appointed so that the Prime Minister would have Putra Jaya excised from the state without opposition. As one wholly dependant upon his support, Dato' Khir allowed the Prime Minister his way. But UMNO in Selangor does not like it, making the state unsafe for the National Front in 2004.

Come tha next general election, if they remain in office with no support in the state, they would have to become accustomed to sit on the opposition benches. The Pahang mentri besar, Dato' Seri Adnan Yaakob understands this equation better than most: he strengthens his hold by moving away from Kuala Lumpur as quickly as he can. The Selangor mentri besar and the Malacca chief minister are there only for their loyalty to the Prime Minister. The mentri besar of Negri Sembilan has outlived his political influence in the state. As the Gerakan chief minister in Penang and the UMNO mentri besar in Perlis. With the opposition, especially PAS, hard on its heels, the mentris besar must have local National Front support to keep his control. If that could only by moving away from Kuala Lumpur and the Prime Minister, they would.

The UMNO constitutional amendments should unloosen the umbilical cord between the mentris besar and Putra Jaya; instead, it tightens it. It is too late to amend it further. The die is cast. There could well be no further elections until after the next Parliament: one was held in May, within a year of the November 1999 elections. This gives the Prime Minister continued dominance for another four years. He would want that. But the longer he stays the more difficult UMNO's post-Mahathir life. Especially when many UMNO members, including the prominent ones, eggs this on to ensure UMNO's demise. Especially, when it inhibits members from high office unless the leaders want them. The members are disgruntled with UMNO. A backlash beckons with this total erosion of state rights. But the 74-year-old Prime Minister sees his own survival more important than the 20-year-younger UMNO. But it does UMNO no good at all.

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