Can Najib drop ‘Malays’ from Umno?

Malaysian Prime Minister Datuk Seri Najib Abdul Razak is reportedly trying to get his Cabinet to drop the requirement for Malaysians to state their race in official documents.

This is a positive move but it raises questions about how far the government is willing to go in tackling Malaysia’s principal quandary, and whether it realises how deep the race-related crevices actually are.

Getting rid of the mention of “race” in official documents is the simplest, and most easily-enforced measure the government could take to hint at the direction it wants to go.

The problem is that it is a hint, and measures that merely hint at changes under-rate the enormity of the issue and throw doubt on the establishment’s willingness to force Malaysians to rise above race.

It is a drop in the ocean, and the racial ocean is one that is expanding by the day.

The recent rally against the Internal Security Act (ISA) was perplexingly criticised for attacking Malay rights.

Similarly, the anger against the death of opposition political aide Teoh Beng Hock while under interrogation by the Malaysian Anti-Corruption Council, was also spun incomprehensibly as aggression against a Malay institution.

Race has been a growing issue since the early 1900s, and as the British withdrew, we witnessed the rise of parties with names like the MIC, Umno and MCA. The only parties that consciously steered clear of race and religion were left-leaning ones.

Clearly multi-racial parties managed to challenge the Alliance coalitional model of race-based parties in the 1960s. This thrust was however defused after the race riots of May 13, 1969. Several of these parties were quickly incorporated into the coalition, leaving diehards such as the Democratic Action Party championing the multi-racial discourse.

There were good reasons why the affirmative action programme — the New Economic Policy (NEP) — implemented in 1970 had a 20-year limit put on it. The racial problems facing the country were diagnosed to be socio-economic, and not ideological in nature. That was a revolutionary shift in thinking.

However, the remedy for such a complicated and divisive socio-economic ailment, required meticulous application.

Comprehensive government measures to improve the lot of the majority Malay community so that racialism would lose its socio-economic basis ran the risk of popularising racialism as an ideology.

The formulators of the NEP realised that clearly, and therefore prescribed that the medication be stopped after 20 years.

The late Deputy Prime Minister and Home Affairs Minister Ismail Abdul Rahman described the NEP as a golf handicap that one worked towards getting rid of, while Ghazali Shafie, who succeeded him as Home Affairs Minister, is on record as saying that if the NEP had not worked after 20 years, then obviously it would have to be revised or repealed.

Most Malaysians today will have difficulty believing this, but the aim of the NEP was to reduce, not boost, racialism in Malaysian life.

On that score, the NEP has definitely failed.

The medication has led to a serious addiction, and many institutions and individuals are now dependent on the resultant racialism for their power and legitimacy.

Thus, if Najib wants to break his people’s dependence on racialism, he needs to be as radical in getting rid of the NEP as his father Tun Abdul Razak Hussein was in putting it into place.

The day he gets his Cabinet to drop “Malays” from Umno, “Chinese” from MCA and “Indian” from MIC will be the day Malaysia finally grows up – TODAY

The writer is a Fellow at the Institute of South-east Asian Studies. His latest book is Arrested Reform: The Undoing of Abdullah Badawi (Refsa).


comments

Some medication can be addictive. Once one becomes addicted to it, its is hard to overcome it. While taking this step, the withdrawal symtems is very painful indeed but the end is justfied. Can our present government see the wisdom?

Defending your race is a good thing but defending all races is better.


the administration has no incentive to change the racial segregation status quo - the changes in forms is for the gullible consumption of the chinese and indians. (its a perception play only - nothing that meaningfully impacts reality on the ground)

Removing race from forms is about 'big moves on small issues, small moves on big issues'.

The primary isssue NOT being addressed by the administration is equal racial rights, equal racial opportunities by law and enforcement by law.


The 'labeling' that institutions are racially owned is sole by folks competing for their self-interests via an unfair illegitimate advantage. (call a spade a spade)

UMNO hated the British so much they dislike to speak the English language as proven by our Rais Yatim's You-Tube reply to a Penang reporter such that he snide Medeka and followed with a very thick English slang. They shoudl stop using UMNO meaning United Malay National Organisation and translate it to Malay word instead. Probably Organisasi Rakyat Malayu Bergabung (ORMB) or something like that. There should not be anymore English UMNO in Malaysia words.

Stop using UMNO and start using Pertubuhan Kebangsaan Melayu Bersatu PKMB unless they are ashame of their own Malay name!
PKMB if they are really very proud of the ultra Malay status.