TR EMERITUS

Dear readers, There are some rumors going round in the internet forums that we have the tacit approval of the family of the late Dr Allan Ooi to publish his farewell letter. This is completely untrue. No members of Allan's family had been in touch with us and neither did we know where to contact them. The letter was forwarded to us by a purported friend of Allan. We made the decision to publish an excerpt of it on our own accord. We would have sought the permission of Allan's family to publish the letter if we had their contacts, but we didn't. We apologized for the infringement of the privacy of Allan's family. Nobody instigated us to publish the letter. We will take full responsibility for our own actions. What are our motives for publishing the letter? All we ever wanted is for the truth to be out and clear Allan's name. Falsehoods must be debunked immediately here and now or they will soon become the irrefutable eternal "truth". We respect the privacy of Allan's family, but we also respect Allan's dignity at the same time. There are no absolute rights or wrongs. It just happened that we chose the latter. To us, the end justify the means. It is a tough call - stuck between reversing the damage done by the mainstream media and adding more pain and agony to the family. Some of you may support what we have done. Others may disagree. We will stand by our deed and accept whatever come our way. We beseech you to help us end these baseless speculations wherever you encounter them. We will not be making any more comments on this matter. Let time be the ultimate judge.   THE EDITORIAL TEAM  Read More →

(1) Introduction:   Be forewarned, this is a very long report not for the faint hearted – it recounts why bloggers like to hammer our government. We advise you not to read this as this will alter your blogging experience in ways and means which we cannot be held accountable for.   (2) A Brief History of the Anatomy of the Cognitive Dissonance   This segment proposes to forward a chronological account to describe how did we get here? Along with questions as to what are the formative milestones encountered during the journey? Causal factors which were deemed operable to all the actors in and outside blogosphere will also be discussed.   In each segment of this report, “breaks” and “milestones” will be identified to account for the following phenomenon.   -What accounts for the “cognitive dissonance” between netizens and government?   -Why is there a prevalent culture of skepticism, cynicism and disbelief of anything government?   These specific breaks and milestones will be referred to as “V” for practical planning notation purposes.   2.1 Why is the past so important?   The working assumption is based on the operating logic: if one doesn’t even know the past, then it’s impossible to build up an accurate picture of the relationship that defines netizens and government to move forward sensibly.   Neither would it be possible to accurately scale the extent of these differing views to effectively craft a workable solutions to close the gap. 2.2 How did the “we against them” mentality develop? It would appear the divide between bloggers and government is unique and particular to suggest it warrants a special case examination. We don’t believe that assumption to be true. This prompts us to consider whether the root causes accounting for the divide between the blogging community and government may even display traditional factor conditions i.e organizational pathology which is characteristically seen in traditional clashes between management and unions, class wars and normative competitive scenarios. Three main stages have been identified, charted, differentiated to be socially and politically relevant in accouting for this divide. 2.2.a The Advent of the Internet During the advent of the internet, government initially decided wisely or naively that though a novel invention - blogging amounts to nothing more than a disingenuous way of circulating information. The relative impact of these online discussion, in being able to shape the landscape of collective consciousness was adjudged to be relatively low or minimal. The nexus between online social media and its potential to be profiled into a wonder weapon as seen recently in the Malaysian GE was still not widely perceived as a real and present danger during this period. The relative importance government ascribed to this new phenomenon in shaping the collective consciousness was generally adjudged to be negligible. Hence no attempts where made to either project or interdict to engage the online community. We consider this to be a very serious omission and for the planning purposes, this has been identified as the first “break” referred to as V1. 2.2.b – Stage 1: The cult of sniperism In Stage 1, the preferred strategy of government appears to be one of restating the adage at every turn and opportunity – content is king – a corollary of that implies while the MSM should be treated as an all weather reliable purveyor of the truth; conversely, the internet remains a feral and dangerous domain where lies and disinformation proliferate. It should be treated as circumspect with a healthy dose of suspicion. It’s even conceivable during these initial stages, a la mission civilisatrice was launched to educate the public on the perils of the net. Though no official confirmation exist todate to establish this as a fact. Even at this relative stage of infancy, many bloggers had begun to challenge the mantra by forwarding the idea “quantity (though amateurish) was a form of quality.” or “blogging was an equivalent of reportage.” Since government strategy implicitly relies on the economic assumption people will always gravitate towards quality. It was not uncommon for the MSM to reinforce this belief through repetition and reinforcement drives to drive home the point, MSM is salvation; the internet is perdation. This single track strategy deployed by the MSM is responsible for the first break in “reality” between bloggers and government (note MSM and government for the purposes of this report is treated as synonymous entities). [special note to planners: in your planning at a strategic level. You will need to augment his misalignment in the MSM first! Pls do not proceed to recommend strategies to augment the internet UNLESS this is first and foremost in your TOR action priority list - treat this as an AN for V1]  One of the main flaws of this strategy lies in the paradox when the importance of something has to be regularly proclaimed. Disbelief is often the by product  – to exacerbate the divide many of these attempts by MSM to restate the “truth” leveraged directly on direct and open criticism of blogging content. It’s conceivable this may have precipitated a sort of arms race which spawned the cult of sniperism. The terms is apt, as a sniper’s job is to deliver discriminatory, highly accurate rifle fire against enemy targets that cannot be engaged successfully by the regular infantry men because of constraints of range, size, location, terrain etc. During stage 1 melee’s between bloggers and MSM, a game developed where a distinctive pathology began to emerge to account for how blogger’s could successfully produce a win result against the juggernaut MSM – bloggers began to cultivate the oblique eye – where they would challenge the veracity of the MSM as the sole purveyor of the truth. At this stage, the primary weapon of the blogger was counter reportage of the observable kind and nature. This style often involved a mix of barbed repartees and comic relief reminiscent of the adage that was frequently used against Pravda, “Pravda means truth, but there is no truth in Pravda.” During this period, the MSM often provided an endless supply of canon fodder for bloggers to perfect their skill of arms. Since the former would slavishly follow the official pronouncements of the party apparatchiks, they could also never contradict the clearly-stated pronouncements. This refusal to acknowledge fallibility became the bull’s eye of the blogging community. By this time many of the incentives which is required to perpetuate a game began to be fleshed out in earnest; not only were bloggers who highlighted discrepancies in the MSM feted with readership, but they were even venerated very much like ace fighter pilots and their style, parlance and attitude widely emulated by netizens. A defining watershed that further solidified this polarized pathology was further exacerbated during the Mr Brown vs MiCa saga. From that point onwards the game has begun in earnest. 2.2.c Stage 2 – The Awakening While stage 1 describes the conditions precedent which made possible the whole hypothesis of the arms race – stage 2 attempts to provide a discursive account of how the competitive game between bloggers and govt was perpetuated. In stage 2 interactions. The blogging community seems to have successfully crafted a unitary identity complete with its own set of historiographies and reward based system, where it able to successfully hold its own narrative against the MSM’s version of reality. There is also evidence to suggest in stage 2. The cult of sniperism has reached a point of obselence and new skills of arms were required to extend beyond merely distanced nit picking. This new capability was made possible for two main reasons: - Firstly, the protective enclosure offered by the MSM, which the govt has traditionally relied on as it’s first defensive line is was by this period so completely overrun by the cult of sniperism; it neither had the means to effectively mythologize and perpetuate the culture of veneration to reliably sustain the image of the political hegemony any longer. In the eyes of blogging community at least the MSM no longer had an semblance of credibility. - Secondly, an unitary culture was beginning to take shape in blogosphere. The exact nature of this culture or where it came from remains imprecise even at the time of writing, but we believe in all likelihood, it would have resembled very much the grand narratives of emancipation and enlightenment: which once questioned the official line - that independence is to be wished for them so long as it is the kind of independence we (govt) approve of. Only in Singapore, net parlance suggest, it is closer to: I dowan lah, go and die lah! What appears to have precipitated the arms race to renewed heights of sophistication at this stage appears to [following the Mr Brown vs MiCa saga] be the apperance of aggregating sites. Aggregators are virtual hubs responsible for harvesting salient reads commonly produced in blogosphere – apart from serving as meet points to allow bloggers to chat and exchange critical information. They are also social platforms which allow for the tacit shaping of a shared identity and common values. The pathology which aggregation sites solicits from its users is very similar to primitive irrigation societies; here since traffic or water is a shared resource; there is a high level of cooperatism; a series of gates needs to be manage to ensure everyone gets the optimal quantity of water. In the same way, aggregators accomplish this balancing task by channeling readers to different nodes in blogosphere - they modulate not only patterns of behavior between bloggers, but more importantly funnel people into common public squares. Thereby inadvertently setting the rhetorical cadence since what they may aggregate will essentially be marketed as the culture of blogosphere. This is evidenced when one examines net reading patterns during stage 2 period where it is not unusual for each aggregating sites to have their respective loyal readership. It is also worth noting during this period net speech or parlance begun to proliferate. Prior to the Mr Brown vs MiCa saga, net speech such as the “States Times” - “Shit Times” - “147th” did not exist see (E-bot Diagram 1 - vid run @ 34). The manner in which they proliferated and taken root in the manner they did is suggestive that aggregating sites may have played a crucial role in the supply chain of information. This operational feature of aggregators should always be borne in mind by planners. YOU NEED TO FACTOR THEM INTO YOUR ASSUMPTIONS! This prompts us to consider at stage 2, whether bloggers have begun to not only to network extensively by exchanging critical information so as to extend their skill of arms – but have they even begun to synthesize new information? One notable example of this is the sharing of information such as how to blog without getting in trouble with the law? Or how to post undetected by using proxy servers?  But the creation of new words is suggestive, bloggers may have also by this stage begun to fashion their own “truths” to account for their diseparate version of “reality.” While we have found no inconvertible evidence suggesting a centrally organized force accounts for this phenomenon – in Stage 2 we did register bloggers may have also migrated to a higher plane shedding their prototypal skill of arms – the cult of sniperism. Again this escalation of skill of arms is consistent with Richardson models of how an arms race should pan out under a given set of circumstances. In Stage 2 not only have the actors begun to draw their battle lines, their identities are unitary and homogeneous unlike stage 1. Their positions diametrically opposed to the establishment view. And there is ample reference to suggest conclusively by this intermediate stage in the game; bloggers have even begun to fashion their own parallel universe by ”breaking away” from the narrative advanced by the government. Bloggers may have also begun the first protocol task of ritualizing and stylizing their class politics to perpetuate the rewards and penalty system of anti establishment blogging – this accounts for the pathos of the period, that is usually described as a parallel universe. Skepticism and cynicism by this stage had become not only synonomous with blogging culture but also a badge of honor. A derivative of the parallel universe syndrome is the pathology that we have today come to regard as the widespread skepticism and cynicism which we usually associate with the blogging community – internet parlance during Stage 2 supports the contention what we consider as entrenched cynicism may have calcified during this tumultuous period. To facilitate the planning function, 2 observations have been noted to be operable during this period designated as V3. • bloggers have begun to synthesize their own version of the truth in earnest. [note: this is a significant escalation from the basic skill of arms associated with the cult of sniperism - where the game is only played at an entry level of counter reportage i.e “you wrote this, but look I snapped this with my camera phone. What do you have to say huh? ” • The rules of the game are structured along the lines of anticipatory versus complex systems – where not only does the skill of arms assume an increasingly ritualized and stylized form. But by this stage it is also characterized by a higher level of intellectual content – as premising, analyzing, attribution and referencing becomes almost a de riguer entry requirement – at this level the syntax that describes this level of the gaming experience can be described in the following terms, “you said you are going to do this. Cite you authority and precedent to do so? According to basic principles of human rights, you cannot do it!” This observation point has been designated super V3. [Special note for planners: Super V3 has been classified as not only the main fissure point accounting the cognitive dissonance between bloggers and govt. As we shall see in Stage 3, this will be your platform for your assumptive work.] 2.2.c – Current Snapshot of Blogosphere Stage 3: How does Stage 3 differ from 1 & 2? In this phase of the game, bloggers are not only content to dogfight with the MSM. They appear to be even questioning openly and directly the broader aspects of govt policies and initiatives with increasing levels of sophistication. What differentiates Stage 3 competitive scenarios from Stage 1 & 2 is the high level of interdiction skills demonstrated by some bloggers to not only pre-empt government initiatives, but also to color them with a high level of interpretative gloss as to what policies should rightly be pursue and why? How are they doing it differently from 1 & 2? Unlike Stage 1 & 2, Stage 3 is marked by a high level of specialization with major blogs fragmenting to different quadrants in blogosphere. In some cases, there is a strong symbiotic nexus, where net traffic is two way, but more often, they are much very different neighborhoods enjoying their respective unique demographics and style of readers  - we don’t really know what accounts for this balkanization of the competitive platform - there are a few theories. - Bloggers may be tweaking their material to serve different interest groups along the readership spectrum. - Readership goes through a natural selection process based on demographics, age and education levels. - Infighting in the blogging community. Leading to foced and decision based segregation.  Whatever the reasons what is clear is Stage 1dog fighting which used to rely implicitly on taking either potshots or exposing incongruence in what was published by the press is no longer an attractive proposition to pursue. A few possible reasons account for this: - The MSM has begun engaging the blogging community. - The MSM has changed their strategy from the previous strategy of non to constructive engagement. What are the threats and opportunities in Stage 3? We are not suggesting Stage 1 type blogs are dead - reading is after all a self selecting exercise. Only most bloggers have migrated upwards in the competitive quadrant. Neither are we suggesting the level of cynicism and skepticism which typified Stage 1 & 2 blogging psyche has diminished significantly - only it should be recognized the pathology of mistrust that has always characterized the relationship between the govt and netizens is beginning to show signs of stabilizing with bloggers who blog openly at least. An unknown quantity is how does this measure up with the broad based statistical significant anonymous majority? It has to be disturbing when one considers anonymous posters account for nearly 94.3% of blog related traffic and chatter. How is the game played at stage 3 - what are the incentives and penalties? It is conceivable, in Stage 3, there will be more incentives for bloggers assume an even higher level of philosophical coherence in how they may choose to write to come across as more appealing to their readership. As the game from this point can be expressed in the following terms: “yes, we know you want to do it that way. But have you considered this way?” However, despite the general positive take of Stage 3 blogging - it should be emphasized under the strongest possible terms - this type of blogging is anticipated to exert more stress on govt’s processes in the long run despite, it’s veneer of civility forwarded through reason discourse - as stage 3 represents the conclusive state of the arms race. If Stage 1 is the age of the sling, stage 2 is the age of the blunderbuster, stage 3 is the age of the guided precision warhead - it should not come as a surprise to planners therefore to regard this stage with renewed vigor. It should always be remembered e-engagement is a double edged sword. As at this level of the game, not only are bloggers beginning to leverage on philosophical parallels elsewhere to not only draw comparatives to further question the Singapore official rhetoric of how getting things are done. But also at Stage 3 bloggers have begun to develop suggested solutions and counter proposals. This supports our believe, for Stage 3, “good” attributes to remain sustainable; there must be a renewed effort by the govt to e-engage in an effective and productive manner. Get it wrong and you will be in hot soup. There is a clear and present danger if govt fails to e-engage effectively; then a reversal may possibly even occur where blogging may return to Stage 2 hybrid Stage 1 type blogging. Concerns & Misc Issues A challenge posed to govt at Stage 3 blogging is this obviously extends the footprint of bloggers to even cover the domain of govt; previously in Stage 1 & 2, the scope of bloggers was very much limited to the role of commenting on tactical and contempraneous (past tense) issues. Another pressing issue is how does govt recruit the participation of anonymous bloggers? Failure to do again, may lead to a regressive state or worst still a forced isolationist state? In Stage 3, the blogging reach is anticipated to increase significantly where the general scope of questions covers not only tactical, but also strategic issues.   What’s notable in Stage 3 is how this is accomplished - by juxtaposing comparative Western models with our own - here the blogging focus will look something like this: why can’t we do it like the French or Americans? Not only is stage 3 characterized by a high degree of comparative analysis, but there is also indicative signs many of these proposals will embody Western thoughtware. In this competitive scenario the following questions is set to make up the complexion of blogosphere: - Why can’t we be more transparent? - What are the checks and balances? - Where is the accountability? - What forms our first principle rights? - What constitutes our accrued rights? We do not know what accounts for this sudden shift and congruence towards Western models. It could well be, bloggers by stage 3 have reached a point of diminishing returns in their capacity to determine equivalence or approximation by simply relying on Stage 2 tools. To instill their argument further with a higher degree of persuasive content to their readership, they appear to be retro-fitting western concepts into their material. What we do know is, this is suggestive the arms race may have finally reached a terminal point of maturity and it’s unlikely to develop further beyond this stage. In Stage 3 encounters, not only will the government’s golden line of incorruptibility, dependability and quality increasing come under closer scrutiny. But against the backdrop of a chorus demanding for greater transparency, accountability and rationality.   A few good example of Stage 3 type encounter is the GST debate where welfarism was injected into the debate ; along with references questioning the wisdom of the free market vs interventionist / S377A and Minister’s pay. In every case, these debates are increasingly juxtaposed against a world stage with comparatives, extrapolations and superimposition with how other countries may be pursuing these goals.  Here readers should note the crossings over between cultures and different states of minds are distinctive and peculiar to Stage 3 blogging experiences, unlike Stage 1 & 2 where they are notably absent.  Against the backdrop of this renewed Archimedean perspective of making sense of the world, not only will the government narrative be stressed. There is a real and present danger if no effort is made to redress these deficits by deploying effective e-engagement strategies. The position of the govt may even slip further. Against this new competitive backdrop, the magic wand of pragmatism, as a theory and science is certainly insufficient to withstand the test of critical examination for long. It is against this fractious social political climate in blogosphere that these proposals have to be crafted under. Read Part 2: Suggested Solutions for managing e-relationships between netizens and government / Part 2 / The Challenges. [This report has been compiled by the ASDF, the Think Tank of the brotherhood]  Read More →

This analysis has been written by the ASDF (Think Tank of the Brotherhood). A survey was conducted recently by the independent pollster Merdeka center of opinion research - UMNO is corrupt – two metrics stand out as a pithy summary of how most Malaysians these days have come to regard UMNO – 61% believe it to be corrupt – while 13% believe the party is out of touch with the rakyat (people). The question is will PAP go down the same dodo hall of fame as UMNO? To understand what conditions need to be present or must be obtained before such radical change can come into effect – it would do us well to first underscore many of the underlying causes which account for lack of transparency, poor governance lack of accountability and corruption which has provoked so much indignation in the public. 1. THE ANATOMY OF FAILURE To understand how UMNO degenerated into a basket case, we need to go all the way back to history. This we will do by tracing out in broad strokes 4 main motifs (1) The Malaysian credo – the struggle for Malaysian identity – Merdeka (2) hegemony – the struggle for Malay supremacy –Perjuagan (3) command and control – in the form and shape of money politics. Finally, (4) linking religion and politics Four elements have been identified by our team as the primary causal factors accounting for BN’s anatomy of failure. 1.1 THE STRUGGLE FOR NATIONAL INDENTITY – “PERJUANGAN” Unlike the Palestinian “intifada,” one of the great anti-colonial uprisings of our times, where struggle over the historical theme of Palestine forms the main montage which defines much of Arab awakening. In the history of the Malay archipelago since Merdeka i.e independence, as Alatas mentions in his seminal work, “The Myth of the Lazy Native.” There was never any real awakening in either culture or identity which allowed Malaysians to break free of the affiliations that dominated ‘colonial capitalist thought.’ Thus he concludes. Much of the remnants we associate with the past and even current Malay idea of “perjuangan” i.e the struggle for identity, is in effect a “false consciousness,” brought forth by a lack of intellectual break with British ideological thinking at “the deeper level of thought.” According to Alatas, the leadership of UMNO suffered in varying degrees from these residues of colonial thinking which resulted in a distorted reality as to how best to accomplish their political architecture. Unlike the Arabs and long before them, the colonist in America, who had ample opportunities to hammer out all the attributes of identity and culture which allowed them to successfully break away cleanly from the stranglehold of British imperialism. The Malay ruling party inherited the rule from the British without so much as a struggle. Unlike the tenacious struggle which once occurred in Indonesia, India and the Philippines. Consequently there was no real intellectual renaissance which made possible the whole idea of cultural identity. To substantiate his damning stricture, Alatas cites the total absence of a core intellectual class of Malays who could have been decisively in dismantling the oligarchies of empire. Most of the Malay leaders he notes without a single exception including Tunku Abdul Rahman  were recruited predominantly from the top hierarchy of the civil service trained by the British, and middle class Malay school teachers and civil servants. What this class of elites did was instead throwing out the old and starting from a clean slate – they merely perpetuated the British model of governance. In short, according to Alatas, “they failed to set the pattern,” to paraphrase, it was this missing link which gave rise to the first head of the anatomy of failure. As all they did was merely perpetuate the set pieces of the oligarchies of imperial power, albeit with slight cosmetic changes. As a consequence, even today, when we survey carefully, the political landscape of the Malaysian scene there remains residues of colonial command and control structures and much of them were built directly into the present day structure of BN. Even today in Malaysia, politics is divided strictly along racial, sectarian and religious lines (a legacy of imperial divide and conquer) – UMNO which stands for United Malays National Organisation represents the Malay majority. The rest of the component parties which make up the Barisan Nasional coalition are similarly organized; the Malaysia Indian Congress, which has been in existence since 1946. The MCA, the Malaysian Chinese Association. What we see here is no attempt was ever made to hammer down these racial lines to forge one supra national party that was able to successfully encompass these sectarian interest. As we will see later, the failure on the part of the Malay elite to hammer out one common all encompassing political identity was one of the reasons that contributed to the anatomy of failure. 1.2 THE MYTH OF THE ENEMY WITHIN Even at it’s inception after “merdeka” i.e independence, the idea of “perjuangan” i.e struggle for Malay supremacy, was directed towards preserving Malay hegemony at the apex of the political structure – “perjuangan” contrary to popular myth did not refer to the ongoing process of dismantling the elements of imperialism by continuously rooting out the old elements of colonial power. Rather “perjuangan,” in the strict Malay sense referred specifically to disarming the “enemy within,” who were considered the Chinese minority. As not only were they comparatively economically better off than the Malays, but since they were centered predominantly in urban nodes. They were often regarded as having a tactical superiority, despite their numerical limitations. These fears became only too real when the Alliance, the forerunner of the BN, performed disastrously in the May 1969 general elections. In the peninsula, the Alliance won only 66 of the 103 parliamentary seats in the general elections – history it seems repeats itself again, in 1969, Penang was lost, Terengganu was barely holding on. Kelantan fell to pass, and both Perak and Selangor hung precariously. This was followed by the racial riots of May 13. To consolidate their fledging political power, in 1972, the Malay elite coined the idea of “ketuanan Melayu” an ideology which states that the Malay people, who are all regarded as “Muslim” under Malaysia’s Kafkaesque legal system, are the original and defining populace of Malaya, and thus should have special status and privileges. This as Darkness and the ASDF noted based on their gaming constructs; set into motion the second head of the anatomy of failure. As Darkness observed based on a Mordecai 51 Game simulation, “by pursuing an economic order strictly along racial lines, they (the Malay elite) committed themselves not only on an intellectually unsustainable path, as the long term of effect this policy can only polarize the races and sharpen the sense of estrangement. Worst still. It was a false economy that reminiscent of Sovietization, as not only was it socially unsustainable but it also meant dismantling the whole idea of meritocracy – even the British did not consider this a sustainable strategy. This was their first big mistake. You can more or less say 99.9% of the problems Malaysia faces today emanated directly from this one policy of promoting the Malays at the expense of the other races.” The coinage of the bumiputra status along with the NEP (New Economic Policy – which favored bumiputra’s) formed the second head of the anatomy of failure. 1.3 THE AGE OF MONEY POLITICS The NEP (New Economic Policy) was based loosely on a pseudo socialist system of wealth redistribution in order to redress the economic gap between the Bumiputra’s and the Chinese. The consequence of this strategy led to a plethora of state inspired rights to promote Malays in trade, commerce, education and even politics. It could be said, much of the systematic problems i.e corruption / lack of accountability that mires BN today stems directly from this one corrosive policy. One theory forwarded by Vollariane head of our strategic think tank is as follows: “…..wealth distribution, if done correctly works – the communist and socialist proved that conclusively. There is no doubt there. However in the case of the Malaysian experience it failed because the elements of control and regulating this process of wealth distribution remained solely within the cloistered apex of the political elite and the parvenu bumiputra business class – these politicians I am sure started with noble intentions, but as time went by, the whole idea got so layered, contorted and misaligned that not only did it fail to re-distribute wealth. It eventually became a syndicate or old boys club whereby concessions, licenses and favors were regularly given out the to same political elites to support and maintain the very political structure that made possible this corrosive practice. We are not sure what is the primary drivers accounting for this shift, but it is fair to assume, we cannot rule out the nexus between politics and money to preserve the Malay elite hegemony. We are still sieving through the data. What’s important for our learning outcome is to register the system (wealth distribution) has managed to close itself and distanced itself from the rakyat, that’s to say not only has it managed to transfuse into an ivory tower, but it has become self sustaining very much like an ecology – that I am afraid is what usually happens when you couple money with politics. Both eventually merge into one reality. They become so inextricably linked, they are almost inseparable – to cut to the chase; in effect what we have here is simply institutional corruption very efficient that benefits only a few! You look at the NEP, its being around for nearly 50 years and it’s still a dismal failure…why hasn’t it managed to eradicate porverty? What accounts for the endemic corruption that scissors through the public sector? Why is there still a significant lag between bumiputra earning power and the rest of the races, most notably the Chinese Malaysians? These are hard hitting questions, which are sensitive, but we cannot hope to make significant progress unless we are prepared to look them straight in the eye. If you want to know; the answer is really simple. Wealth did not percolate downwards as it should have…go one or two steps further and ask who stepped on the hose line – the Barisan National!” One big clue is what happened in the 80’s and 90’s when the Mahatir administration launched one of the worlds biggest get rich quick schemes by privatizing everything from roads to tap water. The problem was the money circulated amongst only in a roomful of Malay elites – the vast majority of Malays, did not benefit from this. Remember Astroboy, there are two components which make up this corrosive equation; to make money, one needs to have political clout, so politics decouples completely from being the platform of service instead it transformed into the basis for wealth creation – how then can wealth distribution feature alongside this equation? That is why the NEP failed then, now and in the future. It’s a lousy system! …..Where I wonder does serving the people even feature? It cannot!” “Perjuangan” these days has taken on a whole new meaning, where the party slogan of the early days has bowed out and given way to an elaborate and grotesque system where loyalty is secured directly by monetary rewards. Even at the divisional level of UMNO “habuan” (pay out) culture dominates the social and political landscape. Thus the by words among many party members these days are contracts, concessions and commission – the three C’s which has become the very means of ensuring continued loyalty and support. This explains why even for the humble post of branch leader, there is often an intense fight for it – it’s an opportunity to get onboard the gravy train. This in turn, spawns another layer of economically inspired corruption that is based on having to continually solicit political loyalty and support through money politics. Hence even at the broad base of the pyramid corruption has successfully percolated right through the entire system. Thus not only do those contesting at party supreme council need to buy whole sale into money politics as the condition precedent for craving out alliances if they want to succeed. They also need to continually replenish their war chest to ward off incumbents and this means elevating corruption as part of the party political process. At the mid band of UMNO the same ritualized process of maintaining power filters through, only this time the war chest is smaller, but the corrosive practice of maintaining command and control remains essentially the same. Even those at the base of the pyramid, at divisional level have to do the same, if they want to remain effectively in power, albeit of a smaller scale and finally at the broad band at the base of the pyramid, at branch level, the same corrosive equation is replicated. 1.4 THE BANE OF POLITICS AND RELIGION. The third factor which led to the anatomy of failure in the Malaysian political system, resides in the mechanism for perpetuating Malay supremacy via “ketuanan Melayu.” In mark contrast to the framers of the Pancasila (Indonesian constitution); who insisted on every cost on a culturally neutral identity, compatible with democratic or Marxist ideologies, and overarching the vast cultural differences of the heterogeneous population. The Pancasila was meant to be all embracing to all races and did specifically promote any particular ethnic group based specifically on religion. In the Malaysian experience since the defeat of the Alliance (the forerunner of BN) in 1969 by the PAS faction, the Malay elites embarked on a master plan to consolidate their power by specifically weaving religion into politics to woe back the voters in the Northern rice belts. At first coupling politics with religion proved successful and BN was able to stave off the islamisation of Malaysia - as evidenced by the period of stability which characterized much of the the 70’s till the mid 90’s, but once again the formulaic approach ran directly into a dead end – the critical flaw in UMNO’s strategy suggest even within Islam there exist varying schools of thoughts as to what constitutes the gold standard. The philosophical divide centers on UMNO’s blend of Islam, “Hadhari”- which PAS and many ulamahs (religious teachers) consider as a compromised and water down understanding of Islam. PAS like Coca-Cola sells itself as “the real thing” – the quintessential Islamic party that aims to establish Malaysia as a country based on Islamic legal theory derived from the primary sources of Islam, the Quran and Sunnah. At a time when the air rents out with allegations of corruption, nepotism and money politics, it seems even UMNO has all but lost it’s capacity to successfully play the religious card to good effect – she’s adrift. 1.5 SUMMARY   The whole system is rotten right down to the core. Will PAP end up like UMNO? [You may experience font differences due to the need to harmonize different com- platforms to enable this report. This is an executive summary compiled by the Interspacing Guild; Lead Writer: Scholar Boy / Astro Boy – support from Vollariane, Memphisto, Cerebus and kadjal / ASDF strategic think tank of the Mercantile Space Guilds / Interstellar Federation of Planners  / alongside our newly formed Malaysian read clubs / PJ group and Damansara Permai read club – The Brotherhood Press 2008]      Read More →