Malaysia Mudah Lupa?

You have to give that RPK some 'respek', man. Never mind that he was willing to languish in Kamunting - and that he knew it was coming and kept on rollin'. Never mind that he hitched his luck to someone who wasn't exactly a sure bet.

You have to salute him, and those like him, who were willing to be martyrs for a cause. Just because the cause was worthy, and not necessarily because the people whom the cause battles were really as worthy as the battle.

We've not entirely worthless as patriotism goes, but we're - how shall I put it - rabbit hopping on a high jump event. The bar is always high (and for that matter, the Malaysian Bar was a test of strength as well) and it's supposed to be. If it weren't, the value of the win wouldn't be as worthy either. We'll have the heat-of-the-moment rallies when a new political party is born, or when elections come along. Heck, we might even deny a two-thirds victory and send some states over the other side and call it a 'tsunami'. But chances are that when it's just about civil liberties and human rights, and not about the price of wan tan mee doubling, Mahathir had the right idea. Malaysia mudah lupa.

How so, you say? Well, Umno has decided to put into the line of succession one whom RPK's wife said would "throw away the key" and leave her husband in detention the rest of his life. So much for the voice of dissent, the cries for reform from within. Anwar, on whom RPK publicly placed his own fate, has waffled on his takeover plans, and with it, RPK's freedom. And as time passes by, even the man himself has worried that Malaysians would forget about him.

Abdullah Badawi insulted the public recently saying that the real way to combat high prices would be to not buy at high prices. Never mind that it's his fault we have those prices to begin with. Ironically enough, the only people who unwillingly fit his plan are those who are fed on less than five ringgit a month. Those under the ISA.

I was never that crazy about Malaysia Today, to be honest. But I recognize that it was for all of us, even if in a slightly caffeinated state. And for that, I say to all who read these letters, jangan mudah lupa.

Here's to you, RPK.

As Others See Us

Excepts from Race to Judgment by Zoher Abdoolcarim, in Time, Oct. 20, 2008.

Asia’s vast ethnic diversity means we are forced to confront many real differences – cultural, political, economic – that exist among us. Sometimes those differences erupt in violence. At least half of the world’s armed conflicts are in Asia, nearly all ethnic-based. But the bigger reason Asians do not focus on commonality is because their societies do not encourage it.

In many countries, ethnic divisions are institutionalized, with strict laws governing what one race can and cannot do. In Malaysia, an affirmative-action program gives preference to Malays over the country’s sizable Chinese and Indian populations in everything from university places to government contracts.

The world has already gained from the Obama candidacy. In one sense, and one sense alone, his skin color does matter. In Asia (with the exception, perhaps, of India), it is virtually unthinkable that an individual from a minority could rise to become a serious national leader. Whatever we may think of the U.S., of its hardly stellar handling of the conflicts in Iraq and Afghanistan, of its lack of oversight, restraint and thrift over the financial meltdown, the fact that a Barack Obama can overcome the disadvantages associated with being black and have a shot at the highest office in the land speaks volumes about the possibility of hope in America.