Self-proclaimed centrist Anas Zubedy, who has just published a
book titled Bodoh Politik 101: Easy Guides on How (Not) to Choose a
Malaysian Leader, insists he takes no sides in politics.
BODOH
Politik is when you think those who do not support you are disloyal to
the country or have been bought over by the other side.
Bodoh Politik is when you spend public money like it's your own.
Bodoh
Politik is complaining that certain media is biased to the other side
but you think it is okay when other media is biased to your side.
Bodoh Politik is when you say Malaysian students have no right to get involved in what is happening in their own country.
Bodoh
Politik is when you ask and advise others to vote FOR or AGAINST
someone simply because he or she is from BN (Barisan Nasional) or PR
(Pakatan Rakyat).
These are some of the amusing quotes found in a little book by Anas Zubedy called #Bodoh Politik 101: Easy Guides on How (Not) to Choose a Malaysian Leader.
Cute? Funny? Does any of these hit a mark?
The
quotes are actually some of his tweets from late last year and Anas
thought it would be a good laugh to compile them into an easy-to-read
book.
And he has dedicated it to so-called “Clever Malaysians”.
“We
need to cheer up a little because in our zest to make Malaysia a better
place, Malaysians are getting angry with each other to the extent of it
sometimes getting ridiculous on both sides of the political divide,”
Anas says.
“We must remember at the end of the day that while we might oppose each other's ideas, we are not enemies.”
He
believes there is a bunch of Malaysians who are active on the Internet
who have become “ugly Malaysians” and are using nasty words on Facebook,
twitter, blogs and the web sphere and who are also going around
screaming and shouting to disrupt the other party's ceramah.
It bothers him that political leaders on both sides are not doing anything against it.
“They should tell their supporters to not do it because it's not helping them or the country,” he says.
His book of tweets, he adds, is in jest and “yet deep”.
Bodoh Politik, he explains, means Silly (not Stupid) Politics.
Anas
insists he is a centrist who does not support any side of the political
divide. His tweets do take pot shots at both Barisan Nasional (BN) and
Pakatan Rakyat (PR).
Bodoh Politik is when you make chauvinistic jokes about women politicians.
Bodoh Politik is when you keep predicting the date of the next general election as though it is your day job.
Anyone
following politics in the country, including parliament sessions, is
able to tell for sure the first is directed at Barisan (thanks to some
of their MPs sexist remarks) and the second at Pakatan.
Then there are a few quotes that are very personality-specific.
Bodoh
Politik is when you run for politics and then go and bite the ears of a
policeman. It is a no-brainer that this tweet was aimed at PKR's Tian
Chua, who bit the ear of a policeman in 2007 after the latter threw a
punch at him.
The following year, Tian Chua was voted into parliament as Batu MP.
For the biting incident, Tian Chua was charged and fined RM2,000 but the policeman who punched him was never charged.
Describing him as “nonsensical” and “gila” (mad), Anas makes no secret what he thinks of Tian Chua.
“Why
so silly? How can you be a political leader and go and bite someone's
ear? There must be some kind of wrong make-up there (in the head) for
him to do that.
“Also, during the Bersih 2.0 protest, Tian Chua
got a bunch of followers to rush towards the policemen. For what? These
kinds of things make Bersih look bad.
“He's gila. But the good news is he's calming down and maturing.”
About
a year ago, Anas (who says he doesn't belong to any political party)
called for the resignation of the DAP's respected leader Lim Kit Siang,
which understandably got party members really angry.
They called Anas an Umno tool and attacked him ferociously in cyberspace.
One
of his tweets in the book pretty much sums up what he thinks about the
matter: Bodoh Politik is demanding old-timers from the other side resign
from politics but getting emotional when the same is asked from your
side.
Anas bristles when asked about him being seen as an Umno tool.
Stressing
that he has always been a centrist, he points out that before 1998, he
was seen as being anti-establishment and hence a leftist.
And it
was only after the 2008 elections, “when the left has gone so far left”,
that he who has remained in the centre now appears like a rightist.
“I've
never changed my position for the past 20 to 25 years. When I say be
fair to both sides', people say cannot'. To the opposition, anyone who
is not with them has been bought over or is with Barisan.
“Barisan used to be like that too. If you are in the centre, they used to call you a traitor, but not any more.
“I
take offence when people say I am an Umno tool. I refuse to take money
for my business from cigarette, beer and gambling companies, so do you
think someone like that will take money from Barisan or the Opposition?
“I will sue the next person who says I have been paid by Barisan,” he says.
People should vote for the candidate rather than the party, Anas stresses.
“We
have good people in both Barisan and Pakatan but the problem is the
good people might not be in the forefront so we need to support them so
that they can come up,” he says, adding that party members shouldn't be
too extreme to support their leader when he makes a mistake.
Some
of the politicians Anas likes on the Pakatan Rakyat side are Nurul
Izzah Anwar (PKR-Lembah Pantai), Nik Nazmi Nik Ahmad (PKR-Seri Setia
state seat) and Mujahid Yusof Rawa (PAS-Parit Buntar).
Anas
also takes to task race-based and religious-based political parties,
saying that PKR probably has the best multi-racial party at this point
in time.
He adds that macho political structures like having the main wing, a Wanita, Youth and Puteri wings is “so old school”.
To have more good leaders, he says, you have to allow people to rise and not segregate them into male and female wings.
“Women make up 50% of the talent pool. In the business world, we would be dead meat without the women.
“But
in Umno, it's the Wanita and Puteri who are doing the work but when
it's time to make the speech, it's the men who go up in front (to take
the credit).
“As for the Puteri, why call them Puteri in the first place? Princess? Come on, are we living 400 years ago?”
Anas
believes the 2008 general election changed the political landscape for
the better because “the government cannot take the people for granted
any more” although, at times, he thinks “the Umno fellows haven't woken
up yet”.
Another thing Anas finds hard to stomach is when the
opposition parties start compromising on principles in their desire to
get to Putrajaya.
“My favourite politician is Karpal Singh who
has always been anti-frogging (against elected representatives jumping
parties) but now he is silent on it because his own party wants to go to
Putrajaya.
“The opposition has betrayed us because they are not fighting against frogging any more.”
Pointing to Opposition Leader Datuk Seri Anwar Ibrahim
as being responsible for the opposition parties' compromising on their
principles, he says: “We do not have a checking mechanism any more so we
need a third group of people who are neither Barisan nor Pakatan who
are willing to voice out whichever side is wrong. Without that, we lose
our conscience.”
On Bersih, Anas says it is good to clean up the
electoral roll but saying that there is massive fraud and cheating in
the elections is too much.
Bersih 3.0 should have held their
rally in the streets of Putrajaya instead of Kuala Lumpur, he feels, and
he is sorry for “poor Ambiga” (Bersih 3.0 co-chairman) because he
thinks she got “played out” for working with the opposition parties.
Anas also has a number of tweets on the NEP.
He is all for affirmative action and says it should be celebrated for helping millions out of poverty.
But
he believes it was “designed wrongly” because it was a race-based
affirmative action, which meant huge chunks of very poor Indians in the
estates were missed out.
“I don't believe in equality. I believe
the poor must be helped. I think now we need a special Indian-based NEP
to help the Indian poor in areas like housing, schooling to jobs.”
One bad thing about the NEP, he says, is that it has created a nation of blamers.
The
Chinese who don't do well or are not rich blame it on the NEP, while
the Malays lack self confidence as they think they cannot be successful
and cannot survive without the NEP, he elaborates.
Anas is also
known for taking full-page advertisements in newspapers to celebrate
festivals. Even this has critics accusing him of being publicity-hungry.
In his defence, he says there's nothing wrong with publicity: Zubedy is the brand of his company and that brand is unity.
“We
have been advertising for almost every festival not only the major ones
but even for Vaisakhi and Vesak Day for so many years. I was also
advertising Sept 16 Malaysia Day since 2001.
“We are a business
organisation and we have a marketing motive. The world will be a very
boring place if nobody wanted publicity.
“The only problem is when people get publicity to do wrong things. I am trying to get publicity to win people's hearts to unite.
“I
don't think there's anything wrong with that,” says Anas, who points
out that accusations of him being publicity-crazy only started after he
asked Kit Siang to step down.
On the back cover of #Bodoh Politik, Anas has put a popular Malay idiom in bold. “Siapa yang makan cili, dia yang terasa pedasnya (Whoever eats chilli, he will feel the spiciness which means whoever has done something wrong, he will feel the guilt).”
For sure, some will feel the sting with this book.
This article has been publilsh and featured in THE STAR newspaper and website
