The jailing of former Prime Minister, Datuk Seri Najib
Razak is an act of tremendous significance to Malay and Malaysian political
culture.
Since Merdeka in 1957, the Prime Minister has been
perceived as the principal protector of a large segment of the citizenry. As
protector he is not just the most important office-holder in the Malaysian political
system. He is the inheritor of political authority in a governance structure
rooted in a traditional polity, namely, the centuries old Malay Sultanate. For
protecting the interests of his people, specifically the Malays, he is ‘entitled’
to unquestioning loyalty from his ‘subjects.’
Unquestioning loyalty, regardless of whether the Ruler
is right or wrong was a much eulogized trait in the relationship between leader
and led right through Malay history. Though it has been eroded by education,
social mobility, democratic practices, electoral competition and the like, it
continues to be perpetuated in contemporary times through the United Malays
National Organization (UMNO), as I argue in my 1979 book called Protector? A
study of leader-led relationships in Malay society from the Malaccan period to
the present. UMNO wore the cherished mantle of protector of the Malays for
decades against real and imagined threats to the community---- up to the 9th
of May 2018, when it was defeated in the 14th General Election.
Despite its defeat, UMNO is still a formidable
political force. It remains to this day, the most powerful political party in
the country among the Malays. Its influence within the grassroots of the
community is pervasive. In the last two years, it has attempted to present
itself as the only genuine protector of the Malays through the articulation of
issues, some real, others false, which, on the whole, have resonated with the
community. The inability of its main adversary, the ruling Pakatan Harapan(PH)
in power from May 2018 to February 2020 to demonstrate that it is more capable
than UMNO of protecting the genuine interests of the Malays unwittingly
strengthened the hand of the latter. Besides, the two main actors in PH, Dr
Mahathir Mohamad and Anwar Ibrahim were engaged in all consuming Wayang Kulit (
Shadow Play) battle revolving around the question of when one should succeed
the other. As a result of this Wayang Kulit, the PH and its allies could not
concentrate their energies on curbing and curtailing UMNO’s perceived role as
the protector of the Malays.
Now the present ruling coalition, the Perikatan
Nasional (PN) or at least some components of it, perhaps with the PH, have yet
another opportunity to try to diminish the impact of the
protector—unquestioning loyalty syndrome. The court decision on Najib focuses
upon alleged wrongdoings --- abuse of power; criminal breach of trust; and
money laundering ---- of someone who was
once a principal protector. Should one continue to be unquestioningly loyal to
such a leader? Surely loyalty is only to
virtue. How can there be loyalty to vice?
Isn’t such a perverted notion of loyalty a betrayal of the very
fundamentals of Islamic ethics?
Shouldn’t the majority of UMNO leaders and its three
million odd grassroots members see the Najib verdict and the trials involving
other UMNO bigwigs as a wake-up call to the party to get rid of corruption and
wrongdoings? In other words, shouldn’t
this unprecedented event, the jailing of a former UMNO president and Prime
Minister on charges related to corruption and venality prompt the party to
undertake the sort of introspection that will lead to a thorough cleansing of
its body and soul?
It is not just UMNO that needs this sort of cleansing.
Given the lack of transparency in electoral funding and the opaqueness of
political financing in the country, all political parties should be willing to
cleanse themselves. This is why the proposed law on political financing and
electoral funding which has yet to see the light of day should be of the
highest priority for both our legislators and our citizens.
We should be encouraged to push for this and other
similar reforms at this juncture for two reasons. One, Najib’s conviction
reminds us that the Malaysian judiciary ---whatever its warts and pimples ---
has over the decades found well-known public figures guilty of wrongdoings and
punished them accordingly. There are not many judicial systems in the world
which have done this without fear or favour. Two, it is equally remarkable that
the Executive, specifically Prime Minister Tan Sri Muhyuddin Yassin upheld his
pledge not to interfere in the judicial process though the man in the dock is
still a political leader of considerable weight in UMNO, the main component
party of the ruling Perikatan Nasional (PN). Indeed, Muhyuddin’s position as
Prime Minister in a sense depends upon the continued support of Najib’s party.
It was in that sense a bold and brave move to allow the rule of law to prevail
and justice to triumph, as Muhyuddin said he would.
As a result, the cynicism and skepticism displayed by
a huge segment of the so-called educated stratum of Malaysian society on the
eve of the High Court verdict in Najib’s case turned out to be totally
misplaced. It shows that there is a need for us to show some faith in the
willingness of certain individuals at the apex of society to exercise restraint
in their use of power and to observe the basic norms of governance. Likewise,
there are individuals of integrity in our judiciary who cherish their roles as
custodians of justice.
It is such individuals wherever they are who will help
to transform our political culture into one that values the dignity of the
human being.
Dr Chandra Muzaffar’s Protector will be re-published
by Gerak Budaya in the next few months with an Afterword written in the wake of
the 2018 General Election.
Kuala Lumpur.
30 July 2020.
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