06/12: The tried and tested route of history

Posted By: Raja Petra Kamarudin


Why has Malaysia Today not written anything about the HINDRAF rally of 25 November 2007? Why is Raja Petra keeping so quiet? Why no comment? The silence is deafening! Does Raja Petra and Malaysia Today support or oppose the Hindu demands?

Yes, I have been inundated by questions, questions and yet more questions. The fact that 80% to 90% of Malaysia Today’s news, letters, articles and blog items are about the HINDRAF rally and the plight of the Indians do not seem to matter. That is what others say. We want to know what Raja Petra and Malaysia Today have to say, came back the reply.

Well, I thought I would allow all and sundry to get in their two cents worth before I deliver my K.O. punch. If I make my move too early, then this would enable the ‘other side’ to modify their stance. Why reveal what I have up my sleeve too early? Let them ‘habis modal’ (can translate to ‘spent force’) first before I show the cards in my hand. Once they have thrown everything onto the table and have nothing left to offer, that will be when I will wham-bam my cards and take them for all they are worth. I will strip them down to their underpants and send them home in their seluar dalam.

And that time is now. But before that, read this e-mail which has been making its rounds in an attempt to stir up Malay nationalism and Islamic sentiments:

ANWAR IBRAHIM - HINDRAF No. 1 FAN

The Muslim community is now closely observing the actions of the movers and shakers of Hindraf, a small group of Hindus who are about on creating chaos in the country whilst maintaining the parade of championing racial and religious sentiments. In fighting for and defending the construction of Hindu temples, they have forsaken all sense of decency towards the others races in this country. What is the measure of their decency when they falsely allege that the government massacred 100 Indians during Kampung Medan incident in the year 2000?

Whilst keeping an eye on the antics of this group, the country was shocked when Anwar Ibrahim approached them from behind and delivered a speech motivating the 1500 odd Hindraf supporters who were congregating in front of the Kelang court house on 26 November 2007. Anwar urged them to continue with their struggle in defending their religion and the temple issue. That is Anwar, always striking while the iron is hot.

Likewise, during the Bersih street demonstration of 10 November 2007, Anwar made hay while the sun shone by making an appearance at the rally, when the coast was already clear and took over the lead in the handover of the memorandum to palace officials. That made the other opposition leaders look idiotic. They slugged hard, braved the rain and skirmished with the authorities. In the end, Anwar enjoyed the fruits of their labour, while they must be content with only the skin of those fruits.

That is Anwar! A politically-bankrupt ex-leader who favours “rear entry” to whatever circumstance he finds himself in. Weekly, in the “back” ground, he meets with the Jews and reviles the government, accusing them of being responsible for the economic downturn of the country, among other things.

He has conveniently forgotten that when he was the finance minister, he agreed to sell out the country when he proposed to accept the IMF package. That is Anwar, the Machiavellian prince with the motto, “the ends justify the means”. He will do whatever it takes for him to crowned, in this case, as the Prime Minister of Malaysia.

The silent majority of Malaysia make your stand now! Do you want this Liberation Tigers of Tamil Elam sponsored Hindraf to destroy the very fabric of Malaysian society? Do you want this failed finance minister who will stop at nothing and won’t hesitate to employ whatever means necessary to achieve his political ambitions to become our leader? Malaysia you need to decide now!

Anwar - the future Hindraf Prime Minister

Yes, that is the e-mail making its rounds, and the ‘message’ dovetails with the statement by Nazri Aziz that Anwar is the hidden hand behind HINDAF. The Umno Youth Leader in turn says that there are certain forces behind all the marches recently organised -- from the Bar Council march on 26 September, to the BERSIH march on 10 November, the HINDAF rally on 25 November, and of course the Batu Burok rally earlier where two people were shot. The talk amongst the Umno circles in the coffee houses and Mamak shops is that Singapore is behind all these rallies, engineered to destabilise the government and to bring about Abdullah Ahmad Badawi’s downfall.

The so-called Singapore connection certainly sounds far-fetched considering that Abdullah is said to be working hand-in-glove with Singapore and that the Singapore ‘plant’ in Abdullah’s government is none other than his ‘economic advisor’, Kalimullah. We can only assume that this Singapore spin is designed to deflect allegations that Singapore has infiltrated Putrajaya and that ‘Tingkat 4’ drafts policies favouring that tiny Island Republic. Whatever it may be, the spin-doctoring machinery is working overtime and the stories coming out of Umno are meant to confuse rather than to inform.

Undoubtedly, much of what has been happening has not been by perchance. If you think that Malaysia has become a victim of circumstances and coincidences, think again. There are engineers and architects at play here. And the endgame is simple; restore Malay unity.

As they say; why reinvent the wheel? Another cliché: if it is not broken, why fix it? That’s right; the best route is the tried and tested route of history. And this tried and tested route was proven on 13 May 1969, two days after the ruling party lost its two-thirds majority in Parliament and a few states fell to the opposition. Today’s scenario is a duplicate of 11 May 1969. They do not need to wait for the results of the 12th General Election to know what the score is. If the 12th General Election is held today, Kelantan, Terengganu, Penang and Sabah will fall to the opposition while the ruling party will loss its two-thirds majority in Kedah, Perak, Selangor and Pahang.

And that is why the tenure of the Chairman of the Elections Commission needs to be extended another year when he retires at the end of this year. Only he can ensure that the ruling party retains control of Parliament and the State Assemblies with a clear two-thirds majority. The postal votes system can’t be abolished, the Chairman replied indignantly, because that would be the only way to ensure that none of the cabinet ministers get kicked out of office. And when asked is not the role of the Elections Commission to conduct free and fair elections, he replied, with maximum arrogance, that the role of the Elections Commission is to ensure that the Malays will not lose political domination. And as to why the campaign period is so short instead of a minimum of 21 days, he told the BERSIH delegation that he does not have the authority to extend the campaign period and if they are not happy with that then go see the Agong and ask the Agong to make the changes.

And so, true to the advice of the Chairman of the Elections Commission, BERSIH took its case to the Agong on 10 November 2007.

The government is worried. Umno has accused BERSIH of ‘dragging’ the Agong into politics. But the Agong is aware that it was the Chairman of the Elections Commission who was the one who brushed off BERSIH and told them to go see His Majesty. And now the Chairman’s tenure of office is about to expire in three weeks time. Will the Agong consent to extending his tenure another year so that he can rig the 12th General Elections and make sure that the ruling party wins, yet again, hands down? This is an unknown factor. The Agong has already rejected the extension of the tenure of the Chief Justice, another crook. Chances are the Agong will also reject the extension of the crooked Elections Commission Chairman as well.

So they need to bypass the Agong. They need to amend the law so that the tenure of the Elections Commission Chairman can be extended without the need to seek the consent of the Agong. And they will do this on Tuesday, 11 December 2007. On Tuesday, Parliament will pass a law allowing the government to extend the tenure of the Elections Commission Chairman another year beyond retirement age. This will therefore make the Agong irrelevant. The Agong’s consent will not be required. The Agong can now be bypassed.

But this is still not enough. The Chinese appear to have abandoned the government. The Sarawak State Elections proved this. But the Malays are split four ways. We have the PAS Malays. We have the PKR Malays. We have the pro-Abdullah Ahmad Badawi Umno Malays. Then we have the anti-Abdullah Ahmad Badawi Umno Malays. At the last count, the pro-Abdullah Ahmad Badawi Umno Malays are down to 20%. 80% of the Malays are with PAS, PKR, and sitting in the anti-Abdullah Ahmad Badwi camp.

There are no two ways about it. The Abdullah camp has to pull out another 13 May 1969 rabbit from the hat. But they can’t wait for the results of the general election before they do this like on 13 May 1969. That would be too obvious and too risky. After all, they can already forecast the result, so why wait? They can do that now. A slight twist from 1969 -- instead of waiting for the results, they can pre-empt the results. But the strategy must be the same, unite the Malays. Get the Malays to rally around one issue. Then there will no longer be PAS Malays, PKR Malays, Anti-Abdullah Umno Malays, and pro-Abdullah Umno Malays. There will be only one group of Malays; a group united under the threats and insolence of the non-Malays.

In 1969, they thought they could contain the fire. Today, they still think they can contain the fire. In 1969, race riots actually broke out. This time around it does not need to break out. They can just suggest that it may break out and then nip the whole thing in the bud by rounding up all those ‘threats to national security’ under the Internal Security Act. This worked 20 years ago when they launched Operasi Lalang. Then, too, the Malays were divided. And, 20 years ago, they brought Malaysia to the brink of race riots and then rounded up everyone under the Internal Security Act and stopped the race riots before it could happen. But at least the Malays reunited under the ‘threat’ of the non-Malays -- a tried and tested formula which works every time.

Ali Rustam was asked to clamp down on the pig farmers in his state. When the Chinese fought back, as they knew the Chinese would, that triggered Malay anger. “They shoot Malays in Terengganu but the Chinese are let off the hook,” were the murmurings amongst the Malays. Then Ali Rustam delivered a speech at the PPP state convention and said that Umno does not need Indian and Chinese support to stay in power. Umno has ruled Malaysia for 50 years and can rule 50 years more without Indian and Chinese support, he arrogantly declared to the assembly of Indians.

Then Khir Toyo demolished a Hindu temple in his state and that triggered Indian anger. The HINDRAF petition to the Queen was mooted. Someone slipped in that most controversial petition that talked about ethnic cleansing and which called for an end to policies favouring the Malays. The HINDRAF committee never got to read the petition. Those 30,000 who came out that Sunday, 25 November 2007, did not know what the petition was all about. Many were not even aware of the existence of a petition. They were told that they are rallying in support of the trillions being claimed from the British government. Every Malaysian Indian is going to become a millionaire. They came out on the promise of the money. They were not aware that in the background was this most controversially-worded petition which would trigger the anger of the Malays and unite them all under Abdullah Ahmad Badawi.

Now the HINDRAF committee thinks that the petition was a mistake. They agree that the petition could have been better-worded. Granted, the Indians’ plight needs to be addressed. But words such as ‘ethnic cleansing’ and whacking the Malays across-the-board will not achieve what they are looking for. How did all that get slipped in? Who slipped it in? Why did no one notice? In all that euphoria why did one man handle the petition instead of the HINDRAF committee, which should have been the one that makes the last call on what the petition should have said?

Nevertheless, the focus was on crowd mobilisation, not on what the petition said. And that was what everyone concentrated on, not realising that the petition would set HINDRAF back in its efforts to highlight the plight of the Indians. At 2.00am on Sunday, the crowd started moving into Batu Caves. At 4.00am, when the Indians tried to start their march, they were pushed back into the temple grounds and the gates locked. At 4.20am, MIC gave the order and the water cannons started shooting into the temple grounds with volley after volley of tear gas until they ran out of stock. New supplies were brought in and the shooting continued under the watchful eyes of the MIC Youth Movement which was ‘directing’ the police operation.

Batu Burok is not the icing on the cake. The 10 November episode at Masjid India is also not the icing on the cake. The 25 November battle is not the icing on the cake either. The big bang is yet to come. This ‘tension’ is yet to peak. And it will peak when word that the government is going to clamp down on un-Islamic religious symbols and statues reaches the ears of Muslims and non-Muslims alike.


On 25 May 2006, the Kudat Town Board sent Chong Kah Kiat a letter ordering him to stop work on the construction of the Goddess of the Sea statue in Kudat, Sabah.

On 6 June 2006, Sabah’s Ministry of Local Government and Housing sent the Kudat Town Board a letter informing them that the Sabah Chief Minister had ordered all work on the statue to stop.

Then, a letter from the Chief Minister’s office was issued on 23 June 2006 reiterating the stop work order on the statue.

On 27 June 2006, the Kudat Town Board again sent Chong Kah Kiat a letter informing him that the government wants him to stop all work on the statue.

On 7 July 2006, the Mufti of the State of Sabah issued a religious decree (fatwah) that said the construction of any statue or replica of a living thing, either human or animistic, is forbidden (haram) according to the Shariah to prevent any heretic act of worshiping statues. The Mufti then asked that construction of Buddhist statues be stopped to protect the sensitivities of Muslims in Sabah in particular and Muslims in Malaysia in general.

And with that religious decree by the Mufti of the State of Sabah, this brings into focus that giant statue in the Batu Caves which comes under the jurisdiction of Khir Toyo, the same Menteri Besar who ordered the demolition of that Hindu temple in Shah Alam and which triggered the HINDRAF rally of 25 November.
In another incident last week, an Umno Member of Parliament asked that all Christian crosses and statues at missionary schools be removed. Going by what the Mufti of Sabah has decreed, the Umno Member of Parliament was not out of line. But why are they suddenly making this move against Hindu temples, Buddhist statues and Christian religious symbols? Surely Umno is not on self-destruct mode because they must know that the non-Muslims would rise up in anger. Or are they supposed to rise up in anger like in 1969 so that the Malays would become united again, like in 1969?

Yes, that is why I reserved judgement and refused to comment on the HINDRAF rally. It appears like there is more than meets the eye here. If the HINDRAF committee members were not aware of the most controversially-worded petition to the Queen, then who was? And was HINDRAF an isolated and unrelated incident or is it tied to the Chinese pig-farming issue plus is it connected to the Sabah Mufti’s fatwah declaring Buddhist temples haram and the call by the Umno Member of Parliament that all Christian religious symbols be removed?

Anyway, whatever it may be, those behind these religious controversies may have met their objective. The Malays may finally unite under Abdullah Ahmad Badawi as planned. And once that happens, Abdullah can safely call for the dissolution of Parliament to make way for the 12th General Elections. Okay, so they lose the Chinese and Indian votes. Okay, so they only garner 60% of the votes. But that does not matter as long as the 60% comes from Malay votes because these 60% votes from united Malays command 80% of the seats. And all Abdullah needs is two-thirds and 80% is more than two-thirds. And, in the meantime, all non-Muslim religious symbols and statues are declared haram and will no longer be allowed in Malaysia, by religious decree.

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