SO, IS IT FITNAH: THE ANWAR IBRAHIM SAGA

WHILE “conjecture is no substitute for truth” says the Holy Quran, some too credible circumstantial evidence makes speculation excusable in this case. If I’m wrong, may God forgive me.

Obviously the man the press labels as de facto leader of PKR, Dato’ Seri Anwar Ibrahim, has little choice but to find redress in the Shariah Courts, especially if he is not guilty. He knows what the alternative court of law is capable of doing, despite his ultimate acquittal. The world, too, knows this!

The correctness of this move by him, however, relies heavily on the assumption that God’s law will not be gerrymandered at the whims and behest of political masters by the faithful. And, an even bigger assumption is that the system is indeed manned by pious Muslims who fears no other but God. But most of all it assumes that his accuser is truly a man of faith and, therefore, God-fearing. Sadly, this last could prove to be a mistake and the ensuing debacle a mockery of Islamic law.

One very important pointer that is indicative of questionable character on the part of the accuser is the man’s willingness to be sodomised. Why I say this is because it is difficult – even near impossible – to see this whole affair as one of rape. He is young compared to Anwar, who is 60. He is a big fellow, bigger than the average as his photograph with Datuk Shahrir Samad makes clear. He is a fit young man compared to Anwar who has had severe injuries inflicted on him by the late former IGP and a horse riding injury to his neck. If Anwar had tried to rape him he could have easily beaten the man to a pulp, had he wished. Don’t you think? No, instead, he allows it to happen and then makes a police report. Why?

I would love to speculate on this, but I have no facts to back my suspicion other than that the young punk can get an appointment to see the DPM at his residence. But even here there can be many legitimate reasons and one of them, as the DPM says, is that he is a rakyat and the DPM is an elected leader of the rakyat. Seeing him, even at what must be short notice, can be plausible. The Lord works in mysterious ways for His own purpose. Lame though this may appear to be it could be true. Wallahu’alam.

Yet, there is one strong assumption I can still make, I feel. I can surmise quite accurately, from the many pictures of him with ministers and those with access to them, that this is an ambitious young man going all out to rub shoulders with the high and mighty. What other reason can there be for this but to climb the ladder of success given the “who-you-know” culture that colours success in our society. Let us also assume that he was hedging his bets when he moved into Anwar’s private office, as assistant no less. When on 8 March 2008 the biggest upset in Malaysian political history occurred, surely he was able to smell the strong whiffs of potential power where he was. And the months following made it even more demonstrable. Nevertheless, he chose to throw the spanner in Anwar’s works at precisely the most important point of the man’s political comeback.

That there was no rape we can almost be certain of. This is a fair conjecture. Why, therefore, complain and make it so public in a police report and open oneself to prosecution when it is consensual sex? Herein is the conundrum. Such intimacy will only make him more favoured by the boss and if he really believed that a comeback by Anwar is highly likely (presumably the reason for his joining the PKR camp) why spoil the show?

One possible answer is that richer, more immediate rewards – measures of success in a materialist society – are forthcoming elsewhere. Speculation, of course, but this is entrapment pure and simple meant to foil the tsunami of Anwar’s comeback that will drown BN into oblivion. The question is whether there is a puppet master somewhere in the murky backstage of Malaysian politics, someone who believed the possibility of Anwar’s return to Parliament as opposition leader, or even PM, to be real. Or was Saiful “fishing in murky waters” so to speak, with the intention of auctioning his sordid services to the highest bidder.

Now, under either of these circumstances, one would have thought that some way would have been found to record the incident, preferably on video. After all, this is premeditated. If someone’s behind this seamy episode this kind of evidence would destroy Anwar once and for all. On the other hand if Saiful is the sole mastermind of the entrapment a truly rich reward would be paid by the highest bidder for any kind of evidence. But there is no evidence, hard or otherwise. Silly ain’t it!
END

MALAYSIA: THE MENTAL EVOLUTION IS ON

IS IT REALLY? Or are Malaysians just peeved: peeved at not being able to get their hands dirtied, as have the politicians and their cronies; peeved at being marginalised because in this last round there has been no need for cronies -- just the wannabe first family will do nicely, thank you (they are reputedly so closed shop that one nominee/crony was quickly christened by critics with the family name) ; and, peeved because this lot dared flaunt their power thinking that they can do it with impunity (You have to give back too mate, not just take: like kept petrol prices down and cooking oil cheap.)!

As a result, the general elections of 8 March 2008, with a definitive tug, pulled the rug from under the feet of the Barisan Nasional (BN), a coalition party that has ruled the country, in one guise or another, since independence. Ministers, deputy ministers, other self-important office-holders and unofficial official holders fell and some were alleged to have fallen but rescued by foul means. This latter only the courts can verify. We, the people, having done what we set out to do, will have to wait and see whether we truly got it right. Was the last Government genuinely so disinterested in us and absolutely corrupt or are we victims of the blogs that have no business publishing rumours passed off as "news". My bet is that the truth lies somewhere in between.

Robbing BN of its two-thirds majority and putting in alternative governments in 4 states with economies instrumental to maintaining the national economic health and restoring the overwhelming majority of the PanIslamic Malaysian Party (PAS) Government in the east coast peninsular state of Kelantan, the people have made it impossible for indifference to economic policies. Now the federal government must indeed be innovative and ingenuous to merely sustain the already lacklustre growth that even now is under threat from a global financial meltdown.

Remember the 1997 regional financial meltdown? It took spunk to keep the people happy. The good doctor kept us, the people, in work. But that we take for granted because it is indeed the function of governments TO LOOK AFTER THE PEOPLE'S WELFARE. Governing is about TRUST. Those voted into office is entrusted with the overall well-being of those who voted them into office, a necessary consequence of the social contract. If they did not, why would be allowing them to make policies that will definitely impact on our lives, for better or worse???

Unfortunately, while that bit of the bargain was then kept, there was another, equally important, that was ignored! TRUST meant that things would be kept above board. EQUAL OPPORTUNITY should have meant only that and not massaged to mean something else under the pretext of Malay special privileges. The cronies that the system spawned under the good doctor helped make the wannabe first family and create the climate that so disgusted the electorate, which culminated in the humiliation of the prime minister, especially, and the BN in general. (Why are the BN component parties silent in the face of such a debacle? Is this an admission of joint liability?)

Malaysia is peculiar in that a convention makes the New United Malay National Organisation (UMNO Baru) -- lest we forget, that is what the current UMNO is -- supremely important. Not unlike the importance of the American presidential elections is to the world, the election of the UMNO president is pivotal to the country. Whoever is the UMNO president will be the prime minister of any BN federal government. And, whoever is the deputy president will step in if anything happened to the incumbent. This is why it is imperative that the top party posts be fought for democratically to ensure that indeed, the best person will win.

With this, another of the good doctors errors was made. In transforming the party from a democracy to an oligarchy, for the simple purpose of holding on to power, UMNO was left with an anointed deputy president and, therefore, Malaysia a prime minister, whose honeymoon period with the nation is not only over but a divorce petition is most definitely already issued.

Under these circumstances, with the exception of the incumbent prime minister and his deputy, intransigence is unacceptable behaviour. UMNO must indulge in navel gazing and figure out how to restore its prestige. Naturally, the most immediate move is to find a new leader from among its MPs. One veteran politician of many decades and a former finance minister has offered himself.

Tengku Razaleigh Hamzah is the only UMNO sitting MP with the stature to hold the country's economy together given the pressure the new Government faces. On the one hand, an impending global economic slowdown, if not recession. On the other, the need to work with the State governments of Selangor, Perak, Pulau Pinang and Kedah to ensure that economic growth is sustained. When it was just Kelantan in opposition hands the strategy of strangling its economy was of little consequence to the national equation. Now, however, the industrialised states and the country's rice bowl are in the hands of parties of the parliamentary opposition. Strangling their economy would only damage the nation.

Now, too, the BN Government has lost its two-thirds parliamentary majority. No more riding rough-shod over the opposition. Bills will have to be debated and the government benches cannot afford a split. Without access to lucrative government contracts UMNO members have to be kept in line by appealing to their better nature of national duty and ethical conduct. A leadership tainted with allegations of corruption and incompetence cannot hope to unite an unhappy party.

UMNO must give the nation a new leadership lineup comprising of able and honest men and women, a leadership that can impress the electorate the next time around. Unfortunately, a much harder task than usual because the competition now has the wherewithal to prove themselves to the public. Having been out of the political leadership lineup now for more than two decades, nobody can point a finger at Tengku Razaleigh and accuse him of corruption. His track record speaks for itself: he is the architect of the Bumiputra economy, not an easy feat because Malaysia then, when he set up Petronas and later was finance minister, was a fledgling nation. Not a stranger to opposition politics the prince from Kelantan may be well placed to appeal to the opposition on the basis of national interests. And, in the face of the mishandling of the Terengganu palace by the incumbent, he is the salve to heal that wound.

Tengku Razaleigh and his UMNO Supreme Council members will be very conscious of the need to overhaul UMNO and BN's image, both nationally and internationally. He will not resuscitate the "dead" by appointing them to his Cabinet, as has the incumbent who has left the people appalled at his sheer audacity. No one sitting UMNO MP can hope to challenge his credentials and his credibility in the face of a newly restless electorate that have drawn "blood" by asserting their democratic rights. If UMNO is not to be relegated to the pages of history its members must act to placate the public NOW!!!
END

PHILOSOPHY FOR SCHOOLS

TURGENEV REMINDED ME OF THE SKIRMISHES between my father and I, how much I was Arkady to his Nikolai Petrovich. Bazarof though I was not. Didn't have the intellectual wherewithal for reasoned debates, the confidence to pull off a flawed argument and the arrogance to believe I cannot be wrong. And so a skirmish it was, every time, no battles, no wars and innumerable retreats. Maybe what we had going was guerrilla warfare of the urban kind.

I had stumbled across Ivan Turgenev's "Fathers and Sons" while rummaging through one of Carrefour's bargain baskets awhile back. For RM9.95 this classic was dirt cheap for the hours of pleasure it gave me. Better than television any time. Value for money it was indeed. I took it up and stopped only to sleep and completed it, cover to cover, in a day and a half. It was more compelling than any action novel I have ever read. It reminded me so much of my days as my father's daughter. And here was a 19th century tale in pre-revolutionary Russia hitting very close to home.

The generation gap, it would seem, is a necessary mechanism of social evolution and, maybe, even revolution as the Russian "nihilists" proved. In Turgenev's Bazarof we see the first example of a Bolshevik, dreamers who think that goodness can be built from ground zero up and structures are all that is needed to eliminate everything undesirable in human existence. Soviet Russia's collapse proved beyond a doubt that the human factor is not so easily fitted into moulds. Again it was the young and the youngish that turned the communist experience into an utter failure. Russia's late 20th century youth were so enamoured of western consumerism and its illusion of untethered freedom that no amount of repression could stop things from changing.

The Russian example then, tells us that the views of the young ought to be taken seriously and not dismissed as inconsequential for the consequences could be grave.

In Malaysia, however, there is comfort in knowing that there are no Bazarovs amongst us. The Islamists are the nearest thing to possible chaos that the country has. Still, we are living in ever present danger of a zealousness that has no alternative social constructs once the present one is overturned. The Islamists are Malaysia's Bolsheviks. They have a vague idea of a glorious future without any notion of what make things tick; what political systems would best deliver the social and economic goods to the people; and, most of all, they persist in a mistaken assumption that because they believe what they want is generally good, others therefore, are stupid to resist. It is this arrogance that always leads humanity up blind alleys.

And this is the error of youth: half-baked belief systems, excessive unchannelled energy easily manipulated by jaded has-beens, and an impatience waiting to be ignited as soon as the critical mass is achieved. The imperative is then, to expose our youth to politics and political philosophy while at school, as an academic discipline so that they are well aware that systems are human machinations not set in stone and that ordering society in all its disparateness has no magic formula.

But what about youthful exuberance that borders on the hedonistic? Here, the lure is of consumerism and lifestyles and no less a menace. Again, it is one of urges and base instincts. Again it is a problem of under exposure to such disciplines as ethics and morality. In short, philosophy is one subject that ought to be introduced to school children and modulated to suit young minds. For, it trains people to think critically and constructively. But, beware, too, of the of it becoming a tool of propaganda. In Soviet Russia Marxism became an uptight dogma fed religiously by the system to manipulate the population. Here, in today's Malaysia, religion is being dogmatically taught to petrify minds and paralyse society into exclusive mental ghettos.

Philosophy is not the preserve of ivory towers. It is the means to intellectual dexterity. Given that it encompasses the whole spectrum of ideas spreading from left to right it teaches the student the importance of informed choices. Understanding the causal relations of social phenomena is the key to a stable society. It creates empathy. Philosophy is the bridge that can close the generation gap, if not today then definitely a generation down the line. But as "Fathers and Sons" shows the reader there has to be a meeting of the minds across the generations before there can be any positive outcome. If the young tells the old that there is something badly amiss it should not be dismissed. The parent generation must investigate the grouse and fix it. When the young stumbles on something positive don't be ashamed to accommodate it. Hopefully, when philosophy becomes an academic staple in schools, the young can be accommodative too.