Things seem to be a wee bit topsy turvy of late!! A lot of people , including this writer, are confused.
First, a lot of people remember that our founding father had declared on many occasions that we are a secular state.
Then recently Malaysiakini reported the DPM said that ours is an Islamic State!
Following this, many people have voiced their opinion , especially in the blogs , supporting one view or the other.
MCA’s secretary general spoke up and cited historical documents to support that this is a secular country.
I thought this was a good sign that we could have a free and heart-to-heart debate on this issue. A debate on this issue is also good to let the younger people realise what was the social contract at the time of Independence.
Then , a government official issued a ban on this matter. The ban, issued by this official, covers all political parties, except PM and DPM. It would seem that it covers the other cabinet members as well.
I am confused.. A government official banning ministers to stop discussing this??
I am confused. Why would they not allow a debate on this? After all, the DPM when he fired the first salvo would have anticipated responses from various groups.
I am confused whether we have 2 sets of standards in this country.
Following this, UMNO youth gave a warning to MCA to shut up, according to Malaysiakini.
I am even more confused. Isn’t MCA part of BN? If so, why not let them have a chance to speak up and at least win some votes back from their community?? aren’t MCA seats part of BN seats??
Issuing a warning to a fellow BN component party is not a wise move. If they keep quiet, it would appear to the Rakyat that they are weak and just followers of UMNO and that would cost them lots of votes and some seats. If they don’t keep quiet, what would happen? A public quarrelling between 2 BN parties??
I am confused that why can’t they just discuss all these in private, through the so-called proper channels, like they always insisted?
One thing I am not confused. All these point to the sign of an impending elections. UMNO would want to win votes from the rural Muslim majority by talking about an Islamic state.
MCA, by voicing out, want to savage whatever face they can and try to swing back a bit of the Chinese votes by giving a perception that they are fighting against Malaysia being made an Islamic nation.
But when a warning is issued to MCA to shut up, it has actually pushed MCA to a corner without any more space to maneuvre. This will not auger well to MCA and by extension, would not auger well to the whole BN.
This is not unlike the proverbial “shooting one’s own foot”.
That, I am utterly confused.
Dr. Hsu's forum 
Jul 23, 2007 @ 15:43:36
Darren, you are prophetic about Hishamuddin pushing MCA into a corner with his dictatorial Tai Koh’s threatening words – I detest his “warning”. How dare he!!!
Even a cornered rat will fight back, and finally a cornered MCA has found its long missing backbone to say: “‘Nuff is ’nuff”. Good on those MCA blokes.
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Jul 23, 2007 @ 15:56:03
No, it could be another attempt
Now, UMNO youth looks like the champions of Islam.
By fighting back, MCA now looks like the champions of Chinese.
So, both are superheroes according to their own communities..
You .. get what I mean?
Regards,
http://sagaladoola.blogspot.com
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Jul 23, 2007 @ 16:06:57
will the keris man draw the keris again ? an education minister shouting for blood what kind of signal is he sending? No wonder education standard keep dropping. He should instead concentrates on how to make UM comes within top 499 of world ranking… for a start
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Jul 23, 2007 @ 17:01:42
Dear Dr Hsu, in this BolehNation, you’re not the only one being confused. UMNO Youth giving warning to another component party – are you surprised? They’d done something even more outrages than this – remember when we were hosting the APEC event and lo-and-behold, UMNO Youth members were having a demonstration outside the convention centre, asking one of our country’s guest at that time (representing her country in the APEC event) to leave? Now, you tell me, isn’t UMNO, being the backbone of the government, and by extension, is the defacto host of the APEC event? What UMNO Youth has done then, was like a child asking his father’s guest to leave the house! Well, we are truly democratic aren’t we? 🙂
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Jul 24, 2007 @ 03:13:57
There will be hope when the die hard idiotic Ah Mows and Ah Tows cease to be perpetually superstitious in the belief that the MCA or Gerakan actually serve their common interests just because of some minor services they can render to make themselves apparently relevant.
The Ah Mow and Ah Tows should, e.g., should wake up to the fact that because their own communal parties fail to tackle the bigger issues properly at the higher that at the municipal level, licensing and other market hawker problems keep emerging.
And that goes full cycle to enable the contrived minor relevance these parties thrift in….in their minimalist way.
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Jul 24, 2007 @ 04:01:43
Great analogy. I personally think you could use the same analogy to describe NEP (or whatever they want to call it now). They shoot the right leg so that the left leg could walk as fast. Doesn’t really make sense. Especially when only one big smelly toe is benefiting from it.
If this is my body, I would cut off the big smelly toe. With both legs receiving the same amount of exercises, I bet I could run faster. Even jump higher than Singapore.
But then I’m only imagining things. Without a strong leader with high ideal, nothing will changed. Time will only strengthen the so-called “culture”.
Whenever I read the comments on BolehNation I feel really sad. So many talented people have left Malaysia. Yet the Government is so unresponsive. Or should I say, only responsive to their own needs. Ah, I wanted to throw up again.
(Just my personal view. I don’t represent all BolehNation’s members.)
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Jul 24, 2007 @ 09:13:06
This is a peculiar country.When a leader feels insecure one way or other, he has to resort to racial or religious sentiments to garner support. Najib’s is a classic case. God bless Malaysia!
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Jul 24, 2007 @ 15:39:48
This is not the first time that an UMNO high ranking leader has declared Malaysia an Islamic state. Former PM Dr Mahathir on 28 September 2001 made a similar statement, adding that many ulama have defined the concept of an islamic state and therefore, Malaysia qualified as one. The previous announcement naturally raised eyebrows and deep concern among non-Muslim communities. On October 20, 2001 MCA orgainzeda forum attended by the then PM’s Religious adviser Tan Sri Dr Hamid Othman, Universiti Teknologi Mara Assistant VC Prof Dr Shad Saleem faruqi and Sisters-in-Islam Executive Director Zainah Anwar, to clear the air and shed more light onto the former PM’s controversial announcement.
According to Dr Hamid, there is a big difference between “secular” and “secularism”. Islam, according to him, accepts secular but not “secularism”. Secular in the first component of Islam means in this life, striving for betterment, providing services for the wellbeing and welfare of fellow men, carrying out their duties and responsibilities. Islam however cannot accept “secularism” which means that there is no life after death (only living in the world this life). Secularism means there is no punishment after death and this runs contrary to Islamic teaching. Dr Hamid added that there is no mention in the Quran or by Prophet Mohammad’s saying on what an Islamic state is. However, the Quran has stated clearly the “duties and responsibilities.”According to him, UMNO since the beginning of the Merdeka government has been performing the 12 duties (Islamic) until now. Sisters-in-Islam build upon the argument that UMNO had responded to the accusation (by Opposition PAS) by launching an Islamization policy. What it saw as a gradual effort to create a society that it would imbibe with universal Islamic values. but the challenge today, as Zainah Anwar (Sister-in-Islam Executive Director) said like in many Muslim countries, the main political conflict is not so much between Muslims and non-Muslims, but rather among Muslims themselves. Contending visions of Islam and the shape of the nation’s state. Even in Malaysia, you can see clearly this battle on what Islam, who is Islam is teh right Islam, and the status of women being the first casualty. Supported by her argument that in many countries such as Malaysia, Indonesia, Pakistan, Bangladesh, Egypt, iran, Morocco and many others, Muslim women and women groups are the forefront in challenging traditional religious authorities and Governments in the use of Islam, interpretation of Islam that discriminate against women.
And lastly, Dr Shad Saleem Faruqi said that there is no “one” version in communism, socilaism, capitalism, secularism. It is a matter of semantics. For that matter, there is no “one” version of interpretation or definition: “Islamic State”. There is “no” one model of an Islamic state. He added that issues comlicated in that the Malaysian Constitution is not entirely articulate as to whether Malaysia is a “secular” or an “Islamic State”. Our Malaysian Constitution lacks a “reamble”. Neither the word, “secular” nor “Islamic” appeared anywhere. The Rukun Negara also after 1969 also did not use the words, “secular” and “Islam”. It used the words, “believe in God.” Article 4 (1) stated the written Constitution is the supreme law of the federation. Though Islam is the religion of the Federation, it is not the basic law of the land and Article 3 (on Islam) imposes no limits on the power of the Parliament to legislate. He added that Islamic law is not and never was the general law of the land either at state or federal level but concluded that malaysia can indeed be described as an “Islamic” or Muslim” COUNTRY (in view that Muslims constitute the majority of the population and Islamization being vigorously enforced).
I hope the abovementioned shed some light onto the controversy of the political statement. Of course, in an Islamic state is further compounded by the “facts” that the principles of political leadership draw from the basic source of legislation from the Quran and the Sunnah (example) compared to our parliamentary monarchy system vis-a-vis supremacy of our Federal Constitution. Other areas to look into under an Islamic State include the judiciary, social order, culture, gender relations which do differ from our current system ogf governance.
Stanley Koh
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Jul 24, 2007 @ 21:29:59
No confusion at all. The Kris Hisham is trying to gain some political capital by waving his silver keris, hopefully the pakcik & makcik at the kampung see him as a hero, and vote for him. And the MCA also do sth to tell all the chinese in Malaysia they can do the job.
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