Be truly independent – stop talking of extending affirmative action

Many things could be done better in Malaysia, but I don’t have the energy, skill or fortitude to do them myself. Therefore, I choose to be more forgiving to those with good hearts who dive into the cesspool of politics to try to make things better.

Only those with good hearts, mind you! People who make tough choices and compromises and sacrifices but whose moral compass remains true. There aren’t many of those, so I’m not overly strained with having to accommodate them.

Recently I read some cautious statements that perhaps the affirmative action programmes which are the backbone of our national politics should be amended or phased out. However, these voices are mostly on the periphery of national politics.

Their positions are often couched in careful terms – perhaps a phased withdrawal at some uncertain date in the future or perhaps some amendments to the current programmes. Some convolute things by arguing for both “meritocracy” as well as some form of continuing affirmative action as the Malays aren’t quite ready to cut the ties to those affirmative actions yet.

False meritocracy

I’m generally not a big fan of this “meritocracy” argument. It’s often just people arguing for their own privileges, whether wealth, culture or some other forms of advantages that cement their head start, while simplistically conflating meritocracy purely through exam results and grades.

I’d rather affirmative actions be directed towards those who really need them, regardless of background. I’m myself a beneficiary of earlier affirmative actions, without which I’d probably just be a poor fisherman off Bayan Lepas staring at unemployment as the sea itself is swallowed up by artificial islands.

The original set of affirmative actions – the New Economic Policy – were actually meant to expire in 1990. That it did not wasn’t a big surprise. In 1990 many Malays were still living in remote villages far away from electricity, schools or hospitals. The aim of changing centuries of neglect within just a generation was too optimistic.

You can easily send young Malays for university education, but success in today’s capitalistic world requires a total mindset change. That transformation is difficult and carries the dangers of killing what is good about Malays – the gentle, warm and friendly folks not quite made for the dog-eat-dog world around us.

Casualties of NEP

The resulting inflamed racial politics benefited some people inordinately at the expense of the many, both Malays and non-Malays.

Another casualty is that the Malays of old, the incorruptible ones – the likes of Onn Jaafar, Dr Ismail Abdul Rahman and Ismail Ali – are mostly gone and no amount of increased piety and religiosity can replace them.

The dominant Malay mindset is one of entitlement. Behind this, however, lies something sadder: insecurity. The same insecurity made us meekly submit to four and a half centuries of colonisation and to our own feudal lords and others where fealty, often unearned, to our “betters” is expected.

Affirmative actions have helped, but also have hurt us. The crutches that helped us stand higher in the economic and other struggles unfortunately have become permanent, which we dare not contemplate living without.

Shackles of fear

Much of the claims of rights and privileges for being the original “sons of the soil” amount to just political manipulation; but they work, because of the fear among many Malays of flying untethered and competing on the same level playing fields as others.

This fear, this insecurity, hurts us. they have become institutionalised and encoded into our psyche. Privileges became rights, the temporary became permanent, regardless of what the Constitution and common sense say.

We invent new logic to support our argument. The latest came from a bunch of political ladies (some who may appear to be “constitutional” rather than ethnic Malays) who say that the old New Economic Policy goal of Malays owning 30% of the corporate wealth should now be raised to 50%, presumably as being a fairer reflection of today’s demographics.

If so, then past exhortations for Malays to reproduce aggressively so that we can “protect” the race have actually proven useful for some.

Greedy elites

Had this been an aspirational goal driving an agenda of advancement (you know, the boring stuff like smaller families, better education, stronger pride of “berdikari” – standing on our own two feet) I’d be the first to applaud it. However, this is just a pretext to carve out even more of the nation’s wealth that we couldn’t earn on our own.

This really is just about a bunch of Malay elites salivating about using politics to gain and protect easy wealth for themselves, which may result in the creation of unit trust funds meant for the bumiputera masses.

Should this happen, what will come to pass is of even more corporate wealth being owned and run by cronies and GLCs and shadowy and corrupt enablers. We’ll have even more Malay billionaires – official ones anyway – but we’ll also have more Malay families struggling to make ends meet.

We’ll never reach 50% because who wants to kill the goose that lays the golden egg? The number of Malays who struggle daily to put food on the table of their large families will remain high because they’re a convenient excuse for politicians.

More non-Malays will feel disenfranchised. Many Malays – those who have options elsewhere – will also be disheartened. Then one day we may even demand 100% of the corporate pie for Malays because Malaysia has lost all non-Malays even while the economic pie itself has shrunk to a measly cookie.

Take off the crutches

When we celebrate national independence — which no West Malaysian alive (except for perhaps one) had actually fought for — we talk about being independent of colonisers, we don’t talk enough about being independent in our own mind. We’re still haunted by fears of others not like us and easily kept in line by our own who are supposedly “better” than us.

And so here we are, not just politically independent but a nation that’s an even more complex and volatile mix.

It’s about time we accept that not everything is about us and that we’re actually tougher than we think – if only we dare to put ourselves to the test. Enough with this rubbish about extending affirmative action. They helped to make us stronger, but now they are making us weaker. We’re now more addicted, more frightened and more angry when we think about living without the privileges.

Let’s have a different kind of conversation. Let’s accept that true independence is being able to stand on our two feet and being able to help others instead of asking help for ourselves. For Malaysia to succeed, we Malays must feel confident we can happily and independently co-exist with fellow Malaysians without worrying about our survival.

With that, Happy Malaysia Day to one and all Malaysians.

The views expressed are those of the writer and do not necessarily reflect those of FMT.

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