Barisan Nasional needs to tune to the clear signals from the
last two general elections.
Former Prime Minister Tun Dr.Mahathir has wrong perception of
Chinese wanting to grab both political and ecenomic dominance in Malaysia.Chinese
in Malaysia has never has the idea of dominating both politics and
economics.The Chinese is very happy that Malaysia is ruled by the predominantly
Malays.What the Chinese wants is that they are treated fairly as Malaysians.
Malays and other indigenous people need not fear of Chinese
dominance as any government wants to stay in power need to take care
of electorates predominant majority.Chinese is not greedy and they
understand the concept of sharing of power and wealth very well.But at present
they feel they are not getting the fair share in almost all spheres of field.
A large educated middle-class Malaysian has emerged and a strong
business comminity with moderate political leaning has rejected the radical
appeals of extremists of either side.
Government attempts at reform have not built public confidence
that it is really serious about changing the ways in which it governs, does
business and conducts politics.It remains uncertain which way to move forward.
BN particularly UMNO is at cross road, want to fully embrace and
implement a democratic transformation agenda and win back public confidence
that it is truly capable of change or turn back to authoritarian rule to assert
its dominance.
The race-based parties set up to protect and promote the
interest of their own ethnic communities have today lost much of their language
of legitimacy in the eyes of the electorate.
In Taiwan, South Korea and Indonesia, incumbent presidents saw
clearly that time was running out for the old form of authoritarian politics
and adopted new legitimacy strategies of democratic reforms in order to
survive.Taiwan, South Korea and Indonesia were once ruled by authoritarian
regimes. And yet the dominant ruling parties of all three countries
successfully chose the road to democratisation and still won elections.
Long-term grievances over corruption, rising cost of living and
income inequality, politics of race and religion,public
transportation,environmental issue, restrictions on constitutional guarantees
of fundamental liberties – all remain largely unresolved.
It is sad that racial identification is still prevalent in the
society espeacially while dealing with civil service matters.Government leaders
must show true leadership and consistent political will by adopting the
visionary 1 Malaysia concept.
