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Malaysia news!
Hi Burma netters,
Here is the news about Malaysia. We need to learn from our neighboring
countries such as Malaysia and Indonesia who strongly support SPDC. Why?
because they share the same mentality.
Htun Aung Gyaw
The Nation (Bangkok) 21 Sep 98 "Editorial & Opinion" heading
Where can Anwar go from
here?
Malaysia's Anwar Ibrahim is now desperately
fighting for his political survival. Can he make a
comeback?
Here's a quiz posted on the Internet after
Malaysia's No 2 was kicked out. Question: Who is
he?
He was once imprisoned because of his political
views. He wrote a book lauding racial chauvinism.
His country was poor until he industrialised it. He
promoted the manufacturing of the first national
car. He launched a slew of mega-projects and
hosted a world-class sport event. He had to face a
severe currency devaluation.
He insisted the problems of his country were due
to a conspiracy by foreign powers. He pulverised
his political enemies and muzzled the media. He
had a deputy who called for reforms and caused
jealousy among party big wigs. His No 2, who had
been with him for some 17 years, was finally
removed under accusations of homosexuality and
treason.
The answer: Adolf Hitler.
Perhaps it is too harsh to equate Prime Minister
Mahathir Mohamad with Hitler, but the
resemblance is uncanny, especially in the way he
''blitzkrieged'' his political rival, Anwar Ibrahim.
The reversal of Anwar's fortune couldn't be more
dramatic. One day the Malaysian media had
Mahathir denying Anwar would resign. The next
Anwar was not only sacked but unceremoniously
expelled from the party. That the media had
missed perhaps the biggest story of the decade,
that problems were brewing between the two top
men, says a lot about press freedom in Malaysia.
Which explains why Web sites providing Anwar's
side of the story appeared soon after the sacking.
Many Malaysians, even those who would normally
support Mahathir, are horrified by the high-handed
manner in which Anwar was dismissed. And
frustrated by a near-total news blackout in the
local media, they turn in droves to the Internet. For
example, Anwar Online, one of the dozens of new
Web sites, registered some 250,000 hits in its first
10 days of operation.
Ironically, Mahathir was instrumental in
encouraging Malaysians to embrace the Internet
revolution. Now, to his chagrin, the Net is being
used for a very different kind of revolution.
However, with no more than 500,000 Net users in
a country of 22 million, this new medium cannot
possibly pose as an effective alternative to the
docile mass media. Not yet.
Nevertheless, such a phenomenon represents a
remarkable shift in the Malaysian political ground.
Anwar, who took pains to fashion himself as a new
breed of leader, has successfully wooed the
backing of the ''virtual'' community, whose
denizens are mostly young professionals and
students. Their support will no doubt help bolster
Anwar in his show-down with Mahathir.
No doubt Mahathir is perturbed by the political
standoff with Anwar. Originally his plan was to
confront Anwar with a barrage of allegations which
Mahathir hoped, by sheer number alone, would
force his deputy to resign quietly.
Indeed no one in Malaysian history has been
assailed with so many allegations and threatened
with so many laws. Anwar was accused of
committing sodomy, sexual impropriety, bribery,
treason, tempering with evidence, interfering with
police investigations, abuse of power, sedition and
now organising illegal rallies. In addition the police
have vowed to use a battery of laws against him
from the Internal Security Act to the Protection of
Women and Girls Act. Still Anwar remains
unmoved.
Mahathir has no doubt grossly miscalculated
Anwar's resolve to slog it out. Now that Plan A has
failed, Mahathir is caught between a rock and a
hard place. He could arrest Anwar under the
Internal Security Act (ISA), which allows indefinite
detention without trial, but if Anwar was not taken
to court, it would only raise further questions
whether Mahathir could prove Anwar's
wrongdoing.
Since he fired Anwar, Mahathir has been telling
just about everyone to trust him. He has, he says,
conducted his own investigations. He has
interviewed witnesses himself and examined the
veracity of their claims, and he has concluded that
his former deputy was ''unsuitable'' and guilty of
''conduct unbecoming'' to a national leader.
If this is so, there shouldn't be any need for
Mahathir to resort to the ISA. That's why Mahathir
would prefer to arrest Anwar on criminal charges.
It would not only legally hobble Anwar for years
but also damage Anwar's image as a pious,
religious man. And even if all the charges were
later proved wrong, Anwar's reputation would be
gravely tarnished, perhaps irreversibly. Indeed
with so much mud being thrown at one man,
surely some of it will stick.
However, for Plan B to work, the police need to
produce evidence which can stand up in court and
not just the nameless and faceless witnesses
mentioned in their affidavits. Nevertheless if the
police were to dig deep enough, they would be
bound to find something rotten. For someone who
has been in government for 16 years and clawed
his way up to be the second most powerful man in
a country where corruption is endemic, abuse of
power rampant and government machinery at best
opaque, Anwar cannot be possibly clean.
Already the line of police inquiry appears to be to
find ''witnesses'' who can be badgered into
incriminating Anwar. On Saturday Anwar's
stepbrother, Sukma Dermawan, and a Pakistani
friend, Munawar Anees, both of whom were
detained earlier for ''questioning'', confessed to
being sodomised by Anwar and were sentenced to
six-months' imprisonment. That's rather odd: the
''victims'' are punished while the alleged sodomist
is still walking free.
Moreover the two were not allowed access to
relatives or lawyers since they were detained
earlier this month. Relatives were also forbidden
to talk to them while in court when their
confessions were read by lawyers their families
had not appointed. All this smacks of a political,
not a criminal, persecution.
By now Anwar would realise that he is not going to
get a fair trial should he be arrested. He is already
being tried and hanged by the media. His only
remaining option is to go to the court of the people
with the immediate aim of getting himself
reinstated in the ruling United Malays National
Organisation (Umno). This would be Anwar's
quickest and easiest road back to power. But it is
also the most unlikely. To return to Umno's fold,
Anwar would need to literally walk over Mahathir's
dead body.
He can still opt to join the opposition. In this,
Anwar doesn't have much of a choice. Joining the
fundamentalist Islamic Party or the Chinese-based
Democratic Action Party would rob him of
broad-based support. Perhaps he would form his
own party and stitch together an alliance with
other opposition groups. However, his most likely
option is to sit it out. Anwar can indeed afford to
wait for a few years until Mahathir goes and be
invited back into the party. Time is on his side:
Mahathir is 73, while he is only 51.
But meanwhile can Anwar keep himself in the
political spotlight?
Anwar, unlike other out-of-favour Umno politicians
who are consigned to the political wilderness once
they are expelled from the party, can survive,
indeed thrive, on the outside. He boasts an
independent power base. Most importantly, he
has the support of a group of energetic students
and Muslim youth. And even if Anwar was jailed
for years, this group of activists could help keep
his political hopes alive.
However, Anwar must also win the support of a
key group of Malaysians, the non-Muslims, who
represent some 40 per cent of the population.
Over the years, Anwar has successfully cultivated
the suave and urbane image of a Muslim leader.
He talks often about democracy, human rights and
civil society, and few can fault him for any sign of
fundamentalism. Yet many non-Muslims are not
convinced.
His Permatang Pauh declaration, launched when
Anwar began his roadshow, will go some way to
reassure those who are still wary of his Islamic
firebrand past. The declaration which sought to
give substance to his reform movement not only
stressed the need to combat corruption and abuse
of power, but also sought a more equal
distribution of wealth across class and ethnic lines
and vowed to keep the cultural traditions of all
races intact.
All this is very much in keeping with Anwar's Asian
renaissance. On the week when Anwar was
sacked, students in Jakarta called for the ouster of
Indonesia's B J Habibie, their fellows in Rangoon
demonstrated against the military junta, and the
opposition in Phnom Penh lambasted strongman
Hun Sen for what they said was massive electoral
fraud in the recent polls. Indeed Asian
renaissance is in the making. However, if Asian
renaissance is to see the light of day in his own
country, Anwar himself must survive.
But he faces a formidable opponent. Ironically, for
someone who can afford to wait, time is fast
running out as he expects to be arrested any time
soon. Clearly one must never underestimate the
old man. Mahathir knows well that if there is
anything which could spook Malaysians into
rallying behind the government it is the spectre of
racial riots, and if all moves to check Anwar fail,
Mahathir could quite possibly engineer mayhem
Jakarta-style which would pave the way for him to
declare a state of emergency, allowing him to
suspend Parliament and postpone the elections
due in 2000.
Already Mahathir is the prime minister, home
minister and finance minister. Soon, say the
opposition, Malaysia will degenerate into a
one-man government. The ruling party, Umno, is
now dubbed the United Mahathir National
Organisation. He has an iron grip over all three
branches of government, the executive, the
legislature and the judiciary. At best, democracy in
Malaysia today exists only on paper, and at worst,
the country is turning into a police state.
Perhaps it is unfair to compare Mahathir to Hitler.
Then again, it was Hitler who once said: ''The
bigger the lie, the easier it is to believe.''
BY STEVEN GAN
The Nation
Steven Gan is member of The Nation's editorial
team. This is part of a speech delivered at the
Foreign Correspondents Club of Thailand on Sept
16.