What will it take to build 1 Malaysia?

It is interesting to see what people are saying about 1 Malaysia and Twitter give you the most real, up to date sentiments. The vast majority of tweets on 1 Malaysia paint a picture that people think it is just another slogan and to quite a fair number, they find it repulsive.  It is hard to say if what goes on twitter is representative of the general population of is it skewed to a segment of the population.

Anyway after long reflection on the matter through the fasting month this is my take on 1 Malaysia. What is needed is pretty obvious. The premise is that to have real unity – people must unite – and people will only unite under 2 circumstances: the first is people unite in a cause that they believe in and the second is people unite becasue of a common enemy / threat.

The unity of Malaysia in the pre-post independence period was galvanized through a common ideology , a common belief in the concept of independence and ability for self determination.  The principles were set forth in the rukun negara as follows:

WHEREAS OUR COUNTRY MALAYSIA nurtures the ambitions of:

• achieving a more perfect unity amongst the whole of her society;
• preserving a democratic way of life;
• creating a just society where the prosperity of the country can be enjoyed together in a fair and equitable manner;
• guaranteeing a liberal approach towards her rich and varied cultural traditions; and
• building a progressive society that will make use of science and modern technology.

NOW THEREFORE WE, the people of Malaysia, pledge to concentrate the whole of our energy and efforts to achieve these ambitions based on the following principles:

• BELIEF IN GOD
• LOYALTY TO KING AND COUNTRY
• THE SUPREMACY OF THE CONSTITUTION
• THE RULE OF LAW
• COURTESY AND MORALITY

The rukun negara is a fantastic piece of work as it set our a clear statement of goals and the pillars on which the goals would be achieved.

Somewhere in the Mahathir’s time the rukun negara  concept got buried.

Now the pendulum has swung to the other end. People ARE united – but they are united against a common enemy – “the Political Masters, namely UMNO, MCA, MIC”

In general people of all races feel that the politicians have abused their privileges as seen through the lens of corruption, “discrimination”, a weakened judiciary, poor delivery of public services, deteriorating education  standards, and so on.

The last elections clearly demonstrated that the people are united, but united against a common enemy and hence the unprecedented swing on votes to an untried and untested opposition.

The challenge now is how does one get the pendulum to swing again?

The answer is fairly straight forward. People want:

a: to feel safe

b: that the law and enforces of the law are here to protect us

c: equal access to quality education

d: equal access to quality health care

e: equal access to economic prosperity

f. freedom of expression (social, political, religious)

That’s about it.  No rocket science.

The reality is that the current political system that is race based will not allow for this to happen.  For one, to achieve “equality” will be seen as a concession that is taking away from the Malays to give to the non Malays.

Secondly, it means that people who are used to getting rewarded without competing must now compete to get rewarded.

Third the issues of  freedom of expression be it social, political or religious will be super contentious because of the lack of definition of  what the do’s and dont’s are within the context of and Islamic State.

For as long as the political system is race based and there is an unwritten belief that Malaysia is Malay in the first instance and Malaysian in the second, change will be hard to come by. But certainly  reforms in addressing corruption, education, health, public services, law and enforcement, transparency will go a long way in re-building a foundation of unity.

Ong Tee Kiat in his meeting with the SME’s (talk with Tee Kiat) outlined  a  goal of having 25% of the civil service staffed by Chinese in order to serve the chinese community.  I can understand where he is coming from, but for as long as the paradigm that a race will only serve the interest of its race exists, we will never achieve unity.