Politics an amusing horror movie

Josh Hong

In a sense, I am glad that Liow Tiong Lai exposed his idiocy to the full when he flip-flopped over an explanation over the bidding for a car number plate. As we all know, Chinese Malaysians often think themselves above others but this utterly incompetent minister and barren mind has just dealt another blow to the Chinese ego, in pretty much the same way that Ibrahim Ali has put the Malays to shame.

Remember the stupid comments that he made last year over the Bersih 2.0 rally? “The police shot the tear gas over the main road. Maybe the smoke was blown by the wind in this direction - that, we don't know, but they were not aiming at the hospital.”

Then he was thoroughly humiliated when netizens rebuked him with eyewitness accounts, pictures and video clips, delivered courtesy of Facebook and YouTube, two of the most epoch-making inventions in the first decade of this century.

But Liow is no doubt symptomatic of the malaise in the Barisan Nasional. There are of course many others in the government who are as obtuse: Kong Cho Ha, Koh Tsu Koon, Bernard Dompok, Rais Yatim and Chor Chee Heung, to name a few. However, some are obviously pretending to be dumb but actually not, such as Nazri Aziz, who can turn around and talk like a reformist whenever circumstances call for it.

If one laments the lack of talent in the BN, the ineptitude again began with Mahathir Mohamad (left), who did everything he could to stop the bright and the gifted from rising so that he could remain dominant.

Even if one may argue he had during his rein fended off one challenge after another, all this was achieved with the aid of a roguish police force and corrupt judiciary, not to mention the wanton manipulation of the media which had a strong impact in the rural areas, to the detriment of the country for sure.

Since there was no level playing field to begin with, how does one expect rare gems to be found among pebbles within the BN?

Party politics is about contestation based on merit. Political parties must therefore be able to identify talents from their own members through a transparent and democratic process, who may form the backbone of a government should they win an election.

For those who lose, they remain duty-bound to play the role of a responsible opposition, being able to monitor or oppose government policies in the name of the people.

Unfortunately, the BN is bankrupt of talents as such. For more than three decades, the component parties have selected their respective leaderships through oligarchy and cronyism, resulting in a serious brain drain even when Malaysia as a whole is concerned about the outflow of our own talents!

Because the BN is a coalition whose top leadership has been guarding its own interests jealously, hardly anyone with real political visions would find it appealing. Instead of evolving into a government that is policy-oriented, the BN continues to survive on accentuating its race-based structure.

Tolerating ruffianism

However ‘diverse’ and ‘multiracial’ it may seem, the coalition remains fragile and incendiary, of which fact Najib Abdul Razak’s elegant silence on the series of violent acts against civil rights groups and opposition parties is a clear sign. When a party is unable to respond to policy demands and to rise to the occasion, a quick way to go around this is to tolerate ruffianism so that the wider populace may be intimidated into voting for the status quo.

Other than Mahathir, both Ling Liong Sik and S Samy Vellu also resorted to tricks and money politics to keep themselves in power. Ong Ka Ting, once a minion of Ling, completely abandoned the party’s political mission by recruiting trusted lieutenants (or backscratchers) through trivial activities such as university debates, Mid-Autumn Festivals and other cultural events.

The end result is mediocre “leaders” such as Liow and Chua Soi Lek, whose loyalty is of no fixed abode.

Not even the seemingly ‘righteous’ Ong Tee Keat is trustworthy. This egoist and opportunist is so full of himself (and his own interests) that he can hardly work with anyone else. He may have crossed swords with Ling, Ong Ka Ting and Chua but he will never tread on the toes of Umno’s bigwigs, in whom the ultimate powers lie, a fact of which he is acutely aware.

Liow’s imbecility can be entertaining, but it still tells us the frightening state that we are in. Voting in an alternative may not necessarily help us overcome our national crisis, but allowing these thug or clown-like politicians to remain in charge will only invite greater calamity in the future.