Wednesday, June 1, 2011

MCA: Malaysian Communities Association

In spite of being far removed from the rarefied air of politics in Malaysia, there is one clear view about the necessary direction that the Malaysian Chinese Association needs to take if it wishes to avoid the certainty of becoming less and less relevant to all but a select few well-heeled Chinese Malaysian businessmen.

The MCA has to be less about race and more about the Malaysian community.

The present tactic of the MCA in appearing the meet provocative views tossed out by the likes of Perkasa rings hollow.

Worse still, the views offered by the likes of Dr Chua Soi Lek are stymied by the parameters of race. 

I hope that there will be an urgent reassessment by the MCA leadership to earnestly and concertedly frame all issues within the framework of the needs of the Malaysian community as a whole instead of spewing points that are of supposed importance to the Chinese community in Malaysia.

Why deprive MCA of the ability to transcend the racial paradigm?

If the polemics are caught within the framework and agenda of race, it is ALWAYS going to give the appearance of a zero-sum game. If there are 10 units of resources and 4 racial groupings with an average ratio of Bumiputra 5, Chinese 3, Indians 1 and Others 1 the resources will be arguably distributed based on the 5:3:1:1 ratio.

But such a mindset is stupid, myopic, troglodytic and wrongheaded.

The correct perspective should be how to increase the units of resources from 10 to, say, 20 or, even 50?

Even my poorly educated grandfather knew this perspective way back in the 1950s. His metaphor was that of changing the size of the kuali or wok to an ever-increasing size and capacity in order to properly feed a growing family. 

Almost everyone knows that it is an easy and lazy and mischievious tactic to harp on race.

It is foolhardy for the MCA to fall into such a trap.

So, I call upon the MCA to reassess its political strategy and rework its paradigm in order to stay relevant and to win back support.

Otherwise, it will be giving more business to the undertakers.

6 comments:

walla said...

A kuali may not be enough. The MCA may need a magic wok. But with tariff increase and desubsidization, induction heating and natural gas could soon be cost-prohibitive. Meanwhile biomass fuel is an unproven and possibly infeasible source. Rubber wood is thus suggested but its supply is erratic.....

The dynamics of Barisan are those of race-based parties shaping government. But the government at present is skewed only to one race. The other races and thus their component political parties may be given a few ministerial posts but even these are answerable to their subordinate KSU's who have direct lines to PWTC. Ask the DM(MOE), for instance.

This means any attempt to transform the present MCA from a race-based party into a multi-racial party in order to counterbalance a DAP becoming more multi-racial in complexion will have to first address the internal race-based but Umno-skewed realpolitik of Barisan.

For the rakyat already know and they will thus bet it won't be a transformation achieved but more likely a transmogrification realized.

Let's say the MCA tries to do so. Where are its non-Chinese peninsular members to come from? Umno? Mic? Then that's cannibalization. Non-Umno, non-Mic? Then that's the national dodo bird, Gerakan.

From the Opposition parties? Then the question of value proposition is asked. What can the new MCA offer which the present Pakatan cannot? Power-sharing? They will ask back how much power does the MCA really wield today in Barisan when Umno is half-thinking of booting the MCA out while making backdoor overtures to PAS to agglomerate a pan-Malay/Muslim front, thereby making a mockery of the very coalition spirit that had formed the Barisan which has ruled this land for half a century.

Would such an Umno change its stripes to accommodate real power-sharing while locked in fear that doing so may trigger its present jittery members to move to Pas instead?

The problem with Barisan is plain. Its chief member Umno has wielded monoracial power to such an extent it sees anything for the members of its coalition fellow parties to be concessions because it thinks that to be really fair and square would be to jeopardize the patronage system that it wants to maintain in order to provide the selling point to its members fed on the myth that economic power resides with the nonMalays which a cursory examination of who controls what of which size would easily dispel.

walla said...

2/2

The zero-sum game that is to be avoided by growing the kuali diameter is already entrenched in the mindset of the chief chef so what new dishes can possibly come out of the kitchen except the smoke billowing out the windows from skewered meat made rancid by racialism excused as AlifBaTa?

Yes, the MCA can become a communities association but only after you, boss Umno, has become a united malaysian national organization, which, however, will change the entire complexion and rationale for Barisan.

The young Malay kampung guy who on his own learned new languages and cultures, and moved up to become a respected bank branch manager in California after suffering the hard knocks of life is an example of how success can come to anyone of any race in any place. Politics of our local variety had and has nothing positive to do with it.

Membership to Umno or any other race-based party is not a prerequisite for such success. On the contrary, it creates a temporary self-syioking, bill-to-others, and nationally irresponsible myth of autarkic invincibility in a world with no permanence.

Which explains why the PM has to fly to the US, his daughter's graduation aside, to try and sell to unblinkered businessmen the case to invest in this country on the other side of the globe in industries such as biomass when that has yet to be clearly proven viable even for an economy experiencing less than the six percent growth rate which was the precondition for achieving developed nation status by 2020 which mandates investment of USD444 Billion, a number only to be uttered in a susurrus.

Leaving all to question how many, exactly, are there in this country who are diehard champions of racialism and racism against the majority of moderates and liberals? Five, ten, percent?

Not seeing the right perspective and size of the problem is a contributing cause of all the angst, anxiety and anguish of too many.

A government not doing anything about it only makes it worse. A government behind it only confirms the worst suspicions of even its own party hacks.

If the Michelin-starred El-Bulli of Spain has only one standard, all exacting, why should the F-grade El-Bully of political Malaysia have two to five?

de minimis said...

bro walla

You said at 2/2, "Yes, the MCA can become a communities association but only after you, boss Umno, has become a united malaysian national organization, which, however, will change the entire complexion and rationale for Barisan."

I believe MCA need not wait for UMNO to change. MCA should initiate its own change into a multiracial party.

walla said...

If it works, then well and good. But if it fizzles out for want of new non-Chinese members, then that would cast a cloud of credibility on Barisan on the whole.

The other option is a merger with Gerakan to enlarge both into a new entity but retaining the name MCA as you have defined. Since one was historically a spin-out from the other, people can say it'll be logical along your theme, persuaded by present political reality.

However, there's the nettlesome precedent which everyone knows - namely, the use of Gerakan in the past by Umno to counterbalance the energies of the MCA in defending its own manifesto.

Mahathir changed the rules of cooperation into containment which created today's Animal Farm.

According to some, the MCA of today is not like the MCA of yesteryear.

Which is sad because it has apparently done a lot for their community unknown to many. Especially in stopping some of the excesses of Umno in the heydays.

But does today's MCA leadership realize enough of what had been done before that will lend new courage, personal and political, needed to go forward on your suggestion, courage much needed to re-articulate the old Malaysian spirit - in a way acceptable to the new generation of voters - which all these years has been dashed on the rocks of Malay chauvinism?

The crystal ball is milky and may soon enough be overtaken by events presaging, perhaps, a new destiny for this nation.

Raison D'etre said...

Walla,
Pleasantly surprised to read your posting outside of Datuk Sak.

Start you own, perhaps?

DM,
MCA is as relevant as MIC is today is my so-biased thoughts.

walla said...

Raison D'etre,

Good to hear from you again. Hope you're keeping well.

Something else:

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