Having been an observer (and arguably a participant) of the Malaysian political scene for a number of years now, I think I’m in a position to be able to well describe that bizarre world to non Malaysians. Even jaded and learned students of politics elsewhere in the world might be in for a shock or two when they get acquainted with how Malaysians think and act in the political realm. Or perhaps not. It can take a lot to surprise people in this cynical age.
Using the standard left wing-right wing model (as flawed as it is), let’s start by talking about the people on Malaysia’s political left. In Malaysia, the left functions much as they do in US, or as they do in Europe for that matter — they’re outright socialists that believe that Malaysia’s ills can be solved if Malaysia becomes a lot more like Europe and adopts a comprehensive cradle-to-grave welfare state, like France or Germany. This group is represented by the Malaysian political party DAP (Democratic Action Party). DAP is a majority Chinese (Malaysians of Chinese descent) party, despite their repeated attempts to branch out ethnically. As you’ll see, ethnic-based political parties in this country are the norm, not the exception.
For an example of a Malaysian left-wing standard bearer, take this guy, Dr. Azly Rahman. He’s a self-styled Malaysian intellectual who loves to write (overly) long soliloquys on the evils of capitalism, or the evils of the US Military in Iraq, etc. and on the advantages of ‘progressivism’. Educated in the hallowed left-leaning halls and high towers of Ivy League academia, Dr. Azly is, unsurprisingly, a big fan of Obama and has contributed to Malaysia’s powerhouse political blog, Malaysia Today.
Speaking of Malaysia Today, the founder of this website is a well-known and noted Malaysian political dissident, Raja Petra Kamarudin. A supposed moderate Muslim, he has recently and proudly described himself as a ‘socialist‘. He writes on Malaysian politics on his website and elsewhere from his self-imposed exile in the U.K.
These bloggers from the Malaysian left devote a lot of thought, words and space in their writing to the alleged evils of corporations, globalization and ‘Islamophobia’. At the same time, this crowd usually downplays or completely ignores the jihad and the ever-growing stack of dead bodies the jihadists are piling up. Or they apologize and rationalize for Islam after the fact. “Yes, Muslims can be barbarous,” they might say, “but it’s all because of Iraq / Islamophobia / Palestine (fill in the blank).” Oftentimes, Malaysia’s political left can get quite chummy with their Muslim overlords. The DAP’s chairman has gone on the record to say that, in effect, Islam is just a wonderful belief system. ‘Useful idiots’, anyone?
In Malaysia, the leftist-Islamist nexus is not just some hypothetical construct, but it is a political fact. DAP and the Pro-Shariah party in Malaysia called PAS are, in fact, united in a political alliance called (the) Pakatan Rakyat (People’s Alliance). This political coalition gained significant power in several Malaysian states in the last Malaysian general election in 2008, but has since been unable to capitalize on those gains. It’s been an uncomfortable alliance, with mutual suspicion on both sides, but is held together mainly by the charisma and the force of personality of Pakatan Rakyat’s founder, Anwar Ibrahim. Anwar, for those unfamiliar with the man, is a rather interesting character, a nominal ‘moderate’ Muslim who emerged from a rather pious Muslim background. At the moment he has his hands full with the Malaysian government prosecuting him for alleged sexual crimes.
Well, what about the Malaysian so-called ‘right wing’? Well, this is where the ‘left-right’ model breaks down, as people in the ‘counterjihad’ like Robert Spencer and Geert Wilders — i.e. the people who are diametrically opposed to Shariah and Islam — are usually described as ‘right wing’ or even ‘ultra right’. But I digress.
The right wing of Malaysia’s political sphere is part and parcel of the jihadist enterprise. Malaysians in this group scrawl Arabic all over their websites, drop ‘SWTs’, ‘SAWs’ and ‘PBUHs’ all over their blog posts like there’s no tomorrow, and generally believe with all of
their hearts that Mo, Islam and Sharia and the rest are Allah’s gifts to humanity. They may not be blowing people up in their backyards, at least not for the moment. But they fully subscribe to the notion of Islamic supremacy. They do attend mosques where the imams every Friday commonly shriek ‘Allah hates the kufr‘,
and many of these same people eagerly send money (‘zakat’) to various
jihadist causes abroad. And yes, a number of these Malaysians run off to join the jihad directly. These jihadist elements are represented by the political party PAS, otherwise known as the ‘Pan Malaysian Islamic Party’.
With
Marxists on one side and jihadists on the other, is there sanity in the
Malaysian middle? Well, not really. The ‘middle’ ground is occupied
by UMNO, the race-based ‘United Malays National Organisation”. They are the long-corrupt and long-ruling political party who have firmly established ‘Malay Supremacy’ as Malaysia’s de facto centerpiece government policy. It’s all in the name of
‘racial harmony’ of course. UMNO uses a number of dhimmi auxiliaries — Malaysian Chinese Association and Malaysian Indian Congress for example — to co-opt any opposition. Any thorn or political opponent who can’t
be co-opted or bought off by these crooks is often thrown in prison via ISA, a law which permits the indefinite detention of any one without charge or trial. UMNO also uses various thugs (RELA, UMNO Youth, Special Branch, etc) and a number of Orwellian laws (Sedition Act, Societies Act, etc.) to intimidate & silence critics and stay in charge.
So where does that leave the counterjihad in the Malaysia? The short answer is ‘nowhere’. Malaysia, with exception of a few renegades, has no counterjihad worthy of the name. There are a few websites here and there, but there is no organization and the numbers are tiny. In short, critics of Islam are the ultimate outsiders in the insane asylum known as Malaysian politics.
Note: Paragraph 6 has been corrected; ‘PKR’ was changed to ‘Pakatan Rakyat’.