Friday 3 April 2009

Mahathir Mohamad Refuses to Fade Away Graciously

Read here for more in MySinChew




Quote

"... Why (are UMNO) leaders making overtures to Mahathir to return and even act as “adviser” ?

We have had enough of Mahathir’s brand of “good governance” for twenty-two agonising, heart-rending, years that saw “Grand Corruption” being institutionalised in every important facet of OUR national life.

Based on what we know about the man, Mahathir is happiest when he is also at his mischievous best.

If there is NO crisis, Mahathir will see to it that one is invented.

We need Mahathir as we need a tail between our legs
. The nation is well-rid of the man.

In God’s name, let him go his own meddling way and we, our own, free to determine our lives in accordance with the Constitution and the dictates of our conscience...."

-Tunku Abdul Aziz



Do Mahathir A Favour: Ignore Him

by

Tunku Abdul Aziz Ibrahim

Excerpts: Read here for more

UMNO is NOT ready to move forward.

UMNO’s internal weaknesses are there for all to see, but it says a great deal about its organisational culture that the leaders remain both deaf and blind to the rot that stares them in the face.

More baffling is why its leaders are making overtures to Mahathir to return and even act as “adviser.”

It somehow suggests complete arrogance, totally muddled thinking and a disdain for Malaysian public opinion on their part. It is, I am convinced, a pathological streak that is part of the UMNO political tradition.

We have had enough of Mahathir’s brand of “good governance” for twenty-two agonising, heart-rending, years that saw “Grand Corruption”, ( first coined by George Moody-Stuart and used as the title of his famous book on international corruption) being institutionalised in every important facet of our national life. By any yardstick, Mahathir’s tenure was twenty-two years too long. We need Mahathir as we need a tail between our legs.

For UMNO in particular, any attempt at open reconciliation with Mahathir, the ‘megalomeddler’, (a new word I have just invented to add further to the richness of English) will be the kiss of death. If, in the intoxicating afterglow of their 59th general assembly UMNO leaders were disposed to be generous towards Mahathir, and forgive him all his transgressions and sins against society, they need to have their heads examined.

Based on what we know about the man, Mahathir is happiest when he is also at his mischievous best. If there is no crisis, Mahathir will see to it that one is invented.

He survived 22 years in office by playing on, and manipulating shamelessly, our fears of a recurrence of the May 13 incident which nearly tore this nation apart in 1969. It is a card that some UMNO types at good at pulling out of their pack when they feel threatened by challenges to “ketuanan Melayu.”

It is not in the man’s mental make up to give, as we have seen in his unremitting hostility to Abdullah Badawi, his anointed successor, a sporting chance to make a mark as prime minister. But, then, Mahathir was not a sportsman in the mould of Tunku Abdul Rahman, Tun Abdul Razak Hussein or even Tun Hussein Onn. One of the central dogmas of Mahathirism and one espoused by the great man with unbounded passion is “winner takes all.”

He did not believe in taking prisoners. The battle field of his choice was the judicial arena where he held sway, and where crouching judges were falling over each other in an embarrassingly sycophantic display of eternal gratitude to their benefactor and where witnesses were “turned” at will to coerce them to cooperate. In one fell swoop, one of the most respected judicial institutions in the Commonwealth became an object of fun, ridicule and derision.

His maniacal urge to dominate everything and everyone in sight is a serious character flaw. To think that he will ever be a moderating influence and, therefore, an asset in the much-needed reinvention of UMNO to be in readiness for the 13th general elections is to believe in Grimm’s Fairy Tales of my childhood.

The nation is well-rid of the man. In God’s name, let him go his own meddling way and we, our own, free to determine our lives in accordance with the Constitution and the dictates of our conscience.

Admitting Mahathir back into UMNO’s inner sanctum will add to its problems, and internal unity will forever remain a gleam in the eye, and it will hasten the demise of UMNO, now already on its last legs.

Perhaps I should just say nothing and let UMNO leaders find out for themselves the joy of having Mahathir under the same roof.
- Tunku Abdul Aziz

2 comments:

Anonymous said...

Never hit a man when he is down. he may wake up. Thumb Logic

Anonymous said...

How long does he think his heart is going to last? Don't forget it is on lease and the lease had long expired!