Living in different worlds...in Malaysia

source: kosongcafe

This morning, one of my two regular breakfast ‘kakis’ asked me, “Why Bersih wanted to stop Parliament from extending EC Chairman’s retirement age? The election procedure seems ok when we voted…”

This really made me gave him a tirade of all the things wrong with our EC, which I am pretty tired of repeating here. He added, it makes sense that Rashid should continue as otherwise, the new Chairman would not know what to do! Can you believe that? Rashid should be kept because he is indispensable!

One of the main reasons BN is able to hold on to power was the almost complete control over mainstream media and there are many people relying on the radio, television and newspapers for the daily news update. Imagine reading opinions from Kalimullah and V.K. Chin and believing them to be gospel truth, and you get the drift.

Just yesterday, a retired teacher told me how he wishes to write his opinions in Malaysiakini if not for the fact that he was a government servant - another good news for BN - the fear factor (unfounded?) of ex-government employees, still receiving monthly pensions. Then there is another ex-teacher who is loud and opinionated but will leave politics to politicians. “What can we do?” is his usual lame excuse even though he is very fond of accusing MCA politicians to be corrupted and self-serving. He added, “in a way it is good if the MCA politicians actually helped the causes of the Chinese with the money from corrupt means!”

The icing on the cake goes to this coffee-shop operator who said his place is only patronised by DAP people, the MCA ones will go to the other one. I reminded him that my two ‘kakis’ are actually MCA life members. Upon hearing this, he admitted he is also a life member since many years ago, through the present ADUN, Lee Kon Yin! This is a good example of being a member in name but not in spirit.

Finally, my wife is also an MCA life member, simply because her brother is fairly active in it. This has made my role more meaningful (as in trying to convince them to vote opposition for the first time) or stressful (as in having to debate very often in the coffeeshop). Perhaps, I should offer myself to go out to speak at ceramahs this coming General Election. But the problem is that the local population prefers Mandarin or even Hakka (like in Pusing) and my points in English would easily lose its ‘umph’ when translated.

The political scene is now full of people who are really sick of the present government with its arrogance personified in Nazri, Khairy (kpc), Zam, Ali Rustam, Khir Toyo, Samy Vellu, Rafidah and many others. MCA and Gerakan leaders are under different category – the opportunists (to put it mildly). For now, I am giving Pak Lah the benefit of the doubt for being wrongly advised by the hawks, but when we think of those and their families suffering under draconian laws, we have a duty to correct the situation by voting opposition.

One way to ‘attack’ where it hurts is to concentrate on unseating them (except Khairy because he is not even seated yet), together with those MPs hogging the limelight for the wrong reasons.

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