Election Commission chairperson Abdul Rashid Abdul Rahman, is clear what his role is. He has proved beyond reasonable doubt, as a lawyer would put it, that he is at the beck and call of Umno, that he would ensure the elections would be conducted unfairly, that he takes orders only from Umno, that any nonsense of all political parties given equal chances at the polls should be disabused without further ado.

He is there so the Malays would not be allotted more seats, not for altruistic reasons of fair play and justice but so PAS would be stopped in its tracks and Umno would continue to govern until Doomsday.

You would note that in recent weeks, he has taken pains to reveal himself naked to all and sundry, that this belief in free and impartial elections is nonsense, that he is there so serve Umno's interests. He now wants the EC to be an employment agency for Puteri Umno members.

We must be grateful to Abdul Rashid for being so candid about his constitutionally defined role, for telling us that the constitution does not require the EC to be impartial, that its role is not to conduct elections fairly and impartially.

Until now, there was only anecdotal evidence of the EC's perfidy; he now provides the proof. Now we know that the conduct of elections in Malaysia does not match up to the highest international standards of fair play and justice. Thanks to the EC chief for telling us that. And in future elections, international oversight is as important as elections in Africa.

In a malaysiakini report on Sept 16, he defends his role as an employment agency for Puteri Umno members. The 'nobility' of this Puteri Umno request touched his heart, and he decided they must be helped, even if it undermined the integrity of the Election Commission. How can there be integrity when there is no food on the table? So he instructs the EC to offer temporary employment to those Puteri Umno decides should be employed.

People don't understand

But you know how people are? They do not understand the EC's selfless motives and its role in nation building and racial equality. They do not understand what it tries to do, not with those pesky opposition parties raising unnecessary hurdles which detract it from its God-ordained role.

People will talk ill about such pure motives, you understand. He does not want trouble. But the Puteri Umno request is nobility itself. So he orders the EC to employ them not as Puteri Umno members but as jobless young women.

He says in the interview he would have done that even for PAS's women's wing. But they did not apply for jobs. How could he go around offering them jobs? That would be political suicide, don't you think?

But Puteri Umno is helped because it asked. Why did not PAS's women's wing? He would have helped it. But it did not ask. So why is PAS misunderstanding the EC's noblest of motives, and impute what is not there.

Does it not understand that Puteri Umno had asked. How did it ask? When a delegation met him in his office early this year - as he would not allow those from other political parties - and the question was raised.

The Puteri Umno chief, Azalina Othman, followed that up with a letter, which Abdul Rashid passed down the line with his approval.

The assistant secretary who passed down to the state election offices the chief's instruction ordered that this employment be kept secret. If it is above board, why? And why has it since been aborted? After all, he says all is noble and above board.

The EC as an Puteri Umno employment agency is a scandal to all but Abdul Rashid. He denies there is a conspiracy between Umno and the EC. He denies the Puteri Umno hiring has to do with the coming general election. If it is all above board, the EC should seriously consider hiring unemployed Puteri Umno members as election officers and clerks at the polling stations as well.

Azalina herself is unfazed by the scandal surrounding her. But she is used to that. She is combative. She has only the purest of motives. Would she have written on an official Puteri Umno letterhead if her motives were not noble?

She now has a datukship to prove she is nobility herself. How dare Malaysians rise up in arms for her sterling role to subvert the EC?

Do not the rabble know that the EC is a body constitutionally set up by Umno, for Umno, of Umno; that if the law disallows that, the law should be changed? Why can't you understand that simple rationale for the EC's existence?

Important disclosure

We hope Abdul Rashid would continue to educate us on why the EC should not be independent, that it would help only Umno, that every other political party is not worth expending time on, that he holds office not at the Yang di-Pertuan Agung's pleasure but the prime minister's.

Th interview he gave are important to let Malaysians know that the EC would leave no stone unturned to rubbish the constitutional nonsense that it would conduct itself with constitutional propriety. And that elections are held so the world knows Malaysia is a democratic nation, but not so the people would defy its injunction and vote in some rascally opposition political parties like PAS, DAP or Keadilan.

We are fascinated by his revelations. He should now tell us what he plans to do to ensure it. My column in Seruan Keadilan , out next week, details his other sterling performances in his commitment to fair play and justice. But let us not sell Abdul Rashid short.

He is part of a corrupt, demeaning system which Umno has set up under the great and glorious governance of its chief, Dr Mahathir Mohamad. Malaysia and the world should not be denied of the glory of Umno in continued power, as democratically above board as President Robert Mugabe's democratic governance in Zimbabwe.

Malaysia is at the borderline between a dictatorship and a flawed democratic system. Everything from within is corrupt and unworkable. The prime minister's word is law. The politicians are there to milk the system for riches and favours. The political rentier system is well-entrenched, the democratic edifice a facade while the system corrupts from within.

The gall with which Abdul Rashid spouts his nonsense reflects not the corruption of the EC - that is taken for granted - but that it follows every department and part of the state which has. It does not matter which: the judiciary, the armed forces, the civil service, the police force, the cabinet, the education system. Corruption in the body politic is not about money alone.

This insidious creeping destruction of the system, often in pique, cannot be repaired overnight. No one sees it as that. Not even the Opposition, which should have and railed against it years ago. Everything is for a price. We are amused, more than angry, at Abdul Rashid's revelations.

He does it because he is in trouble with Umno. The more he talks about how fair and noble he is, the more it paints Umno into a corner. But he has to keep talking for if he stops he would find himself out of a job and public respect as one Rahim Noor (former inspector-general of police).

A system that allowed the ex-IGP to beat up the ex-Umno deputy president and former deputy prime minister for no reason than he had differences of opinion with the Umno president is as serious a blot to the Malaysian body politic as the EC chief telling Malaysians he is there to destroy the fairness and impartiality for which it once stood for.

We can only hope Umno is happy with these developments. But then has happiness anything to do with that?