COMMENT Malaysia's independence first as Malaya in August 1957 followed in September 1963 as Malaysia was based on a federal constitution agreed upon by all the communities respecting all the ethnic groups and people of all religious beliefs to live in peace and harmony in our beloved nation.

Peace and harmony it was for the first decade, then came the book 'The Malay Dilemma' which brought fear amongst the Chinese community and later caused fear amongst the Selangor Malays when one seat separated the control of the state government.
When we look at the past knowing the present day system of political problem ,the May 13, 1969 political strife became the first 'rupture' in the peaceful racial harmony.

Compromise was somewhat reached when the New Economic Policy (NEP) came in for implementation. With this, many Chinese in urban areas joined opposition parties protesting against the NEP.  

Though the NEP was a noble effort to help the bumiputras, but, the seventies being the period of its implementation saw the start of cronyism benefiting only Selected  Malay entrepreneurs given boosts in government mooted companies.

In my opinion, many could have done well if they were made to rise the hard way. Loading them even after failures, in my opinion, is the cause  of not reaching the targeted equity for the Malays!

However, some good progress were made in the education field, with the late 70s and 80s being great years with universities, colleges and Mara Science colleges beingflooded with large and sometimes full intake of Malay students, risking very often the quality of education.

Rush job ends in miserable results

Weaknesses in this crash programme were most obvious when many of the graduates were not able to be employed in the private sector even in bumiputra firms.

Therefore, most government departments were packed to the brim with one race.

With the Islamic Party coming into the limelight,the ruling government went on an Islamisation Policy, bringing fear to non -Muslims with the ruling Party entering the religious field.

This further drove more non-Muslims into the opposition. Tough actions against Islamic leaders like that in the Memali incident further added Muslim sympathizer s drawing more support for the Islamic Party.

The racism problems of 70s have slowly turned in the late 80s into a religious dilemma to be faced by non -Muslims.

This came with the speedily passed amendments to the federal constitution creating two parallel courts, giving much powers to the Shariah Courts through Article 121 (1A) in the year 1988.

The non-Muslim MPs in the ruling coalition, claiming to be assured that it would not affect non-Muslims voted in favour to achieve the two-third majority required to approve an amendment to the federal charter The non-Muslim MPs in the opposition  voted against the amendments.

Success inspires Islamic party

The victory of the Islamic Party in the states of Kelantan and Terengganu made PAS campaign to implement hudud laws in Kelantan in the early 90s.

The MCCBCHST (Malaysian Consultative Council of Buddhism, Christianity, Hinduism, Sikhism and Taoism) went all out to resist this move by meeting all political parties urging them not to support Hudud laws.

Heading the MCCBCHST as its president (Vaithilingam) from 1991 to 1993 the Council received much sympathy but the hurriedly passed amendments to the respective State Islamic Enactments made it a stumbling block for non-Muslims giving much power to State Shariah Councils on all Islamic affairs.

In our state by state campaign against Hudud our non-Muslim atate assemblymen pleaded that their menteris besar or chief ministers assured that they should vote in favour of the amendments because the non-Muslims were not affected.

They were given the papers at about 10am and passed within about four to five hours. Only the non-Muslim opposition members voted against.

It must be remembered that during that period important national leaders of the opposition were held under ISA at Kamunting for about two years when the amendments were made in the parliament in 1988.

Our meeting with the Menteri Besar Nik Aziz Nik Mat was a landmark item. It was then that a government head was willing to discuss in detail on the proposed laws.

Tok Guru’s liberal side revealed

He even offered to consider any proposed law for respective non-Muslim religions. The delegation was jointly led (in alphabetical order) by Ven Seet Kim Beng (Buddhist).

Father Chan of Kelantan (Christian), A Vaithilingam (Hindus) and Sardar Joginder Singh (Sikhs). Taoists were not in the council then.

It must be emphasized that we insisted that we would only recognise the existing civil laws for non-Muslims because it was common for all. We did emphasise that that there should only be one set of criminal laws for the nation i.e. the present laws.

Nik Aziz agreed to consider our views. Within a week he sent us a note that hudud laws will not be imposed on non- Muslims if Hudud laws were implemented.

However, the nation saw an open Umno turmoil in late 90s when Anwar Ibrahim was sacked as deputy prime minister.

The birth of a new opposition party led by Anwar sympathisers saw a grand battle royal in the 1999 general election.

The non-Muslim voters played a role in giving a general support to the ruling party against the opposition mainly because of the fear of the opposition Islamic Party.

The new prime minister's liberal views gained much support to the extent of receiving overwhelming support in the 2004 GE.

Curtain rises on cheery note

He had some good dialogue sessions with non-Muslim leaders. And was generally agreeable on places of worship of non-Muslims and some other reforms.   

However, this show of support was short lived because the ruling party's former leaders were not comfortable with the reforms and liberal policy of the PM.

A new fear of Malays losing their rights was created and a new racist based NGO named Perkasa was launched with the former PM as its patron.

Lots of racist seditious statements were coughed out by Perkasa with the AG and the police force just ignoring all reports against such seditious actions.

The non-Malays were pushed towards the opposition, gaining a tremendous boost with the taking over of Selangor, Penang, Kedah and Perak in addition to Kelantan in the 2008 GE.

Sabah and Sarawak saved the ruling coalition. The act of vengeance was enough to force the reformist PM out the following year.

Many wondered why non-Muslims favoured an Islamic party of the opposition to the racist based ruling coalition  in the 2013 GE!

 Perkasa’s consistent racial actions, candidature of its 2 leaders in the GE by the ruling coalition, biased police actions, dubious decisions of the judiciary in some cases drove vast majority of non-Malays to provide the opposition with 52% of their support.

East rides to the rescue

Once again the Borneo states saved the ruling coalition. An interesting point to note is the good proportion of urban Malay votes going to the opposition.

Hudud was brought as an issue but the racist statement by Perkasa and a former PM overrode the religious hudud, noting that the Islamic party has been liberal on issues like non-Islamic places of worship, eg centre of Kota Bharu boasting a new tall church and a 3-storey Hindu temple when their bids were rejected by the previous government.

Kelantan allowed the revival of the long banned cultural lion dances and cultural building structures.

Poor prime minister, no other PM had given out such generous handouts or good development grants to non-Malay groups.

But he failed to realise that the non-Malays need security and  not donations. His silence on slanders against the non-Malays was the other factor.

Since GE 2013 Perkasa has turned to religious issues onslaught. The target is now the opposition Islamic party.

Some leaders of this party seem to panic, thus going into defence mode by reverting to the hudud issue.

This party must realise that they will never have been in the national scene had it not been for non-Malay support. It will in the end meet the fate of losing the grip it has gained outside Kelantan.

In the meantime the non-Malay and non-Muslim based political parties must refrain from attacking each other, especially regarding religious issues. Lack of concentration on Article 121(1A) has made it possible to bring in new discriminatory laws.

In this country no political party can reach national level success unless it can work together with all races and religions.

Our forefathers, including the original mover of Independence Dato Onn Jaffar and lovable Father of the Nation Tunku Abdul Rahman, showed us the path, not forgetting the open listening and friendly approach of Nik Aziz.

It is most essential that the ruling opposition parties follow and abide by that direction.

Let common sense prevail.


A VAITHILINGAM is former president of MCCBCHST.