“On the lack of confidence in him, I can understand it because in the May 5 general election, many people used Najib’s 'rock star' image to promote (themselves).”

- Former MCA president Chua Soi Lek

As expected, former MCA president Chua Soi Lek was vilified for doing what is expected of a former MCA president engaged in the treacherous race-based politics of Malaysia. Unlike most political pundits who despise the former MCA president or want anything to do with BN, I have a certain respect for the man, even though these days respect means very little in the ‘take no prisoner’ discourse of oppositional politics.

Chua’s recent rejoinder to the MCA to be hard on DAP is exactly the kind of throwback politics that would have worked if MCA enjoyed the majority support of the Chinese community. As it is, the very same MCA, which for years had enjoyed the support of the Chinese community and ironically laid the foundation for the eventual communities' desertion, is unprepared to face the Bangsa Malaysia propaganda that fuels an urban uprising against the Umno hegemon.

Even more damaging to the MCA is the 1MDB scandal that not only acts as the glue that keeps various disparate oppositional fronts together but also the shield that deflects against any other scandal that emanates from the opposition.

What is worse for the former MCA president is that he has publicly acknowledged that the Umno big cheese provided funds for BN component parties to fight elections, and that the non-Malay component parties failed to deliver in return.

The sad reality is that Chua acknowledges what most DAP members purposely choose to ignore or berate those who bring it up, that ultimately race is the foundation of MCA and DAP politics. Race-based politics is the reality for most political parties in the country, with tokenism the fig leaf that hides the sordid truth.

While Chua openly acknowledges this in rhetoric and took pride in debating Lim Guan Eng in 2012, I had a different take on the debate. In a post-debate piece, which did not go down well with most people, I wrote:

“Imagine an alternate scenario where the DAP stuck to its guns and refused to debate the MCA on this racialist topic but rather demanded for a debate between Anwar and PM Najib Razak, since these two are contenders for the Putrajaya throne, or demanded that the topic centres on issues affecting all Malaysians, whom the DAP claims to represent. As it is, this debate merely confirms that the rules of the game haven't changed - that the DAP's role in Pakatan is to pick up the Chinese vote, as are PKR and PAS to scoop up the Malay vote.”

Sometime last year, Chua admitted to receiving funds from the Umno grand poohbah - “I must admit, during the BN supreme council meeting approaching the May 5 general election, he (Najib) in his capacity as prime minister and BN chairperson, did reveal that in that election, BN will support its component parties’ finances. I remembered clearly, I was the first to thank him.”

Chua also claimed that he advised the Umno president, “So long as the money did not come from the government or 1MDB, there is nothing wrong. Because in Malaysia, there is no law to say that when people donate money to you for the election, you need to report it.”

So, what the non-Malays have is former MIC president S Samy Vellu admitting that Umno never really listened to the MIC, then we had former MCA chief Chua admitting that the MCA received funds from one of the biggest corruption scandals in this country. Is it any wonder that the non-Malay vote has mostly left Umno - and add to this the constant provocations by state-sponsored Islamists and outsourced thugs?

Anybody with an inkling of money politics in this country will be cognisant of the fact that rich plutocrats support political parties, even oppositional ones, and this is the reason why campaign finance reforms are extremely difficult to carry out. Furthermore, the naming and shaming proposal by certain Umno hacks or, as Chua calls them - not very clever - are the same cretins who are under the mistaken impression that Umno can go at it alone.

Indeed, when it comes to political funding and political influence/interference, even Anwar Ibrahim felt compelled to acknowledge this in his letter from prison - the same letter I attempted to use to remind oppositional folks that something was rotten in the state of Denmark - “Actually, it is incestuous. Rich men with money are always hedging their bets. The average opposition supporter would be shocked by who funds whom. Plutocrats who are routinely mocked on in the comment sections of Malaysiakini and the other ‘alternative’ news (sic) sources, have always been amenable to funding potentially powerful power structures. Money politics isn’t just an Umno thing.”

Most insightful

Chua, of course, realised even then that nothing coming out of Putrajaya is credible and even today, MCA political operatives tell me that nothing they say, no scandal they reveal or no issues they highlight can detract from the target painted on their backs by the 1MDB scandal.

However, hitching your wagon on a failing star aside, Chua is still the most insightful if mercurial maverick around and his observations are worth considering just maybe not in the way that Chua frames it.

1) Chua’s prediction that Umno would end up working with PAS.

There are a few points to be made of this prediction.

a) Umno working with PAS has nothing to do with lack of non-Malay support but rather the reality that Malay support is fractured and the Umno potentate finds himself in a weak position because of the 1MDB scandal.

b) PAS’s inclusion in mainstream Malaysian politics was detrimental to the opposition front and continues to be because certain elements now find themselves needing PAS to sustain their own political ambitions. The opposition (primarily the DAP) made many mistakes in their dealings with PAS and they maliciously attacked any who stood in their way. Those lessons have sadly been swept under the carpet.

c) While it is tempting to argue that regional geopolitics would hamper the rise of the kind of Islam that characterises a failed Islamic state, I would argue that regional hegemons profit from failed Islamic states. So it is only delusional kool-aid drinking apparatchiks who think that China will curtail the rise of Islamo-fascism in this country. They may make half-hearted attempts to curtail Umno but ultimately China has never had a problem working with Islamic extremists. There, of course, is an abundance of literature to support this proposition.

2) Chua’s contention that the Chinese community must now reflect on whether they would be successful in a third attempt to unseat the ruling coalition.

While some people attacked Chua for making such a “racist” statement even though DAP political operatives have used the same kind of reasoning, I would rephrase Chua’s point. The Chinese community must now reflect on whether they would be successful in a third attempt to unseat the ruling party with a squabbling group of Malay allies.

This is the same kind of realpolitik thinking that sometimes surfaces in oppositional discourse like when Kelvin Yii, the parliamentary assistant to Stampin MP Julian Tan, did (but which somehow escaped the scrutiny of supposed race-blind opposition supporters) in his rambling Chinese dilemma essay, which I helpfully answered, when writing about the black eye the opposition received in the last by-elections:

“Kelvin Yii, an assistant to a DAP MP, asked, ‘So, would the Chinese want to have a say in the government, or stay out there in angry isolation?’ All I can say is that if you were a truly multi-racial party with a race-blind agenda, this type of question would not need to be asked.

“But since this is still a thing, why doesn’t Yii define the ‘rights’ of the Chinese community, which he thinks is lacking under the Umno regime, and demonstrates how Pakatan Rakyat has secured these rights on a state level or even made it an issue on a federal level. In other words, Yii, you don’t get to berate the MCA for playing the race card when you have no problem playing it yourself.”

I have said it before and no doubt will say it again: racial politics is a bitch and apparently an unforgiving one. Chua Soi Lek knows this very well.

S THAYAPARAN is Commander (Rtd) of the Royal Malaysian Navy.