Maybe I have a finicky palate, but I just can't decide what to do with this latest dish of stinking fish that is being served up to us: bolt it down and hope for the best, or throw up in disgust.

Can things really have gotten so rotten in Malaysia that the director-general of the Anti-Corruption Agency is himself corrupt as alleged? Or that the deputy internal security minister is on the take to the tune of RM5.5 million to let 'suspects' out of detention?

Or could it be that what we're really being fed is a can of worms just as disgusting as the one Dr M and the gang forced us to swallow during the Anwar Ibrahim situation?

As they themselves and many others have declared on their behalf, Zulkipli Mat Noor and Mohd Johari Baharom are innocent until proven guilty.

But the proof, proverbially, is in the pudding. And it's very difficult to discern what kind of pudding we're being presented with here. Is this, as it appears and could very well be, a case of two bad apples finally getting their just desserts? Or is it, as in the Anwar case, another instance of charges cooked up against the more-or-less innocent so the guilty can happily continue having their cake and eat it too?

In any case, who wants these two persons' head on a platter and why, when there's such an extensive menu of even fatter and juicier corruption suspects to choose from? Are Zulkipli and Johari really wolves in sheep's clothing as accused? Or, as some doubters have been wondering, are they really a pair of sacrificial lambs?

As for the timing of this feeding frenzy, that's obvious enough. The pre-election heat is on the prime minister to treat the voters to at least a taste of high-level anti-corruption action, if not the feast he promised, to get such a majority to come to the party the last time around.

But from what I see and hear, so many Malaysians are fed-up of the raw deal they've been getting. The Barisan Nasional's entre back into office may not be quite such a snack next time.

It certainly doesn't deserve to be. Despite this long-awaited sop to public hungering for the prosecution of some bigwigs with their snouts in the trough, Malaysia could soon be as notorious for corruption as it is currently celebrated for its cuisine.

Admittedly this nation's reputation is not so far even nearly as unsavoury as that of, say, Indonesia, Nigeria or horror of horrors, Haiti, but it's certainly headed that way. The way the country is going it will soon have more crooks than cooks, and cheating will surpass eating as the national pastime.

Skim off the scum

It doesn't take a survey by Transparency International Malaysia to reveal the seething stew of nepotism, kickbacks, sweetheart deals, vote buying, crony-enriching privatisation projects and corporate bailouts, 'commissions' to 'agents' on government purchases, official appointments by patronage, the letting of secrecy-shrouded contracts without tender, share-ramping, insider trading, the non-accountability of Petronas and other publicly-owned entities, the wholesale rape and pillage of natural resources, the buying and/or leasing of jets, the building or not building of luxury yachts and all the other over-the-top and under-the-table financial arrangements that fuel Malaysian officialdom's insatiable greed.

And the corruption's not just economic, but, even more sickeningly, moral, ethical and social. Far from resembling that delicious, nutritious traditional dish nasi lemak, Malaysia's melting-pot is a nasty, almost 'Nazi lemak' of snoops, censors, keris-brandishing racial supremacists, bounty-hunting storm troopers like Rela and 'reformed' Mat Rempit, laws permitting imprisonment without trial for 'suspects' and 'troublemakers', hopelessly gerrymandered electorates, government-monopolised, mealy-mouthed media, and a domestic economy contentedly riding the gravy-train at the expense of two million grotesquely-exploited foreign workers.

All the ingredients, in fact, of an increasingly sick situation. Let's face it, you wouldn't trust most of the people who have taken charge of this country, at every level from cabinet to local council, to manage your mamak stall. They're as bankrupt of ideas and inspiration as they are of ideals and integrity. Treating the mass of Malaysians to the same old starvation diet of promises and platitudes, and a few crumbs like these current anti-corruption cases, while busily cooking the books behind the scenes and reserving the tastiest, most nourishing morsels for themselves and their own.

How long they imagine the nation is prepared to stomach this situation, it's impossible to tell. Forever, I guess, if only they can get away with it. But now is as good a time as any for the country to get up the guts to get rid of them; to empower some honest politicians capable of using their noodles on behalf of he public good, and giving the incumbents enough curry to finally drive them out of the kitchen.

Like a good many other people, I'm totally confused as to whether the current PM is the chief chef of this mess, or whether he's the good egg he is at pains to appear to be, but with so many bad eggs surrounding and 'supporting' him that he's finding it hard to make a difference.

But either way, thus far into his premiership there's been little discernible change, except perhaps for the worse, in the situation he was handed on a plate by his predecessor.

If it is true, as culinary tradition has it, that too many cooks spoil the broth, then too many crooks is a recipe for utter disaster.

If Malaysia is not to find itself in hot soup, it had better start following the standard broth-clarifying directions: bring the mixture to boiling-point, strain thoroughly and discard the dregs, then simmer as long as it takes to skim all the scum off the top.