The self-destruction of our commonalities –
David Quek
TMI: Published: 23
October 2014
Most religious
festivities are for the joyful reenactment and celebration of our myriad ethnic
and religious sensibilities, family reunions, reminders of our human need to
connect, to belong and to feel human.
Yet there's
been a rising tirade among loud-mouthed politicians who have bucked the trend
for tolerance and acceptance to create a sickening atmosphere of more ethnic
and religious divisions and hatred than ever before! I've been reminded to
re-read Article 8 of our Constitution regarding our ethnic equality mandate.
Clause 2 of
Article 8 of the Constitution of Malaysia on equality reads: “Except as
expressly authorised by this Constitution, there shall be no discrimination
against citizens on the ground only of religion, race, descent, gender or place
of birth in any law or in the appointment... to any office or employment under
a public authority or in the administration of any law relating to the
acquisition, holding or disposition of property or the establishing or carrying
on of any trade, business, profession, vocation or employment."
The above explicit enunciation of our Constitution is
clear and unambiguous. Need we say more? Who has been repeatedly contravening
this constitutional edict for political and personal gains, by evoking and
provoking bogeymen among anyone else who are "different"?
The rising
tempo and shrill exchanges of "pendatangs" versus
"pendatangs" must be laid to rest! The pointless pendatang narrative
must be put aside. Let's all stop this! We are all Malaysians!
The real world
from time immemorial is one huge teeming cross-pollination and commingling of
migrants, first escaping the Rift Valley of Africa, millions of years ago. So
in that sense, we're all pendatangs, and we should relish in this, because
we're all really the relics of successive generations of successful migrants!
That is how we've survived whether here in South East Asia, China or India or
elsewhere.
Malaysians are
now so inward-looking, insular, covert extremists and racially-bigoted that
we've lost sight of the bigger picture out there: the rest of the enlightened
world is already galloping and running away from us!
Of course
there are others, on a downward spiral of self-annihilation: Rwanda's Tutsis
and Hutus, Yugoslavia's tryst with ethnic cleansing debauchery, Sudan's
Islamist divisions, Boko Haram, and now Isis, etc.
And yet we
keep harping on this self-inflicted bogey of Malays versus the rest – the other
racial groups within Malaysia – who are collectively contributing towards
making this nation greater and more prosperous, just to preserve the political
advantage of politicians whose time has come for serious reckoning, to continue
to deceive the less informed, to blindside the real dangers out there, the
coming economic crunch if we're not prepared (our natural resources of oil and
gas are running out, depletion is nigh.), to fool the "heartland"
into a rousing interracial hatred of the different and the unknown.
Do we
recognise and realise that we've become less and less productive and that our
economic and intellectual (dismal university rankings, poor national Pisa
scores), human development growth has stalled and fallen behind vis-à-vis even
our previously poorest neighbouring countries?
That we've
become too dependent on illusionist nationalist propaganda, subsidy/affirmative
action crutches and hand-outs?
That we've
become less competitive, less productive, less educated, less literate but so
so religiously and racially-empowered and paranoid!
We have to
learn to lift up our own bootstraps and learn to run as fast, if not faster, if
we're not to become the newest and increasingly predicted failed basket state
in South East Asia!
Indonesia,
Vietnam and even the once hermitic Myanmar, are poised to spearhead the advance
based on national growth, not warfare of self-destructive racist and
ultra-religious games!
Come on, we
must celebrate and build upon our strengths and diversity, not play
self-destructive race-baiting one-upmanship, of serial mounting threats, of
supremacist racial arrogance, of counterintuitive hatred that only drive wedges
between all of us.
These
uncertainties only create and foster a climate of angry despair, counter-provocative
retaliation, and restless hopelessness, and a brooding sense of loss of
belonging of many among the "others"!
Please! Don't
destroy our Malaysian polity and reality! – October 23, 2014.
* Dr David KL Quek is senior consultant cardiologist at a
private hospital in Kuala Lumpur.
