More of us should be more forthcoming and join in this rising chorus of advocacy, of passionate vocalising and sharing, but especially for more of positive communitarian rather than negative partisan actions. More than 50 years of smouldering if passive acquiescence is enough.
We must now awaken and become individual and/or collective agents of change for a better Malaysia. Although my political inclinations are probably not secret, I wish to categorically state that I am not a member of any political party.
Let me quote from Vaclav Havel, playwright, writer, social critic,
samizdat (underground writing) pioneer, and reluctant first president of the then newly emancipated Czech Republic, who went on to win the Nobel Peace prize.
In his first speech (New Year's day, 1990) Havel talked about the "contaminated moral environment", which the Czech Republic had just broken free from. Although taken from a different context and era, I believe it still applies equally well to our Malaysian situation. I quote:
"We live in a contaminated moral environment. We fell morally ill because we became used to saying something different from what we thought... Only a few of us were able to cry out loud that the powers that be should not be all-powerful... we cannot blame the previous rulers for everything... because it could blunt the duty that each of us faces today, namely, the obligation to act independently, freely, reasonably, and quickly... Freedom and democracy include participation and therefore responsibility from us all."
Thus, Malaysians must to ponder upon and seize this heightened awareness and crucial moment in history for greater engagement, and perhaps empowerment. I believe we all have a tremendous if obligatory stake in our own nation building.
We are who we are, because of what and how we choose to do, or not to do. We should be the masters of our own fate and destiny. We must continue to believe that change for the better is possible.
Contrary to what many people may think, there appears to be a convergence of many minds in our Malaysian society. Lawyers, doctors, economists, academicians, professional bodies and NGOs are more and more aligned to a common objective, where we hope to have a greater say and influence in the direction of where our country is going.
Former Bar Council chairperson Datuk Ambiga Sreenevasan had said that: "Malaysians have changed dramatically; we are more vocal, we are not prepared to suffer in silence or to watch others suffer and most importantly we see clearly what is happening before us. We are bored with explanations or statements that insult our intelligence... There must be a "passive resistance" by the people against unjust actions.
We have seen ordinary people producing extraordinary results when they stand firm against injustice, dishonesty and the destruction of our institutions. Indeed, what we have seen is an awakening of the will, wisdom and the collective conscience of the Malaysian people. And that is a formidable force that those in power ignore at their peril."
The involvement of doctors
Speaking from a point of view of a socially conscious physician, I believe that personally and as a professional group, doctors can help contribute to a more meaningful but less contentious politically charged environment.
As doctors, we are expected to take on leadership and stewardship roles in health and patient issues, to help enhance human dignity. We are exhorted to more directly impact on society so that our professionalism, our acclaimed ethical bearings can be put to better use.
Some have even insisted that we take on the lead in directing rather than advising policy makers i.e. engage with politicians and even indulge in politics.
Although some of us more traditional physicians may baulk at this idea, it is good to note that even as early as in the mid-nineteenth century (1848), physician-pathologist Rudolf Virchow had said that "Politics is nothing more than medicine on a grand scale."
Rudolf Ludwig Carl Virchow was indeed a magnificent exemplar of a quintessential renaissance man. Not contented with just discovering leukaemia, distinguishing postmortem thrombosis from embolism, mastering microscopic examination of cells and tissues, and founding cellular pathology and pathologic physiology, Virchow was also known to be an incurable public service advocate.
Virchow felt his social duty keenly: "Medicine is a social science and as the science of man, has a duty to perform in recognising these problems as its own and in offering the means by which a solution may be reached... medicine has carried us into the social sphere, there to meet up with the great problems of our time." "Physicians," he articulated, "are the natural attorneys of the poor."
Virchow of course went on to be elected into the Berlin City Council, the Prussian House of Deputies and later becoming a member of the Reichstag. He was a co-founder of the German Progressive Party.
Thus perhaps, it is not too much to expect that the modern day physician also share some of the traits of this outstanding man. Increasingly, I believe the medical profession is called upon to be more socially engaged.
Being among the more favoured and endowed cognoscenti, we should lead in matters not just pertaining to health and healthcare, but perhaps to even actively shape its ultimate form and function.
But should we just limit ourselves to only things medical or health? I believe otherwise. Indeed, I venture to say that the expected public roles and responsibilities of the physician have changed and have expanded.
Of course, quite a number of Malaysian doctors have already steeped themselves in politics, and then some. We are keenly aware of some of our more astute if rambunctious physicians, not a few of whom have led us down garden paths of crumbling political wilderness and had contributed to so much of our maligned if fractured institutions.
In many ways therefore, as physicians, our moral covenant with society needs to be renewed, indeed our moral imperative needs to be redefined, rekindled. In 1901, an editorial in the BMJ, extolled the possible potential power of the doctor in politics, if only we choose to use this effectively, and I quote:
"The medical profession is treated by politicians as a negligible quantity, but this is partly because it does not know, and partly because it does not care to use, its power. What doctors could do if they chose to use the legitimate influence which they have..."
Perhaps it is time to reconsider our role and ask ourselves just as Alice in Wonderland had been asked: '"Who are you?" said the caterpillar. "I hardly know, sir, just at present," Alice replied rather shyly, "at least I know who I was when I got up this morning, but I think I must have been changed several times since then."'
Sociopolitical cynicism runs high
The political climate in Malaysia is overcast, fickle and unpredictable-there have been floods, drought, earthquakes and even tsunamis!
There is pervasive cynicism and a brooding sense of despondency and uncertainty. Many are disenchanted, angry, yet deep-down faintly hopeful that some better sense will prevail to propel us forward into a new deal, a renewed sense of belonging.
We hanker for a more meaningful and inclusive unity and seamless sharing, rich with our cultural diversity, yet without all the ethnic baggage and baiting, racist taunting, scandalous corruption and insulting polemics.
The public is clamouring for a clearer moral direction and certainty for our nation. Just shouting the jingoistic "1Malaysia" is not enough; it must be heartfelt and not simply lip service. Perhaps our leaders must set the perfect examples if we hope to believe in their purported visions.
While perusing the Times magazine recently, I came upon the British election story, where I was somewhat surprised to note that even there, political skepticism runs high.
David Cameron, Conservative leader and now just elected British PM had said during the election campaigning that,
"People just aren't cynical about politicians. They're pretty bloody angry; I'm sickened by what's happened in our politics... Change vs. more of the same is the big clarion call. The change we need, the change we believe in, change we can trust, change that happens-call it what you want."
So social skepticism is not something peculiar or special to Malaysian politics. Malaysia is perhaps just a grosser example of escalating and exasperating excesses: of 'endemic' fraud, gratuitous graft, crippling corruption, wanton patronage, unchecked abuse of power; of terrible profligacy and wastage. But clearly we are not alone in this.
When championing Benigno (Noynoy) Aquino III (
right), in the recent Philippines presidential elections,
Newsbreak magazine editor, Maritas Vitug echoed the cry of the populace:
"Our trust in politics has been so eroded that the people just want a new leader who will do the very best-who will not be corrupt, who will be good."
Perhaps, such expectations and wishes are the common public cry for change for the better. Perhaps, they are simply too good to be true. Perhaps this wistful thinking will forever remain elusive, but this has not stopped many people the world over, from yearning for more moral leaders-maybe the 'least bad' will do.
Scurrilous shenanigans
Our own leaders seem mired in petty and scurrilous shenanigans, which appear to tear at the social fabric of our nation. Thus, more enlightened citizens are desperately looking up to someone or anyone, whom they can trust, to displace the overflowing cynicism that has pervaded our sociopolitical space.
The recent Hulu Selangor by-election results point to the state of confusion of what our diverse rakyat wants. The political fault-line is wafer thin (1725 votes). The Sibu by-election reinforced this view that the public is almost equally confused, with the opposition winning by just 398 votes in a bitterly fought campaign. Malaysians appear evenly divided at this juncture, although ethnic divides have widened, hardened even.
It appears that mundane local issues too easily sway us. National interests often take a backseat, trumped by parochial issues, which if 'promised' piecemeal ad hoc resolutions, or even overt pork-barrel goodies, we could be nudged to choose one way or the other.
Perhaps money politics and promises (tens to hundreds of millions of ringgit exchanging hands?) and proffered political positions(senatorships) can buy just about anything in this Malaysian climate of blatant self-serving venality.
Sadly, even as we grapple with that narrow win or loss, depending on which side you stand, other dispiriting issues continue to dominate our sociopolitical landscape and shatter the myth of a harmonious well-ordered society.
It is sad when foreign political observers, deride our political maturity by decrying our intellectual naïveté, and slam our petty mindedness!
Australian AsiaRisk commentator, Manjit Bhatia in a hard-hitting commentary, believed that "Malaysian politics has become more and more of desperation than of cleverness or even of organic intelligence."
His comments that Malaysian politics are mired in primordial 'political psychology' rooted in racial baggage and 'morally bankrupt divide-and-rule' games, rather than via essence of true intellectual discourse, are worth contemplating.
We are riven with oppressive graft and highly questionable practices. We have that RM8 billion military contract to purchase some 257 APCs (each costing more than the best made US Abrams tank in the world!); the scandalous RM3.4 billion purchase of Scorpene submarines; we have that 76 million ringgit investment of lobbying time with President Obama and some American politicians/businessmen; we have that uncovered sale of oil-rich sea blocks off Limbang to Brunei; that brazen RM12 billion Port Klang Free Trade Zone debacle; and the fatal police shooting of a young 15-year old boy out for a midnight joy ride in his sister's car, etc.
Hence, it is not surprising that a late 2009 Merdeka Centre poll showed: corruption and abuse of power, social problems, crime and public safety, and political uncertainty as the top six most problematic concerns in the country!
It is therefore, not wrong to suggest that the informed Malaysian skeptic now believes that our civic institutions are systematically corrupt and crumbling-from the perceived one-sided trigger-happy prosecutorial law enforcement authorities, our ostensibly amoral politicians, to our seemingly browbeaten judicial system.
Our self-censoring mainstream media are a shameful testimony of a sycophantic pliant state of affairs! When two media producers (ntv7 producer Joshua Wong and RTM TV2 producer Chou Z Lam) resigned due to undue pressure and censorship problems, pathetic half-hearted cries for more press freedom finally made some headlines, although more so in the alternate media.
This recent exposé ironically coincided with World Press Freedom Day on May 3. Malaysia is ranked a pathetic 142 out of 196 this year, trailing behind East Timor, Philippines, Indonesia and Cambodia. Journalist CC Liew in
The Malaysian Insider lamented that:
"Our Sword of Damocles is the Printing Presses and Publications Act." But I don't think this draconian and oppressive law to muzzle dissenting voices will be relaxed anytime soon.
Yet, despite all these, I believe that most Malaysians are still trying to make sense of our hardboiled reality, and scrunching our eyes to catch the elusive silver lining among the very dark clouds overhead. Those who have unfortunately lost all hope however, had also probably left our shores in the droves-some 300,000-odd, over the past 18 months or so!
Deepening crisis of public trust
In the early 2000s, British citizens were sucked into a vortex of public recriminations where doctors faced their greatest nemeses and fallout-e.g. rogue doctors who had became killers, reckless surgeons who had over-stepped their surgical skills, excised body parts that had been withheld by pathologists without permission, etc.
Scandals like these had thereby shaken the very foundations of their much-touted National Health Service. Public trust fell to its lowest ebb. But this was not confined to physicians alone, as the BBC's Reith lectures in 2002, described.
"...We are in the grip of a deepening crisis of public trust... Mistrust and suspicion have spread across all areas of life... Citizens, it is said, no longer trust governments, or politicians, or ministers, or the police, or the courts, or the prison service... Patients, it is said, no longer trust doctors (think of Dr Shipman!)... 'Loss of trust' is in short, a cliché of our times."
So there is nothing exceptional about periodic scandals and crises of public trust around the world. This has always been, since time immemorial. Loutish man had always to be constrained by a Leviathan: by social and/or public laws and regulations to dampen his/her penchant for digressions along easier paths of self-serving mischief!
For Malaysia therefore, this may be just one of these cycles of recrimination or a return to our innate brutish behaviour run amuck! Unfortunately for us, this has run into one protracted debilitating atmosphere, which seemed to have paralysed our nation, our progress, our development.
Decades of mismanagement and personal/political aggrandisement had left us with a mindset that is flawed. We are gripped in a pervasive if simplistic claw-hold that handouts are OK, that 'lebih kurang' mediocrity is good enough. We have become soft and lackadaisical. We are not known for our competitiveness. Our hitherto Asian Tiger star rating is fading.
Down the ladder
Yet when our universities continue to decline down the ladder of competitiveness, we strike out vehemently to say that there are too many flaws in the methodology and that we will not be participating in future surveys. Perhaps the truth hurts, particularly when systematic and entrenched "osteoporosis" had weakened our foundations too much.
A general air of despondency has pervaded our shores. Many of our most important assets, our better-educated and knowledgeable citizens are losing faith and hope. Many choose to be abroad for better opportunities, better working environments, more challenging research climates, and less stifling intellectual environments.
For many it is not simply an economic concern, but the deep-seated anguish of uncertain unattainable personal or family goals, self-actualisation and satisfaction, at home.
For many too, our individual pride and patriotism in our nation, has been repeatedly baited and battered until they have become hollow hurtful clanging jingoisms of desperation-deeply etched as negative memes into our troubled minds!
These are the disturbing developments vis-à-vis the Malaysian sociopolitical scene. Although we are not alone, we are a growing body of cynics. We are increasingly mistrustful toward one another. We seem to be trapped within an ethno-cultural anomie and listlessness, going neither here nor there.
Every day we read and are exposed to relentless streams of callous and salacious actions by politicians, officials, police, judiciary and even among our fellow citizens-corrupt practices, petty thefts, snatch-thefts, daylight robberies, mindless attacks, killings even; child rapes, abandoned babies; police atrocities and excesses, etc.- an endless crescendo of dispiriting stories... It is difficult to remain optimistic or positive.
Our lifestyle standards, purchasing power, shrinking exchange rate, workplace discord and unspoken separateness, uncertain employment and promotional prospects, are causes for concern for the ordinary folk.
Our glut of mass-produced under-qualified university and college graduates ensures that they continue to languish as unemployable. Not that anyone really cares. More money is doled out to retrain them some more! Is this money well-spent? Or is this haemorrhaging into more wastage, into rent-seeking schemes, which produce little to show for?
More and more higher educational facilities are approved without the need to see if these are really required for society's needs, or whether they are sufficiently equipped with amenities and quality teaching staff. Our government-sponsored diploma mills brazenly bid for public offering at the stock exchange, as if such largesse were guaranteed gold seams of profit!
Even our broadband standards have fallen by the wayside and are left far behind our faster growing neighbouring states, despite our earlier initiation into our own Silicon Valley, i.e. our MSC (Multimedia Super Corridor) and Cyberjaya.
After the political tsunami
But political shenanigans and vagaries have clearly shaped and defined public confidence in Malaysian society, ever since March 8, 2008, our so-called political tsunami. Initially, some glimmer of hope for urgent change for the better was ignited. Since then however, political wranglings and political one-upmanship have ratcheted up more than a few notches. Politicians from all fronts have relentlessly pushed and pursued these farces of absurdities to their limits!
While not unique to Malaysia
per sé, these "growing pains" are especially true of societies, which are undergoing painful transitions into more credible versions of a mature democracy-where individual human rights and justice concerns take their rightful place as the pinnacle of modern evolved society.
In Malaysia's case however, we appear to have been stuck in a lingering adolescent phase of petulant and stuttering "childhood". The pulls and tugs of small-minded chauvinism and ethnocentric bigotry remain too entrenched, too hardwired to prevent that so important breakaway step into final maturity.
Even our DPM, Muhyiddin Yassin (
right), could not take that plunge to commit himself as a Malaysian first, for fear of diluting his political capital as an ethnic champion! Our "maverick" former prime minister, Tun Dr Mahathir too, could not escape the grips of this confused identity crisis.
We have yet to fully embrace acceptance and tolerance of our multiethnic, multi-religious diversity, so much touted in our jingoistic shibboleths such as "Malaysia Truly Asia", "1Malaysia", even!
My belief is that this is that juncture where Malaysia is today, at the cusp of possible change, for better or for worse... Dare we hope for the better?
We must move away from intimidating fear and self-censorship. Because this timid mindset only allows cobwebs of prejudice and racism to amass under the proverbial carpet of overarching top-down paternalism of government knows best. Those days are passé; they are over and should be deeply buried!
Increasingly, we must opt for more forthright candidness that might serve us better if only we could harness these differences into a synergistic strength of diversity and a collective unity of purpose. Malaysians have to learn to balance the rule of law with the sagacity to oppose unjust laws and systems when they violate human dignity.
We cannot allow ourselves to be sidetracked by ethnocentric and prejudicial fears and flames of passion, which are fanned by Machiavellian politicians of a bygone era, trying to recapture that lost amber of obsolete ethnic pride and bigotry, of shameless political expediency!
We must consciously strive to finally exorcise the stubborn stains of irrational tribalism and prejudice, the acknowledged corruption of our Malaysian soul so entrenched in ethnically-dominated interests, venal pursuits, rent-seeking political patronage.
This blemish has led to so much economic wastage, opportunity costs and productivity leakages, that even latterly, our Prime Minister was forced into openly acknowledging when announcing the New Economic Model (NEM) for Malaysia.
It is certainly time to rid our Malaysian political scene from rent seeking and corrupt patronage expectations. Merit-based, efficient, competitive and productive enterprises must drive our future transformation. Perhaps at last, we can move forwards, away from what has held us back and debilitated our former strengths and unique position as a rising Asian Tiger economy.
Malaysia must strive to remain relevant and competitive within the greater Asian 21st century and sphere of preeminence. As Malaysians, we must all rise up to the challenge by becoming more truly involved to help reshape the politics of the impossible-namely the art of improving ourselves and our world.
To quote Vaclav Havel again:
"The important thing is that the winners will be the best of us, in the moral, civic, political, and professional sense, regardless of their political affiliations. The future policies and prestige of our state will depend on the personalities we select and later elect to serve as our representative bodies..."
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This is a shorter version of my cited lecture to the Malaysian Orthopaedic Association Annual Lecture, in Johor Bahru, 21 May 2010, entitled: "Doctors, Society and Politics"
