by Tunku Abdul Aziz
MySinChew
20.3.09
Najib Abdul Razak will be remembered as the most controversial prime ministerial aspirant this nation has ever known. The deadweight political baggage he is lugging around, as he sets his course on what he fervently hopes will be the last lap to the best address in the country, is enough to make a grown man cry, but not Najib, the single minded man of destiny according to his wife, Rosmah.
He seems to take his travails in his stride. Is he not, again, according to Rosmah, predestined to occupy the highest political office in the land? I am inclined to think that there may be some truth in what Rosmah has been saying about his destiny because she has already begun, to preen herself, so the gossip goes, to play the part of Malaysia’s First Lady.
Unfortunately for her, and others who might harbour a similar ambition in the deep recesses of their fantasy, our country is a monarchy, albeit a constitutional one (may it always remain that way) and as such, the First Lady is our queen, not the wife of the prime minister. Her confident prediction of Najib’s political ascendancy and immortality could, in the event, prove to be just a little premature given the murky political waters he is wading through.
“The PM governs; the king rules! The queen is the First Lady.”
It is not my intention enumerate the reasons for Najib’s unprecedented unpopularity. Many serious allegations of moral and ethical lapses have appeared on local blogs as well as in foreign publications. Rightly or wrongly, he has been cast as someone unappealing, and these negative perceptions look set to feed on him. They can only be reversed by his clearing his name in the court of law.
Najib is an intelligent man, and he must surely know that many people do not trust him and that he cannot govern this country effectively with so much ill will surrounding his person. In his beleaguered state and feeling, no doubt, under constant siege there is, many of us fear, no knowing what diabolical measures he will resort to, including using the Internal Security Act, to silence his critics. I hope Najib will take early steps to assure the citizens of this country that the little crumbs of freedom that Pak Lah has grudgingly thrown at us will not be swept away. He has a monumental task to convince us that he really, despite all indications to the contrary, believes in the rule of law. He has to show that he can be trusted to do the right thing by us.
I am greatly amused to read that our irrepressible former prime minister, Tun Mahathir Mohamad the selective amnesiac has proffered gratuitous advice, as is his wont, to “young Najib” who is starting out in the serious business of governance on the importance of choosing the right people to serve as his cabinet colleagues. What sort of people did Tun himself pick when he ran this country for 22 years? Men and women of great moral and ethical rectitude?
I believe Najib knows what he needs to do to survive the next general elections. The luckless man will be scraping the bottom of the barrel to find men and women of integrity whose main interest as politicians is service in the public interest. We wish him well as he goes about putting his team together. It does seem me that Najib might yet turn out to be a great prime minister by doing the opposite of what Tun Mahathir did when he held sway over this country. He should distance himself from the great meddler and be his own man for once.
Najib will need to be less of an Umno top brass and more of a Malaysian nationalist by putting the interests of the country first and last. Malaysia after the political machinations of nearly three decades is divided as never before on all fronts, and it is time we settled down to a period of calm reflection and introspection. We cannot hope to achieve sustainability of purpose as a united, prosperous and peaceful nation by blind indulgence in policies that we know to be unjust and unfair, policies that are inimical to the future well being of our people.
We cannot survive as a nation in social, political and economic terms unless this country is governed with equity and justice for all. We need another unprincipled politician like we need a hole in the head. However, we need desperately a statesmanlike politician (a contradiction in terms, be that as it may) who has broad appeal not because he embodies and personifies the politics of patronage that sustained Mahathirism of unhappy memory but because he knows instinctively that integrity, and all that it stands for, in governance is the only way forward for this country of ours.
Najib has his work cut out for him, and I wish him well as our next head of government. He governs; the king rules! The queen is the First Lady.