Over the weekend, the MIC assembly got me thinking along a few lines.
I usually don’t bother much about the non-Umno BN parties, on account of them being truly irrelevant mosquitoes.
I was intrigued however, by certain similarities in the dynamics of both BN and Pakatan.
Needless to say, I think these two coalitions are diametrically opposed, with the latter clearly being a better alternative.
That said, I thought about all the criticisms regarding how Pakatan will never hold together because of “ideological” differences.
No one seems to find it strange that BN is based on a racial ‘I’ll take care of my own, you take care of yours” mentality. This means it will always be a zero sum game among the different racial parties - the most obvious of ‘ideological’ differences.
Nowhere is this more noticeable than any component parties’ AGMs, where Umno bashes everyone else, and everyone else bashes Umno. Only lately have they occasionally bothered to bash Pakatan, although they seem more interested in blaming one another for the 2008 elections.
As if that weren’t enough, we see parties torn apart by internal strife, MCA and MIC are recent examples, but Umno was in similar crisis less than a year ago.
However, I’m not one to judge unreasonably. Clearly we’ve had similar problems in Pakatan too, both within the coalition, and within the parties themselves (I do think however that history should clearly put to rest any mainstream-media inspired notion that only Pakatan parties undergo internal strife).
The latest parallel is how the problem Subramaniam and Sothinathan faced was exactly the same that Husam Musa and Mat Sabu did (in both cases, such tragic tactical errors), where the anti-establishment votes outnumbered the pro-establishment ones, but were split between two candidates (a problem Chua Soi Lek did not have). Tragic, tragic, tragic.
In Malaysia’s present context, it seems that both coalitions and all parties have similar problems. They’re somewhat childish problems, but if our political system hasn’t matured enough, we can’t blame anyone else for it.
Such is politics. That arena in which I will unflinchingly admit is too often dirty, but equally unflinchingly call important - an arena that will only worsen for the lack of participation by good men and women.
Just because our politics on both sides of the divide are beset by similarly ridiculous problems doesn’t mean it’ll always be that way.
Recognising the realities we face honestly does not mean we must accept them blindly as unchangeable. With determination and love, any reality can be changed.
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