Malaysian Insider deserves a pat on the back!

I really don't know WHO really are the people behind the online daily The Malaysian Insider, but even if they are some parties related to UMNO (as I hear on the grapevine, but I humbly stand to be corrected!), I think I'd give credit when credit is due. Yesterday's Commentary/Editorial deserves a star rating for saying it right in getting to the heart of the matter on a key property of every Malaysian -- our loyalty to NegaraKu is beyond question by any party unless there's proof of unpatriotism! -- severely put under siege in recent days and occasionally in the past by the print daily Utusan Malaysia and its Sunday counterpart. Kudos, MI! ~~ YL, Desi

Here's the piece of fine writing I raise three goblets -- of Au, Ag or Pt -- of tehtarik to:)

Every Malaysian a traitor? — The Malaysian Insider

AUG 4 — Going by the current Utusan Malaysia thinking, anyone working with the Chinese or Indians for political power is a traitor.

That would include our Father of Independence Tunku Abdul Rahman and his Umno cohorts such as Tun Abdul Razak Hussein, Tun Dr Ismail Abdul Rahman all the way down to current prime minister Datuk Seri Najib Razak who now leads the multi-racial Barisan Nasional founded by his father in the aftermath of May 13.

Didn’t the Tunku get independence for Malaya in 1957 with Tun Tan Cheng Lock and Tun V. Sambanthan?

Would the British colonialists have given Malayans freedom if not for the three coming together under the Alliance umbrella?

Was Malaysia formed by the Malays themselves without the help of Chinese, Indians, Kadazans, Ibans and other ethnic groups?

Yet, if we are to follow Utusan Malaysia’s line of thinking these past few months, it is clear that the newspaper, and by extension its owners Umno, hold the position that anyone who champions a cause with non-Malays is a traitor.

Which begs the question how can the Chinese, Indians, Kadazans, Ibans and others seek refuge with Umno or support the nationalist Malay party for whatever cause they hold?

Kuala Krai MP Dr. Hatta Ramli being pulled and dragged by the police in last Saturday's anti-ISA rally. Utusan says DAP is behind the rally. - Picture by Choo Choy May
After all, the newspaper has buttressed its point by accusing Datuk Seri Anwar Ibrahim and PAS leaders such as Datuk Seri Abdul Hadi Awang and spiritual leader Datuk Nik Aziz Nik Mat as traitors for working with the multi-racial DAP.

The Malay journal claims that the DAP is behind the current call for justice and democracy, which to the the editors is just a mask for more political and administrative power. And that the Malay grip in various institutions is under threat from such an alliance.

Is the dominant party in the country still perpetuating the notion that political parties should fight only for those in their community?

Or is it just the mindset of the editors in Utusan Malaysia who have used Tun Dr Mahathir Mohamad’s recent views to reinforce their thinking.

After all, it would be too easy to call what Utusan and Dr Mahathir think as racist thinking. It is pitiful, more like it, to push views that seem archaic after 52 years of independence.

Shouldn’t Malaysians, whatever their ethnicity, be talking about Malaysian institutions rather than Malay or Chinese or Indians or Iban or Kadazan or whatever? Isn’t the New Economic Policy supposed to erase all that.

For that matter, all that Utusan Malaysia has done lately is lay bare the hollowness of Najib’s 1 Malaysia and the lack of faith from his party and party-owned newspaper. If there is no support from the largest community in the country, what hope is there for 1 Malaysia?

It will be just be another slogan, said sardonically like Malaysia Boleh!

But if Utusan Malaysia continues its diatribe to provoke one community and rile another, calling some traitors and others ungrateful — all that would be left in the next few years is None Malaysia.