Malaysia Matters Podcast

A procedural dry run for a no-confidence vote in the government failed in the Malaysian House of Representatives yesterday. Expect more of this as the summer goes on, and as the opposition’s self-imposed September deadline for taking power approaches. As is common in parliamentary systems, the trigger for the government’s fall — if it happens — will be something comparatively minor like this supply bill. The ruling coalition’s survival may well hinge upon superiority in parliamentary procedural mastery.

If you wish to understand the governing philosophy of Malaysian Prime Minister Abdullah Ahmad Badawi, you must familiarize yourself with Islam Hadhari. It’s a particular take on Islam and its role in public life that has especial traction in Malaysia, not least because the Prime Minister is a vigorous proponent of its role and possibilities. Americans used to our Constitutional order may not readily grasp the importance of a democratic leader’s theological propensities: as Jefferson said, “It neither picks my pocket nor breaks my leg.” But in Malaysia, and in an Islamic society, it might well do both. Most (though not all) strains of Islam claim an explicit role in the state and governance — as do some forms of Judaism, Theravada Buddhism, and to a vastly lesser extent, particular Christian denominations — and so it matters greatly what a leader’s view of religion in public life is.

Before Badawi’s ascent to power, in the 22 years of Mahathir Mohamad’s leadership, the role of Islam in governance was inextricably bound up with the promulgation of the Bumiputra system of ethnic-Malay preference in economic and policy affairs. (We’ll be writing much more on the Bumiputra system in time.) Though Mahathir himself became infamous for saying inflammatory things to Islamic audiences in the last decade of his tenure, within Malaysia itself, it cannot be said that he implemented Islamic rule per se. Rather, Islam was an adjunct to Bumiputra, as Islam plus ethnicity defined what a Bumiputra was.

Under PM Badawi, Islam’s role is shifting, and the endorsement of Islam Hadhari is intrinsically bound to this process. It’s best to let him define the term himself, as he did to a Western audience in his speech at Victoria University in New Zealand in March 2005:

We like to view Islam Hadhari as an effort to bring the faithful back to basics, to give primacy to good values and adherence to certain fundamentals. Islam Hadhari posits ten fundamental principles which Muslim nations and communities must demonstrate, namely:





First, faith and piety in the almighty god, Allah;


Second, a just and trustworthy government;


Third, a free and independent people;


Fourth, vigorous pursuit and mastery of knowledge;


Fifth, balanced and comprehensive economic development;


Sixth, a good quality of life for the people;


Seventh, protection of the rights of minority groups and women;


Eighth, cultural and moral integrity;


Ninth, safeguarding natural resources and the environment; and


Tenth, strong defence capabilities.

Just in case there is any doubt, I would also like to state that Islam Hadhari is entirely consistent with democracy because Islam Hadhari is all about living peacefully and respecting each other in the society. Islam Hadhari would encourage “mushawarah” (consensus building) as an approach to solving problems and would accept the “shura” (consultative process) as the best way of dealing with various societal issues. Islam Hadhari provides for democracy in much the same way as John Dewey, the classical guru on democracy, provided for democracy in his time. In 1916, in his book entitled “Democracy and Education”, John Dewey had stipulated that the democratic way of life requires of everyone that “each has to refer his own action to that of others, and to consider the action of others to give point and direction to his own”.

This passage is worth noting, not just because it’s the only time you’ll ever find an Asian leader using John Dewey as a validator of governing philosophy, but because that invocation emphasizes the pragmatic and moderate role that Islam Hadhari assigns to Islam in Malaysian governance. (Further backgrounder on the topic may be found here and here.)

This is not to pretend that under PM Badawi and Islam Hadhari, all is well at the intersection of Malaysian faith and society. It assuredly is not, and a good example of what goes wrong may be found in Malaysia’s Selangor state, where the ruling state party, the Parti Islam Se-Malaysia, has just forbidden wholesale Islam Hadhari’s promulgation. The Parti Islam Se-Malaysia, or PAS, shocked the ruling coalition, of which Badawi is the national leader, when it seized Selangor’s government in the epochal March 2008 Malaysian elections. Selangor is no backwater, as it directly adjoins the national capital at Kuala Lumpur — its control by the opposition therefore affords it the opportunity to directly challenge the ruling coalition’s policies and practices at the country’s heart.

Herein lies another point worth noting: the PAS is one of the three key members of the opposition coalition, which is itself headed by Western media darling Anwar Ibrahim. It should be recalled that Ibrahim has confidently predicted his own ascent to the Prime Ministerial office by September — so it should be asked who he will bring to power with him. If the PAS will lead Malaysia as a senior coalition partner under an Ibrahim government, it’s worth noting the PAS’s public record. A quick survey leads one to note that the PAS has a history of endorsing shari’a law, including “punishments of stoning, whipping and amputation“; protests against non-Muslim Malaysians; and offering “rhetorical support for Osama bin Laden, Al Qaeda and the Taliban regime.” Ibrahim himself is quite aware of this, and has offered some weak defenses of his alliance with the PAS — but he is not, on the whole, especially concerned with their excesses. Americans may feel differently.

The PAS prohibition on Islam Hadhari in Selangor state, then, is not merely a tactical swipe at a political opponent. It is a fundamental expression of what the PAS believes, and a forthright preview of what it will seek if and when it is part of Malaysia’s ruling coalition. In this light, the success of Islam Hadhari is not some obscure doctrinal dispute in a faraway country, but a very real and current issue in Islam’s own worldwide struggle to accommodate modernity. Americans in the post-9/11 era don’t need any reminder just how much this matters to them — and so we watch Selangor state with concern.

The Malaysian film Mukhsin is actually two years old, but it’s just now opening in New York City, which is why it gets an NYT writeup today. If you’re in NYC, it’s worth a matinee.

A bit light on the political and economic blogging in the past two days, yes. We’ll have a long post up on Islam Hadhari and Selangor state shortly. Stay tuned!

Sure, the 2008 Miss Malaysia Universe pageant is underway, but have you seen the real celebration of Malaysian poise and beauty? I speak, of course, of Malaysian Dreamgirl. Behold:

High art it ain’t, but as a glimpse into Malaysia’s pop culture scene — and its intersection with the wired young set — it’s not too bad. Note the ready Anglophone tendencies of the contestants and the local television news: that’s a society plugged in to the wider world.

One of the interesting things about Malaysia is its infrastructure, which seems an odd comment to make, until you look at the neighborhood the country is in. The Indonesian archipelago in particular is not a model of development. In that light, Malaysia’s reputation for the third-best infrastructure in east Asia — behind South Korea and Japan — is quite an accomplishment. This goes beyond the usual showcase pieces like the Malaysian Expressway System, and extends into Malaysia’s urban planning. We’ve already mentioned (in the context of Mahathir’s race-baiting) the Iskandar Development Region — and there is a plan afoot to expand and revitalize the capital city of Kuala Lumpur itself.

All of this is to say that the Star has a pretty good piece on the debate over Kuala Lumpur’s urban planning, which is worth your time to peruse. Let it not be lost that this sort of public conversation, on this topic, is a decided feature of developed nations — and regrettably uncommon with many of Malaysia’s neighbors.

Forbes has posted its list of the 40 Richest Malaysians, prompting one to ask — who knew there was such a list? But there is, Forbes has it, and you should go read it. It’s actually a fairly useful guide to the movers and shakers of the Malaysian economy. Topping the list is ten-times-over billionaire Robert Kuok, who certainly earned his wealth the hard way, as the son of a Chinese immigrant whose career began as a mere worker under the Japanese occupation of Malaya in World War Two. Take a moment to go read it all.

We mentioned here the efforts of former PM Mahathir to race-bait his way back to popularity, by invoking the convenient specter of Singaporeans and Malaysian Chinese, and their purported plans to seize control of Malaysian life and territory. (Suffice it to say that the principal beneficiaries of the Iskandar Malaysia project that Mahathir denounced will be Mahathir’s own fellow Malays.) Sadly, this is not a new theme for Mahathir, who rose to power in no small part on his ideology of Malay supremacy; nor in Malaysian society, which spent much of its first post-colonial decade wracked by racial troubles that resulted, among other things, in Chinese-majority Singapore’s expulsion from Malaysia. The difference between the two is that Malaysian society has largely moved on — though there is, quite obviously, more road to be traveled here — while Mahathir has not.

Were this just a case of Mahathir being Mahathir, things would probably blow over in time. Unfortunately, events have their own logic, and it appears now that a new irritant to Malaysian-Singaporean relations — and consequently, Malay-Chinese relations — may arise: sometime in the coming 24 hours, the International Court of Justice in the Hague will decide whether a small, uninhabitable island in the Singapore Straits — Pedra Branca or Pulau Batu Puteh, depending on which country’s claim you favor — belongs to Malaysia or Singapore. Unlike many such disputes (Isla Perejil, anyone?), this one is not inherently meaningless — there’s a maritime boundary at stake athwart the world’s busiest shipping lane, and so both nations are paying close attention.

There’s not much to be said on this one. The merits of the case are sufficiently opaque to preclude third parties from having an opinion, and still less interest. But it’s worth noting, as it would be a pity indeed to have this minor territorial dispute stoke the embers that Mahathir Mohamad is so desperately fanning.

The saga of Mahathir Mohamad continues, though not to his advantage. You may recall that Mahathir left UMNO, supposedly on a dare — though really to forestall his own deepening legal troubles — and called for other party members to follow him. His intent was to bring down the government of Prime Minister Abdullah Badawi, whom Mahathir detests for reasons that do Badawi credit — namely, the PM’s abandonment of the narrowness, corruption, and oft-vicious parochialism of Mahathir’s own rule.

A centerpiece of the PM’s program is the reform of the Malaysian judiciary, which is laid out in admirable detail by Malaysia’s law minister, Zaid Ibrahim, here. Critical to the reform is the rooting-out of practices involving the “fixing” of judicial appointments. In Malaysia, the selection of judges of meant to be an impartial, apolitical process. In the past several months, a royal commission has uncovered compelling evidence that under Mahathir’s rule, it was anything but — and there is direct evidence that Mahathir himself was involved. The inevitable legal repercussions for Mahathir are all the explanation needed for his frenetic efforts to bring down the government now.

Mahathir’s logic is, sadly for him, deeply flawed. Assume for a moment that he does bring the UMNO-led coalition down through a series of defections at his behest. It is likely that his old nemesis, Anwar Ibrahim, would ascend to the Prime Ministership — and can Mahathir truly believe that Ibrahim will refrain from pursuing the judiciary case to the hilt? Of course, Ibrahim will do it for vengeance rather than justice — it would be far more creditable for Malaysia were the process to culminate under the leadership of the current PM, Abdullah Badawi.

It looks like this is exactly what will happen. Not a single UMNO MP — not even his own son — has elected to follow Mahathir out of the party. The ruling coalition stands, and the wheels of justice continue to turn. This incredible outcome could merely reflect a failure of planning on Mahathir’s part — instead of acting on a “dare,” perhaps he should have laid the groundwork for a party rebellion more assiduously. More probably it reflects the former PM’s precipitous loss of stature in Malaysia and amongst his own erstwhile proteges. Mahathir is the past, yes — but he is also a discredited past, increasingly revealed as corrupt and vengeful. His break with UMNO has only served to clarify just how much UMNO already broke with him.

UPDATE: This AP story has a good synopsis of events, but also casts Mahathir’s defection as one of many troubles slowly sinking the Badawi government. This is, I think, getting it exactly backwards: Mahathir’s ruckus is a net positive for the government, inasmuch as the former PM has now done all the work needed to demonstrate that it has nothing to do with him and his baleful legacy. One of PM Abdullah Badawi’s delicate tasks was to navigate the shoals between continuity of party, and abandonment of Mahathir-era corruption and bile. Now Mahathir has done this work in full. If I were Badawi, I would be tremendously — and quietly — pleased.

Most of the discussion about Mahathir leaving UMNO, and whether it’s a good thing or bad, will center about the effects on the ruling coalition’s electoral prospects. Its trajectory under Prime Minister Badawi has been somewhat mixed — even as it embraced the right policies in most spheres, it also suffered what, in the Malaysian context, was a significant electoral setback earlier this year.

Still, it does not follow from this that Mahathir Mohamad represents a needed faction for UMNO’s continued paramountcy. In fact, the former Prime Minister has made quite a case in recent days that he is a net drag on his erstwhile party’s prospects — and not just because he’s the subject of a corruption investigation that almost certainly spurred today’s exit from UMNO. Mahathir recently descended into race-baiting over a development project in Johor called Iskandar Malaysia, that he avows will cause “Malays [to] be driven to live at the edge of the forest and even in the forest itself.” The putative replacement for the Malays? Singaporeans, said Mahathir, which is code for Chinese. How unwise is this? The moral rectitude of race-baiting and xenophobia aside (suffice it to say that Singapore has no designs to settle and claim Johor), ethnic Chinese are approximately one-quarter of Malaysia’s population — and they control roughly 40% of its wealth. Furthermore, given that the older generation in Malaysia still remembers the Sino-Malay race riots of the late 1960s, whipping up that old fervor is not merely irresponsible, but cruel.

But then, we shouldn’t forget that those riots led to the expulsion of race-baiting troublemakers from UMNO — including one Mahathir Mohamad, who wrote his racial opus while in the wilderness, before returning to lead his country. In that light, we can see his raising the specter of Chinese domination as a return to a very old and very malign theme. Fortunately, it’s one that UMNO under PM Badawi’s leadership has well outgrown.

It’s just a rumor at the moment, but if it’s true, it’s big. We’ll bring you the latest as we get the news. Stay tuned….

UPDATE: New Straits Times is confirming the news. Here’s the entirety of their story, which, for obvious reasons, I feel free to reproduce on fair use grounds:

Former Prime Minister Tun Dr Mahathir Mohamad announces today that he is quitting Umno.

He said at a forum in Alor Star that he will only rejoin the party when Prime Minister Datuk Seri Abdullah Ahmad Badawi steps down as Umno president.

Here’s more background on UMNO, and the official party site.

Mahathir’s break with the party — now also confirmed, as this is written, by the IHT — is, one suspects, likely prompted by Prime Minister Badawi’s investigation of judicial corruption during Mahathir’s tenure as PM. Mahathir has been publicly defiant, but he is almost certainly distressed at the probability that he will shortly be indicted for his actions.

UPDATE 2: Also confirmed by The Star Online, which opines that the move is meant to force PM Badawi from office by …. weakening UMNO, it seems. Considering that opposition coalition leader Anwar Ibrahim has threatened a showdown before Malaysia Day in mid-September, this, if true, signifies a desire on Mahathir’s part to see UMNO under Badawi actually deposed from power. Presumably, he could then return as the savior of the party and its fortunes. Of course, this thesis presumes that Mahathir could attract sufficient numbers to walk out with him — and that he wants to hold high office again. Both propositions are dubious.

This site sticks with the thesis that Mahathir wants UMNO out of power so the investigation into judicial corruption ends.

UPDATE 3: And now it is reported that Mahathir quit on a dare. Curiouser and curiouser.