opinion

Force politics to mature

Hafidz Baharom

I find it amazing that we can still have stories regarding the supposed RM2.6 billion banked into the prime minister's account to this day. While we have both the judicial and executive branches considering the matter closed, there is still the main unanswered – or in this case, far too many answers – question regarding the money.

The RM2.6 billion question is this? What was the money for?

As far as I can recall, the RM2.6 billion was a donation from the late Saudi King, but now it is a Saudi prince. The Saudi prince now says it was not a donation but an investment into a company. And yet, our prime minister called it a donation.

But according to the Attorney-General, the prime minister did not know that the money was even in his account. If this is true, then how did he know that it was a donation or that he received any money at all.

And if it was a donation, Umno leaders and ministers alike have said that it was to combat Jews, combat the Islamic State (Isis), or even to limit the influence of Egypt's Muslim Brotherhood. So, which one was it?

But then again, the Saudis are saying it wasn't a donation but an investment into a company. If so, how did it end up in Prime Minister Datuk Seri Najib Razak's personal account?

Was the company trying to bribe the prime minister? If so, which company?

And if the anti-corruption ads we have been pimping since the establishment of the Malaysian Anti-Corruption Commission (MACC) says that both giver and receiver are equally guilty, then why is the prime minister innocent?

Besides, doesn't our anti-corruption law say that it is wrong to receive donations as well?

The wording is rather clear on that one.

Needless to say, what the executives of our government have done collectively was to continually dig a hole for themselves, one schadenfreude after another and make this issue exponentially worse.

That being said, Malaysians themselves will continue reading alternative reports, blogs and even learn to undo the censorship by the Malaysian Communications and Multimedia Commission (MCMC) by simply changing their DNS settings to the Google Public Access domains.

Just open your network settings and set the DNS to 8.8.8.8 or 8.8.4.4 – just in case you haven't figured it out yet.

Personally, it must be nice to be able to spend without having to ever check your bank balance – as compared with yours truly, who waits for a paycheque listening to Rihanna's "Bitch Better Have My Money" at the end of every month.

I brought up the above case because I would like to highlight the stupidity of some pro-government blogs.

In the last week or so, we were bogged down with the story that our pilgrim fund managers Tabung Haji were given warning letters by Bank Negara Malaysia (BNM) that they may have trouble meeting their obligations.

This created an uneasiness among Malaysians who were still waiting to go for the holy pilgrimage, but this was for naught since Tabung Haji then announced a 5% dividend plus an additional 3% bonus for those yet to go to Mecca.

The most outspoken on this issue was none other than Mister Langkah Kajang himself – PKR secretary-general Rafizi Ramli.

The Pandan MP was revealed by the pro-government blogs of having about RM500,000 in his Tabung Haji account, even when he didn't trust the fund was being managed well.

His reply to these allegations?  He didn't check his balance.

And the pro-government blogs went wild with the remark.

This was an odd twist even for me. As much as I don't agree with both Rafizi or Najib, if you're impartial you would be asking the following – why is Rafizi getting heat for not checking his Tabung Haji balance of RM500,000, yet when Najib says he didn't check his balance for a surplus of RM2.6 billion, it's acceptable?

So I have to ask the question – have we devolved to political propaganda reaching this level of dumbness?

It was bad enough when the PKR president wanted to be Selangor menteri besar simply to become her husband's puppet, but I would have thought that was as low as we could go in Malaysian politics. Apparently not.

Safe to say, Malaysian politics and society have so far evolved to settle the lesser evil instead of pushing for political parties to actually reach maturity and stop marketing stupid.

And since the opposition now has their main rudder in jail for a year now, it remains adrift with no sign of actually uniting into a single, credible entity that can win an election.

So the task goes back to Malaysians themselves to push for the reformation of both government and opposition. To remain dumb and blindly follow like lemmings is not an option. Wake up. – February 11, 2016.

* This is the personal opinion of the writer, organisation or publication and does not necessarily represent the views of The Malaysian Insider.