We can no longer be silent

There are many who would rather submit blindly than raise their hands up to question and voice their opinions. Then there are also many others who prefer to just make noise.  

Over the weekend, I lamented the fate of my beloved country. At the moment there are just too many issues being played that it is a wonder that we are all confused as to where to begin solving the issues. I feel that sometimes we do make too much noise but we have little implementation and persistence to move forward.

Are we nothing but empty cans?

We have far too long played ourselves emotionally through sentiments. For Malaysians, these sentiments are usually along the lines of ethnicity and religion. For too long, we Malaysians have allowed these sentiments to rile us up and divert us from the real issues at hand.

The most important of all is, we are losing the value of our democracy.

We do not even know what Federal Constitution to uphold any more, as it has been extensively amended and read through many different lenses and interpretations. Worse, those of us who are not legal practitioners or constitutional experts, have minimal understanding of the constitution, its powers and how it makes our country.

Through my training as a scientist, I hold experiments as the only way for me to seek the truth. Experiments need to be thought of thoroughly, budgeted for, accounted for as we are mostly funded by public grants, and must have somewhat a clear theory in mind.

More importantly, it must serve a purpose – if it does not benefit mankind or advance scientific knowledge – then there is no point to begin or continue experimenting. I have a trail of failed experiments in my years as a researcher, but true to the original meaning of research, I continue to do new experiments and make the necessary changes. Yet, my intentions remain true, to find a solution to the original problem at hand.

I understand that policies, laws and even our Federal Constitution need to be changed as time goes by. Amendments should mean progress, as a friend puts it, Malaysia is at its “teenage years” and we are supposed to go through an existential crisis right now.

Like most teenagers, we will rebel and have many issues to deal with as we approach adulthood. We may even tell white lies to our parents to get away from being grounded or punished.

But recently, I feel that we are not solving any issues, we are only creating new ones to divert the public’s attention. We do not have a clear purpose, nor do we have a sustainable, executable plan to move forward.

We risk a mass social experiment with our country. We seem to have been doing this since 1957.

The economy is weak. Back in 1998, I remember many campaigns about how the public can assist to regenerate the economy. Prior to that, there was even a zero inflation campaign that a 10-year-old can easily understand.

I beg all of our experts in economy to come up with a blueprint on how we the public can strengthen the country’s economy. Do we save more? Do we spend? Are there any willing CEOs with million-ringgit paycheques willing to take pay cuts to assist the average workers to earn a minimum wage that can sustain the rising cost of living? How can we push salaries to run parallel to rising costs? How can we reduce unemployment rates?

Bank Negara should take the lead, give transparent reports and run easily executable campaigns.

The public are divided on so many levels. Let’s stop allowing our anger to rile us up on ethnic or religious issues. Let’s continue to put our focus on asking for transparency from our government. We need to reject ethnocentric and religious-centric based policies and start pushing for what will make Malaysia great. Not as a Malay, Chinese, Indian dan lain lain.

But as Malaysians.

We may not have a national identity, but we can be proud of our “rojak-ness”. New policies should help the poor and marginalised to gain access to education and basic human rights regardless of race. We must improve interethnic relations by simply being friends with each other and living together.

We must empower Malaysians that this country belongs to each and every one of us and we are responsible for it.

Our voices matter. Yet, we must follow through with diligence and hard work through our own fields and capacity to heal this country. We put ministers and authorities in power, we must then continue to remind them that they should be leading us, they should be serving us as Yang Berkhidmat, not Yang Berhormat.

We must no longer be silent. – July 29, 2015.

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