The blood is in the politicians’ hands - Nicholas Chan

Some time ago I stumbled upon this documentary about the Syrian Civil War broadcasted by an Australian channel. The documentary was shot using an "on the ground" first person format, whereby the cameraman was basically filming what happens in the warzone by walking and talking around a rebel held town located on the frontiers of war.

The images are doubtlessly shocking, violent and sad because the fighting, the mortars and the airstrikes are all documented real time, along with the grievances and chaos that are unfortunately the usual collaterals of war.

Unlike the academic reproach most war documentaries would resort to, this particular documentary's interviewing focus are fixated on the civilians and soldiers caught in the line of fire, ranging from civilians in the rebel held Sunni majority town, the fighters of the Free Syrian Army (identifying their particular faction is highly challenging), the pro-Assad lieutenant guarding the frontier and some Alawites staying in the government controlled zone.

Despite having obvious differences in faith (the pro- and anti-Assad group are majorly separated along the Sunni-Shiite line) and political allegiances, a surprising similarity shared by both sides of the war, including the civilians, is that most of them would agree the relationship between the Sunnis and Alawites before the Syrian Civil War was just fine. Neighbours visited each other, children intermingle, perhaps some underlying tensions were there, but none would have expected it to erupt into a full blown war.

After watching the documentary, it occurred to me that the hands of politics are indeed very important in maintaining harmony among diversity. The story of Syria elucidated the point that how a few bad political decisions could have jeopardise communal relations in the country, relationships which could be maintained if such choices are not made. It overturns the apologist's stance about inter-racial or sectarian violence, citing them as a result of the innate tendencies of us humans to associate and marginalise, leaving no moral imagination for those outside of our circle. Somewhere along this line of thought would come the argument that violence is a part of human nature, with the cyclical occurrence of it throughout history being an evidence of its inevitability. Certainly not helping is the fact that polarisation by race, religion, nationality, class and predisposition are almost universal across countries and cultures.

The Rwandan Genocide: Boiling over of ethnic tensions or manipulative politics?

I am not going to argue the cynical view of human nature because I reckon there is a great deal of truth about it. But whether or not these so called "irreconcilable" differences are like time bombs waiting to explode is my point of contention. Does everything that simmers would boil without intervention? It may seem like the case for Rwanda with its eternal conflict between the majority Hutu and the Tutsi, culminating to its peak of violence at the Rwandan Genocide in 1994, whereby an estimated 800,000 Tutsi, or 11% of Rwanda's total population were killed by Hutu army extremists, and regrettably, even the Hutu civilians.

Many would have tempted to see the genocide as history taking its course, seeing that multiple "smaller" genocides has already been committed in the country when the Hutu and Tutsi fought each other for power after the end of Belgian colonisation (the Hutu gained the upper hand in winning power, but the exiled Tutsi had then made periodical attempts in invading the country).

However, it is obvious that most of these killings are as a result of armed conflicts, a power struggle between factions that is unfortunately delineated by race due to colonial policies. The Belgians during their colonisation of the nation, had favoured the Tutsi as governing intermediaries, whom they considered racially superior to the Hutu due to their paler skins and supposedly more European appearance. They even make it a requirement in the 1930s for Rwandans to carry identity cards classifying themselves as Hutu or Tutsi, markedly exacerbating ethnic distinctions by making them institutionalised and thus volatile.

Nevertheless, it is still very unimaginable that the Hutu and Tutsi by general would resort to genocide killing at a civilian level in 1994, as both ethnic groups are not exactly that different from each other as believed. They speak the same language, have no problem of religious separation (which is a major point of conflict in the current world) as they are largely Christians and attended the same churches, schools and bars, lived together in the same village and worked together in the same office. Intermarriage is common with a quarter of all Rwandans having great-grandparents of both Hutu and Tutsi origins in their familial line. In fact, some might even argued that the distinctions between Hutu and Tutsi are assigned differences based on appearance and socioeconomic factors rather than anthropological groupings.

To understand this massive spillover of violence, it is vital to understand the dynamics of politics leading up the atrocities. Rwanda until 1989 had enjoyed 15 years of stability after the coup by Hutu general Habyarimana in 1973, which decided to leave the Tutsi in peace. The nation's economy however, collapsed in 1989 due to a steep decline in world prices for Rwanda's principle export of coffee and tea, austerity measures imposed by the World Bank and a drought in the South. Another civil war had then broke up following an attempted invasion of the Tutsi by the Rwandan Patriotic Front (RPF) on northeastern Rwanda from neighboring Uganda in October 1990, ending Habyarimana's offered peace to the Tutsi.

However, a chance of peace was again raised when Arusha Accords was signed by Habyarimana with the rebels in 1993 due to international pressure. All hell breaks loose later when the plane carrying President Habyarimana was shot down by two missiles, killing everyone on board, effectively letting the army extremist seized power and perpetuated the violence. Most would identified the incident as the starting point of the Rwandan genocide 1994, but ironically, the point of origin of the epic bloodshed comes from the aforementioned chance of peace.

This is because the Arusha Accords signals a rollback of authority by President Habyarimana as the peace agreement called for power sharing and a multi-power agreement. The extremists within Habyarimana's party certainly did not favour the signing of the treaty, causing then to fallout with the moderates that supports the treaty. This is unsurprising given the state of dilapidation of Rwanda after the economic downturn and civil wars, there will be ruling elites that are in favour of maintaining the status quo (which also means, more violence) to preserve their political and economic clout.

What best to achieve it than fanning racial sentiments seeing the country very fractious past? It's textbook real politics.  In hindsight, the plane crash (it is still not sure who were the perpetrators) followed by the swift killing of the Hutu prime minister and the other moderates as well as the seize power are just like lined up dominoes waiting to fall by the schemers. Of course, the madness did not stopped there and the army extremists went on and start killing the Tutsi, in the meantime exhorting and sanctioning the killing of them by civilians through broadcasting radio appeals. The killing was likened to cockroach extermination. It was not until the RPF formally declared victory in July 15, 1994 that the two months frenzy was officially ended.

Violence begets violence: The long lasting effects of communal conflicts

Although the genocide would seem like a rather extreme example as compared to the Syrian civil war but both see similarities in the fact that racial/religious hatred was perpetuated and actualised into violence by the politicians, or rather bad political decisions. Members of the society, no matter how divisive one is, are predominantly invested in the activities concerning social mobility and it is rather unthinkable for them to resort to nationwide scale violence without any substantial provocation.

No doubt, as economic conditions worsens; a divisive society would be gradually turned into a tinderbox, but in many instances, it is the decisions or propaganda of the politicians that has breed and tolerate such toxins of violence which would have cataclysmic plus far and long lasting effects. For example, post-war Syria (if there is any possibility of that happening in the near future), would have to deal with the animosities that is ingrained at a personal level between the Sunnis and the Alawites.

Because so much atrocities has been committed on each other, nation-sharing between these two formerly amicable groups might be highly challenging, as can be seen in the case of post-Saddam Iraq.  The majority Shiite government was accused of sidelining the Sunnis in governance and economic opportunities; in retribution of the tyranny of Saddam Hussein (whose Ba'ath is Sunni Islam), thus leading to sectarian violence that erupts throughout the country, bringing the country to the brink of a civil war. The logic is simple; violence begets violence, the heavier the historical baggage is between two communities; the harder it is for power and wealth sharing to be practiced harmoniously and rationally between them.

Malaysia: The case of the ungrateful politicians

This makes the case of Malaysia's success of peacefully forming a federation consisting of multiple ethnic and religion ever the more spectacular. It would seem very disconcerting that the Malaysian politicians (at least a significant chunk of them) are prepared to forego our society's harmony by the incessant fanning of racial and religious sentiments.

Pugnaciously, these hate-mongers would still have the face of warning the Malaysian public of the specter of another racial uprising, not knowing they are constantly testing the resilience of our social fabric, which as do most societies has a breaking point. The dangerous part is, nobody knows where this breaking point is. History has shown us even sporadic and random events could have lit an inferno, especially when the public sphere is dominated by hatred and mistrust perpetuated by effective and irresponsible propaganda. Malaysia is certainly not a stranger of that.

The only hiccup, the May 13 incident in the opinion of the author is as an unfortunate but inevitable incident given the circumstances in the late 1960s but that would not be discussed here. Suffice to say, it's a case of all roads lead to Rome at that particular point of time.

Although it is still unthinkable to paint a bleak picture as of Syria's on Malaysia's future, it is still imperative to warn our politicians enough is enough, especially of the recent venomous demagoguery that entails the Umno general election. The mimicry shown of the aforementioned conflict zones in terms of ethno-religious nationalism fanning is truly unsettling, although not unexpected, because stoking emotions and hatred is one of the oldest tricks from the political playbook, especially when the power balance was challenged. Something obviously Umno is struggling to cope with. Desperate politicians make the worst politicians.

We need to keep the politicians with a leash because the truth is, people do hate each other due to what politicians do. I hope we could be more rational than that, but humans unfortunately have not reached such an evolutionary plateau yet. We are all vulnerable to collective emotions, as can be seen in herd mentalities and mob behaviours, making us a hostage to the politician's maneuverings.

Democracy might be the red herring that leads everyone to believe that anything bad that happens in a nation is a collective responsibility to be bear by all. But the actual fact is, in most of the times, the blood is thicker in the politician's hands. – October 16, 2013.

* Nicholas Chan is a forensic scientist by education and a socio-political analyst of Penang Institute by profession.

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