COMMENT | MIC, the largest Indian-based political party founded in 1946, has lost its lustre and moral compass. Indian Malaysians are slowly dropping MIC and opting for multiracial parties.
MIC seems to have lost direction, and is willing to set aside its initial struggle of providing political representation for the Indian community.
Serious efforts must be taken to rebuild MIC after its tragic loss in the 14th general election. The party must continue to fight to empower the Indian community.
The party leadership must know how to mitigate risk and be willing to make bold decisions and avoid making excuses.
Firstly, MIC must be willing to receive the views of outsiders who are not in the party leadership.
Once, MIC had courageous and outspoken leaders like VT Sambanthan, V Manickavasagam, S Samy Vellu, S Subramaniam, K Padmanaban, MG Pandithan and S Sothianathan, who spoke persistently against injustice and remained champions of the downtrodden.
They were dynamic politicians, with good grassroots experience and they represented the true voices of the people.
Why are the current party leaders quiet and rarely speak up against issues like education, improving livelihoods and better social inclusion?
They should be speaking on creating more employment opportunities for youths and encouraging them to develop their entrepreneurial skills.
Pressure group
The responsibility falls on MIC to ensure there is a seven percent increase in enrolment of Indian students in local higher learning institutes and participation in the civil service in all ranks by 2026.
Remember, last year the government has said that it would review and fine-tune the implementation of the Malaysian Indian Blueprint (MIB) which was introduced by the previous government.
MIC Youth should be a sort of a pressure group and service-oriented to keep the 'mothership' in line and be truthful to the party’s struggle. The Youth wing must not compromise on the party’s core struggle.
MIC Youth is not doing much on unemployment. The wing must focus on issues and solutions which are in line with the needs and demands of the younger generation.
It must come up with various initiatives to help rather than issuing press statements which will not help much.
For the first time, Malaysia’s largest Indian-based political party has been forced out of power. When BN was defeated in last year's general election, MIC suffered a setback as it began to realise the flaws in the party.
MIC gave away two parliamentary seats to Umno – Port Dickson last year and now Cameron Highlands. MIC let go both seats to Umno for the simple reason that both constituencies were considered unsafe.
If the attitude of taking things too much for granted – living in comfort zones, living in denial and being lackadaisical – persists, MIC will die a natural death.
M VIVEK served as an aide to several former MIC deputy ministers.
The views expressed here are those of the author/contributor and do not necessarily represent the views of Malaysiakini.
