Foreign minister Syed Hamid Albar deserves the support of all Malaysians when he said that Malaysians will not be prevented from criticising Singapore's ban on the tudung (head scarf) at school as it concerns all Muslims.
The foreign minister said:"Sometimes their people comment on what happens in Malaysia. Sometime our people comment on what is happening there."
Indeed, Malaysians with reasonable durability of memory certainly remember the many occasions Singapore's Senior Minister Lee Kuan Yew gave us his 'advice' through the mass media in Singapore, or even personally in Kuala Lumpur. Sometimes we accepted it with gratitude, but other times, we rejected it quietly with smiles.
As one of the defining hallmarks of secular modernity is reciprocity, Malaysians also enjoy giving 'advice' to Singapore. Only in ancient theocracy or medieval feudalism, does the principle of reciprocity not apply between the absolutist ruler and the undifferentiated masses of the ruled.
In fact, when former deputy prime minister Anwar Ibrahim and PAS Youth chief Mahfuz Omar led the morally courageous condemnation of the anti-Chinese riots in Jakarta in May 1998, Singapore, China and the United States, among others, joined in the 'interference into the domestic affairs of Indonesia'. Many wealthy Chinese Indonesians also went to Singapore to seek refuge.
A year later, the air powers of the United States and North Atlantic Treaty Organisation (Nato) struck at the capital of Milosevic's Serbia, Belgrade, without mercy to stop the massacre and genocide of Muslims in Kosovo.
Bargaining chip
A new consensus on international law and convention has developed in the West and the progressives in Asia: that universal human rights of minorities, be they Chinese in Indonesia, Muslims in Serbia or Kurds in Iraq should be made the active and effective concern of the world community.
However, Syed Hamid must go a step further. He must not be liberal and progressive only when Muslims in Singapore are affected negatively. Otherwise, he could be easily accused of exploiting the principle of human rights to attack Singapore for other 'ulterior motives' such as using the plight of Muslims in Singapore as a bargaining chip in the pricing of water sold to Singapore and re-sold to Malaysia.
The foreign minister must also advice Prime Minister Dr Mahathir Mohamad to accept international criticism of the serious violations of human rights in Malaysia, including detention without trial under the Internal Security Act (ISA) and the ban of alternative publications and political speeches by opposition parties.
In particular, Syed Hamid should make our government respond positively to the declarations made by the State Department of the United States, the European Union and Amnesty International that Anwar Ibrahim, now in prison is a political prisoner and a prisoner of conscience.
Healthier, vibrant
If Singapore can advice Malaysia and vice-versa, surely our common friends like the United States, Britain, Australia, Canada, New Zealand and the European Union can also advice both Malaysia and Singapore on issues of democracy and human rights. After all, they are not only our close security associates but also trading partners and investors.
The political environments of Malaysia and Singapore would certainly be healthier, and our intellectual atmosphere more vibrant, if both countries amend their principles of non-interference - derived from the 1648 Peace of Westphalia in Europe ruled by absolutist despots - to suit the post-Cold War world of 2002.
JAMES WONG WING ON is chief analyst of Strategic Analysis Malaysia (SAM) which produces the subscriber-based political report, Analysis Malaysia . Wong is a former member of parliament (1990-1995) and a former columnist for the Sin Chew Jit Poh Chinese daily. He read political science and economics at the Monash University in Melbourne, Australia. While in Sin Chew , he and a team of journalists won the top awards of Malaysian Press Institute (MPI) for 1998 and 1999.
