“Justice can sleep for years and awaken when it is least expected. A miracle is nothing more than dormant justice from another time arriving to compensate those it has cruelly abandoned. Whoever knows this is willing to suffer, for he knows that nothing is in vain.”

- Mark Helprin (Winter’s Tale)

While I have always been sceptical of anything that comes out of the Penang Institute, I thought Ooi Kok Hin’s article in the Diplomat hit the target but missed the bullseye. I have argued in various pieces that ultimately what would bring down the Umno house of cards is an economic calamity brought upon by “ketuanan economics” and not any stratagems that the opposition comes up with.

I began the year by saying - “No matter how the government spins it, the economy is in bad shape. And when it gets bad enough, when the money runs out and when political bromides from either side isn’t enough to fill empty bellies, people on their own accord will take to the streets.”

Ooi ends his piece with - “If political change is not sufficient, will it take an economic downturn to bring change in Malaysia, like Indonesia?”

However, implying the rapid democratisation of Indonesia after despotic rule brought upon by economic instability exacerbated by policy malfeasances as something of a miracle and the only option opposition-voting Malaysians could hope for is intellectually dodgy especially after presenting a fairly cogent argument as to why Chairman Najib will most probably win the next general election.

Ooi made his first three factors as to why Najib Abdul Razak will win the centrepiece of his argument:

(1) Electoral malpractices: Keeping the incumbent in their seats

(2) Political fragmentation: Weaker and disunited opposition

(3) Institutional failures: Culture of unaccountability, graft, and state repression,

It is ironic that it is these three points that the opposition keeps harping about that has not gained them any traction with the demographic they claim is keeping the Umno hegemon in power. Indeed, there is very little the opposition can do against the rigged system (that are those institutional failures) and a frontal assault is akin to attacking a tank with a spear.

Counting on Sabah and Sarawak to deliver us from Umno is exactly the same kind of bankrupt ideology that Umno peddles and this meme that West Malaysians are ignorant and less sophisticated displays the hubris of peninsular oppositional types and the reason why they want us to stay the hell out of their states.

And strategically speaking as long as Umno has to rely on Sabah and Sarawak to maintain hegemony, the easier it should be to destabilise Umno in the peninsula. The fact that this has not happened says more about the opposition then so-called ignorant voters.

What is needed is to derail the tank’s track and this is where Ooi’s fourth factor - Societal fault Lines: One cleavage too many - is worth exploring because it provides the key to bringing down the Umno hegemon but it is also a record of the opposition’s failure to present a cohesive alternative to not only Umno but also policies that have no place in an egalitarian Malaysia.

While Ooi rightly argues that everything in Malaysia, is seen through the lens of race and religion, and correctly points out Umno’s part in this mess, he fails to acknowledge that the opposition has also contributed to the narrative.

While the ‘PAS for All’ fiasco was predicated on the pragmatism of the late Tok Guru Nik Aziz Nik Mat, the systemic oppositional policy of chasing the ‘Malay’ vote by the same means as Umno has resulted in religion playing an even greater role in mainstream oppositional politics.

By neglecting the secular approach and instead embroiling itself with Islamic, Christian and of late Hindu political and social agitations, the opposition has turned out to be just another Barisan National clone peddling the same kind of manure. People outside the echo chambers are wondering why vote for the clone when the original can get things done not by rule of law but by fiat.

Here is a hint. If you want to stop religious and racial extremism, stop funding - on a state level - institutions that enable such impulses in the guise of reaching out to the Malay/Muslim community. As long as you are held ransom to the idea that in order to defeat Umno you must use the same tactics to secure the Malay vote, there is always going to be that Malay tilt to Umno.

Parties dance to Umno’s tune

The demonisation of the Chinese community is part of the larger narrative of the reactionary nature of Chinese communal politics. The MCA and DAP have positioned themselves as loudspeakers for the Chinese community hence there is no room for by bipartisanship on any issue, leaving important social, political and economic issues unresolved because these two parties dance to the Umno tune.

These contradictions of course are not lost on the voting public. While I argued that the MCA for instance “has by far had a more accessible position on this subject (hudud) instead of the conflicting messages coming out of the Muslim wing of the opposition front and their non-Muslim supporters; they stand idly by while the Umno hegemon sponsors state-sanctioned racial provocations against the Chinese community using the DAP as a proxy.”

Not to mention that now former prime minister Mahathir Mohamad is the de facto opposition leader, he continues reviving the narrative that the “Malays” will lose their land to “Chinese” interlopers, while Chinese opposition types warn against China’s investments because it is bailing out the Umno hegemon.

So on the one hand we have the narrative of Malays losing their land to Chinese pendatangs and on the other we have Chinese oppositional types confirming that the narrative that the country is being sold to the PRC. So this lens of race and religion is opaque and it is a grave mistake - although it plays well in echo chambers - to simply describe it as something wrong with Umno policy as opposed to describing it as the reality of Establishment - BN and Pakatan Harapan - politics.