KUALA LUMPUR (Islam Online) - In a lengthy live telecast debate, Minister of Defense Najib Tun Razak, son of a former Malaysian Premier, said he wished that the ruling United Malays National Organisation (UMNO) of Prime Minister Mahathir would revert towards Islam. In a statement that may cause jitters in the party, the Minister is hopeful that the party will not be outdated and will get back its glamour among the Malays.
This debate was organized in the run-up to crucial UMNO elections, which seems to be dividing the Malay party on important issues of democracy, Islamization and fairness. A former royal enemy to Mahathir, Prince Tungku Razaleigh Hamza from Kelantan is posed to challenge the top posts in the UMNO party in May. Razaleigh as party leader would mean an end to the career of Mahathir as Premier.
Relevancy Of UMNO
In 1987 Razaleigh almost defeated Mahathir to the party's top post but lost when Najib turned his support to ensure Mahathir's victory by a mere 46 votes. Who wins the top post in the party is thus sworn in as Prime Minister of the country.
Najib won with a slim margin of 213 votes in the Nov 99 elections and is said to have lost his glamour within the party. He lost his prime education ministry job, catapulted in defense ministry but remained a vice president of the party, a post he will have to defend in the May party elections.
The debate was centered on the relevancy of the Malay UMNO party after the general elections, which saw its power base erode in favor of the Islamic party of Malaysia (PAS). This erosion of support is said to be a message to the ruling party and its leaders. "The people, mainly the Malays, want a style of governance and of development based on Islam rather than secular western views," Fadzil Noor the Opposition leader in the Parliament and leader of PAS said.
Najib's Islamic Current
Najib has been considered for a long time as having preference for a more Islamic-based UMNO party even though critics claim he does not represent a truly Muslim leadership. Always soft-spoken and carrying out his duties as minister with diligence , Najib was almost caught in the whirlwind that swept Anwar Ibrahim from his deputy prime minister post and cost him his party membership.
Najib is believed to have been close to Anwar, sharing the same Islamic views and promoting a more Islamically oriented UMNO party. Najib compares the Malays to their Islamic faith in almost all his speeches. During the debate, he never failed to mention that the Malay community upholds their Islamic faith with great pride and honor.
Ahmad Damha of the Stopinjustice group suggested that Najib was hinting that his party might have deviated from the Islamic line. "Najib sees things differently from many other UMNO leaders who are promoting secularism," Stopinjustice said in an e-mail sent to hundreds of Internet users online.
Najib believes that the Malays must continue to support UMNO but insisted that the party needs to revitalize its role as a Muslim party. He always reminds interviewers and interlocutors of the fact that Malays are Muslims and that this is very important in policy-making. "UMNO cannot be the party that builds masjids and at the end of the day leave it to people from other organizations to make use of it. We must become more supportive of the need of the Malays. UMNO must be at the head of celebrations like Quranic recitations, Ramadhan and Eid celebrations," he said. "UMNO must adjust and will adjust to the present situation. This is what makes UMNO relevant and strong," the minister added.
The minister says that UMNO is divided into three specific generations. The early generations, which include the elder leaders of the party. The second generation is the May 13, 1968 generation that witnessed the racial riots and understood the reason behind the riots and why they caused thousands of Chinese deaths. The third generation is the present generation, which seems to be more dynamic and refuses to share the views of the establishment. "Thus, the need for adjustment," Najib said on national television.
A PAS member named Yasril Mamat said that UMNO seems to have understood that they must now follow the mood of the people rather than force their policies on the people. Yasri suggested that UMNO and its leaders tackle the Malay dilemma at its roots rather than at the surface.
Eroding Support
"The Malays in general do not identify themselves to the UMNO party anymore," PAS Youth Chief Mahfuz said after the November 99 elections. "This fact seems to have escaped the leadership of the party," Damha said in an earlier e-mail sent to Islam Online in Kuala Lumpur.
PAS was the party that reaped more benefits of the storm caused by the Anwar Ibrahim saga. The waves that hit the UMNO party lifted PAS to its best ever performance in its entire history. The number of seats and votes PAS garnered shows that UMNO's power base has severely eroded and it might remain this way for years to come unless UMNO shifts its policies. "The shift must be colossal. It must be a rejection of secular ways for more Islamization of UMNO itself," Yasril said.
Yet this is most unlikely according to several political observers, including former Premier of Singapore Lee Kuan Yew, who believes that UMNO will remain a solid secular organization and will not fall into the temptation for Islamization.
Mahathir's Secular Views
Mahathir Mohamad, the aging Prime Minister of Malaysia, is a firm believer in secular values that relegates Islam to birth, death and marriage ceremonies. "He has an absolute control of the party apparatus and the party apparatchiks seems to be puppets in the masters' hands," writes Stopinjustice.
Mahathir never misses an opportunity to criticize the Muslim Ulama, which heavily supports PAS. He tagged PAS leaders as extremists and heretics, religious men distorting the image of Islam. He is currently attempting to sue PAS and promised hell on earth for the Islamic party over contradictory fatwas.
The ruling party has failed to realize that its membership base, which is purely Muslim, has been severely eroded to the limit that it won only 74 parliamentary seats and roughly 30% of national votes compared to the last general elections. This makes UMNO less of a senior partner to the National Front (NF) critics such as Ahmad Damha says.
UMNO claims a membership of 3 million people. The party, which is the leading movement of the NF, a purely communal and racial based coalition that has ruled the country since the early 1970's, won 3.6 million votes in Nov 99. PAS and its Alternative Front (AF) won 3.35 million votes, clearly showing an increase in Malay votes for the Islamic party.
In states where Muslims are a majority, UMNO won by a small margin while the opposition won by a much wider divide than it ever registered in the past. UMNO was instrumental in the independence of Malaysia some 40 years ago, but is accused by PAS leaders of having dropped Islamic values for those it adopted from the colonizers of Malaysia, namely the Portuguese and British.
