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In battling for Malay supremacy, are its champions defending a concept whose origins are blurred in the annals of history? As for those pushing for a Malaysian identity, did the country only begin post-Merdeka? By SUHAINI AZNAM, THE STAR
KETUANAN Melayu (Malay supremacy) is a delicate subject, bringing with it connotations of supremacy of one race over another. Historically, the more confident the Malays are, the more generous they will be. But after the March 8 election they feel threatened, and so are not in a giving mood to their Chinese and Indian fellow countrymen.  »We cannot build this nation overnight. What we are asking for is a willingness to contribute, a willingness to sacrifice.... RAZALI IBRAHIM Thus talk of Malay unity and nationalism has cropped up with increasing frequency over the past two months, the latest being the three-day Congress on Malay Solidarity in Johor Baru last weekend. There, 2,000 representatives from 180 Malay non-governmental organisations got together to discuss the need to form a lobby group to protect Malay interests, due to the failure of Malay political parties to champion the Malay agenda. Congress co-organiser Federation of Malaysian Writers Associations (Gapena) president Tan Sri Ismail Hussein noted the increasing prominence of such ideologies as a Malaysian Malaysia, multi-lingualism, multiculturism and religious pluralism. “We are against these as our stand is that Malaysia’s existence is founded on the principle of Kedaulatan Melayu (Malay sovereignty),” he said. At the same time, he noted that the Congress and its resolutions were not meant to be against non-Malays. For non-Malays, as well as some Malays who espouse a Malaysian Malaysia, this line of argument goes against the grain. Their argument is: how can you advocate supremacy, which by definition places one above another entity, and then claim that you are not against non-Malays? There seems to be no conciliatory ground of understanding between the two. Each group wants concessions that the other is not ready, or willing, to give. Nationalist Malays want Malaysian Chinese and Indians to absorb and demonstrate more Malay traits. The latter do not want to be Malays; they want to be Malaysians. Bukit Bintang MP Fong Kui Lun criticised the Congress “50 years after Merdeka” as a regressive step. “Today we are living in a globalised world, with an open policy. “If you want to hold a convention for uniting Malaysians, then that would be suitable. But if you go for racialism, it’s a step back.” The debate shifted up a gear on May 8 when MCA vice-president Datuk Ong Tee Keat objected to the term ketuanan Melayu as it implied the relationship between tuan, or master, and slave.  Inter-linked: The debate over Malay supremacy is ironic in that as a people, the Malays are very much linked to the Chinese and Indian civilisations of old. Without missing a beat, Information Minister Datuk Ahmad Shabery Cheek responded that the ketuanan referred to the raja raja Melayu of whom all races were subjects. When Hindu Rights Action Force (Hindraf) spilt into the streets last Nov 25, many indignant Malays threatened only half in jest that they should be sent back to India. Ethnic relations had receded to its lowest ebb. Two or three generations along, there were still Malays who thought that they had more rights to this country than anyone else. It is a question that harkens back to 1957 and that non-negotiable trade-off of Malay special privileges for citizenship rights for non-Malays. The die-hard Malay nationalists insist that the non-Malays must first understand the country’s history. “The younger generation Chinese and Indians have to stand tall and appreciate that the country called Malaysia was founded on the Malacca sultanate,” said Muar MP Razali Ibrahim. “All who are Malaysians must accept this as the country that we have built together. “Is it enough to sing the Negara Ku and be able to recite the Rukun Negara by heart to call yourself a citizen?” “We cannot build this nation overnight. What we are asking for (from the non-Malays) is a willingness to contribute, a willingness to sacrifice.” This includes a willingness to wear the songkok, not fighting for mother-tongue classes, and thinking of oneself as Malaysian (first and only) without any reference to China or India, explained the Johor Umno Youth chief. “Without this, it’s too much for the Malays to sacrifice that (element of) language,” he said, adding that he was not trying to promote racial tension but nation building. But the current debate does have race as its political genesis. Umno, by its failure to protect Malay supremacy in politics, has disappointed, even frightened, the Malays. Malay polity is now trying hard to separate religion from culture from their envisioned ideals of “bangsa Melayu” and, of course, from politics. Umno is caught in the middle. It has to placate the intellectuals and cultural activists who still form the opinion leaders among its grassroots. At the same time, it has to evolve into a Malaysian party because that is its only option in the face of Pakatan Rakyat’s multi-racial appeal. Meanwhile, MCA has won admiration even among a segment of Malays, for having been pragmatic enough to evolve into a party that looked beyond the narrow confines of Chinese interests. Its president Datuk Seri Ong Ka Ting said: “We are still a Chinese-based political party but our ways, direction and approach are for all races.” Conversely, the MIC is still looking inward, to protecting Indian interests, especially after makkal sakti (people’s power) swept the nation, leaving its president and a few leaders without a seat. On May 7, Razali took on DAP chairman Karpal Singh for asking who had prepared the text of the King’s speech to Parliament. In the near free-for-all that ensued, Razali challenged Karpal Singh, saying that he was on the verge of being derhaka (an act of treason against a sultan or King). It was telling that all those who later congratulated Razali on a well-delivered speech were Malays from Umno. Malays would probably feel more comfortable if Malaysia comprised ethnic Chinese of say 12% of the population, and Indians another 6%. So far, their brethren from Sabah and Sarawak are no threat to peninsula Malays because of their small numbers. At a relatively youthful 38, Razali would like to inherit a united country. To him, integration was a misnomer for this country’s socio-political evolution. “We have adaptation, accommodation. We respect your culture and needs.” A language belongs to the race as denoted by the people, not the country as defined by a land mass, reasoned Razali. “It does not have to be so taboo to say it belongs to the Melayu because the language belongs to the bangsa of the country – in this case, the Malays. He pointed to Indonesians and Thais as examples, whose Chinese were not ethnically identifiable by their names and who spoke Bahasa Indonesia or Thai as their language of first choice. But before we can reach that point, the Chinese and Indians already fear they have to compromise their roots, he said. “There is no sense of pride in being Malaysian.” “Nation building will not work if only the Malays work towards it. Our future is intertwined.” Razali’s views were typical of a Johorean Malay “cocooned in his Malay milieu,” said the former Speaker of the Kelantan Legislative Assembly Datuk Wan Rahim Wan Abdullah, now the PAS MP for Kota Baru. “The first 50 years are over. Umno must have the courage to admit that the playing field has changed,” he said. “People are educated. In another 10 years, the pre-Merdeka generation will all be over 60 years old.” They will not be showing respect to Umno en masse, he pointed out. It was in that light that at the Congress, Prof Datuk Dr Zainal Kling of the Sultan Idris Teachers’ Training University warned Malays not to be complacent about ketuanan Melayu just because the Prime Minister and most mentris besar were Malay. “Our culture is to surrender leadership to one person, and if he turns out to be weak, all would fall with him.” What in fact constitutes a Melayu? Genetically, it would be almost impossible to define one as the Malays are such a mixed lot. The late National Laureate Datuk Usman Awang described the origins of Malays as covering the swathe of Indonesian islands from Sulawesi to Aceh, on the peninsula from Jakun to Sakai, and eastwards to Pakistan and Arab. The Constitution distils the definition to one who is born to a Malaysian citizen who professes to be a Muslim, habitually speaks the Malay language, adheres to Malay customs and is domiciled in Malaysia or Singapore. All of Malaysia’s first four prime ministers were not of 100% Malay stock: Tunku Abdul Rahman’s mother was a Thai princess; Tun Abdul Razak traced his lineage to Bugis seafarers of Sulawesi; Tun Hussein Onn was of Turkish descent; and Tun Dr Mahathir Mohamad admitted to “having Indian blood flowing through my veins”. Yet they were all Malay and as leaders of the country’s largest Malay political party, Umno, also represented the Malay polity. As Mahathir added: “No Malay is pure.” In fact, in social studies classes, children are taught that the Malays who settled in the coastal areas, pushing the orang asli inland and uphill, descended from Yunnan, in south China. The values Malays hold most dear are, in no particular order: Islam, sultans, land, customs and language. But it is a language that has borrowed heavily from Sanskrit and Arabic, with a smattering of everyday words from the rest of the South-East Asian archipelago. This debate over Malay supremacy is then ironic in that as a people, the Malays are very much linked to the Chinese and Indian civilisations of old, as former deputy prime minister Tun Musa Hitam himself once observed. So in battling for Malay supremacy, are its champions defending a concept whose origins are blurred in the annals of history? And are those pushing for a Malaysian identity also mired in the same misconception that the country only began post-Merdeka? Perhaps there is no big deal to the debate after all – as long as one is comfortable in one’s own skin.
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