Najib disappoints with self-praising speech: Pakatan bashing, hints again of GE-13

As expected, Prime Minister Najib Razak had little to offer but bombast and bluster during his policy speech for his ruling Umno party. The 2011 Umno general assembly is regarded as a watershed meeting as Najib is expected to call for snap national elections early next year, but even so, all he could do was to bash the Pakatan Rakyat led by Opposition Leader Anwar Ibrahim and insist that Umno was the most democratic party in the country.

Najin, the Umno president, repeated his hint that the 13th general election would be held soon, but again failed to give any concrete indication of when Malaysians could expect to go to the polls. His insistence on not giving any advance notice to the opposition is against democratic norms and would be looked at with scorn and contempt in developed democracies.

"It is a disappointing speech, it gives no direction for Umno and only underscores little Umno has changed under Najib. In fact, it is worse now than even under Abdullah Badawi. Or Mahathir Mohamad, where at the very least, there was some underlying economic growth to offset the plunging civil liberties . Now in 2011, Malaysia is not stagnant but actually declining in economic growth and Najib is resorting to blatant lies. How much reform has Umno undertaken, you tell me," PKR vice president Chua Jui Meng told Malaysia Chronicle.

Malaysia now the worst-off country in ASEAN for freedom of assembly

Jui Meng was referring the centre-piece of Najib's sadly-hollow speech, where he insisted Umno was more democratic than the opposition parties PKR, PAS and DAP.

Ironically, just days ago, Najib went down in history as the leader who turned Malaysia into the worst nation in Southeast Asia by ramming through a controversial Assembly Bill that effectively clamps down on citizens' rights to peaceful gathering to express a point of view. Apart from local politicians, the Bar Council, civil society, international bodies including LawAsia, Amnesty International and the Human Rights Watch have condemned the bill as oppressive, against human rights and contrary to democracy.

Yet Najib - in his trademark fashion - completely ignored all these factors, insisting that Malaysia was on track to becoming the world's best democracy thanks to Umno and his administration.

We allow many people in Umno to choose their leaders and Umno is not a party that is afraid of democracy, compared with our competitors. We are not like the opposition parties. In fact, Umno embraces democracy as in the English saying, the proof of the pudding is in the eating, he told the 2011 Umno AGM held at the Putra World Trade Centre on Thursday.

“We have never dominated or intended to dominate other component parties. We are not a racist party, but work towards national development. Furthermore, in PKR, the party president is the wife of the de-facto leader and their eldest daughter becomes the vice-president. We do not need to say anything.

Having walloped his nemesis, Anwar's PKR party, he then took a swipe at the DAP and PAS.

Is it democratic when only branch delegates choose 20 central committee members and then they in turn select the party leaders? Certainly, this is not representing the will of the members," said Najib, referring to DAP.

"This person (mursyidul am) is more powerful than the president, he added, referring to PAS.

Back-biting bluster

Many Malaysians found it strange that with Malaysia on the cusp of either a new beginning or a major implosion, Najib would choose to focus on what happened in his opponents' parties, compounding the view that he had run out of ideas and had no more room to move. As such, the haste to push through the Assembly Bill to deter street protests should his BN coalition be seen to falsely claim victory at the GE-13.

"It is a shock that at such a critical time, Najib wants to compare his party with ours. Either he is feeling very insecure or he knows a lot of Umno members have been signalling their wish to come on board Pakatan. But to answer him, how can Umno be more democratic than PKR? We have a one-member one-vote system, whereas only a miniscule percentage of Umno members get to vote directly for their leaders. They have to go through delegates who will surely take advantage of money politics and vote the way the elite wants," chided Jui Meng.

"As for PAS' Nik Aziz, their internal structure is that the Spiritual Adviser is higher than the party president. So what is Najib talking about? As Umno president and PM, he should be telling his party how they will pull Malaysia out of the economic rut, how they will clean the party from corruption and not defend corruption. He will tell all of Malaysia what a grand party Umno is by envisioning a future of real democracy and hope for all the people especially the poor and down-trodden. Not back-bite and bitch!"

Game changers or mere verbose?

Najib also resorted to fancy terms like "game changers" but gave little explanation of what it really meant or entailed, other than that it included the new media, new political reality and new thinking amongst voters.

However, as he defended Umno's ways in the same breath, his comments were waved off as mere verbose intended to sound nice but not meant to be acted on. It was indeed telling while Najib urged 'unpopular' candidates not to cling onto their seats, he did not once touch on core issues that have wrecked Umno - corruption and power in the hands of the elite.

The 2011 AGM comes as Wanita chief Shahrizat Jalil is accused of abuse of power and her family of corruption in the RM250 million NFC debacle. Yet a day ago, Umno Youth was urged to defend Shahrizat, rather than advise her to undergo a complete probe to clear her name. That Umno was resorting to abusing the institutions especially the police was clear, when Deputy IGP Khalid Bakar suddenly issued a statement this morning that there were no 'elements' of corruption in the police probe on NFC so far, prompting cynicism that Khalid was just being a lackey for Najib to save face for Umno.

Not a word on corruption as M'sia sinks on graft index
Critics said it was also strange that while Najib professes a desire for a new and better Malaysia, for his own party, he does dare to even mention the 'C' word - referring to corruption.

Meanwhile, to underscore how much damage the rot in Umno is causing the country is news that Malaysia had plummeted again in the internationally-followed Corruption Perception Index to 60 from 56 last year. This is the 3rd straight year Malaysia was rated as being more corrupt than the past year.

"We must realise, if Umno still fails to understand and appreciate the factors that become the 'game changers'... and not take steps to re-frame the 'game plan', which is our planned movement, then we will become tragedy. If Umno does not understand the new realities of the national political landscape, how are Umno and BN going to succeed? Secondly, the new media," said Najib.

"Like it or not, Umno should take control of the new media because today, at this moment, it can determine victory or defeat. It can level out the playing field as well as make a battle unequal. Thirdly, Umno should also appreciate that there is new thought among all segments of the electorate, so we must attract their support. Umno cannot have the attitude or be seen as insolent and arrogant, or else the voters and the people will shun us."

Not racist or crowning hypocrisy

But perhaps Najib's 'crowning' hypocrisy was when he declared to the Umno assembly that Umno was not racist. This, when he did not even rebuke his information chief Ahmad Maslan, who just days ago had uttered some of the most racist comments so far for this year.

Umno is in reality a catalyst of the co-operative spirit between races which finally created social stability and brought about national harmony,Najib said. Umno was willing (even) back then to vote candidates not from their own race, for a bigger purpose, for winning elections, forming a government and then independence."

Ahmad Maslan, a deputy minister in Najib's department and the Pontian MP, had lamented the loss of political space to non-Malay leaders as unacceptable. He especially picked on the Chinese and warned that should the Pakatan do well enough in GE-13 to force a 'hung' Parliament, Malays stood to loose their language rights and Islam would be sidelined by the Christians.

Critics hit Najib hard for "daring to make such a thick-skinned claim" that Umno was not racist.

"This must be the biggest joke of all. No wonder Umno has to cheat at the polls. They keep twisting and turning the truth rather admit and correct their wrongdoings. It gets worse and worse each year," said Jui Meng.

"It is no point talking about 'game changers' or using fancy jargon. Just go back to basics. Serve the people well, listen to what they want, recognize it's what the people and not what the Umno elite wants that counts. Sweep out corruption although it may be a bit too late. It will engulf us and bankrupt us. Punish racists in Umno including Muhyiddin Yassin and Mahathir Mohamad before insisting that Umno is not racist. Then we will say, you are not a hypocrite!"






Malaysia Chronicle.com