Sajakkini

Elizabeth Wong : 13th Floor

The mountain made out of the molehill that was the article by Johor-based lawyer Yang Pei Kang paradoxically brings back memories of my trip to Silifke a decade ago.

One evening, I happened to stroll into a beautiful park to escape the remnants of the Turkish summer heat. As dusk fell over the golden horizon, there was a hauntingly beautiful sound that I had not heard since living in Sydney for six years.

I stayed rooted on the spot awash with nostalgia of home and things past. It was the azan (Muslim call to prayer).

ELIZABETH WONG has been involved in human rights since her student days in Sydney. She is currently the secretary-general of the National Human Rights Society (Hakam), a member of the Suaram secretariat and was a human rights fellow of Carnegie Council for Ethics and International Affairs (2002-03). ‘13th Floor‘ will attempt to look into the paradoxes and intricacies of democracy and politics. In her spare time, she revives her search for Dante (the lost cat). She is still leaving the option of playing guitar in a loud band open.

But that was Turkey and far from the political currents of religion and identity politics here in Malaysia.

Yang had succinctly put forward a treatise on the need to have elections for local municipal councils, but it has turned into something quite far from his intention or imagination.

If Umno had chosen to perform its theatrics over our fundamental yet non-existent right to pick and choose our increasingly unaccountable and arrogant councillors, it would be been a popular but staid affair.

This was not the case. Trust the ever-predictable Umno types to ignore the substance of Yang’s argument to take a shot at cheap publicity and political mileage (since they didn’t get their chance to burn down the Selangor Chinese Assembly Hall the last time).

Linguistic problems

Ironically, the molehill may now grow into something much larger than life that would thrill sociologists. For starters, it shows that most people still struggle with the English language and our particular weakness in this area has gotten a number of people into trouble for no reason.

A few years ago, the government took offence when the Singapore’s Straits Times referred to then Prime Minister Dr Mahathir Mohamad as our ‘top dog’ when this is a common phrase in the English language.

(Here I do feel the compulsion to call the usual coterie of commentators who jumped on the bash-Bar Council wagon as ‘running d*gs’. Two years ago, there was the PUM-led lynch mob against a number of writers and rights activists.)

It took the Shah Alam Umno division a couple of months to decipher a single page of text – large fonts for that matter – to come out with a completely LSD-induced take on the article. (So, Umno Shah Alam – heed the advice of Rafidah Aziz – master thy English.)

The other is that there will always be folks who just can’t be bothered reading (did anyone realise that July was National Reading Month?).

The Perak Mufti, Harussani Zakaria, decided he would give his two cents’ worth even though he hadn’t read Yang’s article. Yet he had the gall to admonish those he deemed not ‘well-versed’ in religion to offer their opinions. So one rule for them and diddly-squat for us.

The last is a blessing of sorts. It goes without saying some of our opinions aren’t going to have the privilege of being published in half the op-ed page of the New Sunday Times.

But we now have a small opening to discuss openly a number of issues that had stemmed from this little storm in a teacup; ranging from freedom of speech, the role of religion in public life and the progress, or lack of, plurality and tolerance in our national discourse.

Widening gulf

Everyone loves to chant the mantra of Malaysia being multi-cultural and multi-religious and these are in fact our social elements that we should cherish and protect. But are we a tolerant society? Have we been able to organically embrace cultures, beliefs, differences even those of the idiosyncratic nature?

In the past, one could argue that our richly diverse communities have been able to meld customs, cultures and language to one that is uniquely and deservedly called Malaysian. But these days, we are increasingly polarised and there have been too many recent occasions and incidents where the gulf evidently has grown between tolerance and toleration.

We force our youths into expensive military training camps and very ugly uniforms to make friends. Non-Muslim children are now considered pariahs in state schools when they are ghetto-ised from the rest and have to bring their own cutlery to school. And the list of taboo or sensitive topics grows increasingly longer.

What we have here is toleration of the teeth-gnashing type centred on what the powers-that-be deem right or wrong, suitable or inappropriate.

We are presented with the project of Islam Hadhari with promises better days to come for multi-cultural Malaysia, yet the realities are far from the truth.

Our Prime Minister showed little imagination when all he said was that ‘they’ should be tolerant to others since ‘they’ get to beat drums and ring bells. The irony is that ‘they’ are suppose to be ‘tolerant’ and in the same vein, ‘tolerated’.

So one isn’t going to find police reports lodged against local councils for disallowing churches to be built, Hindu temples demolished or the offensive or frequent write-ups which borders racism in Malay-language newspapers and magazines. And dog-lovers aren’t going to complain about insensitive write-ups and slurs against their pooches.

The lesson in all this is that we have still many miles to go before becoming a mature tolerant nation, never mind the counters of the calendar year.

It’s not too late to start now. Police reports against Yang and the Bar Council should be withdrawn and further harassment should desist. Yang need not bow to pressure to rewrite the Infoline article or censor his future ones.

And can we now get back to that agenda for local elections?

Living together in real harmony