Archive for category Azly Rahman
Megatrends of madness, Part I
Posted by Kit in Azly Rahman, Elections, General, nation building on Tuesday, 9 April 2013
Azly Rahman
Malaysiakini
Apr 8, 2013
We are at a critical juncture – at a dangerous crossroad of either a peaceful transfer of power or a descent into utter chaos. These few weeks we will see more drama unfolding – the ultimate aim is to win and win and win and kill and kill and overkill our critical sensibility.
We have not recovered from the shock of a Sulu incursion and we are ill-prepared for a general election that is plagued with all kinds of issues from many angles and manifesting in all kinds of dimensions. This is our megatrend of madness.
Crossroads
We have perfected Machiavellianism that lives in our world of Oriental Despotism. We live in a mediated world – of truth no longer can be discerned, in a world of perception management wherein politics is so complex yet cannibalistic.
In our society lies Italy’s Mussolini and Germany’s Hitler and Japan’s Tojo; of hegemonisers, of annihilators, and Asian-looking imperators. In these three-in-one deadly concoction of cultural contradictions lies the icing of the one-dimensionality of Malaysiana and that sloganism of ‘Truly Asia’. The show goes on. Read the rest of this entry »
Malay politics and Ramleeology
Posted by Kit in Azly Rahman, Mahathir, nation building on Sunday, 3 February 2013
Azly Rahman
Malaysiakini
Feb 2, 2013
“Alif-Mim-Nun-Wau… sarkis!” – said a character in P Ramlee’s movie Pendekar Bujang Lapok.
Of late I have been hit by nostalgia, reminiscing and even romanticising the 60s, 70s and the early 80s before Mahathirism took root.
My last column on Malaysia in the 70s was an enjoyable piece of journaling and from the numerous comments I read from all the blogs that carry it – my own blog Between Cybernetics and Existentialism, my Facebook page, Malaysia Today, etc – I feel that there was a time when a good Malaysian spirit was about to be forged.
This was that sense of a historical block, until May 13, 1969 came, of course; whether it was orchestrated or a victory campaign that went wrong we are beginning to find out, as alternative accounts of it continue to be written.
After languishing in sweet memories of the 70s, I next thought of the 60s; the time when I was growing up in Johor Baru and how the kampong and the city and the school I went to became my “global classrooms”.
My fond memories always go back to a “multicultural Malaysia I knew – especially how I owed my interest in learning and insatiable urge to acquire knowledge through the selfless work of my teachers – Malay, Chinese, Indians, Sikhs, and even my Peace Corps American teachers.
Without them, I would not have been able to write honestly about the need not just to “tolerate” other cultures but to learn from each one of them, embrace the dynamics of each, and to bring out the universality of the values, and next to design good learning systems and environments that will nurture these differences into commonalities and to hybridise the wisdom we will acquire.
This is what has been lacking in our education system – critical sensibility and the embracing of the idea of “cultural action for freedom”, as the Brazilian educational philosopher Paulo Freire would say. Read the rest of this entry »
Our Malaysia of the 70s
Posted by Kit in Azly Rahman, nation building on Saturday, 26 January 2013
by Azly Rahman
Malaysiakini
Jan 25, 2013
With the state of racial and religious things entire in our beloved Malaysia today – rumours of a festival of Bible-burning, continuing humiliation of the Malaysian Indians especially, the death of critical sensibility in our public universities, the devastating revelations of the ‘Sabah IC-gate’ plot, the issue of ‘stateless Indians’ and the criminalisation of children not able to be schooled because they were born ‘stateless’ and a host of other issues Malaysian-ly unbecoming.
I have decided to travel down the path of nostalgia. I am quite sure many of you reading this column would agree that the late sixties and early seventies presented a good frame of reference of what it means to be Malaysian and what ‘national identity’ could be about. Names upon names came back to me as I conjure fond memories.
There was a certain kind of magic, innocence, and sincerity to foster a Malaysian identity, back then. It didn’t matter what race you were one could love to one’s heart’s content folks like these: P Ramlee, AR Tompel, Aziz Sattar, Saloma, Siput Sarawak, Ayappan, Lim Goh Poh, Andre Goh, Kartina Dahari, Orchid Abdullah, soccer players like V Arumugam the ‘Spider Man’, Soh Chin Aun ‘The Towkay’, Shaharuddin Abdullah the cool guy, Mokhtar Dahari ‘Super Mokh’, Santokh Singh, and many other great names that helped make Malaysian Malaysia proud.
One could laugh at the comedian-ventriloquist Jamali Shadat’s jokes, remember names such a V Sambanthan, Khir Johari, the great statesman Dr Ismail Abdul Rahman, Tan Siew Sin, Temenggung Jugah (the man with a really cool haircut I so wanted one… ), Aishah Ghani, and of course the reluctant but down-to-earth and benevolent multiculturalist-statesman Tunku Abdul Rahman (right) with his famous uncontrollable blurting of Malay curse words and his philosophy of “oil and water can never mix”. A simple, yet profound life was back then…
Those were the days before today… when hell is breaking loose. What happened to the ethos of that genre, I wonder.
Growing up in the early 70s, different words to describe reality, practices, and possibilities were dancing happily around me. Read the rest of this entry »
Lesson from ‘listen, listen, listen’
Posted by Kit in Azly Rahman, Human Rights, university on Thursday, 17 January 2013
by Azly Rahman
Malaysiakini
Jan 17, 2012
As a student of Cultural-Philosophical Studies with a passion in radical educational change framed within the context of cybernating-hypermodern societies such as Malaysia, I see the “Bawani-Zohra Affair” as emblematic of a nation gone berserk on the issue of freedom of speech and the culture of dialogue and public discourse.
We are in an ‘amuck-latah’ mood. The nation, at least in cyberspace, is furious (amuck) of what happened, and the protagonist of the propaganda machine fumbled big-time (latah) assuming that the teaching techniques of the “top-down, humiliate-first, no-apologies later” of many a Biro Tata Negara speaker can still be deployed unreservedly onto university students at the time when amateur videos can go viral, when tweets can flow like a tsunami, and when Facebook pages can be created in a fraction of seconds.
That’s the mistaken assumption – that the Frankenstein called “social media technology” will also not run amuck helping those silenced to have their poetic justice, and those humiliated to become an honourable being raised to the level of stardom, overnight.
It is said that at times, you do not need to find the revolution – for the revolution will find you. The revolution found both Bawani and Zohra in such an ‘absurd’ way, such as in many of the plots of French surrealist dramas like Eugene Ionesco’s rhinoceros running wild on the city streets, and Kafka’s character moving from desolation to awareness in “Metamorphosis”.
The timing was perfect, like that storm brewing right after the almost-a-million Malaysian march to take over Putrajaya; after the Deepak drama which was over-played, overdosing even the older folks; after the successes of all those Bersih rallies, and many other watersheds upon watersheds of consciousness-raising events, and ultimately, after the last hurrah circa GE13 – all these ripened the relevance of the fateful “Bawani-Zohra” rendezvous.
Hence, Malaysians saw not only an explosion of anger, but one that fuelled tremendous amounts of creative products, mainly in the realm of multimedia (music videos, Facebook and Internet posters, audio and video materials, and the production of other forms of creative artifacts inspired by the mantra “listen-listen-listen…”). Read the rest of this entry »
49,000 youngest drop-outs?
Posted by Kit in Azly Rahman, Education on Saturday, 5 January 2013
by Azly Rahman
Malaysiakini
12:22PM Jan 4, 2013
If it is indeed true, as recently reported by Malaysiakini that 49,000 ‘stateless children’ are not going to school because they do not have identity cards, then something must be done to immediately address this issue of fundamental human rights. They must be allowed to go to school by any means necessary as the government resolves the issue of their ‘stateless parents’.
This ruling regime will be committing an act of the worst form of mental slavery should these children not be allowed to have the basic education and the right to be intelligent. If, as alleged, this regime can grant identity cards to newly-arrived immigrants in prepration for the coming elections, we must insist it to be able to do this for these children.
You, in the government, will be called a ‘pariah regime’ if this is not done for those children. The implications of not having those children schooled will be devastating; a reaffirmation of the vicious cycle of poverty, alienation, dehumanisation, and the fast-track way to build Malaysia’s prison-industrial complex. These children are already ‘drop-outs’ even before they enter schools!
What is wrong with our education system when we are now seeing a ruder apartheid-isation of schools? We continue to see the growth of a hideous class and caste structure in schools, from smart schools for the children of the rich to ‘pariah schools’ for the children of the abject poor. And now in the case of the ‘children of stateless parents’, we even have no schools for children of the abyss of the underclass, especially Malaysians of Tamil origin. Read the rest of this entry »
‘Allah’ a journey, not controversy
Posted by Kit in Azly Rahman on Saturday, 29 December 2012
By Azly Rahman
Malaysiakini | Dec 28, 2012
Only in Malaysia is the world perhaps witnessing a raging debate on who has the patent to the word ‘Allah’; simply translated as ‘the/that god.’ It seems to be a seasonal debate to get the political parties to wrestle over the linguistic or semiotic of the word; one that connotes and denotes ‘the Force of Divinity’ that Man has attempted to understand, revere, love, and fear yet can never comprehend.
This is simply because we are in a matrix of truth and representation, and in a prison-house of language unable to see what the Ultimate Reality looks like.
What’s in a name? Maybe nothing. Maybe everything. And even more so this Shakespearean “a rose is a rose” type of problematique seems relevant in a world of political manipulations such as in Malaysia when race and religion are the twin determinants of political evolution.
The debate on the origin of the word ‘Allah’ is obviously interesting as a topic of dissertation or as an inquiry theme in fields such as bio-semantics, bio-semiotics, linguistic philosophy, philology, or the study of the transcultural flow of language as yours truly embarked upon on the origin of the words ‘Cyberjaya’ and ‘Putrajaya’ in a dissertation submitted to Columbia University, a few years back. Read the rest of this entry »
A Yellow Mellow tomorrow
Posted by Kit in Azly Rahman, Bersih, Elections on Saturday, 28 April 2012
an instant poem to be shared quite urgently
by Azly Rahman
I told you already
of the fate of this country
that has moved so fast
and now we have another BERSIH rally
yellow mellow what will it be like tomorrow?
we all won’t know until we wear yellow
I have advised the country already
to go to the national square and treat it like a samba party
why aggravate the authorities when they too wish to join in the party?
they are all lonely and want to be clean and happy
in their hearts they powers that be want to be corrupt-free
what then must we do
for a yellow mellow hot potato tomorrow? Read the rest of this entry »
Beyond the ‘Dong Zong issue’
Posted by Kit in Azly Rahman, Education on Thursday, 29 March 2012
by Azly Rahman
Malaysiakini
Mar 28, 2012
I read with interest about ongoing governmental discrimination against Chinese schools, as highlighted by Dong Zong.
Why are quality teachers and an abundance of resources still channeled only to Malay-dominated schools? Why are children in Chinese schools criminalised by the ‘sanction on teaching staff” which will ultimately deprive students of a good mother-tongue education?
What actually is our illness with regard to denial of the students’ right to their own language? Do policy makers actually understand the relationship between culture, cognition, consciousness and citizenship?
What does nationalism mean these days, and how do we understand it vis-a-viz use of language in schools? Whose brand of nationalism is being made dominant and what should an inclusive one look like?
What is the real issue behind the age-old request for the Chinese schools to have more teachers? How are the children criminalised by all this? Where is the peaceful path to this gentle profession called education? Read the rest of this entry »
Sin City, Jay Bee – a tribute to Johor Bahru
Posted by Kit in Azly Rahman on Sunday, 24 April 2011
by Azly Rahman
Where have all those memories gone
Of the city that never sleeps
Sin-filled you are
… Offering life’s panorama
A pandora box of a lushness of emotions
Jay Bee
You may be called a city of filth
Of gang wars and transvestite agalore
Of rock kapak geniuses conceived immaculately
From the womb of Papa Rock
Ahhh New Johor … New York you may want to be
Thou shall never attain that notoriety Read the rest of this entry »
Education in multicultural Malaysia
Posted by Kit in Azly Rahman, Education on Friday, 11 March 2011
by Azly Rahman
Malaysiakini
Mar 9, 11
Q: Being a multicultural society that Malaysia is, how should our education system be designed? Or, should it be designed at all?
A: Education is a deliberate attempt to construct human beings who will participate in society as productive citizens. The question whether our education system should be designed or not is quite irrelevant when education, schooling, training, indoctrination, and the spectrum of ways by which the child is “schooled” are all based on intentional design.
Schooling is the most contested terrain in any society; it is a battlefield or a conveyor belt for the creation of human beings. We go back one step before the question of design. In a multicultural society, who should be entrusted to design schooling – politicians or philosophers of education trained in the study of political economy and anthropology and alternative historicising?
Are those designing our schooling system equipped with the varieties of philosophical perspectives in education? We have essentialism, progressivism, romanticism, cultural rejuvenation, social reconstructionism, spiritual capitalism, technicism… or even cultural revolution.
These philosophies call for a different perspective of what a human being is and how to draw out the potentials in each and every human being. Hence the Latin word “educare”, from which education comes from, meaning “drawing out”.
My question for all of you: What philosophy of education will be suitable for a multicultural society such as Malaysia? And how do we translate such a philosophy into praxis (Paulo Freire, “Cultural action for freedom”). Read the rest of this entry »
Coloniser-colonised thesis revisited
Posted by Kit in Azly Rahman on Thursday, 20 January 2011
by Azly Rahman
Learning about the current Tunisian revolt, and remembering the work of Martin Luther King Jr, I have somewhat come to draw a parallel between analysis and hope, between reality and manifestation. From Albert Memmi to Martin Luther King Jr.
In the case of the Tunisian youth ‘chasing out’ their dictator of 23 years and their anger over the royal robbery of the monarch, I found an explanation in the 1965 classic by the Tunisian psychoanalyst and political-cultural theorist Albert Memmi in his seminal work, The Colonizer and the Colonized, in which he proposed that the only way to resolve the contradiction of the oppressor and the oppressed and put an end to the brutality of the dictator is through revolt.
One can find a similar theme in analysing the master-slave narrative in works such as Frantz Fanon’s The Wretched of the Earth and Paulo Freire’s Pedagogy of the Oppressed.
That is what is happening now in the streets of Tunis; the coloniser who was once a colonised mind has turned into a coloniser and now is deposed by the colonised. Revolt is the way to overcome the slow death of the masses via hegemony of developmentalism and the illusion of nationalism.
That was the path Algerians took in the Battle of Algiers within the context of The French-Algerian War, in which the colonised fought against the brutal French colonisers, ending in a few million deaths. Read the rest of this entry »
MRSM schools obstacle to national unity?
Posted by Kit in Azly Rahman, Education, nation building on Thursday, 13 January 2011
by Azly Rahman
As hypermodernising societies such as Malaysia progresses in syncrony with the advancement of capitalism, and as race and religion becomes the foundation for decision-making in education, especially in elitist well-funded schools, Malaysia is faced with another dilemma of education and national development.
Is this country creating sophisticated ethnocentrists that will continue to sustain race-based ideologies?
Maktab Rendah Sains Mara (Mara Junior Science College) schools, well-funded, well-staffed with advanced degree faculties, and well-taken care of by the Malay-centric government may be one example of a phenomena of a successful failure in the system’s 40-year evolution.
The school system prides itself in innovative curricular experimentation drawn from best practice of schools, particularly those of the United States; as its original template was based upon.
Read the rest of this entry »
Reconceptualising federalism
Posted by Kit in Azly Rahman, nation building on Tuesday, 28 December 2010
By Azly Rahman
“… Democratic and aristocratic states are not in their own nature free. Political liberty is to be found only in moderate governments; and even in these it is not always found. It is there only when there is no abuse of power. But constant experience shows us that every man invested with power is apt to abuse it, and to carry his authority as far as it will go. Is it not strange, though true, to say that virtue itself has need of limits? …
“To prevent this abuse, it is necessary from the very nature of things that power should be a check to power. A government may be so constituted, as no man shall be compelled to do things to which the law does not oblige him, nor forced to abstain from things which the law permits … .” – Baron de Montesquieu, The Spirit of Laws, Book XI
Read the rest of this entry »
Pakatan Rakyat ready to rule?
Posted by Kit in Articles, Azly Rahman, Election on Monday, 20 December 2010
- by Azly Rahman
Dec 20, 10
Just do it.” – Nike slogan.
As a disinterested and apolitical analyst of Malaysian politics I believe that for the good of all Malaysians, democracy needs renewal, either through evolution or revolution all through its inevitable march towards its final solution. It is not political philosophy that is at issue here but the people that translates it into practice.
Except for the allegedly orchestrated bloody racial riots of May 13 1969, Malaysia is fortunate to have seen peaceful stages of evolution although her prime ministers hailed from the bourgeoisie-class of hybridised Malays helming the race-based party that has no clear ideology; a party that is losing its effect in rallying the Malay electorate due to its own poor understanding of the meaning of nationalism and cosmopolitanism in an age of cybernetics and globalisation.
Is the death of Malaysia’s National Front or the Barisan Nasional near? Can Malaysian politics be “gentlemanly” or borrowing Kung Fu Tze’s word for gentleman, “Chuan tze” enough for the 50-year race-based coalition regime to give way for a coalition of multiculturalists such as Pakatan Rakyat to rule for the next 50 years? Are Malaysians ready enough for this gentlemanly act that will give meaning to the evolutionary democracy Malaysian-styled?
Perhaps the nation is ready. An era awaits no nation. It only needs to be cemented by political will. Read the rest of this entry »
Of megalomaniacs and mega-towers
Posted by Kit in Azly Rahman, Najib Razak on Thursday, 28 October 2010
By Azly Rahman
Here is an excerpt from the Facebook campaign, now numbering to almost 160,000 members, rejecting the Menara Warisan proposal:
“Rakyat Malaysia mengatakan TAK NAK kepada Menara Warisan 100-tingkat yang memakan kos RM5,000,000,000 yang dicadangkan oleh PM Najib Razak dalam Bajet 2011. … Malaysians saying no to the RM5-billion 100-storey Mega Tower proposed by PM Najib in the 2011 budget. Malaysia needs better education, better health care, better public transportation, safer neighbourhood, cleaner water, but not taller building. We don’t need another white elephant! …
“Malaysia perlukan pendidikan, perubatan dan pengangkutan awam yang lebih baik, jiran-tetangga yang lebih selamat, air yang lebih bersih, dan bukannya bangunan yang lebih tinggi. … Kita tidak perlukan seekor lagi gajah putih yang membazirkan wang rakyat jelata. … Wahai, saudara-saudari warga Malaysia sekalian, biar kita bersatu tak mengira kaum, agama, budaya, bahasa, pendirian politik, geografi atau kelas. Biar kita bersatu dan membela nasib endiri. Merdeka! Merdeka! Merdeka!”
I am beginning to sense that the issue will contribute to the downfall of the current regime of Barisan Nasional in the next general election. It is as if the last BN hurrah to showcase megalomania and illusions of grandeur will be a rallying point for the masses/rakyat fatigued by he struggle to survive the daily grind while robber barons rob, dine, and wine.
Read the rest of this entry »
Neo-Maya, Neo-Malaya
Posted by Kit in Azly Rahman on Monday, 18 October 2010
By Azly Rahman
\Verily… the evolution of modern man can be characterized by his worship of the monolith and in building tall structures so that not only he may reach the heavens and touch the gods, but become avatars and demi-gods and enslave fellow men — as those who owns those towers of powers and monoliths of machiavellianism owns the means of writing the script for evolution — ar
And thus sprach Zarathustra,
prophet of long ago who spoke of good and evil
of this world as battleground
of the sacred and the profane
of the triumph of Man
of the triumph of Superman
Read the rest of this entry »
Malaysia’s GPS for General Election-13
Posted by Kit in Azly Rahman, Election on Tuesday, 12 October 2010
By Azly Rahman
Come Malaysia’s general election No 13, how lucky will we be to have the entire nation bold enough to experiment with radical changes, a mega-trend, a paradigm shift, and the will to even replace the blue ocean in which sharks and piranhas battle against each other in a seemingly calm sea of change?
So – are Malaysians ready with a global positioning system that will leave behind that ancient regime calloused with the will to use religion, ethnicity, and race to cling on to power fast waning? As the Malaysian election approaches, people are talking about ‘the new politics’, ‘sustainable capitalism’, ‘new economic model’, ‘radical multiculturalism’, ‘politics of moderation’.
What are these? Are they merely another set of rhetoric, or are they signifiers to a new world of Malaysian political-economic realism? After fifty years of a Rostowian and Friedmanian developmentalist agenda – that we adopt and have a difficult time understanding, and yet we imitate – we are faced with a brand new old question: where do we go from here?
Read the rest of this entry »
Door to any house of worship open
Posted by Kit in Azly Rahman, Islam, Religion on Tuesday, 31 August 2010
by Azly Rahman
“I sincerely and genuinely reiterate that my visit to the Surau Al-Huda was not politically motivated, and had no motive to put into question the sanctity of suraus and mosques,” Serdang Mp Teo Nie Ching said on Saturday…
Teo explained that she had visited the Kajang surau on Sunday, Aug 22, as their MP, in order to hand over to them the state government’s monetary contribution for repairs to the surau fence… She had timed her visit in order to break fast with the surau’s committee members and congregation…
“Since I was invited to say a few words, I in all sincerity gave a brief explanation of the state’s education programmes that benefit the people of Selangor,” she said, adding that she welcomed advice from all parties on better execution of her duties… (Malaysiakini report, Aug 28, 2010)
The Perkasa panic over Teo’s visit to a surau in Kajang intrigues me. The latter had gone there in humility to present a state donation to repair the fence. She is now a sensation and forced to mend fences. She may be meeting with the biggest religious head of the state – the Sultan. There will be repercussions. There has already been.
Read the rest of this entry »
Educational absurdity in Hulu Selangor
Posted by Kit in Azly Rahman, Education, Election, Najib Razak on Thursday, 27 May 2010
by Azly Rahman
“If we win this by-election, you can come to Kuala Lumpur the next day to look for me. I will write a personal letter to approve the money and it will be transferred to the school board’s account. If we lose, don’t have to come.” - Najib Abdul Razak, Prime Minister of Malaysia
If these words quoted in Lim Kit Siang’s blog were uttered and they were true, we have reached the highest level of idiocy in charting the future of Malaysian education. How much shame must we parade in our desperation to win this or that election that is a theater of the absurd anyway?
The essential question is, how dare we use education – the only means for social and economic progress for ALL races – to bribe voters!
We hear all too often now that education is being prostitutionalized in the name of political gains. That gentle profession and a noble enterprise, from the Latin educare (drawing out the potentials) have been overused in election campaigns. From rice to roads, credit cards to cruises, youth facilities to new universities – all these have been used as political baits throughout our history. Read the rest of this entry »
From PERKASA to pekasam?
Posted by Kit in Azly Rahman on Tuesday, 6 April 2010
by Azly Rahman
I am following with interest the development of the collaboration between non-governmental organisations and political parties. I try to analyse the role of local NGOs and international NGOs viz-a-viz the parties they augment or even sabotage.
In a free country such as Malaysia, we will see more of the interplay between hegemonic and counter-hegemonic forces as they deal with angelic or demonic political groups.
It is not easy to read this as we members of the public are always presented with perceptions in this endless game of invented realities. I wish Malaysians are by now well-equipped with the skills of critical media analysis and in political economics to engage in intelligent discussions on the politics of the day.
How would one read the media hype over Perkasa? How might one read Dr. Mahathir Mohamad’s patronage of this interesting group? How about the pledge by the retired and aged Umno leader to uphold the struggle on the rights of the Malays? How do these go with the neverending story of the present regime to hold on to power as the 13th general elections greet us?
Read the rest of this entry »
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