Curiously there are two threads this week alone on Egypt in this Opposition blog. As the rest of the world wonder, so YB Kit is inviting us – including the Opposition politicians but especially the ruling elites to similarly ask “What does this mean for us?

I take it that Lord Acton’s aphorism – power corrupts absolute power corrupts absolutely – is a truism world wide where political elites in power tend to perpetuate power and its abuse unless otherwise checked and removed by their people. Also elections & the ballot box are traditionally used to legitimize the people’s consent & mandate for their elected officials to rule in the name of democracy. (That’s why we pressure Myanmar junta to have free elections and honour their results).

What happened in Tunisia & Egypt is that the ballot box is not necessary equal to good governance.

Tunisia held elections recently in October 2009 which an African Union observer mission declared the elections “free and fair. Voter turn out was recorded at 89.4%. President Ben Ali scored an overwhelming 89.6% victory. Egypt too held parliamentary elections in November last year. Mubarak’s National Democratic Party won 95% of the seats. In 2005, he had won the presidential elections by 88.6%!

However both Egypt and Tunisia have high educational enrolment level but a significant unemployment of their many graduates. Extending education to many is good, but not enough; unless they find employment. They are also the techno savvy generation of information and communication technology (ICT). When they protest in the streets whether in Cairo, Jakarta, Manila or Bangkok it is the cell phones The Internet, cellphones, Facebook, MySpace, and other social sites, and all kinds of media devices to mobilise people to remove unsatisfactory leaders. It is so potent that they don’t even need one galvanising leader to be present all the time. Egyptian Opposition leader Mohamed ElBaradei arrived to speak to supporters in Tahrir Square only much later after opposition formed around that square.
It is hard to imagine these developments elsewhere can readily happen here where the incumbent govt dos not even enjoy Tunisian govt’s 89.4% or Mobarak’s 95% electoral support. (Indeed here the ruling coalition lost in 2008 5 states including 2 of the richest and parliamentary 2/3 majority).
Opposition will think why can’t it happen here since the prospect of it winning via ballot box is challenging and not exactly promising by virtue of 2 factors: (1) the political savvies of BN’s elites to maintain power by hook or by crook and (2) the problems of Opposition uniting itself when it needs PKR as a glue to unite disparate ideologies of DAP & PAS but PKR is fragmenting, a lot of which is due to Anwar’s failure of leadership in playing favourites to Amin for reasons that only he knows best and which I do not wish to speculate publicly.

(Continuing) No one should underestimate the so called political savvies of BN to maintain power – it has successfully done so for more than ½ century using ballot box as to legitimize what its detractors view as mis-governance.

One of the main advantages to it is Malaysian diverse ethnic, religious and cultural composition that helps a divide and rule policy learned from the British colonial masters. By a clever delineation of electoral boundaries favoring the majority race and playing both on their fears of the minorities as well providing the carrot of NEP and other patronage goodies it could retain support, if Tenang and the recent spate of by election success were any indication.
Detractors have derided 1 Malaysia as a ploy to ameliorate Non Malay alienation. Even ex premier Tun Dr Mahathir has done so. From Najib’s view point why not? It gives something to MCA, MIC & Gerakan to hold on to and speak. Of course it also provides fodder for Opposition to lampoon the inconsistencies. But never mind. The salient fact is that if 1 Malaysia really works – and if Malaysians were really united in pluralism as one – then it also means its time for BN to go for a united rakyat might in one voice either in ballot box or the streets ask the political elites to give the next set of opposition politicians “a go” at better governance.

But it does not happen here because everyone is not united: Malay/Muslims are divided between UMNO on one hand and PAS/PKR on the other; the Non malays are equally divided (say between Chinese that seem to trenchantly support opposition whereas Indian voters are swinging back to BN). Even amongst (say) the Chinese, their votes are split 3 ways between DAP, MCA & Gerakan with DAP holding most, which itself alienates other races from supporting the DAP! Even within Chinese based parties within BN there’s disunity. Chua Soi Lek is not only attacked by DAP’s Kit for lying about Chinese support, he is also attacked by his own party’s Ong Tee Keat for being ‘immoral’ (see The Malaysian Insider’s report by Shazwan Mustafa Kamal, February 02). Within PKR there are further disunities (the latest N. Gobalakrishnan) leading to many defections. East Malaysians are also not united with West Malaysians. The latter not only can’t go there to work because of the 20 & 18 point agreements but politically they are not happy with West Malaysian political dominance. It happens even in Opposition front in the case of PKR Sabah. Whereas West Malaysian urban constituencies look at governance issues, the rural ones in both Semenanjong & East Malaysia are still impressed with the lollies and developmental funding distributed out by BN in form of largesse during election. There lies another divide in what is important when vote is given!

Oops typo omission – 1st para of #8 “… so they need ONLY manage the disaffected amongst Malays and Indians…”

Though each and every case of protest is really about the political system and every misgoverning component part within, yet for the catalyst to galvanize popular protest there must be a focal point of hate and disaffection – usually a leader/dictator/strongman who overstayed who becomes a symbol of all that is wrong about the administration.

Now Tunisia’s Ben Ali overstayed 23 years in power, Mubarak over 30 years!

In our case TDM cleverly pushed it to limit of 22 years and then retired to play king maker from behind. Again we don’t have the focal point of long overstaying leader whose influence however continues!

The present leader need only to worry about how to maintain economic growth to provide employment to all especially Malay youths so that they don’t protest on the streets. His dilemma is how to liberalise via the NEM and yet assuage vested interests clinging on to the NEP.

The other challenge is how to appease the young educated in urban constituencies clamouring for transparent and accountable governments and abandonment of old hackneyed formula of divisive race policies.
The crowds in Tunis and Cairo are authentic forces of democracy and have nothing to do with religious zeal or fanaticism. What is even more interesting is that these crowds do not have any ideology, apart from the fact that they want a change in the way they are governed. The crowds are young, they are techno-savvy and they use the Internet and SMS to mobilise.
Our PM also cleverly addresses this segment of the techno savvy ICT generation. His people send sms happy CNY greetings. Our Mr Kee protests in vain about the “spamming” but too bad our Personal Data Protection Act 2010 exempts government from using the data.
That’s another measure of how savvy the political elites of the ruling coalition have been: they are ingenious where and how to push the right buttons to maintain their power. They try forestall dissatisfaction by relenting to form a Royal Commission for TBH without allowing civil society to play a part in nomination of commissioners. They could even get the weather – rain in Tenang – to help by selective mobilization of transportation for FELDA supporters. They could leverage effectively the lack of norm within a monocultural civil service to be politically neutral or the lack of understanding of the differentiation between government resources funded from tax payers money and party’s resources. The latter are also abundant because way back they have corporatised and used these as vehicles to harness national resources to raise funds or maintenance of power. They could raise the money to engage expensive international consultancy firms to boost their political image.

People underestimate the savviness of our political elites at their own peril.

(Continuing) Even in the United States where elections are free and civil liberties reign they are wondering why is their government supporting Mubarak for decades – for Democracy or the Suez Canal and vital ship lanes? Just like the war with Saddam Iraq – was it to remove weapons of mass destruction (where none was found) or protection of US energy interest, oil pipe line or Halliburton’s construction business??? Julian Assange’s Wikileaks whistle blowing on what goes on behind the scenes does not help in building confidence of the ordinary citizen.

There is a thus a growing feeling of both mistrust and impotence and powerlessness in relation to government and people in power even amongst people everywhere including in the so called developed democracies. One feels he is being told and fed lies and lies and sees hypocrisy and corruption everywhere but (alone) cannot do a thing abut it .

Many then live lives of quiet desperation; others just don’t care: they (even the educated) don’t even bother to vote. They just get on with their lives as best as possible with little to do with the government as possible.

At worst politics is oppressive in 3rd world because of incompetent and corrupt political leadership.

In the developed first world where political leadership is supposedly more responsible in use of power due to institutional check and balance, it is best boring. There is a failure to inspire. Obama was exciting in the beginning, and then afterwards it gets boring. He could not even take the moral side in people versus Mubarak. (Perhaps it takes a war or a time of great national danger for leadership to inspire – as did Churchill in World War II or JF Kennedy in the Cuban Missile Crisis when the world was at a brink of a nuclear war).

So it is really understandable why when Egyptians have their moment to now stand and rally against the all omnipotent government (with the armed forces not firing upon them, like they did in Tiananmen Square) and have a real wrestling match, the protesters and spectators at Tahrir Square feel exhilarated – and the rest of the world, who feel equally frustrated with and impotent against their own governments and politicians, vicariously empathize and stand in solidarity with them, hoping after Tunisia and Egypt Yemen will be next.

Yemen is set to follow the precedent set by Tunisia and Egypt. Maybe Algeria will be next domino after Yemen.

Though mis-governance is basic reason, it can only activate widespread protests if some groups first take the lead to protest in the streets and by their actions draw other segment of the disgruntled and angry crowd.

The lead is usually taken by the youths, especially students. They are young and idealistic and protest against corruption.

There must be widespread corruption as a pre-condition. Corruption within government per se is however not enough. It must be represented by a focal point of a long staying leader who has visibly amassed wealth for himself and his family and his therefore hated.

Protests by techno-savvy Youths and Students mobilized by sms/cellphones, Facebook, MySpace, protest – are easier galvanized if the other pre-condition exists: educated but unemployed.

The protests themselves cannot achieve critical mass unless they are joined by the masses. For masses to get out of their inertia there must exist tough economic conditions with high inflation and in particular sharp increases in the price of food compounded by rampant unemployment;

Here the races might be divided but tough economic conditions might still just unite all. In terms of governance or misgovernance, it is more the bread and butter issues than corruption issues per se that cause the masses to rise in protest!

This is what the government here seeks most to avert. It uses our considerable wealth from its oil and gas exports to tackle social and economic complaints with a huge public spending programme. The benefit of this must percolate down. If it were confined to the benefit of a few party stalwarts or cronies, it’s no use.

Also there must be a flashpoint of outrage. It need not be a long staying leader. (As I said we don’t have one now that TDM has cleverly stepped down after 22 years to avoid being focus of popular ire. He now contributes to political system maintenance by distracting the disgruntled amongst the Malays by re-focusing on “Tanah Melayu” etc). It could also be sense of outrage from a popular leader – a Malay- being perceived victimized and cruelly mistreated. (As I earlier said we don’t expect Chinese masses take to the street and its unlikely Malay masses would do so if the victim were a Non Malay). Stirrings of this was seen in the 10,000 strong reformasi protests when Anwar was first unceremoniously dumped and then incarcerated and beaten in Sodomy 1. How sodomy II will act out remains to be seen.

To preempt such protest the ruling elites here try to withdraw subsidies gradually in stages and mitigating its effects : eg rise in fuel prices tampered by withdrawal of some toll charges; pump more money into the system, continue to push NEP by absorbing Malay youths to prevent unemployment. The government here is not taking chances.