///we don’t have leaders of spine, integrity and consistency in our midst///- Jacob Sinnathamby. That’s because from day one of the nation’s birth, its peoples are obsessed with race and political framework (Alliance) was structured on communal lines (UMNO/MCA/MIC). A leader of multi-racial outlook like the Tunku was soon removed from power because of alleged partiality to Chinese. In contrast another who played the race & religious card became successful politically to overstay in power for as long as 22 years. He later said in his blog that politicians who played the race card were somewhat more successful! The problem with preoccupation with race/religion is that these stab at primordial sentiments/emotions. In their grip, one overlooks other issues relating to one’s leaders’ shortcomings. Person in leadership position then are not held to account and they go into a spree in pursuit of material self-interest, like a predatory capitalist, waving the banner of race and religion legitimacy. Politicians who join the communal party for political career become party apparatchiks who rise within the hierarchy based on same modus operandi championing sectional communal interest than the common good of the nation in a scenario where, if one hears the rhetoric of these party apparatchiks, one wonders whether there is in reality really a nation (other in name) since there are so many immigrants and pendatangs amid the so-called original peoples.

I doubt a political system structured on race can attract much less nurture great national leaders of integrity. At best it produces some mediocre and opportunistic leader of a particular community. One of the many reasons may well be the incontrovertible fact that self interest is ingrained in human nature. And for national leadership of integrity to emerge, the political system that nurtures it must channel this self-interest, whether in material wealth or public esteem, to coincide with the promotion of the wider social economic and political interest of the society and country – as a whole.

Instead we have a communal political system that marginalizes, if not oust, politicians who stand their ground on truth and universal and inclusive principles and which makes a successful politician out of anyone who flashes the race/religious card to his communal constituency and at the same time could buy support and votes from party apparatchiks and warlords through largesse patronage benefits he could dispense.

General Douglas MacArthur, a great world war II general, once quipped : “A general is just as good or just as bad as the troops under his command make him”. Can MacArthur ever become a great general to win battles against the Japs if the troops that he led are divided over race and religion all the time? Will there be a MacArthur in the first place if his appointment had otherwise depended on election by troops based on considerations of race and not merits and record on the field?

///But Najib didn’t sound like that (ie the racism and rubbish spewing” as compared to others) in the beginning of his term as the prime minister. He promised changes, said he would be inclusive and heal the wounds…///- Jacob Sinnathamby.

Have you asked how he ascended the party’s heirarchy in the first place to vie for top post? Haven’t you’d heard of that infamous gathering at the TPCA padang in Kampong Baru was held and when as Youth chief, he raised and threatened with the keris?

To be fair for all his other faults Khairy Jamaluddin has not done that as the Youth Chief. But where is he within the party heirarchy? He wasn’t even being made a minister that his position normally commensurates. The moment UMNO Youth under him played down the race rhetoric, Perkasa moves in to fill its slot in this department, and the likes of Ibrahim Ali rise in public prominence. See what works here, as TDM frankly said?