At the recent UMNO General Assembly, the Prime Minister and UMNO President Datuk Seri Najib Razak notched up another octave in the politics of race, hatred and falsehood when he declared DAP as UMNO’s Enemy No. 1 in the forthcoming 14th General Election, declaring that the Malays will have to decide whether to maintain a government led by UMNO or DAP.

This is of course a political fallacy.

Whatever happens in the 14GE, whether Najib is toppled as Prime Minister or UMNO loses the Federal Government, the Malays in Malaysia will continue to exercise political power in the country as there is no way they will lose their political power.

So far, nobody in UMNO and its propaganda apparatus has been able to give a decent reply to the question recently asked by National Laureate Pak Samad as to how Malays would lose political power if UMNO is defeated in a general election.

Pak Samad had found it odd that the Malay community are obsessed over the loss of power to the country’s other minority groups if UMNO loses control of Putrajaya, and how the Malays and Islam could be under threat, and he had asked:

“How are Malays under threat? How can religion (Islam) and Malays be threatened when those in power have been Malays for over five decades?

“What have they (Malay leaders) been doing for five decades (if Malays can be under threat)?”

The demographics in the country is the surest guarantee that the Malays will not lose political power whatever happens to UMNO in the next general election.

In 1970 Malaysia’s population was made up of 44.32% Malays, 34.34% Chinese, 8.99% Indians, 11.89% non-Malay Bumiputeras, 0.67% others.
In 2010, the percentage of Malays increased to 55.07%, Chinese reduced to 24.34%, Indians dropped to 7.35%, non-Malay Bumiputeras maintained at 11.94% and 1.3% others.

During the 13th general election, 52.63% of the voters were Malays, 29.68% Chinese, 7.31% Indians, 8.96% non-Malay Bumiputeras and 1.43% others.
Out of the 165 Parliamentary seats in Peninsular Malaysia, 114 are Malay majority seats, 22 Chinese majority seats and 29 mixed seats. There is not a single Indian majority seat.

Is any UMNO leader suggesting that if UMNO loses in the 14GE, it would be possible for the new Malaysian Government in Putrajaya to ensure the Chinese capture political power by increasing the present 22 Chinese-majority seats to over 83 seats as to constitute a majority of the total of 165 seats in Peninsular Malaysia?

No magician can perform this impossible feat. In fact, the trend is the opposite with fewer than 22 Chinese-majority seats in the coming years because of the demographic realities and declining Chinese population in the country.

Even the UMNO veteran, Tengku Razaleigh Hamzah is on public record as saying that he did not know where the perceived threats to Malays were coming from when the government is headed by a Malay, state governments headed by Malays with the exception of Penang, the civil service is mostly made up of Malays, the army are mostly Malays and there are also the Malay rulers.

Malaysia’s foremost civil rights activist, Zainah Anwar, had also questioned where does the “threat to the Malays” come from after nearly 60 years of UMNO rule, and why, after more than four decades of the New Economic Policy, (i) 75.5 per cent of those at the bottom are Malays; (ii) some 90 per cent of the unemployable university graduates Malays; and (iii) of the RM54 billion worth of shares pumped to Malay individuals and institutions between 1984 and 2005, only RM2 billion remained in Malay hands.

That the Malays will lose political power to the Chinese if UMNO is defeated in the 14GE is of course the “Big Lie” Nazi-style propaganda offensive which the UMNO leaders and strategists have launched in the run-up to the next General Elections to create fear, scare and hatred among the Malay electorate.

This major propaganda offensive adopting the “Big Lie” Nazi-style campaign is increasing in intensity as it had already been launched, before, during and after the UMNO General Assembly last weekend, and I am not surprised to see in circulation on the social media a “Barisan Kerajaan Baru 2017 – Pakatan Harapan DAP/PKR/PAN/PPBM” with a 22-Minister Cabinet line-up.

For the first time in the nation’s 60 year history, I am listed as Prime Minister and Finance Minister in the fake Cabinet list, with Tun Mahathir Mohamad as Deputy Prime Minister, viz:

Prime Minister and Finance Minister – Lim Kit Siang (DAP).

Kesenian, Kebudayaan & Sejarah – Khalid Samad (PAN).

I was quite flattered because this is the first time I have seen myself slated for the PM’s post, although in my 51 years of politics, the thought of being Prime Minister of Malaysia had never entered my mind.

In fact, as the DAP Secretary-General Lim Guan Eng said at the DAP 50th Anniversary National Conference on Saturday, DAP had never asked that a Chinese be a Prime Minister but had always supported a Malay especially Datuk Seri Anwar Ibrahim as Prime Minister.

Article 43(1) of the Malaysian Constitution makes it very clear that there is no ethnic bar to anyone from becoming a Prime Minister, as the only constitutional pre-condition is to command the confidence of the majority of MPs in Parliament.

As a child, Barack Obama wanted to be President of the United States. In Malaysia, the political reality is very different, and in the foreseeable future, the Prime Minister of Malaysia will be a Malay although the Malaysian Constitution allows any Malaysian regardless of race to become a Prime Minister.

When I first time saw this fictitious Opposition Cabinet line-up, I thought its makers had made a major error as I did not find a Finance Minister – until I saw that the Prime Minister also doubled up as Finance Minister.

This shows how out-of-touch are these conjurers for the DAP had made it very clear that the Prime Minister should not double up as Finance Minister, as Malaysia would not have suffered the ignominy and infamy of being regarded as a “global kleptocracy” if Najib had not doubled up as Prime Minister-cum-Finance Minister – and Malaysia would have been spared the international shame of the global 1MDB money-laundering scandal!

The fictitious Pakatan Harapan Cabinet was designed to reinforce the UMNO “Big Lie” scare-fear-hatred propaganda offensive against the DAP, which is why Mahathir is positioned as Deputy Prime Minister, Tan Sri Muhyiddin in the relatively inconsequential portfolio in the Prime Minister’s Department, the DAP assigned seven Cabinet posts (although Tony Pua was erroneously named as a PKR MP), the relatively junior Cabinet positions for PKR (although given 10 positions in the 22-Minister Cabinet) and Parti Amanah Rakyat.

I have no spoken to Mahathir on the subject, but I do not believe he wants to be back in the Cabinet, even as Prime Minister. Her is after all 91 years old.

These lies and falsehoods like the fake Cabinet line-up are only opening gambits in the UMNO’s Nazi-style “Big Lie” offensive against the DAP in the intensification and polarisation of Malaysian politics along both race and religious lines in the run-up to the 14th GE, and more and worst political skulduggery are to be expected in the coming months before the 14GE.

We must not waver however from the objective to Save Malaysia from becoming a rogue and a failed state, and this is why all Malaysians who love Malaysia, whether political parties, organizations or individuals – and equally important, the Federal and State Governments – must have a more inclusive outlook and commitment which tolerate and accept the role and contribution of all races, religions, regions and groups with one common objective to Save Malaysia from the rampant corruption, misuses of power, breakdown of the rule of law, collapse of good governance and liberate Malaysia from the international infamy and ignominy of a “global kleptocracy”.

(Media Conference Statement at Wisma Penang DAP on Tuesday, 6th December 2016 at 12 noon)