Sort of being quoted in the KMU
Gerbang Tempur Politik Maya Kmu Dot Net - Anwar : Malaysiakini's letters
Tuesday 14 December 2004
Tuesday 30 November 2004
CHAPTER 5 - ANALYSIS OF DATA
CHAPTER 5 - FINDINGS AND ANALYSIS OF THE MAINSTREAM PAPERS CPVERAGE ON SUQIU EPISODE
5.1 ANALYSIS OF THE NEWS ARTICLES
Among the interesting observations during the period leading up to the 1999 general elections was the Suqiu episode and how politicians responded to it. The MCA tried to play the middleman by organising meeting between the BN politicians and the Suqiu Committee, and even invited the Suqiu Committee to sit in the NECC II. Obviously, the existence of Suqiu outside the national political framework is threatening MCA claim that they are representing the Chinese interests. Thus, after Suqiu Committee decided not to be part of NECC II, MCA still repeat their invitation to Suqiu to be part of NECC II (“Rethink decision to stay out of panel, group told”, The Star, 13 October 1999).
The announcement of the Appeal was first published in the Nanyang Siang Pau on 17 August 1999. This straight forward article reported that the Appeal was targeted at all political parties, not just the BN as made out to be by the Malay language papers.
The fact that UMNO Youth choose to deal with Suqiu Committee directly at the end of 2000 also dealt a blow to MCA position and function within the BN framework. The elite community leadership co-operation had virtually bypassed MCA, and renders them irrelevant within the national framework.
Why would such broad-based Appeal created so much controversy and misinterpretations?
To be honest, Suqiu Committee knew well the political mood in Malaysia at that time when making public their Appeal. Like what the former Selangor chief minister Harun Idris and UMNO politician Azim Zabidi pointed out that it was a “wrong timing” for Suqiu to make such demands.
Or maybe it was the fact that every single one of the 11 organisations that made up of the Suqiu Committee was Chinese organisation, some of which are staunch critics of the ruling government. Thus, the Appeal inevitably came across as the Chinese applying pressure on the Malays.
The Appeal was generally termed as ‘aspirations’ or ‘appeal’ by the Chinese papers but the Malay papers called it ‘demand’ or ‘blackmail’, in line with Malay politicians’ general response to the Appeal. News reports on politicians’ remarks were generally similar. The differences were in the attributes about the Appeals that each paper chooses to highlight. Generally, Malay language papers will choose to highlight the more communal aspect of the Appeal, while Chinese language papers will highlight the universal aspect of the Appeal.
In the second part of Suqiu episode, after Dr Mahathir Merdeka speech remarks, Utusan even reinterpret the Appeal as “83 demands”, which in fact, was the sub-points in the 17 point Appeal (“Meneliti 83 tuntutan Suqiu [Scrutinise 83 Suqiu demands]”, Utusan, 20 December 2000). This different interpretation on the entire episode by different language papers was meant to be, in line with the prevailing culture of ethnic politics in Malaysia. It is also important that Malaysian papers, as an extension to the ruling BN coalition, are well-known to project different message to different readers, just like their political master. Seeing this in the bigger picture, it is not surprising knowing that different politicians could be saying different things at the same time in different papers.
By studying the data collected before the 1999 general elections, four types of framing could be identified. Among the various papers surveyed, Utusan seems to be the most persistent in their framing. This is understandable, considering Utusan history in galvanising Malay unity, notably during the Malayan Union proposal.
On other occasions, there was little noticeable difference between the news in various papers, especially when the news item is about remarks made by prominent leaders like Dr Mahathir. Perhaps the noticeable difference would be the background use in the news reports, and the attributes that each paper chooses to highlight.
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5.1.1 Suqiu is a selfish Chinese demands, not a Malaysian aspiration
MCA president Dr Ling was quoted in Sin Chew Daily report as saying that Malaysian Cabinet “acknowledged that many points in the Appeal were in line with Vision 2020” (“Ling: No word on Chinese DPM, Cabinet sees Suqiu in line with Vision 2020”, Sin Chew Daily, 23 September 1999). If this statement is to be taken seriously, it essentially means that Malaysian Cabinet was suggesting that the Appeals represent every Malaysians’ aspiration.
Dr Ling was also quoted as describing the Appeal as “broad-based and would benefit all ethnic groups” and “was multi-racial in nature” (“Huatuan and BN parties unanimously accept Suqiu”, Guang Ming Daily, 24 September 1999). However, articles in the Malay papers framed the Appeals as selfish Chinese demands, and framing the Suqiu Committee, if not the Chinese community as ‘opportunists’.
Lee (2004:95) noted that some of the point raised by Suqiu “had in fact been brought up by Dr Mahathir and some UMNO leaders in their address to young Malays”. Lee (2004:95) reasoned that “while Malay leaders could criticise aspects of the NEP, it was something else altogether for non-Malays to bring up what would be considered as a sensitive subject in public”. This interpretation is within the framework of Malaysian politics which promotes Malay supremacy.
On 7 September 1999 news reports, Utusan only choose to highlight two points from the Appeal – equal treatments to all races, and building more Chinese-language schools. This is perhaps a clear indication of what were to come in the future news reports – that this issue will be framed from a communal perspective.
Only in the 24 September 1999 news article, Utusan did mentioned some of the more universal points in the Appeal like national unity, defend basic rights and justice, curb corruptions, protect the environment, and fair economic policies. This change of tone comes after the Cabinet declaration that they will not reject outright the Appeal, but will initiate positive dialogue with Suqiu.
Knowing well how politics will be framed in Malaysia, Suqiu Committee had earlier rejected suggestion from FCAM to include the demand for second post of deputy prime minister being created for the Chinese. Suqiu know well that if this were included, it will definitely unable to avoid being framed as a selfish Chinese demands. It was reported that FCAM deputy president Fong Tian Heng, in his response to the initial draft of the Appeal had suggested that it should include appointing Chinese as the second deputy prime minister and finance minister as recognition to Chinese contribution to Malaysia (“Hua Zong [FCAM] wants Chinese DPM”, Nanyang Siang Pau, 24 August 1999).
Selangor Chinese Assembly Hall (SCAH) president Ngan Ching Wen responded to FCAM suggestions stating that it was “impractical and could jeopardise” the Appeal if such suggestions were to be included and that “the numbers of Chinese ministers was not an issue” (“Call for Chinese DPM is impractical”, Nanyang Siang Pau, 25 August 1999).
Clearly from the start, Suqiu Committee was trying to avoid racial accusations knowing well the nature of Malaysian politics. However, this initial development was not reported by other papers. The first mention of FCAM in the Malay paper was on 8 September 1999 in a report by Berita Harian (“FCAM kutuk tuntutan pertubuhan Cina [FCAM condemns Chinese organisations demands]” Berita Harian, 8 September 1999). FCAM president Chong Chin Shoong statement was definitely a contrast compared to their initial suggestions. Or so it seems.
It would definitely seem that way if one only rely on Berita Harian reports. Chong later clarified in Nanyang Siang Pau that the report in Berita Harian was a “distortions of his words” (“FCAM chief denies criticising Suqiu, says words were distorted”, Nanyang Siang Pau, 9 September 1999). Chong was quoted as saying:
“The Chinese group concerned should not put the government in a difficult position without taking into consideration of the government’s contributions, adding that FCAM would continue to support the BN for the sake of political stability and national unity. [Chong] said FCAM felt that the government was open to ideas and suggestions from Malaysians and therefore the Suqiu group should not jeopardise racial unity by threatening the government. BN should not worry about the support from the Chinese community because [FCAM], the most representative group of all Chinese organisations, would support the BN leadership”.
Chong said that none of the above statements were from him. Chong said he will seek clarification from the Malay papers. However, no such clarification was published by the Malay papers subsequently.
If the purpose of the Malay papers were to pit one Chinese organisation against the other, it seems that they managed to achieve that somewhat. As a response to Chong statement, Jiao Zong deputy chairman Loot Ting Yee lashed out at Chong, reminding him that:
“It is FCAM’s right not to endorse the appeals but the statement by Chong showed complete ignorance to the wished of thousands of Chinese organisations. He has chosen to stand opposite to that of the community. This is making people angry”.
So far it seems this much is clear; FCAM wanted some of its suggestions to be included in the final draft of the Appeal. Suqiu Committee turned it down. Thus, FCAM “agree but did not endorse” the Appeal. FCAM, however, did not “condemn” Suqiu for threatening the government.
The initial FCAM suggestions were later attributed to Suqiu. MCA president Dr Ling has to clarify that there was no suggestion for Chinese to be appointed as second DPM (“Tiada desakan pemimpin Cina TPM kedua – Ling [No demands for Chinese to be second DPM – Ling]”, Utusan, 23 September 1999). It seems that there is no stop to Malay papers attempts in framing the Appeal as a selfish Chinese demands.
Further clarification was published in The Sun on 30 September 1999. In the news article, Dr Ling was quoted as saying that the Cabinet had, in principle, accept the appeals as a “non-communal stance on social equality and justice”. Dr Ling was also quoted as saying that Suqiu appeals “are universal principles which cover a broad consensus that can be accepted by all races”. NST also quoted Dr Ling as saying that the Suqiu appeals are “very humble one and it will benefits all races” (“NECC II will have some reps from Chinese associations”, NST, 30 September 1999).
Sensing that this episode will take a more positive tone, Utusan published a letter from its reader that called Malays to unite as their political differences were giving other races to “demands for equal treatments for all races” (“Kaum lain ambil peluang dari perpecahan Melayu [Other races taking advantages from Malay split]” Utusan, 6 October 1999).
The issue of Chinese school was also highlighted at that time to suggest that the existence Chinese school in Malaysia was no longer an issue, as four papers – The Star, The Sun, Utusan and Berita Harian – quoted then Minister of Education Najib Razak reminding the opposition political parties not to exploit this issue. All four papers carried similar reports on 5 September 1999.
As noted by Freeman (2000:49), Chinese education “can be seen as a barometer of how the Chinese community is faring politically in Malaysia”. By suggesting that the Chinese schools are no longer an issue, the BN government is implying that political discrimination is not an issue for the Chinese in Malaysia. Thus, the Chinese should not be making groundless demands at this time.
Seeing this in a larger context, the highlight of this issue was to remind the Chinese community that the government is taking steps to address general Chinese grievance, and hence, the Chinese should not be making unrealistic and selfish demands. The government is hinting that the Chinese are being selfish when they continued to demand for other things, especially when their demands are ‘communal’ in nature. This ‘reminder’ was delivered during the opening of the 99 Education Expo at the Chong Hua Independent Chinese School in Kuala Lumpur.
NST also managed to framed the Appeal as ethnocentric, and had National Unity chairman Lee Lam Thye to remind Malaysians to “work together to create Bangsa Malaysia instead of being preoccupied with ethnic origin” (“Need to create Bangsa Malaysia”, NST, 12 September 1999). NST quoted Lee as reminding Malaysians that they “must be prepared to reduce their strong sense of ethnicity”. This framing fits into the broader rhetoric that the Chinese are always preoccupied at preserving their ‘Chineseness’, often at the expense of national unity.
Utusan was clever in its 14 October 1999 report on MCA president Dr Ling Liong Sik clarification that the Appeal was not demands. Among the details of the report, Utusan highlighted that among the aim of the Appeal were to demands that government to abolish the racial-based quota system for university entry and subsidy, adding Chinese and Tamil language schools, cancel Vision School plan, and equal funding to all types of schools. One particular interesting point in those highlighted was the Vision School plan.
Vision School plan was framed by national media and politicians as the solution to racial polarisation among the younger generation. National and national-type schools of different languages will share same compound and facilities, while conducting their own classes. Educationists have since stated their reservations for this plan. However, by framing the Appeal within a bigger picture of national unity, and highlighting that the Appeal wants to do away with the Vision School plan, there is little left to guessing as of who the culprits to national unity are to the eyes of Malay language papers.
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5.1.2 The Chinese are blackmailing the weak BN government
When the reports on the Appeal first surfaced in the Chinese language papers like Nanyang Siang Pau, Suqiu Committee chairman, Quek Suan Hiang had stressed that the Appeal was a way to “highlight their plight to all the political parties, both ruling and opposition, in the face of general election soon” (“All parties should support and realise Suqiu”, Nanyang Siang Pau, 17 August 1999). The report also mentioned that Quek hoped that “all political leaders would take into consideration the wishes of five million Chinese Malaysians, as reflected in the Appeal when the general election comes”.
The fact that MCA came out to announce that they agreed with the Appeal in principles only goes to show that the Appeal was well accepted in the initial stage (“MCA agree with Suqiu principles”, Nanyang Siang Pau, 18 August 1999). Its president, Ong Ka Ting said that the “larger principles in the Appeal were in line with MCA’s struggle throughout the years”.
Thus, it is important to note that from the start, the Appeal was never targeted only at BN politicians, and it was never meant to be a demands or conditions in return for Chinese supports. In fact the Appeal covered wide spectrums of issues which are of concerns to Malaysians of late. However, soon this episode took a nasty turn when the Malay language papers start to pay attention to the Appeal. Taking cue from the BN politicians, and considering their readers, Malay language papers generally framed this Appeal as a Chinese demands meant to blackmail the weak BN government.
In fact, Utusan had been very persistent with this angle of news framing. Through out the episode, Utusan did gave space for the Chinese community to explain the real situation and stand, but will later published remarks by Malay leaders that called Suqiu appeals as a demands, or worse, a blackmail.
Utusan fired its first salvo with its news article on 7 September 1999. Its news article headlined “Tanpa syarat jika mahu sokong BN [No conditions if want to support BN]” quoted then Malaysian deputy prime minister Abdullah that those who wanted to support the BN should not imposed any conditions.
It also quoted the UMNO Youth president saying that the government will not compromised on anything concerning the Malay special privileges. From the first news reports on Suqiu, Utusan had framed the Appeal as a condition for Chinese supports towards BN government. In the general understanding of racial politics in Malaysia, the Chinese were usually portrayed as an ‘opportunist’, ‘demanding’ and ‘ungrateful’ for the citizenship granted to them, as well as the economic opportunities available to them.
The news reports choose to frame the Appeal as a “permintaan (request)” rather than using the word “rayuan (appeal)” which essentially is what the Appeal is all about. By quoting the UMNO Youth president’s remarks, Utusan had, in effect, pit this episode head-on with Malay special privileges – an issue that is sure to ignite fury responses from the Malay community.
Utusan mentioned that among the demands were equal treatments to all races, and building more Chinese medium schools. This news article sets the tone for the following news and commentary articles by the press. There was a consistent portrayal of this episode as a ‘Chinese demands’ concerning their own interests.
In order to project neutrality in their news reports, the Malay papers also quoted Chinese leaders as calling Suqiu to stop blackmailing the BN government. In its 8 September 1999 news reports, Berita Harian quoted the president of Federation of Chinese Associations of Malaysia (FCAM) saying that Suqiu should not “take advantage” on the election period to seek personal interests without appreciating BN’s contributions.
Dr Mahathir joined in by saying that the BN will not bow to pressure from certain quarters just to secure their votes. The Sun in its news reports on 21 September 1999, headlined “Mahathir: We won’t give in to blackmail” quoted Dr Mahathir as saying that there will always be opportunists who will want to take advantage of the pre-election period. This use of label to describe Suqiu Committee as “opportunist” fits into the consistent rhetoric in Malaysia ethnic politics that the Chinese are never satisfied with what they have and will actively seek opportunity to gain more.
However, The Sun news report was accompany by another news report on Suqiu coordinator’s clarification that Suqiu was not out to threaten or blackmail the government with its election appeal list. It quoted Suqiu coordinator Ser Choon Ing saying that “the list was made with good intentions, there are no social demands and thus, it should not be seen in a negative light” (“Chinese guilds not out to blackmail govt, says committee”, The Sun, 21 September 1999).
China Press carried a similar report on the same day, quoting Dr Mahathir as warning the Chinese groups not to bring up the Appeal in view if an upcoming national election as a “pressure tactic on the government” (“Don’t threaten the government with Suqiu”, China Press, 21 September 1999). Dr Mahathir argued that if the government was to entertain the Appeal, other races would soon follow suit and make their demands, and this would destroy racial harmony and national unity. This statement suggests that Suqiu should not pressure the government with something impractical like the Appeal. Despite Suqiu’s clarification, Dr Mahathir still accused the Committee of threatening the government with demands that was “unreasonable”.
Berita Harian carried a similar report on Dr Mahathir’s remark. However, Berita Harian upped the ante when it suggests that these ‘certain quarters’ had “threatened not to vote for BN if their demands are not fulfil”, despite the government, according to Dr Mahathir, had been “fair to all races” (“Barisan tidak akan layan ugutan: PM [BN will not entertain threats]”, Berita Harian, 21 September 1999). No news reports on Suqiu clarification were carried in the Malay-language papers.
In the power relations between the Malays and Chinese in Malaysia, it is certainly unacceptable to the Malays that the Chinese see it as fit to ‘threaten’ them with demands. The Appeal was never meant to be a binding document, and it was not only directed to BN politicians – a fact that was conveniently sidelines in the news reports in Malay language papers.
In the 24 September 1999 news reports, Berita Harian quoted MCA president Dr Ling Liong Sik as saying that Suqiu promised to co-operate with government and will not imposed any conditions in the proposing these appeals. The fact remains that, there was never any conditions imposed by Suqiu in the first place.
Another way to frame this episode is to imply that Suqiu is taking advantage to pressure or blackmail the weak BN government at a time when the Chinese should throw their support behind BN. It is after all, as the news reports implied, only the BN government could ensure the continuity and stability that Malaysians – Chinese included – enjoyed. It is this stability that gave the Malaysian Chinese the opportunity to advance economically and having a share in Malaysia’s political direction.
This frame of argument was first uttered by PM Dr Mahathir in Utusan (“Jangan lupa sejarah 1969 [Do not forget history of 1969], Utusan, 10 August 1999). Dr Mahathir reminded Malaysians that a weak government that was under tremendous pressure could jeopardise racial harmony as what happened in 1969. This report gave a good background to the argument that Suqiu Committee should not take this opportunity to ‘blackmail’ the BN government as this might result the same outcome.
As that reminder from a Malay prime minister might not be convincing to the Chinese community in Malaysia, Utusan also quoted MCA deputy president Lim Ah Lek saying that “the Chinese community are reminded not to gamble to decide the government that will govern the country as wrong decision will only jeopardise the Chinese community’s future” (“Lim ingatkan jangan berjudi tentukan kerajaan [Lim remind us not to gamble in deciding government]”, Utusan, 8 August 1999).
This framing was also earlier used in Utusan when Gerakan president, Dr Lim Keng Yaik said that the Chinese and Indians are watching closely the political development of the Malay community (“Kaum Cina, India mahu Melayu bersatu [Chinese, Indians want Malay to unite]”, Utusan, 2 August 1999). The report quoted him as saying that the Chinese and Indian community wanted the Malay community to be united as Malay unity and leadership are important to ensure the continuity of socioeconomic development and political stability in Malaysia. This is to remind Malaysians that Malays are the backbone for unity and peace. Seeing from a bigger picture, this frame only reinforces the Malay supremacy within the political sphere of Malaysia.
Utusan also managed to get a prominent Malay politician to agree with Utusan’s editorial stand that the Appeal was indeed demands all along. In this technique, it is important to properly label the prominent figure quoted. Thus, Dr Rais Yatim was labeled as a “veteran politician” (“Tuntutan 17 taktik agar kerajaan mengalah [17 demands a tactic so government gives in]”, 14 October 1999). In that main news of Utusan, Dr Rais was quoted as saying that such tactic should not be practiced at all in a multiracial society like Malaysia that have live peacefully for a long time. Utusan quoted Dr Rais saying “Those that make these demands are seen as very opportunists, so I felt that the Malay should be firm in opposing these demands”.
By quoting Dr Rais Yatim, Utusan would be able to present the report in a ‘balanced’ way. As the frame to understand this episode was set earlier by Utusan, it is just convenient for Utusan journalists and politicians to fit themselves into it.
This Dr Rais Yatim remarks came after Utusan ran an interview with the former Selangor Menteri Besar (chief minister) Harun Idris (“Melayu pecah, Cina buat tuntutan [Malay splits, Chinese make demands]”, Utusan, 10 October 1999). Harun Idris was labeled as a “Malay leader that was concerned with Malay political status”.
The interview start off with a write-up highlighting that the nation was “shocked” by the actions of 11 Chinese organisations that forwarded election demands. Utusan said the demands looks proper on the surface, but the details show a glaring racism that questioned the basis of racial unity in Malaysia. Utusan was implying that the demands could threaten national.
Utusan also repeated Dr Mahathir’s remarks that this group should not “threaten” the government by stating that they will withdraw their support for the government if their demands are not met. This accusation by Utusan is baseless, as Suqiu Committee had repeatedly clarified that there was no such conditions issued with the Appeal. The introduction to that interview continues by saying that Dr Mahathir wanted unconditioned support and that Suqiu Committee should not pressure the government.
Besides slamming Suqiu as threatening national unity with their demands, Utusan also managed to imply that the foundation of national unity is Malay unity. The introduction also mentioned that the Malays should stay united so that others would not make any demands that will threaten national unity.
Utusan only published clarification from Suqiu Committee at the bottom of page 2 on 16 October 1999. It reported that Suqiu Committee “claimed” that the Appeal was meant for all political parties and candidates taking part in the general elections. The Sun published a similar report, but used a neutral “said” instead of Utusan’s “claimed”. The use of verb by Utusan fits into the frames Utusan had been propagating since the start of the episode.
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5.1.3 The Chinese are breaking the social contract
The social contract in Malaysia is understood as non-Malay endorsement for Malay dominance in the society, as a return for citizenship to the non-Malays. Thus, any attempts to question such arrangement will be seen as challenging the social contract and a direct challenge to the Malay dominance.
For this angle, the press are implying that the Chinese community, through Suqiu are going against the social contracts – in which the spirit of co-operation and sharing among different races, while accepting the political supremacy of the Malay community – had been agreed in the period leading up to the independence of Malaysia by leaders representing different ethnic communities.
This frame was contradictory to the assertion that Suqiu does not represent the Chinese community. If that is the general belief, as reflected by the news reports, then we could wonder for the reason on the accusation of the press that the Chinese community is breaking the social contracts.
Utusan report on 7 September 1999 took on this line of argument when it quoted the UMNO Youth chief Hishammuddin Hussein as stating that the government will never compromised on issue concerning the Malay special rights. By linking the Suqiu episode to Malay special rights, Utusan was able, from the start, framed this episode as a threat to Malay special rights, and thus, able to influence the general interpretation of its readers on this episode.
From then on, Utusan could generally frame the Appeals as a direct challenge to the social contracts. By demanding for the abolition of the Malay special rights – which the Appeals never demanded so – Utusan are trumpeting that the Chinese are just a bunch of opportunists that are taking advantages of the weak Malay-dominated BN government to increase their political rights, and certainly are ungrateful for the political rights granted to the Chinese community through the social contracts.
One of the occasions that illustrate subtly the concept of Malay hegemony was during the annual assembly of the Association of Chinese Chambers of Commerce and Industry of Malaysia (ACCCIM) which was officiated by the prime minister Dr Mahathir. In his speech, he asked Chinese corporate leader to share experience and help out the government to revive the Malay entrepreneurs who was badly affected by the economic crisis.
In both Utusan and Berita Harian reports, the angle of the story was that the Chinese should ‘co-operate’ with the government to help the badly affected Malay entrepreneurs. In fact, Berita Harian headline did not even give any hint of that. It just mentioned about equity restructuring and that the Chinese should co-operate with the government (“Susun semula ekuiti: PM minta masyarakat Cina beri kerjasama [Equity restructuring: PM request co-operation from Chinese community]”, Berita Harian, 13 October 1999).
During the NEP period, government contracts were freely awarded to Malay entrepreneurs – which formed some cooperation with Chinese businessmen – but seldom directly to Chinese companies. Chinese businessmen have to find ways to survive, like venturing overseas, forming business alliance with Malay partners, or keeping their business capital below of the NEP requirements. When the economy hits those Malay businesses badly, the Chinese are expected to perform national service by coming in to rescue badly hit Malay businesses. This arrangement could only be understood from the frame of Malay hegemony.
In that annual assembly, which was also graced by Gerakan president Dr Lim Keng Yaik, Utusan also published an article quoting Dr Lim reiterating that the Appeal was not an election demands. Dr Lim said that it was the poor way in which the Appeals was announced that created much misunderstanding and anxiety among the Malays. Never mind that it was the Malay language press, together with Malay politicians desperate for a punching bag, which initially framed the Appeals from communal, not universal perspective. This ‘kowtow’ gesture certainly fits in nicely within the Malay hegemony framework. NST also carried a similar report on Dr Lim’s remarks, but this clarification was published with small headline.
With that occasion, Utusan also saw fit to editorialise that it “was time to help not demands” (“Masa untuk membantu bukan meminta [Time to help not demand]”, Utusan, 13 October 1999). The editorial praised the prime minister as “appropriate” in asking the Chinese business community to help rebuild the Malay business especially in the context of global economy competition. It also reminds the Chinese community that it is not the time for them to make demands, especially with the economic and political scenario, and any attempts to do so will be interpreted as blackmailing.
It is also convenient for Utusan to support its way of framing the issue by publishing letter written by its readers. This will enable the paper to claim that it merely reflects social reality and that it provide platform for Malaysians to engage in intellectual intercourse. One of the examples was through a letter from ‘Melayu Jati’ (Pure Malay) (“Tuntutan 17 perkara mencabar maruah Bumiputra [17-point demands challenging Malay dignity]”, Utusan, 26 October 1999).
‘Melayu Jati’ wrote that he/she was ‘shocked’ and ‘sad’ when knowing that the 11 Chinese organisations makes demands as conditions for Chinese to support BN candidates in the coming general elections.
As explained earlier, the Appeal was never meant to be conditions for supports. This misinformed Utusan reader certainly was making error in his/her judgment and even had his/her letter conveniently published even when Utusan knew very well the real situation of the Appeal. Definitely, there is no way we could verify the authenticity of the writer.
‘Melayu Jati’ suggested that the Chinese were never honest in their support for the government because they would in turn, pressures the government when the government was perceived to be in need of Chinese supports. ‘Melayu Jati’ concluded that the Chinese are always looking for opportunity to strengthen their position on every aspect.
Another way to pile pressure on Suqiu Committee is to get organisations to issue statement as a response to the Appeal. Among these organisations are like the Lembaga Adat Mandailing Malaysia (LAMA) that demanded the Chinese organisations to retract the Appeal as to avoid suspicion among the Bumiputras (“LAMA gesa persatuan Cina tarik balik 17 tuntutan [LAMA insist Chinese organisation to retract 17 demands]”, Utusan, 28 October 1999).
Another organisation issuing statement was the Dewan Perniagaan Melayu Malaysia (DPMM) (Malay Chamber of Commerce Malaysia). DPMM statement fits into the framing of the Appeal as challenging the social contract. DPMM assumed that Suqiu Committee does not understand ‘Formula Malaysia’. Its president Syed Amir Aljefkri said the Appeal gave the impression that the current government are discriminating other races in Malaysia (“Tuntutan persatuan Cina tidak munasabah [Chinese organisation demands do not make sense]”, Berita Harian, 29 October 1999).
Another way to framed Suqiu Committee as breaking the social contract is to frame the Appeal as extreme and do not fits into the moderate approach governing political conducts of Malaysia all these while.
Utusan carried such article with that implication, in which, it quoted Dr Mahathir as saying that the policy of not giving excessive priorities to a particular race is the formula to maintain BN government (“PM: Sikap toleran formula BN kekal [PM: Tolerance in BN formula to stay]”, Utusan, 5 November 1999). Dr Mahathir said the government has moderate approach in everything and practiced tolerance to all races in Malaysia. This is to contrast with Suqiu Committee approach which the Malay language papers framed as extreme.
NST also reported on the same issue on 5 November 1999, quoting Dr Mahathir as saying that it is not proper for any one race to demand everything for itself, suggesting that the Suqiu Committee was doing such. This frame was implying that Suqiu Committee is threatening the sharing formula within BN framework as Suqiu was seen as demanding everything for them.
This sharing framework was further enforced by Utusan report which quoted Dr Mahathir attributing the basic economic strength of the Chinese community as one of the factors that helped Malaysia face the attacks by currency speculators (“Masyarakat Cina berkongsi kemakmuran demi kestabilan negara [Chinese community share prosperity for the sake of national stability]”, Utusan, 6 November 1999). Dr Mahathir praise was more like a reminder when he said that the Chinese have clearly shown their willingness to share the bounty that Malaysia offers with the Malays and other races in the overall interests of Malaysia’s stability.
Berita Harian and NST carried similar reports along the same framing.
The Sun carried a report quoting Dr Mahathir as saying that “the Chinese always contributed much by not being extreme in its demands”, implying that it is not proper for Suqiu Committee in demanding things as outlined in the Appeals (“BN will receive strong support from Chinese: PM”, The Sun, 19 November 1999). This report, while praising the Chinese in general, also reinforced the notion that the Appeal is breaking the social contract, which partly means taking moderate approach and negotiations and not making demands.
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5.1.4 Suqiu does not represent the Chinese community
When the Appeal was made public by Suqiu Committee, MCA came out to announce that they support the Appeal “in principles” and its president, Ong Ka Ting even goes on to say that the Appeal “were in line with MCA’s struggle throughout the years” (“MCA agrees with Suqiu principles”, Nanyang Siang Pau, 18 August 1999).
On the same day, Gerakan also said that the point raised in the Appeal were “meaningful and in line with the struggle of the party throughout the years” (Gerakan: Suqiu best implemented by ruling parties”, Nanyang Siang Pau, 18 August 1999).
This demonstrated that the Appeal somehow reflects the aspiration of Chinese political leaders as well, even though these political leaders did try to incorporate the Appeal into the national political framework. In fact, MCA president Dr Ling was on the record, saying that “the Appeal was supported and accepted by 99 per cent of Chinese Malaysians (“Huatuan and BN Chinese parties unanimously accept Suqiu”, Guang Ming Daily, 24 September 1999). Dr Ling statement was also carried in China Press.
However, for the same event, Utusan’s report lead off with statement by Dr Ling denying that there was any demand for a second DPM (“Tiada desakan pemimpin Cina TPM kedua – Ling [No demand for Chinese leader as second DPM – Ling]”, Utusan, 24 September 1999). This is only expected, as Dr Ling’s statement does not fit into the frame used by Malay papers, and at the same time, repeating the impression that the Appeal includes demand for the post of DPM for the Chinese.
This frame was first used by a Berita Harian on 8 September 1999, a day after another Malay language paper Utusan framed this episode as a “Chinese requests” (“FCAM kutuk tuntutan pertubuhan Cina [FCAM condemns Chinese organisation demands]”, Berita Harian, 8 September 1999). In the report, it quoted FCAM president Chong Chin Soong as condemning the actions of “some Chinese organisations” for making various demands as conditions to support the BN. FCAM said it is throwing its support behind the BN government for the sake of unity. This reports implied that Suqiu do not represent the Chinese community. It also quoted Chong reminding these ‘Chinese organisations’ not to take this opportunity to seek “personal interests” without considering BN contributions.
Berita Harian in this report managed to quote someone agreeable to Berita Harian. As Kohn (2003:120) pointed out, “a news organisation may insert into a story its own editorial views by actively seeking and then reporting the opinion of someone who agrees with the editors”. In this instance, it was even more convincing when Berita Harian managed to get the president of FCAM to make such statement. Why the president made such statement would is anyone’s guessing, considering that was FCAM that initially proposed a racist demands to be included in the final draft of the Appeal. As noted, FCAM proposal was unanimously turned down by Suqiu Committee. In the same report, Berita Harian also repeatedly point out that the Appeal was a condition for votes by the Chinese organisations.
Both Utusan and Berita Harian also went to town trumpeting the outcome of Dr Mahathir meeting with ACCCIM and FCAM.
Utusan reported that ACCCIM and FCAM had organised a meeting with Dr Mahathir and had expressed their continued supports to the BN government for their success in maintaining political and economic stability (“Kaum Cina sokong BN [Chinese community support BN]”, Utusan, 3 November 1999). In order to support Utusan framing that the Appeals do not represent the Chinese community, Utusan highlighted the fact that both ACCCIM and FCAM had existed more than a century ago, even before the existence of political parties. This statement is to imply that Suqiu Committee do not have long history and do not represent the Chinese community.
Berita Harian also framed the meeting in similar fashion (“Dua pertubuhan terbesar Cina sokong Mahathir [Two largest Chinese organisations support Mahathir]”, 3 November 1999). This report is even more personal considering that the paper framed the supports not for BN, but for Dr Mahathir. Berita Harian goes on to explain that ACCCIM is the federation of 17 Chinese chambers of commerce, representing 20,000 companies, and FCAM representing 100,000 members. ACCCIM deputy secretary general, David Chua also pointed out that their association and FCAM was not part of Suqiu Committee. With that, the framing of the Appeals as not representative of the Chinese community was complete.
Another ‘Chinese’ group that came out to announce their support to Dr Mahathir-led government was the Kesatuan Kebangsaan Guru-guru Besar Malaysia bagi SJKC (National Federation of Principals for National Type Chinese School Malaysia) during the opening ceremony of an education seminar in Kuala Lumpur (“Guru besar SJKC jamin sokong pimpinan Dr M [SJKC principals pledge to support Dr M leadership], Utusan, 5 November 1999). Utusan article reported that the Federation gave their guarantee to continue their support. This is to deny that Dong Jiao Zong (DJZ) represent them as DJZ is one of the main component of Suqiu Committee. Utusan did not failed to mention that the Federation’s president Kang Siew Khoon, in his long speech, lapped praises on Dr Mahathir.
The Star could not take this angle of the story as it would be unbecoming for a Chinese educationist lapping praises on a Malay politician. Thus, it highlighted Dr Mahathir praises “students and teachers in national-type school” have “equal patriotism and loyalty to the nation despite the use of their mother tongue as the medium of instruction”. This is to imply that the government does acknowledge Chinese patriotism to the country.
ACCCIM and FCAM reiterated their supports for BN government after the election date was announced by Dr Mahathir. In Utusan and Berita Harian reports, ACCCIM president Lim Guan Teik was quoted as saying that ACCCIM understand that the Chinese appeals for equal treatments, fair business and education opportunities still cannot be fully fulfilled. Utusan also reminded its reader that the Appeals demanded that the government abolish the NEP, and give equal rights to Malaysian regardless of their races. Other more universal point like abolishing corruption, protecting the environment, and implementing housing for all was again left out.
5.1 ANALYSIS OF THE NEWS ARTICLES
Among the interesting observations during the period leading up to the 1999 general elections was the Suqiu episode and how politicians responded to it. The MCA tried to play the middleman by organising meeting between the BN politicians and the Suqiu Committee, and even invited the Suqiu Committee to sit in the NECC II. Obviously, the existence of Suqiu outside the national political framework is threatening MCA claim that they are representing the Chinese interests. Thus, after Suqiu Committee decided not to be part of NECC II, MCA still repeat their invitation to Suqiu to be part of NECC II (“Rethink decision to stay out of panel, group told”, The Star, 13 October 1999).
The announcement of the Appeal was first published in the Nanyang Siang Pau on 17 August 1999. This straight forward article reported that the Appeal was targeted at all political parties, not just the BN as made out to be by the Malay language papers.
The fact that UMNO Youth choose to deal with Suqiu Committee directly at the end of 2000 also dealt a blow to MCA position and function within the BN framework. The elite community leadership co-operation had virtually bypassed MCA, and renders them irrelevant within the national framework.
Why would such broad-based Appeal created so much controversy and misinterpretations?
To be honest, Suqiu Committee knew well the political mood in Malaysia at that time when making public their Appeal. Like what the former Selangor chief minister Harun Idris and UMNO politician Azim Zabidi pointed out that it was a “wrong timing” for Suqiu to make such demands.
Or maybe it was the fact that every single one of the 11 organisations that made up of the Suqiu Committee was Chinese organisation, some of which are staunch critics of the ruling government. Thus, the Appeal inevitably came across as the Chinese applying pressure on the Malays.
The Appeal was generally termed as ‘aspirations’ or ‘appeal’ by the Chinese papers but the Malay papers called it ‘demand’ or ‘blackmail’, in line with Malay politicians’ general response to the Appeal. News reports on politicians’ remarks were generally similar. The differences were in the attributes about the Appeals that each paper chooses to highlight. Generally, Malay language papers will choose to highlight the more communal aspect of the Appeal, while Chinese language papers will highlight the universal aspect of the Appeal.
In the second part of Suqiu episode, after Dr Mahathir Merdeka speech remarks, Utusan even reinterpret the Appeal as “83 demands”, which in fact, was the sub-points in the 17 point Appeal (“Meneliti 83 tuntutan Suqiu [Scrutinise 83 Suqiu demands]”, Utusan, 20 December 2000). This different interpretation on the entire episode by different language papers was meant to be, in line with the prevailing culture of ethnic politics in Malaysia. It is also important that Malaysian papers, as an extension to the ruling BN coalition, are well-known to project different message to different readers, just like their political master. Seeing this in the bigger picture, it is not surprising knowing that different politicians could be saying different things at the same time in different papers.
By studying the data collected before the 1999 general elections, four types of framing could be identified. Among the various papers surveyed, Utusan seems to be the most persistent in their framing. This is understandable, considering Utusan history in galvanising Malay unity, notably during the Malayan Union proposal.
On other occasions, there was little noticeable difference between the news in various papers, especially when the news item is about remarks made by prominent leaders like Dr Mahathir. Perhaps the noticeable difference would be the background use in the news reports, and the attributes that each paper chooses to highlight.
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5.1.1 Suqiu is a selfish Chinese demands, not a Malaysian aspiration
MCA president Dr Ling was quoted in Sin Chew Daily report as saying that Malaysian Cabinet “acknowledged that many points in the Appeal were in line with Vision 2020” (“Ling: No word on Chinese DPM, Cabinet sees Suqiu in line with Vision 2020”, Sin Chew Daily, 23 September 1999). If this statement is to be taken seriously, it essentially means that Malaysian Cabinet was suggesting that the Appeals represent every Malaysians’ aspiration.
Dr Ling was also quoted as describing the Appeal as “broad-based and would benefit all ethnic groups” and “was multi-racial in nature” (“Huatuan and BN parties unanimously accept Suqiu”, Guang Ming Daily, 24 September 1999). However, articles in the Malay papers framed the Appeals as selfish Chinese demands, and framing the Suqiu Committee, if not the Chinese community as ‘opportunists’.
Lee (2004:95) noted that some of the point raised by Suqiu “had in fact been brought up by Dr Mahathir and some UMNO leaders in their address to young Malays”. Lee (2004:95) reasoned that “while Malay leaders could criticise aspects of the NEP, it was something else altogether for non-Malays to bring up what would be considered as a sensitive subject in public”. This interpretation is within the framework of Malaysian politics which promotes Malay supremacy.
On 7 September 1999 news reports, Utusan only choose to highlight two points from the Appeal – equal treatments to all races, and building more Chinese-language schools. This is perhaps a clear indication of what were to come in the future news reports – that this issue will be framed from a communal perspective.
Only in the 24 September 1999 news article, Utusan did mentioned some of the more universal points in the Appeal like national unity, defend basic rights and justice, curb corruptions, protect the environment, and fair economic policies. This change of tone comes after the Cabinet declaration that they will not reject outright the Appeal, but will initiate positive dialogue with Suqiu.
Knowing well how politics will be framed in Malaysia, Suqiu Committee had earlier rejected suggestion from FCAM to include the demand for second post of deputy prime minister being created for the Chinese. Suqiu know well that if this were included, it will definitely unable to avoid being framed as a selfish Chinese demands. It was reported that FCAM deputy president Fong Tian Heng, in his response to the initial draft of the Appeal had suggested that it should include appointing Chinese as the second deputy prime minister and finance minister as recognition to Chinese contribution to Malaysia (“Hua Zong [FCAM] wants Chinese DPM”, Nanyang Siang Pau, 24 August 1999).
Selangor Chinese Assembly Hall (SCAH) president Ngan Ching Wen responded to FCAM suggestions stating that it was “impractical and could jeopardise” the Appeal if such suggestions were to be included and that “the numbers of Chinese ministers was not an issue” (“Call for Chinese DPM is impractical”, Nanyang Siang Pau, 25 August 1999).
Clearly from the start, Suqiu Committee was trying to avoid racial accusations knowing well the nature of Malaysian politics. However, this initial development was not reported by other papers. The first mention of FCAM in the Malay paper was on 8 September 1999 in a report by Berita Harian (“FCAM kutuk tuntutan pertubuhan Cina [FCAM condemns Chinese organisations demands]” Berita Harian, 8 September 1999). FCAM president Chong Chin Shoong statement was definitely a contrast compared to their initial suggestions. Or so it seems.
It would definitely seem that way if one only rely on Berita Harian reports. Chong later clarified in Nanyang Siang Pau that the report in Berita Harian was a “distortions of his words” (“FCAM chief denies criticising Suqiu, says words were distorted”, Nanyang Siang Pau, 9 September 1999). Chong was quoted as saying:
“The Chinese group concerned should not put the government in a difficult position without taking into consideration of the government’s contributions, adding that FCAM would continue to support the BN for the sake of political stability and national unity. [Chong] said FCAM felt that the government was open to ideas and suggestions from Malaysians and therefore the Suqiu group should not jeopardise racial unity by threatening the government. BN should not worry about the support from the Chinese community because [FCAM], the most representative group of all Chinese organisations, would support the BN leadership”.
Chong said that none of the above statements were from him. Chong said he will seek clarification from the Malay papers. However, no such clarification was published by the Malay papers subsequently.
If the purpose of the Malay papers were to pit one Chinese organisation against the other, it seems that they managed to achieve that somewhat. As a response to Chong statement, Jiao Zong deputy chairman Loot Ting Yee lashed out at Chong, reminding him that:
“It is FCAM’s right not to endorse the appeals but the statement by Chong showed complete ignorance to the wished of thousands of Chinese organisations. He has chosen to stand opposite to that of the community. This is making people angry”.
So far it seems this much is clear; FCAM wanted some of its suggestions to be included in the final draft of the Appeal. Suqiu Committee turned it down. Thus, FCAM “agree but did not endorse” the Appeal. FCAM, however, did not “condemn” Suqiu for threatening the government.
The initial FCAM suggestions were later attributed to Suqiu. MCA president Dr Ling has to clarify that there was no suggestion for Chinese to be appointed as second DPM (“Tiada desakan pemimpin Cina TPM kedua – Ling [No demands for Chinese to be second DPM – Ling]”, Utusan, 23 September 1999). It seems that there is no stop to Malay papers attempts in framing the Appeal as a selfish Chinese demands.
Further clarification was published in The Sun on 30 September 1999. In the news article, Dr Ling was quoted as saying that the Cabinet had, in principle, accept the appeals as a “non-communal stance on social equality and justice”. Dr Ling was also quoted as saying that Suqiu appeals “are universal principles which cover a broad consensus that can be accepted by all races”. NST also quoted Dr Ling as saying that the Suqiu appeals are “very humble one and it will benefits all races” (“NECC II will have some reps from Chinese associations”, NST, 30 September 1999).
Sensing that this episode will take a more positive tone, Utusan published a letter from its reader that called Malays to unite as their political differences were giving other races to “demands for equal treatments for all races” (“Kaum lain ambil peluang dari perpecahan Melayu [Other races taking advantages from Malay split]” Utusan, 6 October 1999).
The issue of Chinese school was also highlighted at that time to suggest that the existence Chinese school in Malaysia was no longer an issue, as four papers – The Star, The Sun, Utusan and Berita Harian – quoted then Minister of Education Najib Razak reminding the opposition political parties not to exploit this issue. All four papers carried similar reports on 5 September 1999.
As noted by Freeman (2000:49), Chinese education “can be seen as a barometer of how the Chinese community is faring politically in Malaysia”. By suggesting that the Chinese schools are no longer an issue, the BN government is implying that political discrimination is not an issue for the Chinese in Malaysia. Thus, the Chinese should not be making groundless demands at this time.
Seeing this in a larger context, the highlight of this issue was to remind the Chinese community that the government is taking steps to address general Chinese grievance, and hence, the Chinese should not be making unrealistic and selfish demands. The government is hinting that the Chinese are being selfish when they continued to demand for other things, especially when their demands are ‘communal’ in nature. This ‘reminder’ was delivered during the opening of the 99 Education Expo at the Chong Hua Independent Chinese School in Kuala Lumpur.
NST also managed to framed the Appeal as ethnocentric, and had National Unity chairman Lee Lam Thye to remind Malaysians to “work together to create Bangsa Malaysia instead of being preoccupied with ethnic origin” (“Need to create Bangsa Malaysia”, NST, 12 September 1999). NST quoted Lee as reminding Malaysians that they “must be prepared to reduce their strong sense of ethnicity”. This framing fits into the broader rhetoric that the Chinese are always preoccupied at preserving their ‘Chineseness’, often at the expense of national unity.
Utusan was clever in its 14 October 1999 report on MCA president Dr Ling Liong Sik clarification that the Appeal was not demands. Among the details of the report, Utusan highlighted that among the aim of the Appeal were to demands that government to abolish the racial-based quota system for university entry and subsidy, adding Chinese and Tamil language schools, cancel Vision School plan, and equal funding to all types of schools. One particular interesting point in those highlighted was the Vision School plan.
Vision School plan was framed by national media and politicians as the solution to racial polarisation among the younger generation. National and national-type schools of different languages will share same compound and facilities, while conducting their own classes. Educationists have since stated their reservations for this plan. However, by framing the Appeal within a bigger picture of national unity, and highlighting that the Appeal wants to do away with the Vision School plan, there is little left to guessing as of who the culprits to national unity are to the eyes of Malay language papers.
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5.1.2 The Chinese are blackmailing the weak BN government
When the reports on the Appeal first surfaced in the Chinese language papers like Nanyang Siang Pau, Suqiu Committee chairman, Quek Suan Hiang had stressed that the Appeal was a way to “highlight their plight to all the political parties, both ruling and opposition, in the face of general election soon” (“All parties should support and realise Suqiu”, Nanyang Siang Pau, 17 August 1999). The report also mentioned that Quek hoped that “all political leaders would take into consideration the wishes of five million Chinese Malaysians, as reflected in the Appeal when the general election comes”.
The fact that MCA came out to announce that they agreed with the Appeal in principles only goes to show that the Appeal was well accepted in the initial stage (“MCA agree with Suqiu principles”, Nanyang Siang Pau, 18 August 1999). Its president, Ong Ka Ting said that the “larger principles in the Appeal were in line with MCA’s struggle throughout the years”.
Thus, it is important to note that from the start, the Appeal was never targeted only at BN politicians, and it was never meant to be a demands or conditions in return for Chinese supports. In fact the Appeal covered wide spectrums of issues which are of concerns to Malaysians of late. However, soon this episode took a nasty turn when the Malay language papers start to pay attention to the Appeal. Taking cue from the BN politicians, and considering their readers, Malay language papers generally framed this Appeal as a Chinese demands meant to blackmail the weak BN government.
In fact, Utusan had been very persistent with this angle of news framing. Through out the episode, Utusan did gave space for the Chinese community to explain the real situation and stand, but will later published remarks by Malay leaders that called Suqiu appeals as a demands, or worse, a blackmail.
Utusan fired its first salvo with its news article on 7 September 1999. Its news article headlined “Tanpa syarat jika mahu sokong BN [No conditions if want to support BN]” quoted then Malaysian deputy prime minister Abdullah that those who wanted to support the BN should not imposed any conditions.
It also quoted the UMNO Youth president saying that the government will not compromised on anything concerning the Malay special privileges. From the first news reports on Suqiu, Utusan had framed the Appeal as a condition for Chinese supports towards BN government. In the general understanding of racial politics in Malaysia, the Chinese were usually portrayed as an ‘opportunist’, ‘demanding’ and ‘ungrateful’ for the citizenship granted to them, as well as the economic opportunities available to them.
The news reports choose to frame the Appeal as a “permintaan (request)” rather than using the word “rayuan (appeal)” which essentially is what the Appeal is all about. By quoting the UMNO Youth president’s remarks, Utusan had, in effect, pit this episode head-on with Malay special privileges – an issue that is sure to ignite fury responses from the Malay community.
Utusan mentioned that among the demands were equal treatments to all races, and building more Chinese medium schools. This news article sets the tone for the following news and commentary articles by the press. There was a consistent portrayal of this episode as a ‘Chinese demands’ concerning their own interests.
In order to project neutrality in their news reports, the Malay papers also quoted Chinese leaders as calling Suqiu to stop blackmailing the BN government. In its 8 September 1999 news reports, Berita Harian quoted the president of Federation of Chinese Associations of Malaysia (FCAM) saying that Suqiu should not “take advantage” on the election period to seek personal interests without appreciating BN’s contributions.
Dr Mahathir joined in by saying that the BN will not bow to pressure from certain quarters just to secure their votes. The Sun in its news reports on 21 September 1999, headlined “Mahathir: We won’t give in to blackmail” quoted Dr Mahathir as saying that there will always be opportunists who will want to take advantage of the pre-election period. This use of label to describe Suqiu Committee as “opportunist” fits into the consistent rhetoric in Malaysia ethnic politics that the Chinese are never satisfied with what they have and will actively seek opportunity to gain more.
However, The Sun news report was accompany by another news report on Suqiu coordinator’s clarification that Suqiu was not out to threaten or blackmail the government with its election appeal list. It quoted Suqiu coordinator Ser Choon Ing saying that “the list was made with good intentions, there are no social demands and thus, it should not be seen in a negative light” (“Chinese guilds not out to blackmail govt, says committee”, The Sun, 21 September 1999).
China Press carried a similar report on the same day, quoting Dr Mahathir as warning the Chinese groups not to bring up the Appeal in view if an upcoming national election as a “pressure tactic on the government” (“Don’t threaten the government with Suqiu”, China Press, 21 September 1999). Dr Mahathir argued that if the government was to entertain the Appeal, other races would soon follow suit and make their demands, and this would destroy racial harmony and national unity. This statement suggests that Suqiu should not pressure the government with something impractical like the Appeal. Despite Suqiu’s clarification, Dr Mahathir still accused the Committee of threatening the government with demands that was “unreasonable”.
Berita Harian carried a similar report on Dr Mahathir’s remark. However, Berita Harian upped the ante when it suggests that these ‘certain quarters’ had “threatened not to vote for BN if their demands are not fulfil”, despite the government, according to Dr Mahathir, had been “fair to all races” (“Barisan tidak akan layan ugutan: PM [BN will not entertain threats]”, Berita Harian, 21 September 1999). No news reports on Suqiu clarification were carried in the Malay-language papers.
In the power relations between the Malays and Chinese in Malaysia, it is certainly unacceptable to the Malays that the Chinese see it as fit to ‘threaten’ them with demands. The Appeal was never meant to be a binding document, and it was not only directed to BN politicians – a fact that was conveniently sidelines in the news reports in Malay language papers.
In the 24 September 1999 news reports, Berita Harian quoted MCA president Dr Ling Liong Sik as saying that Suqiu promised to co-operate with government and will not imposed any conditions in the proposing these appeals. The fact remains that, there was never any conditions imposed by Suqiu in the first place.
Another way to frame this episode is to imply that Suqiu is taking advantage to pressure or blackmail the weak BN government at a time when the Chinese should throw their support behind BN. It is after all, as the news reports implied, only the BN government could ensure the continuity and stability that Malaysians – Chinese included – enjoyed. It is this stability that gave the Malaysian Chinese the opportunity to advance economically and having a share in Malaysia’s political direction.
This frame of argument was first uttered by PM Dr Mahathir in Utusan (“Jangan lupa sejarah 1969 [Do not forget history of 1969], Utusan, 10 August 1999). Dr Mahathir reminded Malaysians that a weak government that was under tremendous pressure could jeopardise racial harmony as what happened in 1969. This report gave a good background to the argument that Suqiu Committee should not take this opportunity to ‘blackmail’ the BN government as this might result the same outcome.
As that reminder from a Malay prime minister might not be convincing to the Chinese community in Malaysia, Utusan also quoted MCA deputy president Lim Ah Lek saying that “the Chinese community are reminded not to gamble to decide the government that will govern the country as wrong decision will only jeopardise the Chinese community’s future” (“Lim ingatkan jangan berjudi tentukan kerajaan [Lim remind us not to gamble in deciding government]”, Utusan, 8 August 1999).
This framing was also earlier used in Utusan when Gerakan president, Dr Lim Keng Yaik said that the Chinese and Indians are watching closely the political development of the Malay community (“Kaum Cina, India mahu Melayu bersatu [Chinese, Indians want Malay to unite]”, Utusan, 2 August 1999). The report quoted him as saying that the Chinese and Indian community wanted the Malay community to be united as Malay unity and leadership are important to ensure the continuity of socioeconomic development and political stability in Malaysia. This is to remind Malaysians that Malays are the backbone for unity and peace. Seeing from a bigger picture, this frame only reinforces the Malay supremacy within the political sphere of Malaysia.
Utusan also managed to get a prominent Malay politician to agree with Utusan’s editorial stand that the Appeal was indeed demands all along. In this technique, it is important to properly label the prominent figure quoted. Thus, Dr Rais Yatim was labeled as a “veteran politician” (“Tuntutan 17 taktik agar kerajaan mengalah [17 demands a tactic so government gives in]”, 14 October 1999). In that main news of Utusan, Dr Rais was quoted as saying that such tactic should not be practiced at all in a multiracial society like Malaysia that have live peacefully for a long time. Utusan quoted Dr Rais saying “Those that make these demands are seen as very opportunists, so I felt that the Malay should be firm in opposing these demands”.
By quoting Dr Rais Yatim, Utusan would be able to present the report in a ‘balanced’ way. As the frame to understand this episode was set earlier by Utusan, it is just convenient for Utusan journalists and politicians to fit themselves into it.
This Dr Rais Yatim remarks came after Utusan ran an interview with the former Selangor Menteri Besar (chief minister) Harun Idris (“Melayu pecah, Cina buat tuntutan [Malay splits, Chinese make demands]”, Utusan, 10 October 1999). Harun Idris was labeled as a “Malay leader that was concerned with Malay political status”.
The interview start off with a write-up highlighting that the nation was “shocked” by the actions of 11 Chinese organisations that forwarded election demands. Utusan said the demands looks proper on the surface, but the details show a glaring racism that questioned the basis of racial unity in Malaysia. Utusan was implying that the demands could threaten national.
Utusan also repeated Dr Mahathir’s remarks that this group should not “threaten” the government by stating that they will withdraw their support for the government if their demands are not met. This accusation by Utusan is baseless, as Suqiu Committee had repeatedly clarified that there was no such conditions issued with the Appeal. The introduction to that interview continues by saying that Dr Mahathir wanted unconditioned support and that Suqiu Committee should not pressure the government.
Besides slamming Suqiu as threatening national unity with their demands, Utusan also managed to imply that the foundation of national unity is Malay unity. The introduction also mentioned that the Malays should stay united so that others would not make any demands that will threaten national unity.
Utusan only published clarification from Suqiu Committee at the bottom of page 2 on 16 October 1999. It reported that Suqiu Committee “claimed” that the Appeal was meant for all political parties and candidates taking part in the general elections. The Sun published a similar report, but used a neutral “said” instead of Utusan’s “claimed”. The use of verb by Utusan fits into the frames Utusan had been propagating since the start of the episode.
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5.1.3 The Chinese are breaking the social contract
The social contract in Malaysia is understood as non-Malay endorsement for Malay dominance in the society, as a return for citizenship to the non-Malays. Thus, any attempts to question such arrangement will be seen as challenging the social contract and a direct challenge to the Malay dominance.
For this angle, the press are implying that the Chinese community, through Suqiu are going against the social contracts – in which the spirit of co-operation and sharing among different races, while accepting the political supremacy of the Malay community – had been agreed in the period leading up to the independence of Malaysia by leaders representing different ethnic communities.
This frame was contradictory to the assertion that Suqiu does not represent the Chinese community. If that is the general belief, as reflected by the news reports, then we could wonder for the reason on the accusation of the press that the Chinese community is breaking the social contracts.
Utusan report on 7 September 1999 took on this line of argument when it quoted the UMNO Youth chief Hishammuddin Hussein as stating that the government will never compromised on issue concerning the Malay special rights. By linking the Suqiu episode to Malay special rights, Utusan was able, from the start, framed this episode as a threat to Malay special rights, and thus, able to influence the general interpretation of its readers on this episode.
From then on, Utusan could generally frame the Appeals as a direct challenge to the social contracts. By demanding for the abolition of the Malay special rights – which the Appeals never demanded so – Utusan are trumpeting that the Chinese are just a bunch of opportunists that are taking advantages of the weak Malay-dominated BN government to increase their political rights, and certainly are ungrateful for the political rights granted to the Chinese community through the social contracts.
One of the occasions that illustrate subtly the concept of Malay hegemony was during the annual assembly of the Association of Chinese Chambers of Commerce and Industry of Malaysia (ACCCIM) which was officiated by the prime minister Dr Mahathir. In his speech, he asked Chinese corporate leader to share experience and help out the government to revive the Malay entrepreneurs who was badly affected by the economic crisis.
In both Utusan and Berita Harian reports, the angle of the story was that the Chinese should ‘co-operate’ with the government to help the badly affected Malay entrepreneurs. In fact, Berita Harian headline did not even give any hint of that. It just mentioned about equity restructuring and that the Chinese should co-operate with the government (“Susun semula ekuiti: PM minta masyarakat Cina beri kerjasama [Equity restructuring: PM request co-operation from Chinese community]”, Berita Harian, 13 October 1999).
During the NEP period, government contracts were freely awarded to Malay entrepreneurs – which formed some cooperation with Chinese businessmen – but seldom directly to Chinese companies. Chinese businessmen have to find ways to survive, like venturing overseas, forming business alliance with Malay partners, or keeping their business capital below of the NEP requirements. When the economy hits those Malay businesses badly, the Chinese are expected to perform national service by coming in to rescue badly hit Malay businesses. This arrangement could only be understood from the frame of Malay hegemony.
In that annual assembly, which was also graced by Gerakan president Dr Lim Keng Yaik, Utusan also published an article quoting Dr Lim reiterating that the Appeal was not an election demands. Dr Lim said that it was the poor way in which the Appeals was announced that created much misunderstanding and anxiety among the Malays. Never mind that it was the Malay language press, together with Malay politicians desperate for a punching bag, which initially framed the Appeals from communal, not universal perspective. This ‘kowtow’ gesture certainly fits in nicely within the Malay hegemony framework. NST also carried a similar report on Dr Lim’s remarks, but this clarification was published with small headline.
With that occasion, Utusan also saw fit to editorialise that it “was time to help not demands” (“Masa untuk membantu bukan meminta [Time to help not demand]”, Utusan, 13 October 1999). The editorial praised the prime minister as “appropriate” in asking the Chinese business community to help rebuild the Malay business especially in the context of global economy competition. It also reminds the Chinese community that it is not the time for them to make demands, especially with the economic and political scenario, and any attempts to do so will be interpreted as blackmailing.
It is also convenient for Utusan to support its way of framing the issue by publishing letter written by its readers. This will enable the paper to claim that it merely reflects social reality and that it provide platform for Malaysians to engage in intellectual intercourse. One of the examples was through a letter from ‘Melayu Jati’ (Pure Malay) (“Tuntutan 17 perkara mencabar maruah Bumiputra [17-point demands challenging Malay dignity]”, Utusan, 26 October 1999).
‘Melayu Jati’ wrote that he/she was ‘shocked’ and ‘sad’ when knowing that the 11 Chinese organisations makes demands as conditions for Chinese to support BN candidates in the coming general elections.
As explained earlier, the Appeal was never meant to be conditions for supports. This misinformed Utusan reader certainly was making error in his/her judgment and even had his/her letter conveniently published even when Utusan knew very well the real situation of the Appeal. Definitely, there is no way we could verify the authenticity of the writer.
‘Melayu Jati’ suggested that the Chinese were never honest in their support for the government because they would in turn, pressures the government when the government was perceived to be in need of Chinese supports. ‘Melayu Jati’ concluded that the Chinese are always looking for opportunity to strengthen their position on every aspect.
Another way to pile pressure on Suqiu Committee is to get organisations to issue statement as a response to the Appeal. Among these organisations are like the Lembaga Adat Mandailing Malaysia (LAMA) that demanded the Chinese organisations to retract the Appeal as to avoid suspicion among the Bumiputras (“LAMA gesa persatuan Cina tarik balik 17 tuntutan [LAMA insist Chinese organisation to retract 17 demands]”, Utusan, 28 October 1999).
Another organisation issuing statement was the Dewan Perniagaan Melayu Malaysia (DPMM) (Malay Chamber of Commerce Malaysia). DPMM statement fits into the framing of the Appeal as challenging the social contract. DPMM assumed that Suqiu Committee does not understand ‘Formula Malaysia’. Its president Syed Amir Aljefkri said the Appeal gave the impression that the current government are discriminating other races in Malaysia (“Tuntutan persatuan Cina tidak munasabah [Chinese organisation demands do not make sense]”, Berita Harian, 29 October 1999).
Another way to framed Suqiu Committee as breaking the social contract is to frame the Appeal as extreme and do not fits into the moderate approach governing political conducts of Malaysia all these while.
Utusan carried such article with that implication, in which, it quoted Dr Mahathir as saying that the policy of not giving excessive priorities to a particular race is the formula to maintain BN government (“PM: Sikap toleran formula BN kekal [PM: Tolerance in BN formula to stay]”, Utusan, 5 November 1999). Dr Mahathir said the government has moderate approach in everything and practiced tolerance to all races in Malaysia. This is to contrast with Suqiu Committee approach which the Malay language papers framed as extreme.
NST also reported on the same issue on 5 November 1999, quoting Dr Mahathir as saying that it is not proper for any one race to demand everything for itself, suggesting that the Suqiu Committee was doing such. This frame was implying that Suqiu Committee is threatening the sharing formula within BN framework as Suqiu was seen as demanding everything for them.
This sharing framework was further enforced by Utusan report which quoted Dr Mahathir attributing the basic economic strength of the Chinese community as one of the factors that helped Malaysia face the attacks by currency speculators (“Masyarakat Cina berkongsi kemakmuran demi kestabilan negara [Chinese community share prosperity for the sake of national stability]”, Utusan, 6 November 1999). Dr Mahathir praise was more like a reminder when he said that the Chinese have clearly shown their willingness to share the bounty that Malaysia offers with the Malays and other races in the overall interests of Malaysia’s stability.
Berita Harian and NST carried similar reports along the same framing.
The Sun carried a report quoting Dr Mahathir as saying that “the Chinese always contributed much by not being extreme in its demands”, implying that it is not proper for Suqiu Committee in demanding things as outlined in the Appeals (“BN will receive strong support from Chinese: PM”, The Sun, 19 November 1999). This report, while praising the Chinese in general, also reinforced the notion that the Appeal is breaking the social contract, which partly means taking moderate approach and negotiations and not making demands.
…………………………………………………………………………….
5.1.4 Suqiu does not represent the Chinese community
When the Appeal was made public by Suqiu Committee, MCA came out to announce that they support the Appeal “in principles” and its president, Ong Ka Ting even goes on to say that the Appeal “were in line with MCA’s struggle throughout the years” (“MCA agrees with Suqiu principles”, Nanyang Siang Pau, 18 August 1999).
On the same day, Gerakan also said that the point raised in the Appeal were “meaningful and in line with the struggle of the party throughout the years” (Gerakan: Suqiu best implemented by ruling parties”, Nanyang Siang Pau, 18 August 1999).
This demonstrated that the Appeal somehow reflects the aspiration of Chinese political leaders as well, even though these political leaders did try to incorporate the Appeal into the national political framework. In fact, MCA president Dr Ling was on the record, saying that “the Appeal was supported and accepted by 99 per cent of Chinese Malaysians (“Huatuan and BN Chinese parties unanimously accept Suqiu”, Guang Ming Daily, 24 September 1999). Dr Ling statement was also carried in China Press.
However, for the same event, Utusan’s report lead off with statement by Dr Ling denying that there was any demand for a second DPM (“Tiada desakan pemimpin Cina TPM kedua – Ling [No demand for Chinese leader as second DPM – Ling]”, Utusan, 24 September 1999). This is only expected, as Dr Ling’s statement does not fit into the frame used by Malay papers, and at the same time, repeating the impression that the Appeal includes demand for the post of DPM for the Chinese.
This frame was first used by a Berita Harian on 8 September 1999, a day after another Malay language paper Utusan framed this episode as a “Chinese requests” (“FCAM kutuk tuntutan pertubuhan Cina [FCAM condemns Chinese organisation demands]”, Berita Harian, 8 September 1999). In the report, it quoted FCAM president Chong Chin Soong as condemning the actions of “some Chinese organisations” for making various demands as conditions to support the BN. FCAM said it is throwing its support behind the BN government for the sake of unity. This reports implied that Suqiu do not represent the Chinese community. It also quoted Chong reminding these ‘Chinese organisations’ not to take this opportunity to seek “personal interests” without considering BN contributions.
Berita Harian in this report managed to quote someone agreeable to Berita Harian. As Kohn (2003:120) pointed out, “a news organisation may insert into a story its own editorial views by actively seeking and then reporting the opinion of someone who agrees with the editors”. In this instance, it was even more convincing when Berita Harian managed to get the president of FCAM to make such statement. Why the president made such statement would is anyone’s guessing, considering that was FCAM that initially proposed a racist demands to be included in the final draft of the Appeal. As noted, FCAM proposal was unanimously turned down by Suqiu Committee. In the same report, Berita Harian also repeatedly point out that the Appeal was a condition for votes by the Chinese organisations.
Both Utusan and Berita Harian also went to town trumpeting the outcome of Dr Mahathir meeting with ACCCIM and FCAM.
Utusan reported that ACCCIM and FCAM had organised a meeting with Dr Mahathir and had expressed their continued supports to the BN government for their success in maintaining political and economic stability (“Kaum Cina sokong BN [Chinese community support BN]”, Utusan, 3 November 1999). In order to support Utusan framing that the Appeals do not represent the Chinese community, Utusan highlighted the fact that both ACCCIM and FCAM had existed more than a century ago, even before the existence of political parties. This statement is to imply that Suqiu Committee do not have long history and do not represent the Chinese community.
Berita Harian also framed the meeting in similar fashion (“Dua pertubuhan terbesar Cina sokong Mahathir [Two largest Chinese organisations support Mahathir]”, 3 November 1999). This report is even more personal considering that the paper framed the supports not for BN, but for Dr Mahathir. Berita Harian goes on to explain that ACCCIM is the federation of 17 Chinese chambers of commerce, representing 20,000 companies, and FCAM representing 100,000 members. ACCCIM deputy secretary general, David Chua also pointed out that their association and FCAM was not part of Suqiu Committee. With that, the framing of the Appeals as not representative of the Chinese community was complete.
Another ‘Chinese’ group that came out to announce their support to Dr Mahathir-led government was the Kesatuan Kebangsaan Guru-guru Besar Malaysia bagi SJKC (National Federation of Principals for National Type Chinese School Malaysia) during the opening ceremony of an education seminar in Kuala Lumpur (“Guru besar SJKC jamin sokong pimpinan Dr M [SJKC principals pledge to support Dr M leadership], Utusan, 5 November 1999). Utusan article reported that the Federation gave their guarantee to continue their support. This is to deny that Dong Jiao Zong (DJZ) represent them as DJZ is one of the main component of Suqiu Committee. Utusan did not failed to mention that the Federation’s president Kang Siew Khoon, in his long speech, lapped praises on Dr Mahathir.
The Star could not take this angle of the story as it would be unbecoming for a Chinese educationist lapping praises on a Malay politician. Thus, it highlighted Dr Mahathir praises “students and teachers in national-type school” have “equal patriotism and loyalty to the nation despite the use of their mother tongue as the medium of instruction”. This is to imply that the government does acknowledge Chinese patriotism to the country.
ACCCIM and FCAM reiterated their supports for BN government after the election date was announced by Dr Mahathir. In Utusan and Berita Harian reports, ACCCIM president Lim Guan Teik was quoted as saying that ACCCIM understand that the Chinese appeals for equal treatments, fair business and education opportunities still cannot be fully fulfilled. Utusan also reminded its reader that the Appeals demanded that the government abolish the NEP, and give equal rights to Malaysian regardless of their races. Other more universal point like abolishing corruption, protecting the environment, and implementing housing for all was again left out.
CHAPTER 4 - RESEARCH METHODOLOGY AND QUESTIONS
CHAPTER 4 – RESEARCH METHODOLOGY AND QUESTIONS
4.1 RESEARCH METHOD
According to Jim A. Kuypers in his book Press Bias and Politics, controversial issues are, by their essential nature, unsolvable to everyone’s satisfaction. In dealing with the Suqiu episode, I will use framing analysis to understand how Malaysian mainstream press framed this episode.
As noted by Kuypers (2002:3), public [communication] do not exist in vacuum, but usually what politicians and other public figures say in public “is a response to a situation of some sort … [thus], when analysing the words, or utterances, of a speaker, it is important to understand the situation surrounding the problem a speaker is addressing”.
George Bateson (as quoted in Kuypers 2002:4) defines context as “a collective form for all those events which fell the organism among what set of alternatives he must make his next choice”.
Bernard C. Cohen (as quoted in Kuypers 2002:4-5) observed that the press “may not be very successful in telling its readers what to think, but it is stunningly successful in telling its readers what to think about”.
Kuypers (2002:5) noted that the press is a “good indication of the issues and ideas that informed voters and opinion leaders will be talking about … and they are good indicators of that which still needs to be addressed in public policy or that they should be talking about”.
Trent and Friedenberg (1991:107) observed that the media “have a great deal of influence” on politics and in telling the public what to think about.
Maxwell E. McCombs and Donald L. Shaw (as quoted in Kuypers 2002:5) suggested that voters learn about an issue “in direct proportion” to the attention given that issue by the press, and that voters tend to share what the media defines as important.
Kuypers (2002:5) added that “often, the longer an issue remains in news focus, the more the public perceived it as a crisis”. Michael B. Salwen (as quoted in Kuypers 2002:5) highlighted the importance of this consideration when he suggested that the policymakers “will address issues only when these issues are perceived as crises by the public”.
Kuypers (2002:7) observed that framing “involves the relationship between qualitative aspects of news coverage – contextual cues – and how public interprets the news”. William Gamson (as quoted in Kuypers 2002:7) asserted that a “frame is a central organising ideas for making sense of relevant events and suggesting what is at issue”.
Kuypers (2002:7) noted that “facts remain neutral until framed, thus, how the press frames an issue or event will affect public understanding of that issue or event”. Gamson (as quoted in Kuypers 2002:7) argued that facts “take on their meaning by being embedded in a frame or story line that organises then and give them coherence, selecting certain ones to emphasise while ignoring others”.
Framing, then, according to Kuypers (2002:7), “is the process whereby communicators act to construct a particular point of view that encourages the facts or a given situation to be viewed (or ignored) in a particular manner, with some facts made more noticeable than other”.
Agenda-setting, according to Kuypers (2002:8), can be described as “the role the media play in focusing the public’s attention on a particular object or issue over another object or issue, primarily by how much attention the media gives to that object or issue”.
During the Suqiu ‘controversy’, other more pressing issues ‘ignored’ by the media were like the crack in UMNO hegemony, and the cold response by PAS to UMNO-proposed Malay unity talk.
Second-level agenda-setting deals with the amount of attention media gives on a particular attributes within a particular object or issue. For example, in the framing of Suqiu episode, Malay politicians and Malay-language papers choose to highlight the ‘communal’, instead of the ‘universal’ aspect of the Appeals.
According to Doris Graber (as quoted in Kuypers 2002:8), agenda-building (which Kuypers called agenda-extension) is the “process whereby news stories influence how people perceive and evaluate issues and policies”. Kuypers (2002:8) observed that agenda-extension “involves the influencing of public opinion”.
This evaluative component in press coverage on an issue or event enable the seemingly neutral news reports to actually influence the way readers interpret an issue or event, even without the press actively advocating such view. By doing so, the press could tell us how to think about an issue, besides telling us what to think about.
In order for the media to influence public opinion, issue or object have to be framed in a certain manner. Thomas Nelson et al. (quoted in Kuyper 2002:9) noted that one of the example of frames is to present audiences with either one of two stories.
Another technique of framing, as advanced by Zhongdang Pan and Gerald M. Kosicki (in Kuygers 2002:10) is that each news story will have a theme that “structurally located lexical choices of codes constructed by following certain shared rules and conventions”.
Kuypers (2002:10) observed that “these codes and lexical choices are the tools that news-makers use to construct news discourse and the psychological stimuli the audience processes when reading the news”. It was observed that during the Suqiu episode, the Malay-language papers used ‘tuntutan’ [demand] and ‘ugutan’ [blackmail] instead of ‘rayuan’ [appeal] to describe the Appeals.
Kuypers (2002:10) noted that “the lexical choices made to act to frame the news story so that it facilitates a dominant reading of that story”.
Robert M. Entman (in Kuypers 2002:11) noted that framing process “begins with the interaction of sources and journalists” which he called “even-specific schema” Once in place, Entman noted, it will encourage journalists to “perceive, process, and report all further information about the event in ways supporting the basic interpretation encoded in the schema”. Entman (1993:52) noted that framing involves “selection” and “salience”. Selection involves a deliberate process in selecting a piece of information to report and preclude others. Salience involves highlighting the selected information while intentionally diminishing others.
By doing so, frames could defines problems, identifying the cause, and suggest solutions. As noted by David Weaver (as quoted in Kuypers 2002:199), “salience is the key to any attempt to put a certain spin or interpretation on an issue, event, product or person. By highlighting or emphasizing certain aspects, or attributes, the media can influence not only the way we think about, but how we think about it”.
In the Suqiu episode, the first contact between journalist and source was between influential Malay paper Utusan journalists with the then deputy prime minister Abdullah that describe the Appeals as conditions for supports. Subsequent news report by Utusan will argued along this theme.
This thesis will use framing analysis – which was proposed by Erving Goffman in 1974 – to understand how the episode was initially framed by politicians and media. Four themes had been identified from the news reports and commentaries on this episode gathered. Close relationship between the press and politicians in Malaysia might explain the similarity between the framing of politicians and the press on this issue.
In understanding the role of the press in this episode, the analysis will focus on what attributes of this episode the press focused on, and how those attributes are stressed in order to influence audiences’ reactions. As noted by Kuypers (2002:199), “in framing, it is not the frequency of a word, metaphor, or concept that account for its strength, but rather how it is consistently framed across time”.
As noted by Kuypers (2002:12), “instead of an objective Fourth Estate, the media have evolved into a partisan collective which both consciously and unconsciously attempts to persuade the public to accept its interpretation of the world as true”.
Bob Kohn through his book Journalistic Fraud: How The New York Times Distorts the News and Why It Can No Longer Be Trusted shows explicitly how “misinformation” was carried out by slanting the presentations of the facts in leads, headlines and placement of the news item in the paper. As demonstrated by Kohn, there are nine ways a journalist could distort a news reports.
4.2 UNIT OF ANALYSIS
This thesis will analyse headlines and text of news reports and commentaries. Attention will be on the choice of words used in the news reports, particularly on the differences – if any – between articles from different language papers.
Headlines will be a unit of analysis because only a small percentage of those who read the headline actually read the rest of the story (Kohn 2003:87). Kohn (2003:76) also noted that “the vast majority of people who read newspapers gain their understanding of the news by glancing at the headlines and subheads. To influence the headlines is to influence public opinion”.
As for commentaries, this thesis will analyse the argument used, and how these argument fit into the frames used by the press when telling stories of this episode. It is expected that commentaries will assert their opinion forcefully, but this thesis will also try to identify how news stories reflect these same opinions by relying on the quotations from sources that agreed with their stand.
The choice of verbs used in the reports will also be compared across papers of different languages. In the data collection, it was identified that different verbs were used to describe the Appeals and what it means to both the Suqiu Committee and politicians.
4.3 METHOD OF DATA COLLECTION
The primary data for this thesis are collected from main section of Malay and English language papers from the period of six months leading up to the Malaysian general elections on 29 November 1999.
The English language papers are New Straits Times, The Star and The Sun, while the Malay language papers are Utusan Malaysia and Berita Harian.
The primary data for Mandarin language papers – Sin Chew Daily, Nanyang Siang Pao, and China Press – are from the news clipping compiled by Suqiu Committee, which was later published into a book. Thus, translation service was sought through a Malaysian journalist who had excellent command in Mandarin and English. The first process involved translating the headlines, and these headlines were checked with the existing news reports from Malay and English language papers. Then, 28 news reports and 2 commentaries were chosen for full translation. One translator was involved in this process to ensure consistency in the translated articles.
In addition to that, the Suqiu controversy resurfaced again after the general elections, and was a hot topic from August 2000 until it Suqiu “set aside” 7 sub-points of the Appeals in early January 2001. The primary data from this period was mainly from the articles compiled by Suqiu Committee.
Additional data complementing primary data in this thesis were from websites like malaysiakini, newsmagazines like ASIAWEEK and Aliran, and other regional papers like The Straits Times of Singapore.
4.4 Research questions
This study also challenges the belief that Malaysia had undergone a ‘deracialisation of politics’ since the Anwar episode. This optimistic view of Malaysia, I will argue, is premature as we witness the continue relevance of ethnicity in national political discourse, especially after the 1999 general elections when UMNO attempts to gain lost grounds.
In short, this study will attempt to understand what attributes of the Suqiu episode that were emphasised by the press in the context of ethnic politics in Malaysia.
Specifically, this thesis attempts to answer these questions:
How did politicians and public figures frame this issue?
How did the press, responding to politicians and public figures reactions, frame this issue?
Were there any clear differences between the different languages papers in their framing of this issue?
In answering these questions, this thesis will used four frames that were consistently used by the press in framing the Suqiu episode. These four frames are:
Suqiu is a selfish Chinese, not Malaysian demand;
The Chinese are blackmailing the weak BN government;
The Chinese are breaking the social contracts;
Suqiu do not represent the Chinese community.
Frame A and D might contradict Frame B and C but that does not stop politicians and the press from framing Suqiu episode in that way. Almost all news reports and commentaries collected could be analysed from these four frames.
The data in this thesis is not exhaustive, and did not aimed to be. Rather, it is more interested in understanding how the press framed the Suqiu episode, and how these frames fit into the broader picture of ethnic politics in Malaysia.
4.1 RESEARCH METHOD
According to Jim A. Kuypers in his book Press Bias and Politics, controversial issues are, by their essential nature, unsolvable to everyone’s satisfaction. In dealing with the Suqiu episode, I will use framing analysis to understand how Malaysian mainstream press framed this episode.
As noted by Kuypers (2002:3), public [communication] do not exist in vacuum, but usually what politicians and other public figures say in public “is a response to a situation of some sort … [thus], when analysing the words, or utterances, of a speaker, it is important to understand the situation surrounding the problem a speaker is addressing”.
George Bateson (as quoted in Kuypers 2002:4) defines context as “a collective form for all those events which fell the organism among what set of alternatives he must make his next choice”.
Bernard C. Cohen (as quoted in Kuypers 2002:4-5) observed that the press “may not be very successful in telling its readers what to think, but it is stunningly successful in telling its readers what to think about”.
Kuypers (2002:5) noted that the press is a “good indication of the issues and ideas that informed voters and opinion leaders will be talking about … and they are good indicators of that which still needs to be addressed in public policy or that they should be talking about”.
Trent and Friedenberg (1991:107) observed that the media “have a great deal of influence” on politics and in telling the public what to think about.
Maxwell E. McCombs and Donald L. Shaw (as quoted in Kuypers 2002:5) suggested that voters learn about an issue “in direct proportion” to the attention given that issue by the press, and that voters tend to share what the media defines as important.
Kuypers (2002:5) added that “often, the longer an issue remains in news focus, the more the public perceived it as a crisis”. Michael B. Salwen (as quoted in Kuypers 2002:5) highlighted the importance of this consideration when he suggested that the policymakers “will address issues only when these issues are perceived as crises by the public”.
Kuypers (2002:7) observed that framing “involves the relationship between qualitative aspects of news coverage – contextual cues – and how public interprets the news”. William Gamson (as quoted in Kuypers 2002:7) asserted that a “frame is a central organising ideas for making sense of relevant events and suggesting what is at issue”.
Kuypers (2002:7) noted that “facts remain neutral until framed, thus, how the press frames an issue or event will affect public understanding of that issue or event”. Gamson (as quoted in Kuypers 2002:7) argued that facts “take on their meaning by being embedded in a frame or story line that organises then and give them coherence, selecting certain ones to emphasise while ignoring others”.
Framing, then, according to Kuypers (2002:7), “is the process whereby communicators act to construct a particular point of view that encourages the facts or a given situation to be viewed (or ignored) in a particular manner, with some facts made more noticeable than other”.
Agenda-setting, according to Kuypers (2002:8), can be described as “the role the media play in focusing the public’s attention on a particular object or issue over another object or issue, primarily by how much attention the media gives to that object or issue”.
During the Suqiu ‘controversy’, other more pressing issues ‘ignored’ by the media were like the crack in UMNO hegemony, and the cold response by PAS to UMNO-proposed Malay unity talk.
Second-level agenda-setting deals with the amount of attention media gives on a particular attributes within a particular object or issue. For example, in the framing of Suqiu episode, Malay politicians and Malay-language papers choose to highlight the ‘communal’, instead of the ‘universal’ aspect of the Appeals.
According to Doris Graber (as quoted in Kuypers 2002:8), agenda-building (which Kuypers called agenda-extension) is the “process whereby news stories influence how people perceive and evaluate issues and policies”. Kuypers (2002:8) observed that agenda-extension “involves the influencing of public opinion”.
This evaluative component in press coverage on an issue or event enable the seemingly neutral news reports to actually influence the way readers interpret an issue or event, even without the press actively advocating such view. By doing so, the press could tell us how to think about an issue, besides telling us what to think about.
In order for the media to influence public opinion, issue or object have to be framed in a certain manner. Thomas Nelson et al. (quoted in Kuyper 2002:9) noted that one of the example of frames is to present audiences with either one of two stories.
Another technique of framing, as advanced by Zhongdang Pan and Gerald M. Kosicki (in Kuygers 2002:10) is that each news story will have a theme that “structurally located lexical choices of codes constructed by following certain shared rules and conventions”.
Kuypers (2002:10) observed that “these codes and lexical choices are the tools that news-makers use to construct news discourse and the psychological stimuli the audience processes when reading the news”. It was observed that during the Suqiu episode, the Malay-language papers used ‘tuntutan’ [demand] and ‘ugutan’ [blackmail] instead of ‘rayuan’ [appeal] to describe the Appeals.
Kuypers (2002:10) noted that “the lexical choices made to act to frame the news story so that it facilitates a dominant reading of that story”.
Robert M. Entman (in Kuypers 2002:11) noted that framing process “begins with the interaction of sources and journalists” which he called “even-specific schema” Once in place, Entman noted, it will encourage journalists to “perceive, process, and report all further information about the event in ways supporting the basic interpretation encoded in the schema”. Entman (1993:52) noted that framing involves “selection” and “salience”. Selection involves a deliberate process in selecting a piece of information to report and preclude others. Salience involves highlighting the selected information while intentionally diminishing others.
By doing so, frames could defines problems, identifying the cause, and suggest solutions. As noted by David Weaver (as quoted in Kuypers 2002:199), “salience is the key to any attempt to put a certain spin or interpretation on an issue, event, product or person. By highlighting or emphasizing certain aspects, or attributes, the media can influence not only the way we think about, but how we think about it”.
In the Suqiu episode, the first contact between journalist and source was between influential Malay paper Utusan journalists with the then deputy prime minister Abdullah that describe the Appeals as conditions for supports. Subsequent news report by Utusan will argued along this theme.
This thesis will use framing analysis – which was proposed by Erving Goffman in 1974 – to understand how the episode was initially framed by politicians and media. Four themes had been identified from the news reports and commentaries on this episode gathered. Close relationship between the press and politicians in Malaysia might explain the similarity between the framing of politicians and the press on this issue.
In understanding the role of the press in this episode, the analysis will focus on what attributes of this episode the press focused on, and how those attributes are stressed in order to influence audiences’ reactions. As noted by Kuypers (2002:199), “in framing, it is not the frequency of a word, metaphor, or concept that account for its strength, but rather how it is consistently framed across time”.
As noted by Kuypers (2002:12), “instead of an objective Fourth Estate, the media have evolved into a partisan collective which both consciously and unconsciously attempts to persuade the public to accept its interpretation of the world as true”.
Bob Kohn through his book Journalistic Fraud: How The New York Times Distorts the News and Why It Can No Longer Be Trusted shows explicitly how “misinformation” was carried out by slanting the presentations of the facts in leads, headlines and placement of the news item in the paper. As demonstrated by Kohn, there are nine ways a journalist could distort a news reports.
4.2 UNIT OF ANALYSIS
This thesis will analyse headlines and text of news reports and commentaries. Attention will be on the choice of words used in the news reports, particularly on the differences – if any – between articles from different language papers.
Headlines will be a unit of analysis because only a small percentage of those who read the headline actually read the rest of the story (Kohn 2003:87). Kohn (2003:76) also noted that “the vast majority of people who read newspapers gain their understanding of the news by glancing at the headlines and subheads. To influence the headlines is to influence public opinion”.
As for commentaries, this thesis will analyse the argument used, and how these argument fit into the frames used by the press when telling stories of this episode. It is expected that commentaries will assert their opinion forcefully, but this thesis will also try to identify how news stories reflect these same opinions by relying on the quotations from sources that agreed with their stand.
The choice of verbs used in the reports will also be compared across papers of different languages. In the data collection, it was identified that different verbs were used to describe the Appeals and what it means to both the Suqiu Committee and politicians.
4.3 METHOD OF DATA COLLECTION
The primary data for this thesis are collected from main section of Malay and English language papers from the period of six months leading up to the Malaysian general elections on 29 November 1999.
The English language papers are New Straits Times, The Star and The Sun, while the Malay language papers are Utusan Malaysia and Berita Harian.
The primary data for Mandarin language papers – Sin Chew Daily, Nanyang Siang Pao, and China Press – are from the news clipping compiled by Suqiu Committee, which was later published into a book. Thus, translation service was sought through a Malaysian journalist who had excellent command in Mandarin and English. The first process involved translating the headlines, and these headlines were checked with the existing news reports from Malay and English language papers. Then, 28 news reports and 2 commentaries were chosen for full translation. One translator was involved in this process to ensure consistency in the translated articles.
In addition to that, the Suqiu controversy resurfaced again after the general elections, and was a hot topic from August 2000 until it Suqiu “set aside” 7 sub-points of the Appeals in early January 2001. The primary data from this period was mainly from the articles compiled by Suqiu Committee.
Additional data complementing primary data in this thesis were from websites like malaysiakini, newsmagazines like ASIAWEEK and Aliran, and other regional papers like The Straits Times of Singapore.
4.4 Research questions
This study also challenges the belief that Malaysia had undergone a ‘deracialisation of politics’ since the Anwar episode. This optimistic view of Malaysia, I will argue, is premature as we witness the continue relevance of ethnicity in national political discourse, especially after the 1999 general elections when UMNO attempts to gain lost grounds.
In short, this study will attempt to understand what attributes of the Suqiu episode that were emphasised by the press in the context of ethnic politics in Malaysia.
Specifically, this thesis attempts to answer these questions:
How did politicians and public figures frame this issue?
How did the press, responding to politicians and public figures reactions, frame this issue?
Were there any clear differences between the different languages papers in their framing of this issue?
In answering these questions, this thesis will used four frames that were consistently used by the press in framing the Suqiu episode. These four frames are:
Suqiu is a selfish Chinese, not Malaysian demand;
The Chinese are blackmailing the weak BN government;
The Chinese are breaking the social contracts;
Suqiu do not represent the Chinese community.
Frame A and D might contradict Frame B and C but that does not stop politicians and the press from framing Suqiu episode in that way. Almost all news reports and commentaries collected could be analysed from these four frames.
The data in this thesis is not exhaustive, and did not aimed to be. Rather, it is more interested in understanding how the press framed the Suqiu episode, and how these frames fit into the broader picture of ethnic politics in Malaysia.
CHAPTER 3 - LITERATURE REVIEW AND THEORETICAL FRAMEWORK
CHAPTER 3 – LITERATURE REVIEW AND THEORETICAL FRAMEWORK
3.1 THEORETICAL FRAMEWORK
This thesis will used two theories – consociational theory and plural society theory – to interpret post-colonial Malaysia social and political landscape. Since independence in 1957, Malaysian political landscape had evolved from the equal power sharing in the Alliance to the domination of UMNO within the BN government. Pro-Malay policies had been implemented more aggressively since the NEP was launched in 1970. Even though there was a departure from the exclusivist pro-Malay to more inclusive policies since 1990s, Malay supremacy within Malaysia is still very real.
Some Malaysian observers argued that Malaysia have move beyond ethnic politics, especially after the 1998 reformasi era. This thesis will argue otherwise. In fact, there was an increase in ethnic assertion in the form of religious exclusivism. Increasingly, the Malays in Malaysia are redefining their ethnic boundary from Islamic aspects.
This chapter will begin by looking at some basic concepts commonly mentioned throughout this thesis. Then it will look at two theories in detail.
The last part in this chapter it will point out that the notion of news objectivity is a myth, and essentially, news can be manipulated to reflect the editorial opinion of a particular newspaper.
……………………………………………………………………..
3.2 DEFINITION OF CONCEPTS
3.2.1 Race, ethnic and ethnicity
It was suggested that competition for environment resources were generally linked to ethnic tension (Despres 1975; Tan 1987). In Malaysia, it has been proposed that the primary cause for such tension since the 1980s is economic factors. (Hua 1983; Tan 1987; Jesudason 1989).
Huang In-Won (2003:9) in his Personalized Politics: The Malaysian State Under Mahathir observed that Malaysia is generally described as a prime example of a society severely divided along ethnic lines and ethnic conflict is still one of the most distinctive sources of political conflicts.
Race or racial group
The earliest use of the term ‘race’ was in the 16th and 17th century European to mean the descendents of a common ancestor, emphasizing kinship and linkage (Krugman 1945:38).
Only in the late 18th century that the term ‘race’ come to mean a distinct category of human being with physical characteristics transmitted by descent (Feagin 1989:5).
According to Feagin(1985:5), Francis Berneir was one of the first European to sort out human beings with physical characteristics into basic and distinctive categories, with European on top and Negro or Black Africans on the bottom, primarily because they were then best known to European as slaves.
By the late 19th century, numerous European and American writers were systematically downgrading all peoples not of northern European origin as inferior “races”, particularly southern and eastern European (Rose 1968:3 and Gossett 1965:3).
It was in this context of downgrading that ideological “racism” emerged. Von den Berghe (1967:11) defined ideological racism as “an ideology that considers a group’s unchangeable physical characteristics to be linked in a direct, casual way to psychological or intellectual characteristics, and on this basis distinguishes between superior and inferior racial groups”.
Apart from the ideological racism, another school of thought tried to introduce the “scientific racism”. European writers like Count de Gobineau in mid 19th century used this concept to morally justify the imperialism of northern European state in Asian, Africa, and the Americas (Feagin 1989:5).
Some actually believed that the size of a person’s brain had causal influence on a person’s intelligence. In 1935 an influential professor from University of Virginia wrote that “the size of the brain of the Black Race is below the medium both of the Whites and the Yellow-Browns, frequently with relatively more simple convolutions” (Robert Bennett Bean, as quoted in Carlson and Colburn 1972:106).
Feagin (1989:6) noted that for the last few decades, a major concern among social scientists has been with the social definition of race and racial groups. In 1948, Cox (1948:402) was one of the first to underscore this perspective by defining a race as “any people who are distinguished, or consider themselves distinguished, in social relations with other peoples, by their physical characteristics”.
Von den Berghe (1967:9) also defined racial groups as “human group that defines itself and/or is defined by other groups as different from other groups by virtue of [presumed] innate and immutable physical characteristics”.
Feagin (1989:6) noted that a person’s race is most typically determined by and important to certain outsiders, although a group’s self-definition can also be important. Feagin (1989:6-7) defined a racial group as “not something naturally generated as part of the self-evident over the universe, but is a social group that persons inside or outside the group have decided is important to single out as inferior or superior, typically on the basis of real or alleged physical characteristics subjectively selected”. Feagin noted that the physical characteristic usually associated with race is skin colour.
Banton (1967:57-8) argued that “skin colours are easily observed and ordered in the mind”. Feagin (1989:7) argued that, “more important than ease of observation is the way which economic or political exploitation often leads to the need to identify the exploited group in a certain way”.
Ethnic group
Gordan (1964:27) defined ethnic group as “a social group distinguished by race, religion, or national origin”. Feagin (1989:8) noted that the word ‘ethnic’ comes from Greek ‘ethnos’, originally meaning “nation”.
German sociologist Weber (1961:306) defined ethnic group as “human group that entertain a subjective belief in their common descent – because similarities of physical type or of customs or both, or because of memories of colonisation or migration – in such a way that this belief is important for the continuation of the non-kinship communal relationships”.
Feagin (1989:9) noted that these social definitions of ethnic group move us away from a “biological determinism that sees groups as self-evident and genetically fixed with unchanging physical or mental characteristics”.
Lai (2004:2) defined ‘race’ as a category based on physical features, while ‘ethnicity’ are social constructs.
Lai (2004:2) also quoted Frederick Barth definition of ethnicity as “a mode of identification and organisation by one group vis-à-vis other, in which, in the process of interactions, ethnic groups draw from their cultures each with their own elements of affinity and identity, to mark out differences and to fix the relationship to each other”.
Joanna and Darini (1999:12) pointed out that numerical majorities and minorities are constructed and manipulated, just as ethnicity is, in group struggles for power and hegemony.
For example, the inclusion of non-Malay indigenous people of Sarawak and Sabah in 1963 to form the larger group of Bumiputra, rather than classifying them separately from Malays is a strategy to increase the percentage of Bumiputra in Malaysia. In practice, Bumiputra usually refers to the Malays in Malaysia.
Joanna and Darini (1999:13) also noted that nation-building often meant “centralization and a single group dominating the symbolic framework of national”. This domination will encourage minority groups felt marginalised by the process “to (re)invent new collective identities” (Joanna & Darini 1999:13). This process will cause mass mobilization of groups along ethnic lines.
This is the paradox of nation building as a process of creating a common national identity, which will stimulate resistance from the minorities.
Joanna and Darini (1999:15) suggest that there are two reasons why people prefer to stick to their own kind. From the culture side, people place special trust in members of their own kind. The political arrangement of patron-client also requires political elites to promote and award their own people to political positions as an acknowledgement of their loyalty.
Brown (1994:xii) stated that “ethnicity constitute one of several forms of association through which individuals pursue their interests relating to economic and political advantage” and noted that “individuals seem to need to distinguish between ‘us’ and ‘them’ communities”.
The debate on ethnicity generally takes two approaches; primordialism and situationalism.
Brown (1994:xiii) noted that the first approach asserts that “people are naturally ethnocentric, exhibiting trust and preference for those of their own cultural group while feeling more distant from, and distrustful of, those of other cultural groups”. Main proponents for this perspective include J. S. Furnivall and M. G. Smith.
Brown (1994:xiv) noted that “any attempts at responsive, democratic, or alliance-based government will tend to degenerate into political instability and disintegration”. In the early days of independence, observers predicted that the alliance formed to govern Malaysia will not be lasting because of the instability nature of such political arrangement. However, Brown (1994:xiv) noted that “political instability can be avoided only by some form of authoritarian state”. The BN government’s responses to the May 13 riot mirrored some of this approach.
For the situationalist approach, individuals are seen as a member of social and cultural groups without necessary recognizing them as having ideological and political significance. Brown (1994:xvi) noted that “ethnic attachment has frequently been explained as a response to situational threats from dominating others, so that individuals react by forming appropriate defensive groups”. These groups will vary depending upon the source of the perceived situational threat.
Brown (1994:xvii) noted that this approach guided the works of Judith Nagata, Charles Keyes, William Liddle, and Robert Taylor. Situationalist approach explains ethnicity as one resource among many which individuals may employ in their efforts to respond to the environment.
Brown (1994:xviii) concluded that “the primordialist and situationalist approaches can thus both be seen to offer valuable insights as to the nature of ethnicity and its role in politics, but the adoption of either approach on its own seems to be misleading”.
Brown (1994:1) pointed out that there is a close relationship between ethnic consciousness and relationship, and the activities of the state. State, according to Brown (1994:1-2), played a major role in influencing the distribution of power, status and wealth, thus, not only influencing the socioeconomic disparities, but on the “advantages which accrue to those possessing a particular language, religio-culture or racial identity”. For example, Indian Muslim community in Malaysia enjoys the Bumiputra special privileges despite their Indian background.
The British era in Malaysia had generated distinctive type of relationship between class and ethnicity as pointed out by Brown (1994:213). In order to sustain British demands for raw materials, different racial groups were recruited into a particular occupational category. For example, the Indians were largely involved in plantations, while the Chinese were largely involved in mining industry.
Brown (1994:213) noted that this “coinciding of race with class fraction fostered the perception by the exploited classes that it was their racial attributes which determined their class position”. Malays in Malaysia certainly argue for their special privileges based on the perceived discrimination by the British, that resulted – according to the Malay elites – Malays being left behind in the economic progress of Malaysia.
Another feature of British rule was the close co-operation between the commercial sector and the state bureaucratic sector, in order to maintain the social order of which these two sectors were the major beneficiaries. Brown (1994:214) noted that one of the main strategies employed by the bourgeois class was to exploit ethnic sentiments.
According to Brown (1994:214) this strategy was possible in Malaysia because of three factors. These interrelated factors are:
a. The colonial state was able to make use of the prevalent ethno-class consciousness which had been generated by the racial division of labour under colonialism, inhibiting the emergence of an incipient class consciousness which transcended racial lines and which posed a potential threat to orderly decolonialisation.
b. The institutional form of the alliance between the commercial and bureaucratic bourgeoisie was that of the ethnically consociational state, in which political alliance were formed between racial groups.
c. The compartmentalization of each racial class began to erode and contacts increases between different racial classes. Unequal competitions for jobs and resources breed rivalry between racial class, which gave credibility to the ethnic ideology propagated by the state elites.
Frank Furedi (as quoted in Brown 1994:214) noted that these factors were used to promote ethnic ideology, in which “overtly class-based political movements were suppressed by the colonial and post-colonial state, and were redesignated as ethnic communal movements so as to be politically neutralised”.
Brown (1994:217) noted that the British were actively structuring the Malaya community along racial-occupational lines, so that there are only limited interactions between the various communities.
This occupational compartmentalisation was made worse by British policy in education. The Indian and Chinese were left alone to take care of their educational needs, and the British only provides Malay and English schools.
Fuston (1980:31) noted that the majority of Malays were provided with only elementary vernacular education, “practically oriented so as to stress the educational value of manual labour and not give rise to any dissatisfaction with the peasants’ humble lot”.
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3.2.2 Malay supremacy
The first colonial definition of a ‘Malay’ was made in the Malay Reservations Act 1913, classifying as a Malay ‘any person belonging to the Malayan race’ who habitually spoke Malay or ‘any other Malayan language’ and who professed Islam (Andaya & Andaya 2001:183).
According to Heng (1998:51), there are three core ethnic identifiers of “Malayness” – bahasa, agama, raja (language, religion, and royalty) – that was constantly used by the Malay leaders to reflect the hegemonic status of the Malay in Malaysian polity.
Shamsul (1996: ??) said these ethnic identifiers concurred with the three key attributes identified by the Malay nationalist movement in the 1900s. These Malay nationalists also felt that Malay should be the sole official and national language in an independent Malaya.
The Malay nationalists which consist of three factions – the “administocrats”, the Malay Left, and the Islamic leaders – differed in regards of the role of the royalty and Islam.
In the early stage of independence, the British choose to back the Malay ‘administocrats’, which the British see as in the best position to maintain British interests in the independent Malaya.
Thus, royalty and Islam were thrust to the fore – together with the Malay language – as the main ethnic identifiers of the Malays in Malaysia.
Heng (1998:52) pointed out that the main priority of the Malay nationalists after WWII was to ensure their political hegemony in the independent Malaya. In another word, the Malay put politics before economy.
Malay political hegemony in Malaysia was largely attributed to the British’s ‘blessing’, unlike the official narrative put forward by the ruling elites in Malaysia today. According the Heng (1998:58), the British acknowledged the Malay political and cultural dominance in the Federation of Malaya Agreement 1948 and later entrenched it in the 1957 Constitution.
Besides having the blessing from the British, UMNO also had it easy with its Alliance partner. Heng (1998:58) noted that MCA in negotiating the independence Constitution with UMNO conceded to the Malay special positions, Malay language as the sole national language, and the lack of official status for Mandarin. In another word, MCA had recognised the Malay hegemonic position in politics from the birth of Malaysia. Heng pointed out that MCA had little choice because the Federation of Malaya Agreement of 1948 had already discriminated against Chinese interests. In addition to that, the British is supporting UMNO in their position in Malay political leadership.
The British did not encourage the Chinese to sought equal citizenship. As a response to the MCA-negotiated deal with UMNO, the Council of Registered Chinese Guilds and Association led by Chinese-educated merchant Lau Pak Khuan were formed to push for equal citizenship and official-language status for Mandarin. According to Heng (1998:59), this movement was rebuffed by the British, thus leaving the Chinese with the MCA-brokered deal.
Heng also pointed out that the independence in 1957 actually bought less freedom for the Chinese as “it ends the autonomy they had enjoyed in running their community affairs”. The independence actually put the Chinese under the direct rule of the Malay political elites, as the Chinese were unable to secure favourable deals with their Malay political partner.
Khoo (2003:199) noted that “several turning points of Malaysian politics were set by mass Malay intrusions upon the political stage: witness 1946 and the Malayan Union; 1969 and May 13; and 1998 and reformasi”.
Lee and Heng (2000:194) noted that once Malay power was consolidated in the period after 1969, with the inclusion of PAS, Chinese influence in the ruling coalition, along with their political expectations, became markedly reduced.
Mauzy (1983:140) concurred with this view. She noted that “although UMNO was the dominant party in the Alliance, it is even more hegemonic in the BN … After 1969 it was clear to everyone that the Malays led by UMNO were in charge”.
Jomo, Khoo and Chang (1995:15) noted that the “Alliance regime and what it stood for were things of the past, a reality capped by Tunku’s retirement in September 1970”. Gomez and Jomo (1999:22) observed that the “hegemonic position of the new, more Malay-oriented leadership in the BN was enhanced through amendments to the Constitution”.
Mauzy (1993:110-11) noted that all the power sharing arrangement was in effect “accommodation in essentially Malay terms”.
Milne and Mauzy (1999:90) observed that the Chinese, especially those in the MCA “have suffered from delusions about power”. Even though MCA could claim to be the third largest Chinese-based political party in the world, in reality, it is just a junior political partner to UMNO in the BN.
Milne and Mauzy (1999:90) noted that MCA was weaken because of the ‘Merdeka bargain’ and by the inclusion of other Chinese-dominated political parties like Gerakan into the BN. The seats allocation for MCA in the Malaysian Cabinet had steadily decline over the past decades. In addition to that, ‘strategic’ portfolios like Finance and Trade and Industry were taken away from MCA in period after the start of NEP. Milne and Mauzy (1999:91) noted that “Finance Ministry, the last bastion of Chinese strength in the Cabinet, was lost in 1974”.
Gomez and Jomo (1999:23) noted that “in subsequent years, UMNO leader would openly assert that the party could rule alone, but preferred to ‘share’ power in the interest of national unity”.
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3.3 Consociational Theory
Consociational theory was first associated with the integration process of the European Union. According to Barry the term ‘consociation’ derives from the Latin consociatio which means “the action or fact of associating together” or “union in fellowship” (Barry, 1975:478, quoted in Chryssochoou 2001:3).
The Netherlands were the first countries to be identified as consociational (Lijphart 1975:231). Malaysia was a consociational country from 1955 to 1969 and since 1971, with the increased concentration of power to the ruling elites (Von Vorys 1976). As a political theory, it is a good way to explain the political arrangement among the political elites in Malaysia, and as a way to understand the working nature of a diverse political coalition in Malaysia that was in power since Independence.
Holden, however, pointed out that consociationalism is often “a theory about how much decision making remains possible in the face of grave difficulties” (1993:112). Even so, Brown (1994:228) pointed out that proponents of the concept of consociationalism argued that it represent the only effective way of organizing democracy in an ethnically plural society.
It is important to note that in times of crisis, negotiations between subunits within the system are often carried out behind closed door. Chryssochoou (2001:6) pointed out that, because of these practices, “members of the elite cartel successfully exclude themselves from extensive public scrutiny”. Decisions reached within the coalition are usually treated as a collective decision. Therefore, no particular subunit within the system could be picked out to be responsible for the decision reached.
Tindigarukayo (1989:43) proposed five favourable factors for consociationalism. These include segmental isolation; traditions of elite accommodation and overarching cleavages; popular legitimacy of the ruling elites; respect for institutional rules and procedures; and generous amount of compromise, trust and goodwill among political leaders.
Peter Mair (1994:99) pointed out that segmentation in a plural society is usually on linguistic and religious sphere.
Lijphart (1968:5) also proposed that there are four “prerequisites” for consociational democracy to work in a plural society. These includes society’s ability to recognise the dangers inherent in a fragmented system; committed to [political] system maintenance; ability to transcend sub-cultural cleavages at the elite level; and the ability to forge appropriate solutions for the demands of the sub-cultures.
From this, we could assume that components within this particular political system come together and co-operate on an equal ground, towards a common goal. This, in essence, very much characterised the early stage of the Alliance, the predecessor to the Barisan Nasional (BN) government which rules Malaysia since her Independence in 1957.
The term ‘consociational democracy’ was first use by Apter who defined it as the “joining together of constituent units which do not lose their identity when merging in some form of union” (Apter 1961:24). This is very much the case of the 13 political parties forming the ruling coalition in Malaysia, with the three major political parties clearly maintaining their ethnic identity.
This is only possible because the three major ethnic groups in Malaysia – namely, Malays, Chinese and Indians – trust their political elites to bargain on behalf of them. As pointed out by Stevenson (1982), “in such countries the population is segmented in subgroups, each represented by political elites who are trusted to bargain with other elites on behalf of the group interests” (1982:37).
In fact, those political elites often project their parties as such. Three major parties in the BN coalition were formed specifically for that proposes – to champion the rights of their ethnic groups. Brown (1994:229) criticised these inter-communal Alliance as the “institutional form for the maintenance of bourgeois class domination, which allowed the bourgeois class fractions to disguise the defence of their own class interests as the protection of communal interests”.
United Malay National Organisation (UMNO) was formed at the height of the Malays’ protest against the formation of Malayan Union by the British in 1948. Malayan Union was seen as challenging the sovereignty of the Malay rulers. This was seen as a direct challenge to the very existence of the Malays in their own land.
Lijphart argue that there could be “stable democracy in plural, vertically segmented or communally divided societies if there was overarching co-operation among the segment elites, based on a set of unwritten rules of the games” (Lustick 1979). Lijphart was the author of the 1968 article Typologies of democratic systems which launched the term consociational democracy.
In the case of Malaysia, the “unwritten rules of the games” are, of course, “the informality yet seriousness of the discussions, the atmosphere of hard bargaining, but a willingness to compromise” (Von Vorys 1976:104). This method of negotiation basically sets the tone of future inter-ethnic negotiations within the BN coalition.
Lijphart also pointed out that the consociational democracy comprised of four characteristics: grand coalition, segmental autonomy, proportionality and mutual veto (Lijphart 1977:25). However in the later stage of the BN coalition, we see that the coalition was dominated by UMNO especially after the late 1980s. Naturally, UMNO being the largest subunit within this grand coalition will also have the majority to bulldozer their way through any negotiations.
When the ‘old’ UMNO was deregistered in 1988, Dr Mahathir, the UMNO president then, registered the ‘new’ UMNO and this is the beginning of greater UMNO domination over the ruling coalition. Critics have accused Dr Mahathir of engineering the deregistration of the old UMNO as a step to purged the party of his rival fraction, then led by Tengku Razaleigh.
Basically the domination of UMNO in the ruling coalition was the result of the consolidation of power under Dr Mahathir and the need to show to the Malays community – which was split after the 1988 UMNO deregistration – that UMNO are still able to defend the interests of the Malays and that UMNO is still very much in control of the ruling coalition.
Hwang (2003:9) concurred that the “consociational model is only evident in the period between 1957 and 1969, and since the 1970s, there were increasing political and economic discrimination in favour of the Malays.
Andeweg (2000) pointed out that the later evolution of the consociational theory, the element of elite cooperation had evolved into this: “political elites do not compete”. As for the Malaysia case, political elites do not compete mainly because the political elites from the other political parties are dominated by UMNO.
In the Lower House (Dewan Rakyat ), the ruling coalition control 147 out of 193 seats in the house (Election Commission of Malaysia). However the figures in the Election Commission website only shown the seats won by BN coalition as a whole, not the breakdown of the seats won by individual political parties within the coalition. This is another cosmetic ways to show the unity within the ruling coalition. However, this is not surprising because a coalition need to show that decisions are arrived collectively.
Andeweg (2000:511) pointed out that the main feature in consociational democracy is that “the elite eschew decision by the majority.” This means that UMNO would not want to be seen as dominating the decision making process because of its majority number within the ruling coalition. Any decisions made are best projected as a collective decision and not a decision by the majority.
UMNO total popular votes during the 1999 general election dropped but they still managed to control 48 percent of seats of the Lower House (Maznah 1999).
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3.4 Plural Society Theory
The pioneers of the theory of plural societies were J. S. Furnivall and M. G. Smith (Rex & Gurharpal 2003:107). Furnivall was writing about Indonesia and Smith was writing primarily about the British West Indies.
Plural societies, in Furnivall (1956:304) famous words, are societies that “mix but do not combine” Furnivall also noted that in the plural societies, “different sections of the community living side by side but in the same political unit”. In the economic sphere, Furnivall noted, “there is a division of labour on racial lines (1956:304)”. Hilley (2001:23) noted that “the British encouraged a policy of ethnic immigration and stratified labour relations as part of an export-led strategy”. Hilley (2001:24) noted that it was also during that time that “colonial [mis]representations of racial attributes began to find popular resonance”.
This division of labour or the identification of labour along racial lines will be the major source of contention on the post-colonial Malaysia and will become one of the strongest reasons for the massive social reengineering programmes by the Malaysian government.
These affirmative action-oriented programmes, according to Bacchi (1996), did not start after the 1969 racial riot as widely believed by many observers of Malaysian affairs. It was perhaps pursued more aggressively by the Malaysian government after the racial riots, as there was then a more pressing reason to do so. It was also a physical proof of what economic imbalance among the different races living together could do to a newly independent multiracial country like Malaysia.
During the colonial time in Malaya, the basic relations among the communities and the colonial powers were essentially economic. In the 19th century, the British encouraged aggressive immigration by the Chinese and Indians. This is to meet the demands of labours in plantation and mining sectors – two major sources of income to the colonial power. As noted by Rex & Gurharpal (2003), “most colonial societies involved groups of different origin performing different functions”. This is also the case for the immigrant communities in Malaya.
The Chinese were mainly involved in mining sector and trade in urban area. The Indians were confined to the plantation estates. The British were very specific in their labour policy, confining one ethnic group into one industry.
Abraham (2004) pointed out that “the division of labour along ethnic lines further reinforced sociocultural differences because of lack of social interaction between the different ethnic groups”.
This separation of immigrants’ communities with the local communities resulted minimum contact between them. Each community will have different ways of life and since “these different groups came from different geographical origins meant that in part the distinction between them was an ethnic one” (Rex & Gurharpal 2003:111). This form of divide and rules resulted “social-class antagonisms, ethnocentrism and racial polarisation (Abraham 2004:xvii).
During the colonial times, each community had to look after their own welfare. Thus, this “reinforced a consciousness of kind as the basis for groups to organise themselves to survive (Abraham 2004: xviii).
This form of political arrangement resulted the respective groups to turn to their own elites for supports. Abraham (2004) noted that despite knowing that these elites will use their position as the power base for their own benefits, the communities had little choice but to turn to them. This is still the situation in Malaysia where each community elites will claimed that they will fight on behalf of them with the condition that the community must give these elites undying political supports.
Perhaps, that is the paradox of Malaysia, while striving to achieve Bangsa Malaysia; its political parties are still formed along racial lines.
When the British withdrawn from Malaya, power was passed to the local lead by the Alliance. Within this transition period, there are at least two groups of Malayan vying for power – the secular Alliance that consist of the three major races in Malaya and the mainly Chinese-based Malayan Communist Party (MCP).
In Malaya, powers were divided between two ethnic groups – the Chinese controls the economic while the Malays by defaults of their majority in Malaya control the politics.
As noted by Rex & Gurharpal (2003:112), “in Malaysia, Malays controlled the government, economic entrepreneurship was in the hands of the Chinese and agricultural labours in the hands of Indians”. For the agricultural sectors, large foreign plantation companies like Sime Darby and Guthrie continues to operate. These companies had since being taken over by Malaysians.
In plural societies, those who are vying for power usually claimed to represent everyone in the countries and usually stand on nationalistic platform when negotiating for power. However, as noted by Rex & Gurharpal (2003), these “nationalist leaders commonly represent a particular class or ethnic group”.
Tunku Abdul Rahman, the leader in the Alliance knew this very well. British would not grant Malaya independence if the three races in Malaya could not cooperate and live together as a nation. The British were also aware that they are limited in choice and time.
After WW2, there was a massive drawback of the British forces in their overseas colonies. The other promising group in Malaya then was the Malayan Communist Party. MCP led Malayan People Anti-Japanese Liberation Army (MPAJA) were credited for supplying the British with intelligence during the Japanese Occupation that eventually resulted the defeat of the Japanese in WW2. However, global ideology struggle among the superpowers then clearly strike this out as an alternative.
As a post-colonial country, Malaysia constantly has to deal with question of multiculturalism. Von Vorys (1976) also pointed out that generally in newly independent countries, the “social system is far from stable”.
In addition to that, contemporary Malaysian also has to deal with the question of class. This appeared more apparent in the Malay community and is one of the reasons for the split of the Malays community in the recent years. The aggressive affirmative actions programmes only reach certain groups of Malays, creating new Malay middle class playing a dominant role.
Abraham also argues, “colonialism superimposed class distinctions on racial groups and this created racial antagonism between the Malays, Chinese and Indian (2004:xxii).
Even in 2003, Malaysian press still portrayed the Chinese as the rich community and the Malays still needs government subsidies.[1] It was reported that Dr Mahathir said that if the Chinese in Malaysia were given the same subsidies and concessions as given to the Malays, the Chinese would have been “way ahead by now”. These constant portrayals by the press create the impression that the Chinese are largely of the middle class.
Perhaps the most controversial point made by Abraham was about the social impact of colonisation. Abraham argues “colonial rules had a negative impact on this harmony and consequently manifested itself in racial perceptions, tension and potential social conflict (2004:1). In another words, colonisation split the Malayan community.
Jomo, Khoo and Chang (1995:6) observed that:
“Malaysian social and political life appears to be overwhelmingly organised around this plural society and its trends of fluctuating interethnic competition, compromise and conflict. Political parties are mainly ethnically based, all kinds of issues are readily ‘communalised’, and political coalitions represent attempts at interethnic compromise”.
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3.5 THE MYTH OF NEWS OBJECTIVITY
Students taking Journalism 101 class will be told that objectivity is the cornerstone of news. Why is there such an emphasis on news objectivity? Tuchman (1972:297) suggested that “the term ‘objectivity’ stands as a bulwark between themselves and critics” and was often invoked to defend themselves against any attacks on their news articles.
The most basic way to be objective is to identify ‘objectivity’ with ‘facts’ which may be verified. Tuchman (1972:299) suggested four strategic procedures for journalists to follow so that they could claimed being objective. These procedures are:
a. Presentation of conflicting possibilities
b. Presentation of supporting evidence
c. The judicious use of quotation marks
d. Structuring information in an appropriate sequence
It is important for journalists to present both sides of the story so that he may claim to be ‘objective’ and allows the readers to decide on that particular issue. However, even this is open to criticism.
A charge placed at the beginning of a story might receive more attention from readers than the denial placed toward the bottom of the story. In the Suqiu episode, Suqiu press statements of denial or clarification usually end up at the bottom of the story.
Quotations are usually used in news because it is view as a form of supporting evidence. Tuchman (1972:301) noted that “the reporter may remove his opinions from the story by getting others to say what he himself thinks”.
Newspaper also have the tendency to include public opinions that reflects the newspaper’s stand on a particular issue and reject those that contradict or critical of them.
In structuring information in an appropriate sequence, journalist has to decide what is ‘important’ and ‘interesting’ for the readers. This process in itself cannot be objective because it will involve journalist’s judgment based on their values and experience.
Tuchman (1972:302) noted that “newspapers differ in their choice of material ‘facts’, their news policies, but all claim to be ‘objective’”. Tuchman (1972:304) asserted that these ‘news procedures’ are actually “strategies through which [journalists] protect themselves from critics and lay professional claim to objectivity”. Tuchman (1972:305) asserted that “an attempts to obtain objectivity […] cannot be said to provide objectivity”.
Cohen (1963:13) noted that the press “may not be successful much of the time in telling people what to think, but it is stunningly successful in telling its readers what to think about”.
Bob Kohn in his Journalistic Fraud: How The New York Times Distorts the News and Why It Can No Longer Be Trusted had demonstrated that it is possible to disguise editorial opinion as objective news “for the purpose of influencing public opinion” (2003:4).
Kohn (2003:24) noted that it is important to slip editorial opinion into straight news because that will “lends a level of credibility to the opinion that is normally reserved for objective news” and this will be a “much more effective means of influencing the public than the mere expression of opinion on editorials and op-ed pieces”.
Kohn (2003:29) noted that, unlike the past, today “newspapers are in the business of identifying solutions to society’s problems and influencing public opinion to agree with those solutions”.
Among the techniques of ‘passing opinion as objectives news’ identify by Kohn are: distorting the lead, the headline, and the facts; distorting with opinion, with labels, with loaded language, with crusades, with polls and with placement of facts within an article or the placement of articles within the paper.
In brief, no journalist could fully claim to be objective and it is possible to slip editorial opinion into ‘objective’ news in order to influence public opinion.
Footnote:
[1] NST 13 Oct 2003
3.1 THEORETICAL FRAMEWORK
This thesis will used two theories – consociational theory and plural society theory – to interpret post-colonial Malaysia social and political landscape. Since independence in 1957, Malaysian political landscape had evolved from the equal power sharing in the Alliance to the domination of UMNO within the BN government. Pro-Malay policies had been implemented more aggressively since the NEP was launched in 1970. Even though there was a departure from the exclusivist pro-Malay to more inclusive policies since 1990s, Malay supremacy within Malaysia is still very real.
Some Malaysian observers argued that Malaysia have move beyond ethnic politics, especially after the 1998 reformasi era. This thesis will argue otherwise. In fact, there was an increase in ethnic assertion in the form of religious exclusivism. Increasingly, the Malays in Malaysia are redefining their ethnic boundary from Islamic aspects.
This chapter will begin by looking at some basic concepts commonly mentioned throughout this thesis. Then it will look at two theories in detail.
The last part in this chapter it will point out that the notion of news objectivity is a myth, and essentially, news can be manipulated to reflect the editorial opinion of a particular newspaper.
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3.2 DEFINITION OF CONCEPTS
3.2.1 Race, ethnic and ethnicity
It was suggested that competition for environment resources were generally linked to ethnic tension (Despres 1975; Tan 1987). In Malaysia, it has been proposed that the primary cause for such tension since the 1980s is economic factors. (Hua 1983; Tan 1987; Jesudason 1989).
Huang In-Won (2003:9) in his Personalized Politics: The Malaysian State Under Mahathir observed that Malaysia is generally described as a prime example of a society severely divided along ethnic lines and ethnic conflict is still one of the most distinctive sources of political conflicts.
Race or racial group
The earliest use of the term ‘race’ was in the 16th and 17th century European to mean the descendents of a common ancestor, emphasizing kinship and linkage (Krugman 1945:38).
Only in the late 18th century that the term ‘race’ come to mean a distinct category of human being with physical characteristics transmitted by descent (Feagin 1989:5).
According to Feagin(1985:5), Francis Berneir was one of the first European to sort out human beings with physical characteristics into basic and distinctive categories, with European on top and Negro or Black Africans on the bottom, primarily because they were then best known to European as slaves.
By the late 19th century, numerous European and American writers were systematically downgrading all peoples not of northern European origin as inferior “races”, particularly southern and eastern European (Rose 1968:3 and Gossett 1965:3).
It was in this context of downgrading that ideological “racism” emerged. Von den Berghe (1967:11) defined ideological racism as “an ideology that considers a group’s unchangeable physical characteristics to be linked in a direct, casual way to psychological or intellectual characteristics, and on this basis distinguishes between superior and inferior racial groups”.
Apart from the ideological racism, another school of thought tried to introduce the “scientific racism”. European writers like Count de Gobineau in mid 19th century used this concept to morally justify the imperialism of northern European state in Asian, Africa, and the Americas (Feagin 1989:5).
Some actually believed that the size of a person’s brain had causal influence on a person’s intelligence. In 1935 an influential professor from University of Virginia wrote that “the size of the brain of the Black Race is below the medium both of the Whites and the Yellow-Browns, frequently with relatively more simple convolutions” (Robert Bennett Bean, as quoted in Carlson and Colburn 1972:106).
Feagin (1989:6) noted that for the last few decades, a major concern among social scientists has been with the social definition of race and racial groups. In 1948, Cox (1948:402) was one of the first to underscore this perspective by defining a race as “any people who are distinguished, or consider themselves distinguished, in social relations with other peoples, by their physical characteristics”.
Von den Berghe (1967:9) also defined racial groups as “human group that defines itself and/or is defined by other groups as different from other groups by virtue of [presumed] innate and immutable physical characteristics”.
Feagin (1989:6) noted that a person’s race is most typically determined by and important to certain outsiders, although a group’s self-definition can also be important. Feagin (1989:6-7) defined a racial group as “not something naturally generated as part of the self-evident over the universe, but is a social group that persons inside or outside the group have decided is important to single out as inferior or superior, typically on the basis of real or alleged physical characteristics subjectively selected”. Feagin noted that the physical characteristic usually associated with race is skin colour.
Banton (1967:57-8) argued that “skin colours are easily observed and ordered in the mind”. Feagin (1989:7) argued that, “more important than ease of observation is the way which economic or political exploitation often leads to the need to identify the exploited group in a certain way”.
Ethnic group
Gordan (1964:27) defined ethnic group as “a social group distinguished by race, religion, or national origin”. Feagin (1989:8) noted that the word ‘ethnic’ comes from Greek ‘ethnos’, originally meaning “nation”.
German sociologist Weber (1961:306) defined ethnic group as “human group that entertain a subjective belief in their common descent – because similarities of physical type or of customs or both, or because of memories of colonisation or migration – in such a way that this belief is important for the continuation of the non-kinship communal relationships”.
Feagin (1989:9) noted that these social definitions of ethnic group move us away from a “biological determinism that sees groups as self-evident and genetically fixed with unchanging physical or mental characteristics”.
Lai (2004:2) defined ‘race’ as a category based on physical features, while ‘ethnicity’ are social constructs.
Lai (2004:2) also quoted Frederick Barth definition of ethnicity as “a mode of identification and organisation by one group vis-à-vis other, in which, in the process of interactions, ethnic groups draw from their cultures each with their own elements of affinity and identity, to mark out differences and to fix the relationship to each other”.
Joanna and Darini (1999:12) pointed out that numerical majorities and minorities are constructed and manipulated, just as ethnicity is, in group struggles for power and hegemony.
For example, the inclusion of non-Malay indigenous people of Sarawak and Sabah in 1963 to form the larger group of Bumiputra, rather than classifying them separately from Malays is a strategy to increase the percentage of Bumiputra in Malaysia. In practice, Bumiputra usually refers to the Malays in Malaysia.
Joanna and Darini (1999:13) also noted that nation-building often meant “centralization and a single group dominating the symbolic framework of national”. This domination will encourage minority groups felt marginalised by the process “to (re)invent new collective identities” (Joanna & Darini 1999:13). This process will cause mass mobilization of groups along ethnic lines.
This is the paradox of nation building as a process of creating a common national identity, which will stimulate resistance from the minorities.
Joanna and Darini (1999:15) suggest that there are two reasons why people prefer to stick to their own kind. From the culture side, people place special trust in members of their own kind. The political arrangement of patron-client also requires political elites to promote and award their own people to political positions as an acknowledgement of their loyalty.
Brown (1994:xii) stated that “ethnicity constitute one of several forms of association through which individuals pursue their interests relating to economic and political advantage” and noted that “individuals seem to need to distinguish between ‘us’ and ‘them’ communities”.
The debate on ethnicity generally takes two approaches; primordialism and situationalism.
Brown (1994:xiii) noted that the first approach asserts that “people are naturally ethnocentric, exhibiting trust and preference for those of their own cultural group while feeling more distant from, and distrustful of, those of other cultural groups”. Main proponents for this perspective include J. S. Furnivall and M. G. Smith.
Brown (1994:xiv) noted that “any attempts at responsive, democratic, or alliance-based government will tend to degenerate into political instability and disintegration”. In the early days of independence, observers predicted that the alliance formed to govern Malaysia will not be lasting because of the instability nature of such political arrangement. However, Brown (1994:xiv) noted that “political instability can be avoided only by some form of authoritarian state”. The BN government’s responses to the May 13 riot mirrored some of this approach.
For the situationalist approach, individuals are seen as a member of social and cultural groups without necessary recognizing them as having ideological and political significance. Brown (1994:xvi) noted that “ethnic attachment has frequently been explained as a response to situational threats from dominating others, so that individuals react by forming appropriate defensive groups”. These groups will vary depending upon the source of the perceived situational threat.
Brown (1994:xvii) noted that this approach guided the works of Judith Nagata, Charles Keyes, William Liddle, and Robert Taylor. Situationalist approach explains ethnicity as one resource among many which individuals may employ in their efforts to respond to the environment.
Brown (1994:xviii) concluded that “the primordialist and situationalist approaches can thus both be seen to offer valuable insights as to the nature of ethnicity and its role in politics, but the adoption of either approach on its own seems to be misleading”.
Brown (1994:1) pointed out that there is a close relationship between ethnic consciousness and relationship, and the activities of the state. State, according to Brown (1994:1-2), played a major role in influencing the distribution of power, status and wealth, thus, not only influencing the socioeconomic disparities, but on the “advantages which accrue to those possessing a particular language, religio-culture or racial identity”. For example, Indian Muslim community in Malaysia enjoys the Bumiputra special privileges despite their Indian background.
The British era in Malaysia had generated distinctive type of relationship between class and ethnicity as pointed out by Brown (1994:213). In order to sustain British demands for raw materials, different racial groups were recruited into a particular occupational category. For example, the Indians were largely involved in plantations, while the Chinese were largely involved in mining industry.
Brown (1994:213) noted that this “coinciding of race with class fraction fostered the perception by the exploited classes that it was their racial attributes which determined their class position”. Malays in Malaysia certainly argue for their special privileges based on the perceived discrimination by the British, that resulted – according to the Malay elites – Malays being left behind in the economic progress of Malaysia.
Another feature of British rule was the close co-operation between the commercial sector and the state bureaucratic sector, in order to maintain the social order of which these two sectors were the major beneficiaries. Brown (1994:214) noted that one of the main strategies employed by the bourgeois class was to exploit ethnic sentiments.
According to Brown (1994:214) this strategy was possible in Malaysia because of three factors. These interrelated factors are:
a. The colonial state was able to make use of the prevalent ethno-class consciousness which had been generated by the racial division of labour under colonialism, inhibiting the emergence of an incipient class consciousness which transcended racial lines and which posed a potential threat to orderly decolonialisation.
b. The institutional form of the alliance between the commercial and bureaucratic bourgeoisie was that of the ethnically consociational state, in which political alliance were formed between racial groups.
c. The compartmentalization of each racial class began to erode and contacts increases between different racial classes. Unequal competitions for jobs and resources breed rivalry between racial class, which gave credibility to the ethnic ideology propagated by the state elites.
Frank Furedi (as quoted in Brown 1994:214) noted that these factors were used to promote ethnic ideology, in which “overtly class-based political movements were suppressed by the colonial and post-colonial state, and were redesignated as ethnic communal movements so as to be politically neutralised”.
Brown (1994:217) noted that the British were actively structuring the Malaya community along racial-occupational lines, so that there are only limited interactions between the various communities.
This occupational compartmentalisation was made worse by British policy in education. The Indian and Chinese were left alone to take care of their educational needs, and the British only provides Malay and English schools.
Fuston (1980:31) noted that the majority of Malays were provided with only elementary vernacular education, “practically oriented so as to stress the educational value of manual labour and not give rise to any dissatisfaction with the peasants’ humble lot”.
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3.2.2 Malay supremacy
The first colonial definition of a ‘Malay’ was made in the Malay Reservations Act 1913, classifying as a Malay ‘any person belonging to the Malayan race’ who habitually spoke Malay or ‘any other Malayan language’ and who professed Islam (Andaya & Andaya 2001:183).
According to Heng (1998:51), there are three core ethnic identifiers of “Malayness” – bahasa, agama, raja (language, religion, and royalty) – that was constantly used by the Malay leaders to reflect the hegemonic status of the Malay in Malaysian polity.
Shamsul (1996: ??) said these ethnic identifiers concurred with the three key attributes identified by the Malay nationalist movement in the 1900s. These Malay nationalists also felt that Malay should be the sole official and national language in an independent Malaya.
The Malay nationalists which consist of three factions – the “administocrats”, the Malay Left, and the Islamic leaders – differed in regards of the role of the royalty and Islam.
In the early stage of independence, the British choose to back the Malay ‘administocrats’, which the British see as in the best position to maintain British interests in the independent Malaya.
Thus, royalty and Islam were thrust to the fore – together with the Malay language – as the main ethnic identifiers of the Malays in Malaysia.
Heng (1998:52) pointed out that the main priority of the Malay nationalists after WWII was to ensure their political hegemony in the independent Malaya. In another word, the Malay put politics before economy.
Malay political hegemony in Malaysia was largely attributed to the British’s ‘blessing’, unlike the official narrative put forward by the ruling elites in Malaysia today. According the Heng (1998:58), the British acknowledged the Malay political and cultural dominance in the Federation of Malaya Agreement 1948 and later entrenched it in the 1957 Constitution.
Besides having the blessing from the British, UMNO also had it easy with its Alliance partner. Heng (1998:58) noted that MCA in negotiating the independence Constitution with UMNO conceded to the Malay special positions, Malay language as the sole national language, and the lack of official status for Mandarin. In another word, MCA had recognised the Malay hegemonic position in politics from the birth of Malaysia. Heng pointed out that MCA had little choice because the Federation of Malaya Agreement of 1948 had already discriminated against Chinese interests. In addition to that, the British is supporting UMNO in their position in Malay political leadership.
The British did not encourage the Chinese to sought equal citizenship. As a response to the MCA-negotiated deal with UMNO, the Council of Registered Chinese Guilds and Association led by Chinese-educated merchant Lau Pak Khuan were formed to push for equal citizenship and official-language status for Mandarin. According to Heng (1998:59), this movement was rebuffed by the British, thus leaving the Chinese with the MCA-brokered deal.
Heng also pointed out that the independence in 1957 actually bought less freedom for the Chinese as “it ends the autonomy they had enjoyed in running their community affairs”. The independence actually put the Chinese under the direct rule of the Malay political elites, as the Chinese were unable to secure favourable deals with their Malay political partner.
Khoo (2003:199) noted that “several turning points of Malaysian politics were set by mass Malay intrusions upon the political stage: witness 1946 and the Malayan Union; 1969 and May 13; and 1998 and reformasi”.
Lee and Heng (2000:194) noted that once Malay power was consolidated in the period after 1969, with the inclusion of PAS, Chinese influence in the ruling coalition, along with their political expectations, became markedly reduced.
Mauzy (1983:140) concurred with this view. She noted that “although UMNO was the dominant party in the Alliance, it is even more hegemonic in the BN … After 1969 it was clear to everyone that the Malays led by UMNO were in charge”.
Jomo, Khoo and Chang (1995:15) noted that the “Alliance regime and what it stood for were things of the past, a reality capped by Tunku’s retirement in September 1970”. Gomez and Jomo (1999:22) observed that the “hegemonic position of the new, more Malay-oriented leadership in the BN was enhanced through amendments to the Constitution”.
Mauzy (1993:110-11) noted that all the power sharing arrangement was in effect “accommodation in essentially Malay terms”.
Milne and Mauzy (1999:90) observed that the Chinese, especially those in the MCA “have suffered from delusions about power”. Even though MCA could claim to be the third largest Chinese-based political party in the world, in reality, it is just a junior political partner to UMNO in the BN.
Milne and Mauzy (1999:90) noted that MCA was weaken because of the ‘Merdeka bargain’ and by the inclusion of other Chinese-dominated political parties like Gerakan into the BN. The seats allocation for MCA in the Malaysian Cabinet had steadily decline over the past decades. In addition to that, ‘strategic’ portfolios like Finance and Trade and Industry were taken away from MCA in period after the start of NEP. Milne and Mauzy (1999:91) noted that “Finance Ministry, the last bastion of Chinese strength in the Cabinet, was lost in 1974”.
Gomez and Jomo (1999:23) noted that “in subsequent years, UMNO leader would openly assert that the party could rule alone, but preferred to ‘share’ power in the interest of national unity”.
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3.3 Consociational Theory
Consociational theory was first associated with the integration process of the European Union. According to Barry the term ‘consociation’ derives from the Latin consociatio which means “the action or fact of associating together” or “union in fellowship” (Barry, 1975:478, quoted in Chryssochoou 2001:3).
The Netherlands were the first countries to be identified as consociational (Lijphart 1975:231). Malaysia was a consociational country from 1955 to 1969 and since 1971, with the increased concentration of power to the ruling elites (Von Vorys 1976). As a political theory, it is a good way to explain the political arrangement among the political elites in Malaysia, and as a way to understand the working nature of a diverse political coalition in Malaysia that was in power since Independence.
Holden, however, pointed out that consociationalism is often “a theory about how much decision making remains possible in the face of grave difficulties” (1993:112). Even so, Brown (1994:228) pointed out that proponents of the concept of consociationalism argued that it represent the only effective way of organizing democracy in an ethnically plural society.
It is important to note that in times of crisis, negotiations between subunits within the system are often carried out behind closed door. Chryssochoou (2001:6) pointed out that, because of these practices, “members of the elite cartel successfully exclude themselves from extensive public scrutiny”. Decisions reached within the coalition are usually treated as a collective decision. Therefore, no particular subunit within the system could be picked out to be responsible for the decision reached.
Tindigarukayo (1989:43) proposed five favourable factors for consociationalism. These include segmental isolation; traditions of elite accommodation and overarching cleavages; popular legitimacy of the ruling elites; respect for institutional rules and procedures; and generous amount of compromise, trust and goodwill among political leaders.
Peter Mair (1994:99) pointed out that segmentation in a plural society is usually on linguistic and religious sphere.
Lijphart (1968:5) also proposed that there are four “prerequisites” for consociational democracy to work in a plural society. These includes society’s ability to recognise the dangers inherent in a fragmented system; committed to [political] system maintenance; ability to transcend sub-cultural cleavages at the elite level; and the ability to forge appropriate solutions for the demands of the sub-cultures.
From this, we could assume that components within this particular political system come together and co-operate on an equal ground, towards a common goal. This, in essence, very much characterised the early stage of the Alliance, the predecessor to the Barisan Nasional (BN) government which rules Malaysia since her Independence in 1957.
The term ‘consociational democracy’ was first use by Apter who defined it as the “joining together of constituent units which do not lose their identity when merging in some form of union” (Apter 1961:24). This is very much the case of the 13 political parties forming the ruling coalition in Malaysia, with the three major political parties clearly maintaining their ethnic identity.
This is only possible because the three major ethnic groups in Malaysia – namely, Malays, Chinese and Indians – trust their political elites to bargain on behalf of them. As pointed out by Stevenson (1982), “in such countries the population is segmented in subgroups, each represented by political elites who are trusted to bargain with other elites on behalf of the group interests” (1982:37).
In fact, those political elites often project their parties as such. Three major parties in the BN coalition were formed specifically for that proposes – to champion the rights of their ethnic groups. Brown (1994:229) criticised these inter-communal Alliance as the “institutional form for the maintenance of bourgeois class domination, which allowed the bourgeois class fractions to disguise the defence of their own class interests as the protection of communal interests”.
United Malay National Organisation (UMNO) was formed at the height of the Malays’ protest against the formation of Malayan Union by the British in 1948. Malayan Union was seen as challenging the sovereignty of the Malay rulers. This was seen as a direct challenge to the very existence of the Malays in their own land.
Lijphart argue that there could be “stable democracy in plural, vertically segmented or communally divided societies if there was overarching co-operation among the segment elites, based on a set of unwritten rules of the games” (Lustick 1979). Lijphart was the author of the 1968 article Typologies of democratic systems which launched the term consociational democracy.
In the case of Malaysia, the “unwritten rules of the games” are, of course, “the informality yet seriousness of the discussions, the atmosphere of hard bargaining, but a willingness to compromise” (Von Vorys 1976:104). This method of negotiation basically sets the tone of future inter-ethnic negotiations within the BN coalition.
Lijphart also pointed out that the consociational democracy comprised of four characteristics: grand coalition, segmental autonomy, proportionality and mutual veto (Lijphart 1977:25). However in the later stage of the BN coalition, we see that the coalition was dominated by UMNO especially after the late 1980s. Naturally, UMNO being the largest subunit within this grand coalition will also have the majority to bulldozer their way through any negotiations.
When the ‘old’ UMNO was deregistered in 1988, Dr Mahathir, the UMNO president then, registered the ‘new’ UMNO and this is the beginning of greater UMNO domination over the ruling coalition. Critics have accused Dr Mahathir of engineering the deregistration of the old UMNO as a step to purged the party of his rival fraction, then led by Tengku Razaleigh.
Basically the domination of UMNO in the ruling coalition was the result of the consolidation of power under Dr Mahathir and the need to show to the Malays community – which was split after the 1988 UMNO deregistration – that UMNO are still able to defend the interests of the Malays and that UMNO is still very much in control of the ruling coalition.
Hwang (2003:9) concurred that the “consociational model is only evident in the period between 1957 and 1969, and since the 1970s, there were increasing political and economic discrimination in favour of the Malays.
Andeweg (2000) pointed out that the later evolution of the consociational theory, the element of elite cooperation had evolved into this: “political elites do not compete”. As for the Malaysia case, political elites do not compete mainly because the political elites from the other political parties are dominated by UMNO.
In the Lower House (Dewan Rakyat ), the ruling coalition control 147 out of 193 seats in the house (Election Commission of Malaysia). However the figures in the Election Commission website only shown the seats won by BN coalition as a whole, not the breakdown of the seats won by individual political parties within the coalition. This is another cosmetic ways to show the unity within the ruling coalition. However, this is not surprising because a coalition need to show that decisions are arrived collectively.
Andeweg (2000:511) pointed out that the main feature in consociational democracy is that “the elite eschew decision by the majority.” This means that UMNO would not want to be seen as dominating the decision making process because of its majority number within the ruling coalition. Any decisions made are best projected as a collective decision and not a decision by the majority.
UMNO total popular votes during the 1999 general election dropped but they still managed to control 48 percent of seats of the Lower House (Maznah 1999).
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3.4 Plural Society Theory
The pioneers of the theory of plural societies were J. S. Furnivall and M. G. Smith (Rex & Gurharpal 2003:107). Furnivall was writing about Indonesia and Smith was writing primarily about the British West Indies.
Plural societies, in Furnivall (1956:304) famous words, are societies that “mix but do not combine” Furnivall also noted that in the plural societies, “different sections of the community living side by side but in the same political unit”. In the economic sphere, Furnivall noted, “there is a division of labour on racial lines (1956:304)”. Hilley (2001:23) noted that “the British encouraged a policy of ethnic immigration and stratified labour relations as part of an export-led strategy”. Hilley (2001:24) noted that it was also during that time that “colonial [mis]representations of racial attributes began to find popular resonance”.
This division of labour or the identification of labour along racial lines will be the major source of contention on the post-colonial Malaysia and will become one of the strongest reasons for the massive social reengineering programmes by the Malaysian government.
These affirmative action-oriented programmes, according to Bacchi (1996), did not start after the 1969 racial riot as widely believed by many observers of Malaysian affairs. It was perhaps pursued more aggressively by the Malaysian government after the racial riots, as there was then a more pressing reason to do so. It was also a physical proof of what economic imbalance among the different races living together could do to a newly independent multiracial country like Malaysia.
During the colonial time in Malaya, the basic relations among the communities and the colonial powers were essentially economic. In the 19th century, the British encouraged aggressive immigration by the Chinese and Indians. This is to meet the demands of labours in plantation and mining sectors – two major sources of income to the colonial power. As noted by Rex & Gurharpal (2003), “most colonial societies involved groups of different origin performing different functions”. This is also the case for the immigrant communities in Malaya.
The Chinese were mainly involved in mining sector and trade in urban area. The Indians were confined to the plantation estates. The British were very specific in their labour policy, confining one ethnic group into one industry.
Abraham (2004) pointed out that “the division of labour along ethnic lines further reinforced sociocultural differences because of lack of social interaction between the different ethnic groups”.
This separation of immigrants’ communities with the local communities resulted minimum contact between them. Each community will have different ways of life and since “these different groups came from different geographical origins meant that in part the distinction between them was an ethnic one” (Rex & Gurharpal 2003:111). This form of divide and rules resulted “social-class antagonisms, ethnocentrism and racial polarisation (Abraham 2004:xvii).
During the colonial times, each community had to look after their own welfare. Thus, this “reinforced a consciousness of kind as the basis for groups to organise themselves to survive (Abraham 2004: xviii).
This form of political arrangement resulted the respective groups to turn to their own elites for supports. Abraham (2004) noted that despite knowing that these elites will use their position as the power base for their own benefits, the communities had little choice but to turn to them. This is still the situation in Malaysia where each community elites will claimed that they will fight on behalf of them with the condition that the community must give these elites undying political supports.
Perhaps, that is the paradox of Malaysia, while striving to achieve Bangsa Malaysia; its political parties are still formed along racial lines.
When the British withdrawn from Malaya, power was passed to the local lead by the Alliance. Within this transition period, there are at least two groups of Malayan vying for power – the secular Alliance that consist of the three major races in Malaya and the mainly Chinese-based Malayan Communist Party (MCP).
In Malaya, powers were divided between two ethnic groups – the Chinese controls the economic while the Malays by defaults of their majority in Malaya control the politics.
As noted by Rex & Gurharpal (2003:112), “in Malaysia, Malays controlled the government, economic entrepreneurship was in the hands of the Chinese and agricultural labours in the hands of Indians”. For the agricultural sectors, large foreign plantation companies like Sime Darby and Guthrie continues to operate. These companies had since being taken over by Malaysians.
In plural societies, those who are vying for power usually claimed to represent everyone in the countries and usually stand on nationalistic platform when negotiating for power. However, as noted by Rex & Gurharpal (2003), these “nationalist leaders commonly represent a particular class or ethnic group”.
Tunku Abdul Rahman, the leader in the Alliance knew this very well. British would not grant Malaya independence if the three races in Malaya could not cooperate and live together as a nation. The British were also aware that they are limited in choice and time.
After WW2, there was a massive drawback of the British forces in their overseas colonies. The other promising group in Malaya then was the Malayan Communist Party. MCP led Malayan People Anti-Japanese Liberation Army (MPAJA) were credited for supplying the British with intelligence during the Japanese Occupation that eventually resulted the defeat of the Japanese in WW2. However, global ideology struggle among the superpowers then clearly strike this out as an alternative.
As a post-colonial country, Malaysia constantly has to deal with question of multiculturalism. Von Vorys (1976) also pointed out that generally in newly independent countries, the “social system is far from stable”.
In addition to that, contemporary Malaysian also has to deal with the question of class. This appeared more apparent in the Malay community and is one of the reasons for the split of the Malays community in the recent years. The aggressive affirmative actions programmes only reach certain groups of Malays, creating new Malay middle class playing a dominant role.
Abraham also argues, “colonialism superimposed class distinctions on racial groups and this created racial antagonism between the Malays, Chinese and Indian (2004:xxii).
Even in 2003, Malaysian press still portrayed the Chinese as the rich community and the Malays still needs government subsidies.[1] It was reported that Dr Mahathir said that if the Chinese in Malaysia were given the same subsidies and concessions as given to the Malays, the Chinese would have been “way ahead by now”. These constant portrayals by the press create the impression that the Chinese are largely of the middle class.
Perhaps the most controversial point made by Abraham was about the social impact of colonisation. Abraham argues “colonial rules had a negative impact on this harmony and consequently manifested itself in racial perceptions, tension and potential social conflict (2004:1). In another words, colonisation split the Malayan community.
Jomo, Khoo and Chang (1995:6) observed that:
“Malaysian social and political life appears to be overwhelmingly organised around this plural society and its trends of fluctuating interethnic competition, compromise and conflict. Political parties are mainly ethnically based, all kinds of issues are readily ‘communalised’, and political coalitions represent attempts at interethnic compromise”.
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3.5 THE MYTH OF NEWS OBJECTIVITY
Students taking Journalism 101 class will be told that objectivity is the cornerstone of news. Why is there such an emphasis on news objectivity? Tuchman (1972:297) suggested that “the term ‘objectivity’ stands as a bulwark between themselves and critics” and was often invoked to defend themselves against any attacks on their news articles.
The most basic way to be objective is to identify ‘objectivity’ with ‘facts’ which may be verified. Tuchman (1972:299) suggested four strategic procedures for journalists to follow so that they could claimed being objective. These procedures are:
a. Presentation of conflicting possibilities
b. Presentation of supporting evidence
c. The judicious use of quotation marks
d. Structuring information in an appropriate sequence
It is important for journalists to present both sides of the story so that he may claim to be ‘objective’ and allows the readers to decide on that particular issue. However, even this is open to criticism.
A charge placed at the beginning of a story might receive more attention from readers than the denial placed toward the bottom of the story. In the Suqiu episode, Suqiu press statements of denial or clarification usually end up at the bottom of the story.
Quotations are usually used in news because it is view as a form of supporting evidence. Tuchman (1972:301) noted that “the reporter may remove his opinions from the story by getting others to say what he himself thinks”.
Newspaper also have the tendency to include public opinions that reflects the newspaper’s stand on a particular issue and reject those that contradict or critical of them.
In structuring information in an appropriate sequence, journalist has to decide what is ‘important’ and ‘interesting’ for the readers. This process in itself cannot be objective because it will involve journalist’s judgment based on their values and experience.
Tuchman (1972:302) noted that “newspapers differ in their choice of material ‘facts’, their news policies, but all claim to be ‘objective’”. Tuchman (1972:304) asserted that these ‘news procedures’ are actually “strategies through which [journalists] protect themselves from critics and lay professional claim to objectivity”. Tuchman (1972:305) asserted that “an attempts to obtain objectivity […] cannot be said to provide objectivity”.
Cohen (1963:13) noted that the press “may not be successful much of the time in telling people what to think, but it is stunningly successful in telling its readers what to think about”.
Bob Kohn in his Journalistic Fraud: How The New York Times Distorts the News and Why It Can No Longer Be Trusted had demonstrated that it is possible to disguise editorial opinion as objective news “for the purpose of influencing public opinion” (2003:4).
Kohn (2003:24) noted that it is important to slip editorial opinion into straight news because that will “lends a level of credibility to the opinion that is normally reserved for objective news” and this will be a “much more effective means of influencing the public than the mere expression of opinion on editorials and op-ed pieces”.
Kohn (2003:29) noted that, unlike the past, today “newspapers are in the business of identifying solutions to society’s problems and influencing public opinion to agree with those solutions”.
Among the techniques of ‘passing opinion as objectives news’ identify by Kohn are: distorting the lead, the headline, and the facts; distorting with opinion, with labels, with loaded language, with crusades, with polls and with placement of facts within an article or the placement of articles within the paper.
In brief, no journalist could fully claim to be objective and it is possible to slip editorial opinion into ‘objective’ news in order to influence public opinion.
Footnote:
[1] NST 13 Oct 2003
CHAPTER 2 - POLITICAL AND MEDIA LANDSCAPE OF MALAYSIA
CHAPTER 2 – POLITICAL AND MEDIA LANDSCAPE OF MALAYSIA
2.1 Political landscape
Hwang (2003:10-12) divided independent Malaysia politics into four phases. The first phase, according to him was after independence until the May 13 riots. During this phase, Malay dominance formed the foundations of Malaysian political landscape, but with strong recognition of the non-Malay political role.
The implementation of NEP in 1970 marked the second phase of Malaysian politics, with shift in the UMNO leaders’ attitude for moderate consociational bargaining to one of more hegemonic control.
Political challenge to Dr Mahathir leadership in 1987 shifted the state power from UMNO to Mahathir. This phase marked the consolidation of Dr Mahathir’s authoritarian rule, and courting the non-Malays neglected under NEP.
The fourth phase of Malaysian politics starts with the sacking of Anwar Ibrahim from his Cabinet post in 2 Sept 1998. Anwar reformasi movement marked the emergence of a multi-ethnic consciousness in Malaysian civil society.
Malaysia has been described as an authoritarian (Gomez & Jomo 1999), semi-authoritarian (Crouch 1992), semi-democratic (Case 1993) and quasi-democratic (Zakaria 1989) state since its independence in 1957.
In order to better understand the origins of ethnic politics in Malaysia, we need to trace back the early stage of nationhood of Malaysia, starting from the period prior to the British rule in Malaya, the impact of British rule in Malaya, the Japanese Occupation, the early stage of independence negotiations, and the vague but yet influential ‘social contracts’.
2.1.1 Melaka and Malay Dominance
Melaka before it was invaded by the Portuguese in 1511 A.D. was the major entreport in Asia. Today, it is only a reminder of the once great Malay Muslim Empire that is still a source of pride among the Malays in Malaysia.
It was in the 15th century when trade was among the major income to the Melaka sultanate particularly and to the people of Southeast Asia generally. The Southeast Asia region is also often referred to as the Nusantara Archipelago. Natives in this archipelago shared the same cultural roots.
It was believed that the Malays migrated from the southern part of China and settled in this region before the Chinese and Indian immigrants. It is important to note that the Malays were immigrant themselves. However, the Malays in Malaysia claimed special positions and the status of being natives to the land. This shall be the source of contention for many years after the special privileges were formally enshrined into the 1957 Merdeka Constitution, the supreme law in Malaysia.
When the Melaka sultanate was mention in any setting within the Malay community, a sense of pride and shame teased their hearts. Pride because it reminds them those glory days when Melaka was the centre of trade in Asia and what Malays community is capable of. Shame because it reminds them the catastrophe for being complacent of their achievements and how they were tricked into discriminating treaties and agreements by the foreign powers that finally resulted them being left behind by other immigrant races like the Chinese and the Indians. As pointed out by Von Vorys, “traditional Malay society was especially vulnerable to external predatory initiatives” (1976:36).
The Malays have to be subjected to the rule of foreign western powers until the World War II that saw the participation of the Japanese army for the Pacific theater. For over 400 years, the Malays only managed to see in awe what the western powers were capable of, especially in exploiting their beloved lands.
The Malays were also constantly being made to believe that they would never be capable to run the country. The term ‘lazy natives’ were always being used to describe the Malays. This ‘lazy native’s myth’ was also the justification used by the British to pursued aggressive immigration policies in bringing in foreign labours from China and India.
Gomez and Jomo (1999:10) noted that “despite the formation of a plural society in Malaysia with the mass migration of Chinese and Indians into the country, there was very little integration and only limited interaction among the ethnic communities”.
The British argue that these influxes of foreign communities were crucial to support the labours demands for the economy of Malaya then. Hilley (2001:23) observed that the “British and other commercial interests have sought to restructure [Malaya] domestic economy, turning it from subsistence agriculture into key producer of primary products and raw materials for the British and European markets”.
If this past account gave the impression that the British actively sidelined the entire Malay community, it is only half of the story. During the British colonial time, they had actively engaged the elites in the Malay community, and to protect their interests by promoting their positions in the community.
According to Haque (2003:247), the British had “arranged English education and training for the sons of aristocratic Malays to join certain positions in the Malayan Civil Service (MCS). Haque also noted that the Malay Administrative Service (MAS) were created for these privileged Malays, but actively leave out the ordinary Malays (Means 1986:97 as cited in Haque 2003).
Thus, we could only speculate the reason the ruling elites in Malaysia arguing for the preferential treatments for the Malays. According to Haque, the proportion of Malays and non-Malays entering the MCS was required to be 4:1, to “ensure that they were not marginalised by non-Malays” (2003:247).
Andaya and Andaya (2001:174) noted that the co-operation of the Malay ruling class, initially the most hostile towards the British … was essential for the success of indirect rule. Andaya and Andaya (2001:174) pointed out that “a primary mean of gaining the desired co-operation was to compensate the ruling class for income they had lost through the abolition of slavery and the introduction of a central treasury”.
In another word, it was their own social and economy well-being that concerns them most, not the welfare of the mass. And yet, the present Malay political elites have elevated their status, including the sultans, to that of Malay special privileges guardian.
Andaya and Andaya (2001:175) noted that such relationship with the British resulted the Malay sultans and elites losing most of their former powers, but the British support gave them security from potential challengers. Hilley (2001:27) concurred that “the British had employed a form of indirect rule, by adhering to pro-Malay policies and recognizing the Malay Sultans as ‘natural rulers’, thus avoiding unnecessary conflict”.
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2.1.2 The Japanese Invasion
As discussed above, for over 400 hundreds years, the Malays were made to believe that they are not capable of running the country and the western races were invincible. The swift success of the Japanese army invasion over the large part of Asia generally, and especially their two weeks campaign in Peninsula Malaysia demolished this myth once and for all. Previously, even the lower administration clerks job were sourced directly by the British from India.
When the Japanese defeated the British in Peninsula Malaysia, they established the Japanese Emperor administration to replace it. As a strategy to influence the Malays to support the Japanese invasion, some administration posts were passed to the Malays. This is to minimize local insurgence by the Malays community. Malays were also recruited into the police force.
The Japanese used this strategy to pit the Malays against the Chinese in Malaya. Oversea Chinese donated large sum of money to support China during the Japanese campaign back in 1938. As revenge, the Japanese targeted the Chinese in their ‘purifying’ campaign of the Malaya. Thus, the Malay police force was used to hunt down the Chinese. This strategy leaves a sore point between the Chinese and the Malays in the post-WW2 period in Malaysia.
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2.1.3 The Malayan Union
The Malayan Union proposed by the returning British after the WW2 was perhaps the best chance for the immigrant communities especially the Chinese and Indians to fight for equal citizenship. However, the political consciousness of these two communities was largely aligned to their home countries – China and India.
Hilley (2001:27) noted that the Malayan Union was an “attempt to move towards a more uniform [political] structure in 1946” and to “bring the nine Malay states …, plus two Straits Settlements … under the ambit of stable central governing body for the first time”.
The period after WW2 was a period of uncertainty, with the status of Malaya as a country unclear. Hence, the Chinese saw it fit to keep their Chinese citizenship than to give it up and fight for Malayan citizenship which is uncertain of coming in the first place.
Therefore, when the Malayan Union proposed of equal citizenship to everyone in Malaya, the Malays through their vernacular newspapers were strongly opposed to the idea while the Chinese only gave it a cold response. Chinese papers gave scant coverage to this aspect of the Malayan Union. The Majority of the Chinese still felt that their homeland was China and Malaya was only a temporary place. (Fujio 2003:98).
The rally by the Utusan, an influential Malay paper saw the rise of Malay political consciousness, led by a Malay leader Onn Jaafar from Johor. The Malays saw the need to come together to defend their rights in Malaya and thus, United Malays National Organisation (UMNO) was formed in 1948 with this purpose in mind.
The scheme was replaced in 1948 by the Federation of Malaya Agreement, drawn up by British and Malay leaders, which the non-Malays did not get the full citizenship rights.
Hilley (2001:28) observed that this 1948 Agreement gave rise to the “communally located political parties”. The Agreement itself had set a trend in distinguished Malaya citizens into two categories. This gave the political parties a “communal agenda … for political mobilization of the subordinate classes”. Hilley (2001:27) said this enable UMNO, MCA and MIC to emerge as the “class patrons for each ethnic grouping”.
The founder of UMNO, Onn bin Jaafar wanted to open UMNO to all Malayan, but his idea was strongly opposed by UMNO members and he later left UMNO and set up the non-communal Independence of Malaya Party (IMP) in 1951. It did not attract much support from anyone. Zakaria (1993:356) observed that “the failure of non-communal political parties is simply a consequence of a nature of the polity in which political mobilisation has greatest success when it appeals to race”.
At that time, when the idea to replace Malayan Union solidified, the non-communal All Malay Council of Joint Action (AMCJA) came to being and called for the a political structure that recognise universal citizenship. However, the British choose to support and negotiate with the Alliance for the independence of Malaya.
Another potent force at that time was the Malaya Communist Party (MCP). Hilley (2001:28) observed that the British “portray the MCP as an avowedly Chinese nationalist body, rather than a broad-based, anti-colonial class movement, the British hope to stifle Malay support for any form of class politics or radical nationalism”.
Khoo (1997:51) noted that despite its mainly Chinese base, MCP managed to garner commendable Malay and Indians’ supports by 1948.
Gomez and Jomo (1999:11) noted that as tension mounted between the British and the Malayan Communist Party (MCP) – despite MCP crucial role in helping the British defeating the Japanese – “the need for an alternative Chinese party that was conservative yet pliant to British interests became imperative”.
The British turned to a leading Chinese businessman Tan Cheng Lock for such purpose and the Malayan (later Malaysian) Chinese Association (MCA) was formed in February 1949.
Overall, Hilley (2001:29) concluded that the British legacy was significant to Malay from three aspects:
“First, it helped drawn the Malayan economy into the world capitalist system, thus setting the basic metropole-domestic class relations. Second, as a central feature of this process, it created an ethnic division of labour in which racial attributes became synonymous with class position. And, third, it provided the nucleus of a pragmatic alliance between the Malay aristocracy/state bureaucracy, the main Chinese commercial bourgeoisie and Indian petite bourgeoisie, setting the framework of class accommodations, consociational politics and ethnic ideology to follow”.
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2.1.4 The Alliance and the Merdeka social contract
It can be said that the first generation of the leaders forming the core of the Alliance shared some of the similar characteristics. Tunku Abdul Rahman of UMNO, Tan Cheng Lock of Malaysia Chinese Association (MCA) and Sambathan of Malaysia Indian Congress (MIC) all were convinced that the “single most critical fact with which a viable political system would have to come to grips was the dominance of profound communal cleavages” (Von Vorys 1976:13). This communal cleavage is one single factor that “radically distinguished it from its Western counterparts”.
The Alliance leaders recognised the grip of communal cleavages in human personality that they are convinced that “the only reasonable course to follow was to recognise communal groups as essential, legitimate components of the political system (Von Vorys 1976:14). Hence, the Alliance was formed with individual political parties intact to represent their respective communities.
The early Alliance leaders also were able to mobilise popular support because they were “themselves primarily communal leaders”.
Von Vorys (1976) also pointed out that these leaders shared certain beliefs like: a preference for democratic politics in resolving political conflicts and in providing legitimacy for the political system, and seeing the use of violence as a bad form and poor judgment, and coercion as only the last resort of public policy. They were also educated in English school.
Due to this sociopolitical background, “Malaysian (Malayan) leaders set out to establish a viable, democratic system not based on a national community, but on the cooperation of discrete communal groups” (Von Vorys 1976:14).
Von Vorys listed out the four features of this political arrangement:
The relationship of citizens within the same group would continue to be managed through a semi-autonomous communal hierarchy;
The relationships of citizen across communal boundaries or to the government would be regulated through terms agreed to by an inter-communal Directorate at the highest level;
The terms of inter-communal relations would be promulgated in a constitutional contract, and then implemented and when necessary augmented by policies secretly negotiated;
The members of the Directorate would have to possess dual qualification. They would have to be the leaders of the political organisation of their community most capable of mobilizing mass support behind the government in democratically conducted elections.
They would also have to be men who would maintain the confidence of their colleagues by keeping negotiations within the Directorate secret and by refraining from ever mobilizing their external communal mass-support to bring pressure on the secret negotiations (1976:14-15).
Under the 1957 Merdeka Constitution, the Malays were given ‘special privileges’ status, not the ‘special rights’ as often heard these days. These ‘special privileges’ were enshrined in Article 153 of the Constitution as an exchange to the extension of political rights to the non-Malays then.
This bargaining is commonly known as the social contract between the Malays and the non-Malays in Malaysia. It is considered the cornerstone to the formation of Malaysia and the very concept where modern Malaysian society is built upon. Hence, as noted by Hilley (2001:1), Malaysia had reached “a settlement structured around ethnic parties and communal politics”.
The members of the Alliance also pledged to “establish a type of national school that will be acceptable to the people of Malaya.”[1]
In the Report of the Education Committee 1956, better known as the Razak Report, the direction of this ‘national school’ was envisioned to share common syllabuses for all school throughout the country and for the Malay and English to be made compulsory subjects in all primary and secondary schools.
Roff (1967:318) noted that the exclusion of Chinese or Tamil language as a compulsory subject do not received strong objections from the leaders of the Malayan (later Malaysian) Chinese Association and the response from the Chinese press were restrained and hopeful.
The Chinese and Indian leaders were probably overcome by the euphoria of the prospect of gaining independence for Malaya.
However, the Malays intellectuals were not satisfied with the Razak Report. Outside the UMNO, various Malay Teachers’ Associations, the Malay Language Society of the University, and PENA the national writers association united under the leadership of the National Language Action Front (NLAF) to voice their dissatisfaction. This protest simply means that UMNO was losing grip of the Malay intellectuals. The loudest criticism was voiced when NLAF accused Tunku Abdul Rahman of betraying the Malays.
For the Chinese community, the political party representing them – the MCA – only played marginal roles on most Chinese daily lives. Chinese communities also treat their chambers of commerce and their clan associations with great respect and importance.
Thus, when the Alliance and later the Barisan Nasional coalition government, managed to co-opt the largely Malay and Indians communities into the mainstream political ideology, the Chinese had different channels to vent their dissatisfactions and to seek help. This is one of the reasons for a large number of Chinese to have their own psyche and do not share the national sentiments.
“Alliance ideology had helped institutionalises an exclusive ‘partnership of understanding’ between ethnic patrons who between them claimed the necessary abilities to manage racial tensions and promote social prosperity”.
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2.1.5 The May 13 racial riot and the NEP
Among the darkest history of Malaysia are the May 13 racial riots in 1969. The official explanation of the cause of the riot was the economic imbalance among the different races in Malaysia. After the riot, Malaysia was declared under the state of Emergency. Operation of the country was transferred from the Cabinet to the newly formed National Action Council (NAC).
As Milne (1970:??) noted that the riot “showed that consensus was low and that primordial loyalties were high.” Hilley (2001:29) observed that “in contrast to the Malay elite, the economic position of ordinary Malays had not been substantially improved by decolonization”. The Malays feared that their political position and constitutional rights will be threatened by the outcome of the 1969 general elections (Hilley 2001:31). Gomez and Jomo (1999:21) also noted that “despite steady growth, diversification and low inflation, unemployment had been growing and ethnic tensions grew as inequalities were increasingly perceived in ethnic terms and attributes to the ‘ethnic other’ ”.
Brown (1994) however, explained the May 13 riot from the class struggle perspective. He (1994:233) noted that “by the end of the 1960s, it was becoming increasingly evident that the net result of government economic policies was the redistribution of wealth, within each racial community, from the poor to the rich.
Anand (1983:96) noted that by 1970, “nearly 90 per cent of overall income inequality was due to differences within racial groups, rather than to differences between them”.
These income inequalities, according to Brown (1994:234) “prompt significant sections of the subordinate classes in each racial group to withdraw their support for the Alliance parties and to seek alternatives channels for articulating their interests”.
The 1969 riot in Malaysia is often seen as a landmark event that shapes the future of Malaysia. If the Article 153 in the Constitutions institutionalised communalism, then the New Economic Policy (NEP) put forward by the National Operation Council (NOC) certainly operationalised it. Almost every single policy implemented in Malaysia after that was somehow influenced by the NEP.
Economically, the skewed distribution of wealth among different ethnic groups ‘forced the Malaysian government to fundamentally rethink its economic policy’ (Andaya & Andaya 2001:302). In 1970, 75 per cent of households living under poverty lines were Malays.
However, it would be inaccurate to assume that the Chinese controls all the wealth in Malaysia. Chinese economic role might be bigger that the Malays, but this is still inferior compared to foreign capital. According to Heng (1998:55), the diverse and widespread economic role of the Chinese might gave the impression that they controlled the economy of Malaysia at that period.
Politically, after the poor showing of UMNO in the 1969 general elections, UMNO had to heed the pressure from the Malay community in order to stay relevant. The Tunku, at that time, was unwilling to advance Malay welfare at the expense of holding back Chinese business interests. There was general perception that the prime minister who is also the president of UMNO was too compromising to the non-Malays. Some of UMNO leader like the Minister of Agriculture, Abdul Aziz Ishak had called for the advancement of Malay economic interests, even at the expense of the Chinese.[2]
The Constitutions were suspended, and National Operations Council (NOC) was formed to run the country. NOC was headed by the then deputy prime minister Abdul Razak. Tunku Abdul Rahman stepped down soon after that and Abdul Razak took leadership after that.
NOC finally launched the New Economic Policy (NEP) in 1971 with the purpose to correct the economic imbalance among the different races in Malaysia. The main objectives of the NEP were:
a. To reduce and eradicate poverty by increasing employment opportunities to every Malaysian regardless of ethnic background.
b. To restructure the society and to eventually eradicate the identification of ethnic groups according their occupation.
Implicitly, the NEP aimed to reduce poverty among the Malays. In order to achieve this objective, government pursued aggressive positive affirmative actions aimed at the Malays. Malays were given subsidies, preferential treatment in granting licenses and franchises, quotas in government jobs and university places. For example, 64 percent of local universities places were reserved for the Malays. This number was in recent years reduced slowly.
In pursuing these two objectives, the implementation seems to focus on the eradication of poverty along communal lines. History will be twisted to provide justification to this one-sided policy. The official narrative will point to the colonial policies which put the Bumiputra at a disadvantage position. Even though there is an official recognition[3] that poverty exist in all communities, the focus is usually on the Bumiputra because of Malay special rights and that they are discriminated during the colonial era.
At the same time, the Alliance was expanded to include opposition political parties like PAS (which later left) and was known as Barisan Nasional (BN). Tun Razak’s key objective was to implement UMNO’s long overdue objective of redressing the problem of Malay economic weakness through the implementation of the NEP.
In achieving the second objective, government introduced the Industrial Co-ordination Act 1975 which “required the private sectors to employ 30 per cent Malays at every level or risk revocation of their licenses” (Andaya & Andaya 2001:314).
The NEP officially ended in 1990 with the introduction of National Development Policy (NDP). Despite the aggressive interventionist steps taken by the government, ‘ethnic and economic disparities were still very much part of Malaysian life’ (Andaya & Andaya 2001:318). This gave the Malay nationalists reason to call for the maintenance of the Malay special rights and created an atmosphere of fear and siege that help to define the political roles for UMNO.
Often, the NEP will be abused for political mileage. Malays will be constantly reminded to support the existing government in order for them to continually enjoy the special privileges. The NEP also created a new class of Malays that benefited from the government-sponsored oversea tertiary educations and government contracts. The main beneficiaries of NEP were the Malay bureaucrats and politicians.
Brown (1994:246) noted that the main impact of the NEP was that it “further increases the income and occupational disparities within the Malay community”.
This eventually split the Malays into groups that support the present government because they benefited from it and those who prefer reforms because they see the special privileges as a political blackmail.
The anticipated protests by the Chinese bourgeois did not materialised even though from the surface, the NEP pro-Malay development and wealth redistribution programs will jeopardise Chinese economic interests. In fact, MCA continue to co-operate with UMNO even though the NEP did not argue well for MCA political status. Brown (1994:247) suggested that the obvious explanation for this is that the NEP “has been implemented so as to minimize its adverse impact upon the Chinese commercial and business sectors and indeed to ensure their continued prosperity”.
In the 1999 general elections, the Malays are clearly divided into the urban middle class UMNO supporters on one side and the largely rural lower class PAS supporters. Of course, the division is not that clear cut. There are also urban Malay middle class, who themselves benefited from the NEP, who join their rural brethrens to push for reforms.
In 1991, the NEP was replaced by the National Development Policy (NDP). NEP failed to achieve some of the objectives outlined. The ownership of share capital in limited companies by the Bumiputeras (read: Malays) did not hit 30 percent as targeted by NEP.
Andaya and Andaya (2001) noted that the NEP would ‘have been difficult to implement had it not been for UMNO’s power in the governing coalition’. After the Parliament resumed in February 1971, amendments were passed in Dewan Rakyat which enables the government to implement these policies. Steps were also taken to remove the public discussion of ‘sensitive issues’ like the power and status of the Malay rulers, Malay special privileges, Malay as national language and the status of Islam as the official religion.
This reality is in stark contrast to the official rhetoric of equal partnership and power-sharing of the governing coalition. Up to 1969, UMNO still treat its two weaker partners with respect. However, with UMNO losing its credibility after the elections, it had no choice but to maintain its own relevance to the Malay community. The poor elections result of its Chinese partner, MCA also greatly weakens its bargaining power with UMNO (Andaya & Andaya 2001:325).
The massive social restructuring of the NEP also saw the restructuring of the politics in Malaysia. The Alliance was expanded to include the PAS and was known as Barisan Nasional (National Front) from then on.
Since then, the Barisan Nasional has been able to win more than two-third of the seats in Parliament due to the clever combinations of persuasive and coercive tactics. This enable the BN to amend the Constitutions ‘at will to suit its purpose’ (Andaya & Andaya 2001:327).
UMNO is also never shy in letting the coalition partners to know who the actual boss is and who could have the final say. Dr Mahathir, well-known for his tactics in consolidating powers to the executive, stated that ‘UMNO is the backbone, the very bulwark of the Barisan Nasional.’[4]
The position of UMNO within the ruling coalition and the government is so strong that any threats to the party are usually internal power struggle rather than external threats.
In recent history, two particular events had shaped the position of UMNO within the society and resulted in UMNO reasserting its position as the defender of Malay special rights. In these two occasions, it’s the non-Malay who suffered as they are used as a bogeyman in UMNO communal rhetoric.
The Operasi Lallang in 1987 was the response of UMNO to the perceived threats to the party internally and externally. The challenge to UMNO leadership of Dr Mahathir by Tengku Razaleigh, together with the dissatisfaction of the Chinese community caused by the appointment of non-Chinese speaking Chinese to head Chinese schools gave UMNO the opportunity to clamp down on its enemies, both internal and external.
In this episode, language and education were the main cause of the Chinese dissatisfaction.
The 1998 episode was the accumulation of political crisis as a result of Asian economic crisis ravaging through Asia in 1997. The ambitious Anwar Ibrahim, inspired by the reformasi movement in Indonesia attempted to challenge Dr Mahathir to the premiership. The initial differences in handling the economic crisis later spilled to the political arena, climaxed with the sacking of Anwar Ibrahim from the post of deputy prime minister and deputy president of UMNO. He was later charged in court for sodomy and corruption. This episode caused a massive swing of Malay supports to the Opposition, especially with the forming of Parti Keadilan Nasional by Anwar’s wife.
UMNO had to reassert its position as the defender of the Malay special rights. The clever dissemination of message by the mainstream papers enables UMNO to tell the Malays a different picture while paint a different picture to the non-Malays. To the Malays, Anwar was painted as the cause of disunity in the community. This, UMNO argued, will result the Malay community being weak and unable to defend its interests. On the other hand, PAS was portrayed as an extremist Islamic party to the non-Malay, especially the Chinese. The political collaboration of DAP and PAS in Barisan Alternatif caused the former to lost their traditional supporters.
Some Malaysian observers argued that the 1998 episode is the start to more principle-based politics, departing from the usual communal politics. This thesis argues that, even under such conducive environment, clever dissemination of messages by the ruling coalitions and their control over the mass media enables them to ethnicised even universal issues. The Suqiu episode is one clear example.
Communal issues will always remain relevant in Malaysia as long as the present political structure is maintain, and this writer believe that political elites in Malaysia will strive hard to maintain such structure.
At the end of NEP, official figures showed it had succeeded in achieving its major goals. Although official figures show that the Malay share of corporate equity did not achieve the targeted figure of 30 per cent, some non-official reports showed that the figure in fact has been achieved (Malaysian Chinese Association, Report of the MCA National Task Force 1988: 32).
The National Development Policy (NDP) was formulated to replace NEP with the same social and economic objective of achieving national unity. However, NDP avoid emphasizing numerical targets and emphasis on income-raising policies rather than income redistribution.
NDP are welcomed by the Chinese because it is less ethnically divisive than NEP. Together with this, Dr Mahathir introduced his ‘Vision 2020’ for the nation in the first meeting of the Malaysian Business Council (MBC) in early 1991. Dr Mahathir wanted Malaysia to be “a nation at peace with itself, territorially, and ethnically integrated, living in harmony and in full and fair partnership made of one Bangsa Malaysia”.[5]
Vision 2020 captured the imagination of Malaysians, particularly the non-Malays because this is a clear shift from the exclusivist bangsa Melayu to the all-embracing Bangsa Malaysia. Hilley (2001:4) observed that Dr Mahathir attempts to “galvanise the public imagination through ideas of a shared vision of prosperity”. Thus, Vision 2020 is “more than an industrial plan for advanced economic development. It is an attempt to stimulate a new social context for the emergence of an alternative social order (Hilley 2001:19).
Hilley (2001:20) termed this Vision as a “post-ethnic nationalism” and marked the “gathering shift away from the NEP ideology, ethnic balancing and the old ‘politics of consociationalism’ – class constructions and state forms variously designed to reproduce the ideas and interests of the dominant class fractions across ethnic lines”.
The NEP success in achieving its goals without alienating the non-Malays was mainly attributed to the robust growth of the economy that ensure that the economic pie was large to be shared by all.
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2.1.6 1997 economic crisis and the 1998 political crisis
Anwar Ibrahim, the former deputy prime minister was sacked from his post on 2 Sept 1998. This was the clearest sign of difference between the top two men in the government, something which they both had publicly denied before that. With the sacking of Anwar, Lee (2002:177) observed that “the economic fallout in Malaysia became intertwined with a political crisis.”
After the 1988 UMNO political crisis, Dr Mahathir had managed to purged his party from rival fractions by registering UMNO as a new party, excluding those he seen as his political rivals. Thus, through out the 90s, he manages to consolidate power to himself and to put anyone up or down at his will. Anwar Ibrahim, a student leader back in the 70s is among a few who earned Dr Mahathir’s trust. Anwar meteoric rise to the top was envy to a large numbers of UMNO members.
The baht devaluation in July 1997 sparked a massive economic crisis that hits most of the Asian countries. Dr Mahathir with his usual rhetoric snubbed the International Monetary Fund advice for tighter fiscal policy.
The government announced that the Chinese would be allowed to take over companies owned by Malay to prevent the latter going bankrupt. However, they were not allowed to hold these assets in the long term, as spelt out by Daim Zainuddin, then the Minister of Special Functions: “I’d allow them [the Chinese] to rescue ailing companies. After they recover, they can talk about ownership” (FEER 19/2/9).
Gomez and Jomo (1999:196) observed that “this use of selected Chinese businessmen to help bail out some well-connected Malay businessmen reflects Chinese capital’s continued subordination and obligations to Malay political hegemony”.
On the other hand, Anwar Ibrahim was widely seen as favourable of the tighter fiscal policy. Dr Mahathir announced increase in government spending to facilitate economic growth. This goes against Anwar Ibrahim who was then the Finance Minister as well. These economic differences were downplayed by both men as the usual difference but with the similar goal in mind. Lee (2004:88) pointed out that “some observers believed that each faction was anxious to protect the business interests of its supporters”.
Gomez and Jomo (1999:200) observed that at that time, “the Western media openly encouraged early Anwar succession to national leadership, portraying Dr Mahathir as out-moded, inadequate to the challenge and even ignorant, if not irrational”.
During the 1998 UMNO general assembly, Zahid Hamidi, a protégée of Anwar Ibrahim moved a motion during the debate of the presidential speech. Zahid brought up the cronyism and corruption issue during his speech. This was seen as an indirect attack to Dr Mahathir. Cronyism and corruption was seen as the reason for the weak Asian economic fundamentals including Malaysia.
It was also these two issues that brought down the former Indonesian president Suharto.
Dr Mahathir pulls another rabbit out his political hat by releasing list of names of Bumiputera that had benefited from the government’s share allocation schemes. These names includes non other that Anwar Ibrahim’s father.
That was the clearest sign of Anwar’s challenging Dr Mahathir leadership. Many observers felt that the days of Anwar were numbered. However the swiftness of Anwar’s removal and the subsequent events caught everyone by surprise.
The sacking of Anwar Ibrahim on 2 Sept 1998 ends the dynamic partnership of Mahathir and Anwar in running the country and marked the beginning of Malay splits.
As expected, Anwar did not go quietly. He rallied his supporters for massive demonstrations in the capital city and hold rallies around the country to gather supports. Malays who were left out from the economic growth felt that it is time to push for reforms and PAS was fast in throwing support behind the man they once criticised as the traitor to the Islamic religion.
The political stakes during the 1999 general election were high. There was a general consensus that changes with the existing sociopolitical conditions were possible. It was also in the spirit of reforms that Chinese associations introduced the 17-point election appeals.
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2.1.7 The split of the Malays and Chinese voters as kingmaker
The gentlemen’s agreement to discuss anything sensitive within the Alliance was tested several times throughout the history of Malaysia. The last one was during the 1999 general elections. It was a few months prior to the general elections that 11 Chinese association came together to form The Malaysian Chinese Organisation Election Appeals Committee, or in short Suqiu.
Suqiu came out with a 17-point appeal and “call upon all political parties an candidates in the coming general elections to declare their support and endorsement” (Suqiu 2002:11). This was seen by the BN as a pressure by the Chinese community from outside the Alliance to bow to their demands and the failure of the MCA to co-opt and check on this dissident voices.
After the sacking of the former deputy prime minister Anwar Ibrahim, the Malay community was split and thus, supports from other communities were even more crucial to ensure that BN stays in power. Thus, the BN government do not take this 17-point appeal kindly and seen it as a blackmail by the Chinese community on the BN government. As the Chinese consist of 26 percent of the population, any swing by the Chinese electorates will ensure victory to any candidates the Chinese choose to support.
Khoo Boo Teik (2003:128) in his book Beyond Mahathir: Malaysian Politics and its Discontents noted that “it has become one of UMNO’s stock political myths that ‘disunity’ was something the Malay community could not afford because it implied weakness that would be exploited by others”.
Ratnam and Milne (1970) in their paper published in the Pacific Affairs, noted that in the 1969 general election, UMNO were only commanding 47.7 per cent of the valid Malay votes as compared to Pan Malaya Islam Party (PMIP, the predecessor to PAS) 52.3 per cent.
Khoo (2003:128) suggested that this ‘Malay disunity’ will be invoked to rally for support for UMNO. UMNO argued and persuaded PAS to join the enlarged BN in 1971 and pushed for aggressive implementation of NEP.
In 1987, prior to Operation Lalang, there was an internal power struggle in UMNO between Team A headed by Dr Mahathir and Team B spearheaded by Tengku Razaleigh.
In 1998, it was a challenge to Dr Mahathir leadership mounted from the reformasi movement. In order to rally for Malay supports, UMNO had to create a credible ‘non-Malay threat’. Thus, Suqiu was single out for that purpose.
Weiss (2000:413) noted that the Malay vote was clearly split between UMNO and PAS. Lee (2002:177) also concluded that the deep split in the Malay community was obvious with the participants on the reformasi demonstrations launched by Anwar were largely Malays. Lee (2004:88) noted that “Dr Mahathir’s own reputation had suffered as a result both from the 1997-98 financial crises and from the handling of Anwar’s [reformasi] challenge”.
The Chinese were with the BN since the 1995 general elections. The BA coalition with PAS and Keadilan closely identify with the reformasi movement do not appeal to some Malays and especially the non-Malays. As noted by Weiss (2000:421), some Malaysian voters “expressed dissatisfaction with or distrust Anwar, seeing him as just another opportunistic BN politician”.
Weiss (2000:421) noted that for the non-Malays, Anwar Ibrahim was known for its “pro-Malay, pro-Islam policies of the 1980s and 1990s that have disgruntled non-Malays; hence, his multiracial rhetoric rang a bit hollow to some”.
Thus, in the elections, the choice was clear. It was between the BN’s politics of development and stability and BA’s politics of justice and good governance.
However, even when BA tried to move beyond ethnic politics, its own campaigns and conducts during the run up to the elections were playing into BN’s hand. Weiss (2000:425) noted that since its formation, Keadilan “has grown more Islamic in image”.
However hard the BA tried to move beyond ethnic politics, they know very well that ethnic issues certainly appeal to Malaysians. PAS government in Kelantan – in a move seen as trying to appeal to the Chinese voters – lifted the ban on pig farming.
Even though this move was commendable, Chinese voters never distinguish PAS Islamic politics with UMNO Malay nationalist politics. Lee (2004:90) pointed out that “many Chinese rejected the link between the DAP and PAS”.
Even in the early years of Malaysia, during the debate of national language after the Razak Report was published in 1956, PAS “have often being critical of the government for what is felt to be the inexcusable gradualism in making Malay the sole official language, and foolish tolerance towards the persistence of other language” (Roff 1967:319).
Weiss (2000:425) noted that the elections results for Keadilan candidates could be interpreted as voters identifying Keadilan as a Malay-based party, as all its successful candidates were Muslim Malays.
Lee (2004:90) also pointed out that the party that gained most in the 1999 elections was PAS.
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2.2 THE POLITICAL ECONOMY OF THE PRESS IN MALAYSIA
In Malaysia, the media, especially the press, was controlled through media ownership and also via coercive legislation. Zaharom (2002:112) observed that “the early 1980s saw the emergence of new titles, signifying to many a liberalisation of media policies, a relaxation of control”. However, almost all national dailies in Malaysia are published by three groups that are owned or linked to individuals or political parties of the ruling coalitions.
New Straits Times Press (NSTP) published two English dailies – New Straits Times (NST) and Malay Mail – as well as two Malay dailies – Berita Harian (BH) and Harian Metro.
Utusan Melayu (Malaysia) published the influential Utusan Malaysia. Both NSTP and Utusan are linked to the dominant partner in BN – UMNO.
Star Publications (M) Sdn Bhd – which is owned by the MCA through Huaren Holding – published the leading English daily, The Star.
Thus, as observed by Zaharom (2002:117), that the local press “while seemingly increasing in number, nonetheless are controlled by the same few actors … invariably aligned to political parties and leaders”. Gomez and Jomo (1999:2-3) also concurred that the press in Malaysia are largely owned by politicians or politically influential businessmen.
Hilley (2001:12) noted that the main agenda-setting agency in Malaysia is the mass media, and they “represent a vital part of the UMNO network, helping to filter information, entertainment and civil values”. Gomez and Jomo (1999:3) noted that these BN-controlled media have been “used by the BN to promote and legitimise itself as well as to discredit political opposition and dissent more generally”.
Hilley (2001:12) also observes that Malaysian media, since 1980s have been “encouraging a form of safe ‘role model’ media discourse based on lifestyle images and social concerns”. This strategy, observed Hilley (2001:13), has provided a context for “managed media debate, helping to keep dissent distanced from any meaningful critique of the power structure”. Anyone louder than the ‘tolerated noise’ will be shut out from the debate.
History
The first newspaper published in Malaya was the English language Government Gazette, later called the Prince of Wales Island Gazette (PWIG) on 1 March 1806 (Mustafa 2002:140; Mohd Safar 1996:57). According to Mustafa (2002:140), in the early 1800s, “there was no existing law in the Straits Settlements governing the issuance of newspaper licences”.
The first Chinese language newspapers, The Chinese Monthly Magazine, started its publication in August 1815, and it was produced not for local population but for audiences in China.
Only by 1876, the first Malay newspaper, Jawi Peranakan, was published in Singapore. The first Tamil newspaper, Singai Warthamani was started a year earlier.
During the Japanese rule, the press was designated the main tool of Propaganda Department of the Japanese Military (Mohd Safar 1996:204). After the Japanese surrender, the Malay newspaper such as the Utusan Melayu, which was highly influential among the Malay, particularly rural Malays, took on a more aggressive role in raising Malay consciousness pertaining to the hotly debated issue of Malayan Union (Mohd Safar 1996:213).
However, Utusan Melayu was involved in a takeover by UMNO in 1961. The newspaper worker called for editorial independence that was in line with the newspaper’s original philosophy of fighting for ‘the race, religion and homeland’, while UMNO insisted that the daily should consciously give full support to UMNO (Mustafa 2002:145-46). The 93-day strike was finally over with UMNO gaining control over Utusan Melayu. As observed by Mustafa (2002:146), this is “the first instance in Malaysian journalism since independence of a political party taking over a newspaper”.
Press freedom in Malaysia has a close link to the political climate in Malaysia. Press freedom is usually tightened by the ruling coalition when there are threats to the power of the ruling coalition.
As observed by Mustafa (2002:146), in the aftermath of May 13, press freedom in Malaysia was further restricted. Regulations were amended and ownership structure was changed in the early 1970s.
The government then felt that the locals should control the local media industry; hence the purchase of major stocks in Straits Times Press (STP) Group in 1972 by government-owned PERNAS, which was later transferred to UMNO investment company called Fleet Holdings. By 1984, the transfer was completed and STP was changed to New Straits Times Press (NSTP).
The MCA also began to acquire various media interests starting with their purchase of 67.35 per cent of Star Publications (M) Sdn Bhd in 1979.
Legislation
The tightening of legislations governing the media in Malaysia usually follows as a result of the need for the ruling coalition to exercised greater control over the media. Mustafa (2002:149) observed that “traditionally, the threats of communism and communalism provided justification for these laws. However, the rationale for retaining and applying these laws has been widened and, in some cases, made vague enough to leave a catch-all effect”.
Printing Presses and Publications Act 1984
The main law governing the media had been amended 4 times, each time to tighten and gave the state more power over the media. The Printing Presses Ordinance of 1948 was revised in 1971 and 1974 as the Printing Presses Act. It was then revised in 1984 as the Printing Presses and Publications Act, and again in 1988 after Operasi Lalang.
Initially, this legislation was meant to exercise control over the ownership of printing presses and publications in the face of an increasing threat from communist in Malaya (Mohd Safar 1996:222-24).
The amendment in 1987 gave the Home Minister the power to grant printing permit to any newspapers circulating in Malaysia. The minister’s decision to grant the permit is final, and cannot be challenged in a court of law.
Internal Security Act (ISA) 1960
The ISA was also introduced by the government as a ‘safety net’ at the end of the communist threat in Malaysia. The Act empowers the home affairs minister to impose preventive detention without trial on anyone “acting in a manner prejudicial to the security of Malaysia” (Means 1991:142). Zaharom (2002:124) noted that “over the years, the ISA has seen many people detained not necessarily because of communist connections or subversive activities”.
Official Secret Act (OSA) 1972
The political uncertainty after the May 13 riot provided some justification for the government to introduce the OSA. In theory, this Act prohibit a person from getting information that is deemed an ‘official secret’, but in practice, “it hampered the working journalists and dampened the development of investigative journalism” (Mustafa 2002:151).
The 90s
The improving standards of living of Malaysians, and the general atmosphere of liberalisation after the 1990 “provide the golden opportunity for the profit-driven mainstream newspapers to attract more readers and, by extension, more advertisers by publishing reports and analyses that were politically safe and sanitised” (Mustafa 2002:152).
Mustafa (2002:152) observed that during this period, papers in Malaysia “had undergone cosmetic changes in terms of format and the use of more colours as a way of making themselves visually more attractive”.
Loh and Mustafa (1996:111) observed that “these changes made up for the newspapers’ weaknesses in the crucial area of investigative journalism, and incisive and illuminating commentaries”. Mustafa (2002:152) noted that “these editorial developments constituted a form of social control as they helped newspapers to divert themselves – and the public’s attention – away from controversies, depoliticise issues, and displace people’s rights to political participation”.
The press was generally not critical of the ruling party, but would only give coverage to the opposition when there are opportunities to demonise them. Mustafa (2002:155) observed that “the depiction of political parties in the opposition coalition as disparate and lacking both compatibility and direction, only reinforced the BN’s stereotype of the opposition as being unreliable and unfit to govern the country”.
The mainstream press as a whole was willing to cooperate with the state and place its resources, expertise and influence at the disposal of the BN (Mustafa 2002:161).
Mustafa (2002:162) observed that “the mainstream press under the tense circumstances of September 1998 was unmistakably partisan”. The negative coverage on Anwar after his sacking without him being given any change for rebuttal and the portrayal of street protests as the act that will threatened national security and political stability only goes to show what the press are ready to sacrifice in time of crisis.
The change of editorial of NST is closely linked to the power struggle within the UMNO leadership. Back in 1993, Anwar Ibrahim, then Malaysian Finance Minister, through his associates bought into NSTP and TV3 in a steps widely seen as a preparatory to Anwar’s successful challenge later that year for UMNO’s deputy presidency.
Gomez and Jomo (1999:126) observed that “in the run-up to [UMNO] election, although TV3 and NSTP newspapers were not blatantly supportive of Anwar, they gave him prominent and favourable coverage, while ignoring Ghafar [Baba, then deputy prime minister and deputy president of UMNO] and his camp”.
In the lead-up to the sacking of Anwar Ibrahim in September 1998, Anwar associates, Johan Jaafar, editor-in-chief of Utusan Malaysia, and Nazri Abdullah, group editor of Berita Harian – the leading Malay language dailies – were removed. This removal was seen as an early step in getting ready the media for an all out assault on Anwar after his sacking.
Lee (2004:100) suggested that the purchase of Nanyang Siang Pau and the China Press was an attempt by Dr Ling to deal with the continued challenge fro Team B. While this might be an internal power struggle within the MCA, Chinese in general see this episode as an attempt by the government through the MCA to further domesticate the Chinese press.
Lee (2004:100) noted that “editorial in the Chinese press are relatively more independent compared with the Malay- and English-language newspapers”.
During the proposed use of English in teaching Mathematics and Science controversy, several groups expressed strong reservations. They included Malay language supporters and Chinese educationists. Even Dewan Bahasa dan Pustaka expressed caution. However, the Malay press choose only to highlight the Chinese protests, as if the Malays are united behind this UMNO’s initiative. One could only imagine the Malay press reactions if this idea was mooted by the MCA.
Lee (2004:104) pointed out that the Malay press like Utusan Malaysia labeled the Chinese educationists as chauvinists and exclusionists.
In the period leading up to the 1999 general elections, Utusan was careful not to bash DAP for its political association with PAS. The contest for Malay votes was fierce at that time between UMNO and PAS, and any attempts to discredit PAS will be detrimental to UMNO’s efforts in garnering Malay votes.
Utusan, however, portrayed DAP as a party that do not respect rule of laws, and Utusan is implying that this attitude contradicts DAP’s political struggles. In its 11 August 1999 report, Utusan urged Chinese to deny DAP their supports because DAP do not respect the rule of laws, and not for DAP’s association with PAS.
Perhaps, with the increased sophistication of media consumers in Malaysia, there is hope in this controlled media environment. As observed by Zaharom (2002:131-32), “stringent though the political and economic controls on the Malaysian media may be, raising vital questions about democratic practices, nonetheless it would be rather premature to assert that media audiences are simply duped into accepting at face value what is produced by the controlled media”.
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2.3 Suqiu
Suqiu is the common names for The Malaysian Chinese Organisation Election Appeals Committee. According to Wong Chin Huat writing in Suqiu Document, Suqiu is literally a “voters’ manifesto”. This 17-point appeals (the Appeals) was launched on 16 August 1999, and by the eve of the 1999 general elections, this document was endorsed by 2095 organisations nationwide (Suqiu 2002:13).
These organisations were mainly Chinese organisations because it is a Chinese community’s initiative. However, Wong pointed out that “its spirit and substances are definitely not Chinese but Malaysian oriented”. Lee (2002:184) also noted that the points raised by Suqiu could be divided into two types; the more universal goals similar to the ones promoted by civil society groups, and the one that reflects the usual Chinese concerns like equality in economic, education, and cultural rights.
Plenty of the 17 points raised in the Appeals were universal in nature. For example, Point 14 urged the government to restore confidence in the police force. Suqiu reiterated their stand again on 17 October 2000 by issuing a press statement which urged the government to review the “salary scheme of Malaysian police, to build a clean and professional Police Force, and the regain public confidence” (Suqiu 2002:114).
It is therefore not wrong to say that government do agree and share the same sentiments as that of Suqiu. The 5th Prime Minister of Malaysia Abdullah Ahmad Badawi on 29 December 2003 announced that Malaysian government will set up a Royal Commission to “study and recommend steps to enhance the capability of the Royal Malaysia Police (PDRM) (Bernama 29 Dec 2003).
According the Bernama news report, Abdullah said the proposed commission would modernise all operational and work aspects of the police, taking into account policing techniques and human rights issues, including women's rights.
In fact, Lee (2002:184) noted that the Cabinet voted to support the Appeals in principle. However, during the period leading to the general elections, the BN took the usual strategy to ethnicised legitimate universal appeals in order to whip up ethnic sentiments.
While UMNO’s strategy was to focus on the ethnic aspect of the appeals, PAS and Keadilan avoided the ethnic appeals and focus on the universal ones.
Looking back, Suqiu is not something new from the Chinese community but a “continuation of its previous calls for an inclusive Malaya/Malaysia”. In the 80s, there were also two similar documents – Memorandum of National Culture (1983) and the Joint Declarations of Chinese Organisations (1986).
Back in June 1999, with elections expected to be held anytime, the Selangor Chinese Assembly Hall (SCAH) took the initiative to organise dialogue between the Chinese community leaders and the representatives of both the ruling and oppositions parties.
On 16 August 1999, the SCAH together with 10 other Chinese organisations launched the final version of the Appeals in Malay, English and Chinese.
One interesting episode within the Suqiu was the proposal by the Federation of Chinese Associations Malaysia (FCAM) to include an ethnic Chinese second PM and an ethnic Chinese Finance Minister as part of the final draft. Even though Suqiu rejected outright this suggestion from FCAM, it was eventually accused by the mass media of playing up racial sentiments.
The main theme for the Appeals were promote national unity, advance democracy, uphold human rights and justice, curb corruption, fair and equitable economic policy, review the privatisation policy, enlightened, liberal and progressive education policy, let multiethnic cultures flourish, protect the Malaysian environment, develop and modernize new villages, housing for all, protect women’s rights, fair media, restore confidence in the police force, upgrade social services, respect the rights of workers, and provide for our indigenous people.
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2.3.1 History of Chinese pressure
The three main concerns of the Malaysian Chinese can be summed up in three aspects – politics, economic, and culture.
Politically, Malaysian Chinese always felt that Malay special rights put the Chinese as second-class citizen. Milne and Mauzy (1999:95) noted that the Chinese felt that they “should be hired in the public service, armed forces, etc., in accordance with their proportion in the population”.
Economically, Malaysian Chinese felt that the aggressive implementation of the NEP had compromised their opportunity in business.
Malaysian Chinese also takes the right for mother-tongue education seriously because language vital for the continuation of Chinese culture. Milne & Mauzy (1999:90) noted that the “Chinese seemed to be especially vociferous on language and educational issues”.
Lee and Heng (2000:194-5) argued that Chinese political parties on both sides of the national political divide “have always sought to represent the community bedrock interests: rights of full citizenship, opportunity for economic advancement, preservation of the Chinese language and Chinese schools, and outlets for public cultural expression”.
Politically, Malaysian Chinese had come to term with the Malay special rights, and economically, Malaysian Chinese had been able to form symbiotic business partnership with Malay corporate elites.
The issue of Chinese education has remained a fundamental concern to the Chinese community, and currently the most contentious of all. Tan Liok Ee (2000), in her stuffy on Chinese schools in Malaysia noted that Malaysia is the only country outside of China where there is a well-developed system of Chinese schools that is largely supported by the state. She argued that these Chinese schools are not only educationally significant but also culturally and politically important to the Chinese.
Tan (2000:228) argued that the Chinese schools in Malaysia are an unusual example of education institutions which began as schools serving a migrant community, but were able to evolve into a vibrant part of the education system of a multi-ethnic nation.
According to the Report of the MCA National Task Force (1988:89) published in 1988, and Tan (2002:157) close to 90 per cent of Chinese parents sent their children to Chinese primary national-type schools. This percentage drop a bit a few years later and Lee (2004:105) pointed out that some 70 per cent of Chinese parents send their children to Chinese schools.
This 70 per cent also includes some 60,000 non-Chinese students enrolled in Chinese schools in 2000 (Tan 2002:164). Thus, Chinese educationists maintain that the Chinese school stream is not exclusivist. According to Tan (2002:155), there are today 1,284 national-type primary schools (NTPSs), and 60 independent Chinese secondary schools (ICSSs).
The ruling government also makes it a point to point out that the existence of ICSSs is not an issue and their existence are guaranteed under the Education Act 1996. This issue will surface every time an election is near. In the period leading up to the 1999 general elections, Malaysian government, perhaps anticipating that it will resurfaced again, reminded political parties not to exploit this issue (Chinese school here to stay, The Star, 5 September 1999, p4).
Chinese schools could be found not only in towns but also small villages, wherever there was a group of children needing a school and some local leaders prepared to take the initiative to organise one. According to Tan (2002:157) local leaders “had a social and moral obligation to keep the schools going and, together with Chinese schoolteachers, enjoyed both status and respect for their role in fulfilling a social and cultural need”.
The common complaints of Chinese educationists were that there was no provision for new or additional NTPSs, less generous grants, and insufficient attention on training more teachers (Tan 2002:157).
In the past, Chinese schools grew according to local needs. Since independence, government has played a dominant role in education, seeking control over all schools, including the growth of Chinese schools.
Even in the days leading to the independence of Malaya, Chinese education groups were vocal in voicing their protests in what they seen as steps by the government to sidelined Chinese education and Chinese language values. Roff (1967:318) noted that the Chinese Guilds and Associations response to the release of the Razak Report in 1956 by demanding that Chinese language be accepted as an official language as well, and be accorded the same status as the Malay language in the national education system.
Within the framework of the Alliance, MCA too tried to pressure its partner, UMNO in endorsing Chinese language as an additional official language. After Dr Lim Chong Eu was elected the president in 1958, the United Chinese School Teachers’ Association, and the Chinese Guilds and Associations began to pressure Dr Lim.
It is difficult to tell why an English-educated politician would take up this cause. Certainly by taking up this cause, Dr Lim hoped to draw these Chinese organisations into the national decision making process.
However, this decision was not being received kindly by UMNO, especially after Dr Lim wrote letter to Tunku Abdul Rahman, outlining demands concerning language and the increase of seats allocation in the upcoming elections. MCA threatened to quit the Alliance unless these demands were met. The Alliance National Council, which Tunku was the chairman, announced that MCA must withdrawn these demands. Soon after that, Dr Lim resigned as the president of MCA and was replaced by Tan Siew Sin, the son of MCA founder.
This episode demonstrated that the role of MCA within the ruling coalition is to explain and persuade the Chinese community to support government’s policies, not as a vehicle to pressure the government. This episode is a clear lesson for the Chinese organisations that it is usually fruitless to pressure the government through political channel.
Lucien Pye (1985:251) also pointed out that Confucian culture do not provide any guidelines for Chinese leaders to function in a non-Confucian context. Worse still, the idea of Chinese being the subordinates of a foreign power is “unthinkable”. Pye (1985: 251) added that “any Chinese who acts as a leader must be an imposter, if he is subservient to the Malay majority leadership”.
This observation might explain the low status of MCA leaders in the Chinese community. The Chinese had long dismissed MCA leaders as selling out Chinese rights when they agreed to the deals brokered with UMNO. Gomez and Jomo (1999:12) observed that “in vein of the bourgeois nature of the MCA leadership and its subservient role to UMNO in the ruling coalition, the party has always have much difficulty in galvanising and sustaining the support of the working-class and middle-class Chinese”.
As Pye pointed out, the “MCA leaders who supported the pro-UMNO constitutional deal were characterized as self-serving towkays (merchants) … and who were willing to serve as UMNO lackeys in order to reap the spoils of the political office”.
It certainly did not help the MCA that their early leaders were mostly merchants. Chinese cultural and language leaders, that have extensive networks with the masses were largely aligned to the Malayan Communist Party (MCP), the party that British choose to ignore despite MCP’s contribution to the fall of the Japanese Occupation in Malaya.
Having said that, Lee and Heng (2000:223) argued that Chinese in Malaysia have developed “appropriate responses to successive groups of power wielders, and that Chinese co-operation in the Malaysian political system is central to the maintenance of political stability and inter-ethnic harmony”.
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2.3.2 The chronology of the episode
1999 June – The Civil Rights Committee (CRC) of Selangor Chinese Assembly Hall (SCAH) worked on to organise a dialogue between the Chinese community leader and the representatives of both the ruling and opposition parties.
1999 August 16 – Final version of the Appeals launched in Malay, English and Chinese and Suqiu started the endorsement drive.
1999 Sept 6 – DPM Abdullah said “Suqiu is not allowed to bargain with government”.
1999 Sept 20 – PM Dr Mahathir labeled Suqiu as “a mean to pressurise the government” and criticised it for “damaging racial harmony”.
1999 Sept 23 – 11 ministers, led by Dr Ling Liong Sik, Dr Lim Keng Yeik and Dr Lau Hieng Ding, met with Suqiu and accepted the Appeals in principle. NST quoted Dr Ling as saying that “Suqiu represented 99 per cent of Malaysian Chinese”.
1999 Oct 19 – Suqiu issued a press statement that to date, Suqiu has not received any invitation to sit on the NECC II. However, Suqiu resolved not to do so should the invitation arrive in the future. Reasons given are: Suqiu will promote the Appeals through public education; and since BN, in principle, have accepted the Appeals, it is up to the Cabinet, not NECC II, to realise those Appeals.
1999 Oct 19 – BA expressed their supports to a number of principles and concerns outlined in the Appeals.
2000 May – Suqiu permanent secretariat was set up in SCAH.
2000 August 8 – Judgment day for Anwar’s corruption charge.
2000 August 14 – Malay media tried to plying up businessman David Chua’s call for overview of Bumiputra privileges in an interview with FEER.
2000 August 16 – First anniversary celebration and launching of Suqiu website. The next day, Utusan headlined “Persatuan Cina Ulangi Tuntutan” [Chinese association repeat its demands].
2000 August 17 – 200 UMNO Youth members, lead by its deputy chief Abdul Aziz, demanded Suqiu to abandon its Appeals and to apologise to the Bumiputra society within a week, or, they will burn down the SCAH.
2000 August 31 – PM Dr Mahathir labeled Suqiu as ‘extremist’ and made equivalent to the communist and religious insurgent in his National Day speech.
2000 Sept 15 – 20 members of Suqiu committee meet up with PM to explained Suqiu aspirations. PM admit BN accept the Appeals before the general elections so that BN will not lose Chinese supports.
2000 Nov 29 – BA secured victory in Lunas by-election, a mix constituency which has been BN stronghold since independence.
2000 Dec 11 – PM reiterated his equating of Suqiu with the communists when answering questions by Kota Melaka MP (DAP) Kerk Kim Hock in Parliament. PM admit the government was just forced to accept the Appeals in principle.
2000 Dec 13 – 500 members of GPMS held a demonstration. Its president Suhaimi Ibrahim demanded Suqiu to withdraw all its 83 sub-points within a month or GPMS will call for national demonstration and issue their own 100 demands.
2000 Dec 29 – Suqiu negotiated with UMNO Youth to set aside 7 sub-points.
2001 Jan 5 – Suqiu ‘put aside’ seven out of its 83 sub-point appeals in a joint statement with the UMNO Youth.
Footnote:
[1] Alliance Manifesto for the Federal Elections, June 1955.
[2] Abdul Aziz Ishak had confiscated all the licenses of Chinese rice millers in northern Perak and Province Wellesley (Seberang Perai, Penang) with which to win Malay’s supports.
[3] The Third Malaysia Plan (1876-80) acknowledges the poverty of non-Malay groups, and their need for improved access to education, healthcare and amenities.
[4] New Straits Times, 19 June 1999, p6, 18 as cited in Andaya & Andaya 2001:327.
[5] New Straits Times, March 2, 1991.
2.1 Political landscape
Hwang (2003:10-12) divided independent Malaysia politics into four phases. The first phase, according to him was after independence until the May 13 riots. During this phase, Malay dominance formed the foundations of Malaysian political landscape, but with strong recognition of the non-Malay political role.
The implementation of NEP in 1970 marked the second phase of Malaysian politics, with shift in the UMNO leaders’ attitude for moderate consociational bargaining to one of more hegemonic control.
Political challenge to Dr Mahathir leadership in 1987 shifted the state power from UMNO to Mahathir. This phase marked the consolidation of Dr Mahathir’s authoritarian rule, and courting the non-Malays neglected under NEP.
The fourth phase of Malaysian politics starts with the sacking of Anwar Ibrahim from his Cabinet post in 2 Sept 1998. Anwar reformasi movement marked the emergence of a multi-ethnic consciousness in Malaysian civil society.
Malaysia has been described as an authoritarian (Gomez & Jomo 1999), semi-authoritarian (Crouch 1992), semi-democratic (Case 1993) and quasi-democratic (Zakaria 1989) state since its independence in 1957.
In order to better understand the origins of ethnic politics in Malaysia, we need to trace back the early stage of nationhood of Malaysia, starting from the period prior to the British rule in Malaya, the impact of British rule in Malaya, the Japanese Occupation, the early stage of independence negotiations, and the vague but yet influential ‘social contracts’.
2.1.1 Melaka and Malay Dominance
Melaka before it was invaded by the Portuguese in 1511 A.D. was the major entreport in Asia. Today, it is only a reminder of the once great Malay Muslim Empire that is still a source of pride among the Malays in Malaysia.
It was in the 15th century when trade was among the major income to the Melaka sultanate particularly and to the people of Southeast Asia generally. The Southeast Asia region is also often referred to as the Nusantara Archipelago. Natives in this archipelago shared the same cultural roots.
It was believed that the Malays migrated from the southern part of China and settled in this region before the Chinese and Indian immigrants. It is important to note that the Malays were immigrant themselves. However, the Malays in Malaysia claimed special positions and the status of being natives to the land. This shall be the source of contention for many years after the special privileges were formally enshrined into the 1957 Merdeka Constitution, the supreme law in Malaysia.
When the Melaka sultanate was mention in any setting within the Malay community, a sense of pride and shame teased their hearts. Pride because it reminds them those glory days when Melaka was the centre of trade in Asia and what Malays community is capable of. Shame because it reminds them the catastrophe for being complacent of their achievements and how they were tricked into discriminating treaties and agreements by the foreign powers that finally resulted them being left behind by other immigrant races like the Chinese and the Indians. As pointed out by Von Vorys, “traditional Malay society was especially vulnerable to external predatory initiatives” (1976:36).
The Malays have to be subjected to the rule of foreign western powers until the World War II that saw the participation of the Japanese army for the Pacific theater. For over 400 years, the Malays only managed to see in awe what the western powers were capable of, especially in exploiting their beloved lands.
The Malays were also constantly being made to believe that they would never be capable to run the country. The term ‘lazy natives’ were always being used to describe the Malays. This ‘lazy native’s myth’ was also the justification used by the British to pursued aggressive immigration policies in bringing in foreign labours from China and India.
Gomez and Jomo (1999:10) noted that “despite the formation of a plural society in Malaysia with the mass migration of Chinese and Indians into the country, there was very little integration and only limited interaction among the ethnic communities”.
The British argue that these influxes of foreign communities were crucial to support the labours demands for the economy of Malaya then. Hilley (2001:23) observed that the “British and other commercial interests have sought to restructure [Malaya] domestic economy, turning it from subsistence agriculture into key producer of primary products and raw materials for the British and European markets”.
If this past account gave the impression that the British actively sidelined the entire Malay community, it is only half of the story. During the British colonial time, they had actively engaged the elites in the Malay community, and to protect their interests by promoting their positions in the community.
According to Haque (2003:247), the British had “arranged English education and training for the sons of aristocratic Malays to join certain positions in the Malayan Civil Service (MCS). Haque also noted that the Malay Administrative Service (MAS) were created for these privileged Malays, but actively leave out the ordinary Malays (Means 1986:97 as cited in Haque 2003).
Thus, we could only speculate the reason the ruling elites in Malaysia arguing for the preferential treatments for the Malays. According to Haque, the proportion of Malays and non-Malays entering the MCS was required to be 4:1, to “ensure that they were not marginalised by non-Malays” (2003:247).
Andaya and Andaya (2001:174) noted that the co-operation of the Malay ruling class, initially the most hostile towards the British … was essential for the success of indirect rule. Andaya and Andaya (2001:174) pointed out that “a primary mean of gaining the desired co-operation was to compensate the ruling class for income they had lost through the abolition of slavery and the introduction of a central treasury”.
In another word, it was their own social and economy well-being that concerns them most, not the welfare of the mass. And yet, the present Malay political elites have elevated their status, including the sultans, to that of Malay special privileges guardian.
Andaya and Andaya (2001:175) noted that such relationship with the British resulted the Malay sultans and elites losing most of their former powers, but the British support gave them security from potential challengers. Hilley (2001:27) concurred that “the British had employed a form of indirect rule, by adhering to pro-Malay policies and recognizing the Malay Sultans as ‘natural rulers’, thus avoiding unnecessary conflict”.
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2.1.2 The Japanese Invasion
As discussed above, for over 400 hundreds years, the Malays were made to believe that they are not capable of running the country and the western races were invincible. The swift success of the Japanese army invasion over the large part of Asia generally, and especially their two weeks campaign in Peninsula Malaysia demolished this myth once and for all. Previously, even the lower administration clerks job were sourced directly by the British from India.
When the Japanese defeated the British in Peninsula Malaysia, they established the Japanese Emperor administration to replace it. As a strategy to influence the Malays to support the Japanese invasion, some administration posts were passed to the Malays. This is to minimize local insurgence by the Malays community. Malays were also recruited into the police force.
The Japanese used this strategy to pit the Malays against the Chinese in Malaya. Oversea Chinese donated large sum of money to support China during the Japanese campaign back in 1938. As revenge, the Japanese targeted the Chinese in their ‘purifying’ campaign of the Malaya. Thus, the Malay police force was used to hunt down the Chinese. This strategy leaves a sore point between the Chinese and the Malays in the post-WW2 period in Malaysia.
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2.1.3 The Malayan Union
The Malayan Union proposed by the returning British after the WW2 was perhaps the best chance for the immigrant communities especially the Chinese and Indians to fight for equal citizenship. However, the political consciousness of these two communities was largely aligned to their home countries – China and India.
Hilley (2001:27) noted that the Malayan Union was an “attempt to move towards a more uniform [political] structure in 1946” and to “bring the nine Malay states …, plus two Straits Settlements … under the ambit of stable central governing body for the first time”.
The period after WW2 was a period of uncertainty, with the status of Malaya as a country unclear. Hence, the Chinese saw it fit to keep their Chinese citizenship than to give it up and fight for Malayan citizenship which is uncertain of coming in the first place.
Therefore, when the Malayan Union proposed of equal citizenship to everyone in Malaya, the Malays through their vernacular newspapers were strongly opposed to the idea while the Chinese only gave it a cold response. Chinese papers gave scant coverage to this aspect of the Malayan Union. The Majority of the Chinese still felt that their homeland was China and Malaya was only a temporary place. (Fujio 2003:98).
The rally by the Utusan, an influential Malay paper saw the rise of Malay political consciousness, led by a Malay leader Onn Jaafar from Johor. The Malays saw the need to come together to defend their rights in Malaya and thus, United Malays National Organisation (UMNO) was formed in 1948 with this purpose in mind.
The scheme was replaced in 1948 by the Federation of Malaya Agreement, drawn up by British and Malay leaders, which the non-Malays did not get the full citizenship rights.
Hilley (2001:28) observed that this 1948 Agreement gave rise to the “communally located political parties”. The Agreement itself had set a trend in distinguished Malaya citizens into two categories. This gave the political parties a “communal agenda … for political mobilization of the subordinate classes”. Hilley (2001:27) said this enable UMNO, MCA and MIC to emerge as the “class patrons for each ethnic grouping”.
The founder of UMNO, Onn bin Jaafar wanted to open UMNO to all Malayan, but his idea was strongly opposed by UMNO members and he later left UMNO and set up the non-communal Independence of Malaya Party (IMP) in 1951. It did not attract much support from anyone. Zakaria (1993:356) observed that “the failure of non-communal political parties is simply a consequence of a nature of the polity in which political mobilisation has greatest success when it appeals to race”.
At that time, when the idea to replace Malayan Union solidified, the non-communal All Malay Council of Joint Action (AMCJA) came to being and called for the a political structure that recognise universal citizenship. However, the British choose to support and negotiate with the Alliance for the independence of Malaya.
Another potent force at that time was the Malaya Communist Party (MCP). Hilley (2001:28) observed that the British “portray the MCP as an avowedly Chinese nationalist body, rather than a broad-based, anti-colonial class movement, the British hope to stifle Malay support for any form of class politics or radical nationalism”.
Khoo (1997:51) noted that despite its mainly Chinese base, MCP managed to garner commendable Malay and Indians’ supports by 1948.
Gomez and Jomo (1999:11) noted that as tension mounted between the British and the Malayan Communist Party (MCP) – despite MCP crucial role in helping the British defeating the Japanese – “the need for an alternative Chinese party that was conservative yet pliant to British interests became imperative”.
The British turned to a leading Chinese businessman Tan Cheng Lock for such purpose and the Malayan (later Malaysian) Chinese Association (MCA) was formed in February 1949.
Overall, Hilley (2001:29) concluded that the British legacy was significant to Malay from three aspects:
“First, it helped drawn the Malayan economy into the world capitalist system, thus setting the basic metropole-domestic class relations. Second, as a central feature of this process, it created an ethnic division of labour in which racial attributes became synonymous with class position. And, third, it provided the nucleus of a pragmatic alliance between the Malay aristocracy/state bureaucracy, the main Chinese commercial bourgeoisie and Indian petite bourgeoisie, setting the framework of class accommodations, consociational politics and ethnic ideology to follow”.
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2.1.4 The Alliance and the Merdeka social contract
It can be said that the first generation of the leaders forming the core of the Alliance shared some of the similar characteristics. Tunku Abdul Rahman of UMNO, Tan Cheng Lock of Malaysia Chinese Association (MCA) and Sambathan of Malaysia Indian Congress (MIC) all were convinced that the “single most critical fact with which a viable political system would have to come to grips was the dominance of profound communal cleavages” (Von Vorys 1976:13). This communal cleavage is one single factor that “radically distinguished it from its Western counterparts”.
The Alliance leaders recognised the grip of communal cleavages in human personality that they are convinced that “the only reasonable course to follow was to recognise communal groups as essential, legitimate components of the political system (Von Vorys 1976:14). Hence, the Alliance was formed with individual political parties intact to represent their respective communities.
The early Alliance leaders also were able to mobilise popular support because they were “themselves primarily communal leaders”.
Von Vorys (1976) also pointed out that these leaders shared certain beliefs like: a preference for democratic politics in resolving political conflicts and in providing legitimacy for the political system, and seeing the use of violence as a bad form and poor judgment, and coercion as only the last resort of public policy. They were also educated in English school.
Due to this sociopolitical background, “Malaysian (Malayan) leaders set out to establish a viable, democratic system not based on a national community, but on the cooperation of discrete communal groups” (Von Vorys 1976:14).
Von Vorys listed out the four features of this political arrangement:
The relationship of citizens within the same group would continue to be managed through a semi-autonomous communal hierarchy;
The relationships of citizen across communal boundaries or to the government would be regulated through terms agreed to by an inter-communal Directorate at the highest level;
The terms of inter-communal relations would be promulgated in a constitutional contract, and then implemented and when necessary augmented by policies secretly negotiated;
The members of the Directorate would have to possess dual qualification. They would have to be the leaders of the political organisation of their community most capable of mobilizing mass support behind the government in democratically conducted elections.
They would also have to be men who would maintain the confidence of their colleagues by keeping negotiations within the Directorate secret and by refraining from ever mobilizing their external communal mass-support to bring pressure on the secret negotiations (1976:14-15).
Under the 1957 Merdeka Constitution, the Malays were given ‘special privileges’ status, not the ‘special rights’ as often heard these days. These ‘special privileges’ were enshrined in Article 153 of the Constitution as an exchange to the extension of political rights to the non-Malays then.
This bargaining is commonly known as the social contract between the Malays and the non-Malays in Malaysia. It is considered the cornerstone to the formation of Malaysia and the very concept where modern Malaysian society is built upon. Hence, as noted by Hilley (2001:1), Malaysia had reached “a settlement structured around ethnic parties and communal politics”.
The members of the Alliance also pledged to “establish a type of national school that will be acceptable to the people of Malaya.”[1]
In the Report of the Education Committee 1956, better known as the Razak Report, the direction of this ‘national school’ was envisioned to share common syllabuses for all school throughout the country and for the Malay and English to be made compulsory subjects in all primary and secondary schools.
Roff (1967:318) noted that the exclusion of Chinese or Tamil language as a compulsory subject do not received strong objections from the leaders of the Malayan (later Malaysian) Chinese Association and the response from the Chinese press were restrained and hopeful.
The Chinese and Indian leaders were probably overcome by the euphoria of the prospect of gaining independence for Malaya.
However, the Malays intellectuals were not satisfied with the Razak Report. Outside the UMNO, various Malay Teachers’ Associations, the Malay Language Society of the University, and PENA the national writers association united under the leadership of the National Language Action Front (NLAF) to voice their dissatisfaction. This protest simply means that UMNO was losing grip of the Malay intellectuals. The loudest criticism was voiced when NLAF accused Tunku Abdul Rahman of betraying the Malays.
For the Chinese community, the political party representing them – the MCA – only played marginal roles on most Chinese daily lives. Chinese communities also treat their chambers of commerce and their clan associations with great respect and importance.
Thus, when the Alliance and later the Barisan Nasional coalition government, managed to co-opt the largely Malay and Indians communities into the mainstream political ideology, the Chinese had different channels to vent their dissatisfactions and to seek help. This is one of the reasons for a large number of Chinese to have their own psyche and do not share the national sentiments.
“Alliance ideology had helped institutionalises an exclusive ‘partnership of understanding’ between ethnic patrons who between them claimed the necessary abilities to manage racial tensions and promote social prosperity”.
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2.1.5 The May 13 racial riot and the NEP
Among the darkest history of Malaysia are the May 13 racial riots in 1969. The official explanation of the cause of the riot was the economic imbalance among the different races in Malaysia. After the riot, Malaysia was declared under the state of Emergency. Operation of the country was transferred from the Cabinet to the newly formed National Action Council (NAC).
As Milne (1970:??) noted that the riot “showed that consensus was low and that primordial loyalties were high.” Hilley (2001:29) observed that “in contrast to the Malay elite, the economic position of ordinary Malays had not been substantially improved by decolonization”. The Malays feared that their political position and constitutional rights will be threatened by the outcome of the 1969 general elections (Hilley 2001:31). Gomez and Jomo (1999:21) also noted that “despite steady growth, diversification and low inflation, unemployment had been growing and ethnic tensions grew as inequalities were increasingly perceived in ethnic terms and attributes to the ‘ethnic other’ ”.
Brown (1994) however, explained the May 13 riot from the class struggle perspective. He (1994:233) noted that “by the end of the 1960s, it was becoming increasingly evident that the net result of government economic policies was the redistribution of wealth, within each racial community, from the poor to the rich.
Anand (1983:96) noted that by 1970, “nearly 90 per cent of overall income inequality was due to differences within racial groups, rather than to differences between them”.
These income inequalities, according to Brown (1994:234) “prompt significant sections of the subordinate classes in each racial group to withdraw their support for the Alliance parties and to seek alternatives channels for articulating their interests”.
The 1969 riot in Malaysia is often seen as a landmark event that shapes the future of Malaysia. If the Article 153 in the Constitutions institutionalised communalism, then the New Economic Policy (NEP) put forward by the National Operation Council (NOC) certainly operationalised it. Almost every single policy implemented in Malaysia after that was somehow influenced by the NEP.
Economically, the skewed distribution of wealth among different ethnic groups ‘forced the Malaysian government to fundamentally rethink its economic policy’ (Andaya & Andaya 2001:302). In 1970, 75 per cent of households living under poverty lines were Malays.
However, it would be inaccurate to assume that the Chinese controls all the wealth in Malaysia. Chinese economic role might be bigger that the Malays, but this is still inferior compared to foreign capital. According to Heng (1998:55), the diverse and widespread economic role of the Chinese might gave the impression that they controlled the economy of Malaysia at that period.
Politically, after the poor showing of UMNO in the 1969 general elections, UMNO had to heed the pressure from the Malay community in order to stay relevant. The Tunku, at that time, was unwilling to advance Malay welfare at the expense of holding back Chinese business interests. There was general perception that the prime minister who is also the president of UMNO was too compromising to the non-Malays. Some of UMNO leader like the Minister of Agriculture, Abdul Aziz Ishak had called for the advancement of Malay economic interests, even at the expense of the Chinese.[2]
The Constitutions were suspended, and National Operations Council (NOC) was formed to run the country. NOC was headed by the then deputy prime minister Abdul Razak. Tunku Abdul Rahman stepped down soon after that and Abdul Razak took leadership after that.
NOC finally launched the New Economic Policy (NEP) in 1971 with the purpose to correct the economic imbalance among the different races in Malaysia. The main objectives of the NEP were:
a. To reduce and eradicate poverty by increasing employment opportunities to every Malaysian regardless of ethnic background.
b. To restructure the society and to eventually eradicate the identification of ethnic groups according their occupation.
Implicitly, the NEP aimed to reduce poverty among the Malays. In order to achieve this objective, government pursued aggressive positive affirmative actions aimed at the Malays. Malays were given subsidies, preferential treatment in granting licenses and franchises, quotas in government jobs and university places. For example, 64 percent of local universities places were reserved for the Malays. This number was in recent years reduced slowly.
In pursuing these two objectives, the implementation seems to focus on the eradication of poverty along communal lines. History will be twisted to provide justification to this one-sided policy. The official narrative will point to the colonial policies which put the Bumiputra at a disadvantage position. Even though there is an official recognition[3] that poverty exist in all communities, the focus is usually on the Bumiputra because of Malay special rights and that they are discriminated during the colonial era.
At the same time, the Alliance was expanded to include opposition political parties like PAS (which later left) and was known as Barisan Nasional (BN). Tun Razak’s key objective was to implement UMNO’s long overdue objective of redressing the problem of Malay economic weakness through the implementation of the NEP.
In achieving the second objective, government introduced the Industrial Co-ordination Act 1975 which “required the private sectors to employ 30 per cent Malays at every level or risk revocation of their licenses” (Andaya & Andaya 2001:314).
The NEP officially ended in 1990 with the introduction of National Development Policy (NDP). Despite the aggressive interventionist steps taken by the government, ‘ethnic and economic disparities were still very much part of Malaysian life’ (Andaya & Andaya 2001:318). This gave the Malay nationalists reason to call for the maintenance of the Malay special rights and created an atmosphere of fear and siege that help to define the political roles for UMNO.
Often, the NEP will be abused for political mileage. Malays will be constantly reminded to support the existing government in order for them to continually enjoy the special privileges. The NEP also created a new class of Malays that benefited from the government-sponsored oversea tertiary educations and government contracts. The main beneficiaries of NEP were the Malay bureaucrats and politicians.
Brown (1994:246) noted that the main impact of the NEP was that it “further increases the income and occupational disparities within the Malay community”.
This eventually split the Malays into groups that support the present government because they benefited from it and those who prefer reforms because they see the special privileges as a political blackmail.
The anticipated protests by the Chinese bourgeois did not materialised even though from the surface, the NEP pro-Malay development and wealth redistribution programs will jeopardise Chinese economic interests. In fact, MCA continue to co-operate with UMNO even though the NEP did not argue well for MCA political status. Brown (1994:247) suggested that the obvious explanation for this is that the NEP “has been implemented so as to minimize its adverse impact upon the Chinese commercial and business sectors and indeed to ensure their continued prosperity”.
In the 1999 general elections, the Malays are clearly divided into the urban middle class UMNO supporters on one side and the largely rural lower class PAS supporters. Of course, the division is not that clear cut. There are also urban Malay middle class, who themselves benefited from the NEP, who join their rural brethrens to push for reforms.
In 1991, the NEP was replaced by the National Development Policy (NDP). NEP failed to achieve some of the objectives outlined. The ownership of share capital in limited companies by the Bumiputeras (read: Malays) did not hit 30 percent as targeted by NEP.
Andaya and Andaya (2001) noted that the NEP would ‘have been difficult to implement had it not been for UMNO’s power in the governing coalition’. After the Parliament resumed in February 1971, amendments were passed in Dewan Rakyat which enables the government to implement these policies. Steps were also taken to remove the public discussion of ‘sensitive issues’ like the power and status of the Malay rulers, Malay special privileges, Malay as national language and the status of Islam as the official religion.
This reality is in stark contrast to the official rhetoric of equal partnership and power-sharing of the governing coalition. Up to 1969, UMNO still treat its two weaker partners with respect. However, with UMNO losing its credibility after the elections, it had no choice but to maintain its own relevance to the Malay community. The poor elections result of its Chinese partner, MCA also greatly weakens its bargaining power with UMNO (Andaya & Andaya 2001:325).
The massive social restructuring of the NEP also saw the restructuring of the politics in Malaysia. The Alliance was expanded to include the PAS and was known as Barisan Nasional (National Front) from then on.
Since then, the Barisan Nasional has been able to win more than two-third of the seats in Parliament due to the clever combinations of persuasive and coercive tactics. This enable the BN to amend the Constitutions ‘at will to suit its purpose’ (Andaya & Andaya 2001:327).
UMNO is also never shy in letting the coalition partners to know who the actual boss is and who could have the final say. Dr Mahathir, well-known for his tactics in consolidating powers to the executive, stated that ‘UMNO is the backbone, the very bulwark of the Barisan Nasional.’[4]
The position of UMNO within the ruling coalition and the government is so strong that any threats to the party are usually internal power struggle rather than external threats.
In recent history, two particular events had shaped the position of UMNO within the society and resulted in UMNO reasserting its position as the defender of Malay special rights. In these two occasions, it’s the non-Malay who suffered as they are used as a bogeyman in UMNO communal rhetoric.
The Operasi Lallang in 1987 was the response of UMNO to the perceived threats to the party internally and externally. The challenge to UMNO leadership of Dr Mahathir by Tengku Razaleigh, together with the dissatisfaction of the Chinese community caused by the appointment of non-Chinese speaking Chinese to head Chinese schools gave UMNO the opportunity to clamp down on its enemies, both internal and external.
In this episode, language and education were the main cause of the Chinese dissatisfaction.
The 1998 episode was the accumulation of political crisis as a result of Asian economic crisis ravaging through Asia in 1997. The ambitious Anwar Ibrahim, inspired by the reformasi movement in Indonesia attempted to challenge Dr Mahathir to the premiership. The initial differences in handling the economic crisis later spilled to the political arena, climaxed with the sacking of Anwar Ibrahim from the post of deputy prime minister and deputy president of UMNO. He was later charged in court for sodomy and corruption. This episode caused a massive swing of Malay supports to the Opposition, especially with the forming of Parti Keadilan Nasional by Anwar’s wife.
UMNO had to reassert its position as the defender of the Malay special rights. The clever dissemination of message by the mainstream papers enables UMNO to tell the Malays a different picture while paint a different picture to the non-Malays. To the Malays, Anwar was painted as the cause of disunity in the community. This, UMNO argued, will result the Malay community being weak and unable to defend its interests. On the other hand, PAS was portrayed as an extremist Islamic party to the non-Malay, especially the Chinese. The political collaboration of DAP and PAS in Barisan Alternatif caused the former to lost their traditional supporters.
Some Malaysian observers argued that the 1998 episode is the start to more principle-based politics, departing from the usual communal politics. This thesis argues that, even under such conducive environment, clever dissemination of messages by the ruling coalitions and their control over the mass media enables them to ethnicised even universal issues. The Suqiu episode is one clear example.
Communal issues will always remain relevant in Malaysia as long as the present political structure is maintain, and this writer believe that political elites in Malaysia will strive hard to maintain such structure.
At the end of NEP, official figures showed it had succeeded in achieving its major goals. Although official figures show that the Malay share of corporate equity did not achieve the targeted figure of 30 per cent, some non-official reports showed that the figure in fact has been achieved (Malaysian Chinese Association, Report of the MCA National Task Force 1988: 32).
The National Development Policy (NDP) was formulated to replace NEP with the same social and economic objective of achieving national unity. However, NDP avoid emphasizing numerical targets and emphasis on income-raising policies rather than income redistribution.
NDP are welcomed by the Chinese because it is less ethnically divisive than NEP. Together with this, Dr Mahathir introduced his ‘Vision 2020’ for the nation in the first meeting of the Malaysian Business Council (MBC) in early 1991. Dr Mahathir wanted Malaysia to be “a nation at peace with itself, territorially, and ethnically integrated, living in harmony and in full and fair partnership made of one Bangsa Malaysia”.[5]
Vision 2020 captured the imagination of Malaysians, particularly the non-Malays because this is a clear shift from the exclusivist bangsa Melayu to the all-embracing Bangsa Malaysia. Hilley (2001:4) observed that Dr Mahathir attempts to “galvanise the public imagination through ideas of a shared vision of prosperity”. Thus, Vision 2020 is “more than an industrial plan for advanced economic development. It is an attempt to stimulate a new social context for the emergence of an alternative social order (Hilley 2001:19).
Hilley (2001:20) termed this Vision as a “post-ethnic nationalism” and marked the “gathering shift away from the NEP ideology, ethnic balancing and the old ‘politics of consociationalism’ – class constructions and state forms variously designed to reproduce the ideas and interests of the dominant class fractions across ethnic lines”.
The NEP success in achieving its goals without alienating the non-Malays was mainly attributed to the robust growth of the economy that ensure that the economic pie was large to be shared by all.
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2.1.6 1997 economic crisis and the 1998 political crisis
Anwar Ibrahim, the former deputy prime minister was sacked from his post on 2 Sept 1998. This was the clearest sign of difference between the top two men in the government, something which they both had publicly denied before that. With the sacking of Anwar, Lee (2002:177) observed that “the economic fallout in Malaysia became intertwined with a political crisis.”
After the 1988 UMNO political crisis, Dr Mahathir had managed to purged his party from rival fractions by registering UMNO as a new party, excluding those he seen as his political rivals. Thus, through out the 90s, he manages to consolidate power to himself and to put anyone up or down at his will. Anwar Ibrahim, a student leader back in the 70s is among a few who earned Dr Mahathir’s trust. Anwar meteoric rise to the top was envy to a large numbers of UMNO members.
The baht devaluation in July 1997 sparked a massive economic crisis that hits most of the Asian countries. Dr Mahathir with his usual rhetoric snubbed the International Monetary Fund advice for tighter fiscal policy.
The government announced that the Chinese would be allowed to take over companies owned by Malay to prevent the latter going bankrupt. However, they were not allowed to hold these assets in the long term, as spelt out by Daim Zainuddin, then the Minister of Special Functions: “I’d allow them [the Chinese] to rescue ailing companies. After they recover, they can talk about ownership” (FEER 19/2/9).
Gomez and Jomo (1999:196) observed that “this use of selected Chinese businessmen to help bail out some well-connected Malay businessmen reflects Chinese capital’s continued subordination and obligations to Malay political hegemony”.
On the other hand, Anwar Ibrahim was widely seen as favourable of the tighter fiscal policy. Dr Mahathir announced increase in government spending to facilitate economic growth. This goes against Anwar Ibrahim who was then the Finance Minister as well. These economic differences were downplayed by both men as the usual difference but with the similar goal in mind. Lee (2004:88) pointed out that “some observers believed that each faction was anxious to protect the business interests of its supporters”.
Gomez and Jomo (1999:200) observed that at that time, “the Western media openly encouraged early Anwar succession to national leadership, portraying Dr Mahathir as out-moded, inadequate to the challenge and even ignorant, if not irrational”.
During the 1998 UMNO general assembly, Zahid Hamidi, a protégée of Anwar Ibrahim moved a motion during the debate of the presidential speech. Zahid brought up the cronyism and corruption issue during his speech. This was seen as an indirect attack to Dr Mahathir. Cronyism and corruption was seen as the reason for the weak Asian economic fundamentals including Malaysia.
It was also these two issues that brought down the former Indonesian president Suharto.
Dr Mahathir pulls another rabbit out his political hat by releasing list of names of Bumiputera that had benefited from the government’s share allocation schemes. These names includes non other that Anwar Ibrahim’s father.
That was the clearest sign of Anwar’s challenging Dr Mahathir leadership. Many observers felt that the days of Anwar were numbered. However the swiftness of Anwar’s removal and the subsequent events caught everyone by surprise.
The sacking of Anwar Ibrahim on 2 Sept 1998 ends the dynamic partnership of Mahathir and Anwar in running the country and marked the beginning of Malay splits.
As expected, Anwar did not go quietly. He rallied his supporters for massive demonstrations in the capital city and hold rallies around the country to gather supports. Malays who were left out from the economic growth felt that it is time to push for reforms and PAS was fast in throwing support behind the man they once criticised as the traitor to the Islamic religion.
The political stakes during the 1999 general election were high. There was a general consensus that changes with the existing sociopolitical conditions were possible. It was also in the spirit of reforms that Chinese associations introduced the 17-point election appeals.
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2.1.7 The split of the Malays and Chinese voters as kingmaker
The gentlemen’s agreement to discuss anything sensitive within the Alliance was tested several times throughout the history of Malaysia. The last one was during the 1999 general elections. It was a few months prior to the general elections that 11 Chinese association came together to form The Malaysian Chinese Organisation Election Appeals Committee, or in short Suqiu.
Suqiu came out with a 17-point appeal and “call upon all political parties an candidates in the coming general elections to declare their support and endorsement” (Suqiu 2002:11). This was seen by the BN as a pressure by the Chinese community from outside the Alliance to bow to their demands and the failure of the MCA to co-opt and check on this dissident voices.
After the sacking of the former deputy prime minister Anwar Ibrahim, the Malay community was split and thus, supports from other communities were even more crucial to ensure that BN stays in power. Thus, the BN government do not take this 17-point appeal kindly and seen it as a blackmail by the Chinese community on the BN government. As the Chinese consist of 26 percent of the population, any swing by the Chinese electorates will ensure victory to any candidates the Chinese choose to support.
Khoo Boo Teik (2003:128) in his book Beyond Mahathir: Malaysian Politics and its Discontents noted that “it has become one of UMNO’s stock political myths that ‘disunity’ was something the Malay community could not afford because it implied weakness that would be exploited by others”.
Ratnam and Milne (1970) in their paper published in the Pacific Affairs, noted that in the 1969 general election, UMNO were only commanding 47.7 per cent of the valid Malay votes as compared to Pan Malaya Islam Party (PMIP, the predecessor to PAS) 52.3 per cent.
Khoo (2003:128) suggested that this ‘Malay disunity’ will be invoked to rally for support for UMNO. UMNO argued and persuaded PAS to join the enlarged BN in 1971 and pushed for aggressive implementation of NEP.
In 1987, prior to Operation Lalang, there was an internal power struggle in UMNO between Team A headed by Dr Mahathir and Team B spearheaded by Tengku Razaleigh.
In 1998, it was a challenge to Dr Mahathir leadership mounted from the reformasi movement. In order to rally for Malay supports, UMNO had to create a credible ‘non-Malay threat’. Thus, Suqiu was single out for that purpose.
Weiss (2000:413) noted that the Malay vote was clearly split between UMNO and PAS. Lee (2002:177) also concluded that the deep split in the Malay community was obvious with the participants on the reformasi demonstrations launched by Anwar were largely Malays. Lee (2004:88) noted that “Dr Mahathir’s own reputation had suffered as a result both from the 1997-98 financial crises and from the handling of Anwar’s [reformasi] challenge”.
The Chinese were with the BN since the 1995 general elections. The BA coalition with PAS and Keadilan closely identify with the reformasi movement do not appeal to some Malays and especially the non-Malays. As noted by Weiss (2000:421), some Malaysian voters “expressed dissatisfaction with or distrust Anwar, seeing him as just another opportunistic BN politician”.
Weiss (2000:421) noted that for the non-Malays, Anwar Ibrahim was known for its “pro-Malay, pro-Islam policies of the 1980s and 1990s that have disgruntled non-Malays; hence, his multiracial rhetoric rang a bit hollow to some”.
Thus, in the elections, the choice was clear. It was between the BN’s politics of development and stability and BA’s politics of justice and good governance.
However, even when BA tried to move beyond ethnic politics, its own campaigns and conducts during the run up to the elections were playing into BN’s hand. Weiss (2000:425) noted that since its formation, Keadilan “has grown more Islamic in image”.
However hard the BA tried to move beyond ethnic politics, they know very well that ethnic issues certainly appeal to Malaysians. PAS government in Kelantan – in a move seen as trying to appeal to the Chinese voters – lifted the ban on pig farming.
Even though this move was commendable, Chinese voters never distinguish PAS Islamic politics with UMNO Malay nationalist politics. Lee (2004:90) pointed out that “many Chinese rejected the link between the DAP and PAS”.
Even in the early years of Malaysia, during the debate of national language after the Razak Report was published in 1956, PAS “have often being critical of the government for what is felt to be the inexcusable gradualism in making Malay the sole official language, and foolish tolerance towards the persistence of other language” (Roff 1967:319).
Weiss (2000:425) noted that the elections results for Keadilan candidates could be interpreted as voters identifying Keadilan as a Malay-based party, as all its successful candidates were Muslim Malays.
Lee (2004:90) also pointed out that the party that gained most in the 1999 elections was PAS.
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2.2 THE POLITICAL ECONOMY OF THE PRESS IN MALAYSIA
In Malaysia, the media, especially the press, was controlled through media ownership and also via coercive legislation. Zaharom (2002:112) observed that “the early 1980s saw the emergence of new titles, signifying to many a liberalisation of media policies, a relaxation of control”. However, almost all national dailies in Malaysia are published by three groups that are owned or linked to individuals or political parties of the ruling coalitions.
New Straits Times Press (NSTP) published two English dailies – New Straits Times (NST) and Malay Mail – as well as two Malay dailies – Berita Harian (BH) and Harian Metro.
Utusan Melayu (Malaysia) published the influential Utusan Malaysia. Both NSTP and Utusan are linked to the dominant partner in BN – UMNO.
Star Publications (M) Sdn Bhd – which is owned by the MCA through Huaren Holding – published the leading English daily, The Star.
Thus, as observed by Zaharom (2002:117), that the local press “while seemingly increasing in number, nonetheless are controlled by the same few actors … invariably aligned to political parties and leaders”. Gomez and Jomo (1999:2-3) also concurred that the press in Malaysia are largely owned by politicians or politically influential businessmen.
Hilley (2001:12) noted that the main agenda-setting agency in Malaysia is the mass media, and they “represent a vital part of the UMNO network, helping to filter information, entertainment and civil values”. Gomez and Jomo (1999:3) noted that these BN-controlled media have been “used by the BN to promote and legitimise itself as well as to discredit political opposition and dissent more generally”.
Hilley (2001:12) also observes that Malaysian media, since 1980s have been “encouraging a form of safe ‘role model’ media discourse based on lifestyle images and social concerns”. This strategy, observed Hilley (2001:13), has provided a context for “managed media debate, helping to keep dissent distanced from any meaningful critique of the power structure”. Anyone louder than the ‘tolerated noise’ will be shut out from the debate.
History
The first newspaper published in Malaya was the English language Government Gazette, later called the Prince of Wales Island Gazette (PWIG) on 1 March 1806 (Mustafa 2002:140; Mohd Safar 1996:57). According to Mustafa (2002:140), in the early 1800s, “there was no existing law in the Straits Settlements governing the issuance of newspaper licences”.
The first Chinese language newspapers, The Chinese Monthly Magazine, started its publication in August 1815, and it was produced not for local population but for audiences in China.
Only by 1876, the first Malay newspaper, Jawi Peranakan, was published in Singapore. The first Tamil newspaper, Singai Warthamani was started a year earlier.
During the Japanese rule, the press was designated the main tool of Propaganda Department of the Japanese Military (Mohd Safar 1996:204). After the Japanese surrender, the Malay newspaper such as the Utusan Melayu, which was highly influential among the Malay, particularly rural Malays, took on a more aggressive role in raising Malay consciousness pertaining to the hotly debated issue of Malayan Union (Mohd Safar 1996:213).
However, Utusan Melayu was involved in a takeover by UMNO in 1961. The newspaper worker called for editorial independence that was in line with the newspaper’s original philosophy of fighting for ‘the race, religion and homeland’, while UMNO insisted that the daily should consciously give full support to UMNO (Mustafa 2002:145-46). The 93-day strike was finally over with UMNO gaining control over Utusan Melayu. As observed by Mustafa (2002:146), this is “the first instance in Malaysian journalism since independence of a political party taking over a newspaper”.
Press freedom in Malaysia has a close link to the political climate in Malaysia. Press freedom is usually tightened by the ruling coalition when there are threats to the power of the ruling coalition.
As observed by Mustafa (2002:146), in the aftermath of May 13, press freedom in Malaysia was further restricted. Regulations were amended and ownership structure was changed in the early 1970s.
The government then felt that the locals should control the local media industry; hence the purchase of major stocks in Straits Times Press (STP) Group in 1972 by government-owned PERNAS, which was later transferred to UMNO investment company called Fleet Holdings. By 1984, the transfer was completed and STP was changed to New Straits Times Press (NSTP).
The MCA also began to acquire various media interests starting with their purchase of 67.35 per cent of Star Publications (M) Sdn Bhd in 1979.
Legislation
The tightening of legislations governing the media in Malaysia usually follows as a result of the need for the ruling coalition to exercised greater control over the media. Mustafa (2002:149) observed that “traditionally, the threats of communism and communalism provided justification for these laws. However, the rationale for retaining and applying these laws has been widened and, in some cases, made vague enough to leave a catch-all effect”.
Printing Presses and Publications Act 1984
The main law governing the media had been amended 4 times, each time to tighten and gave the state more power over the media. The Printing Presses Ordinance of 1948 was revised in 1971 and 1974 as the Printing Presses Act. It was then revised in 1984 as the Printing Presses and Publications Act, and again in 1988 after Operasi Lalang.
Initially, this legislation was meant to exercise control over the ownership of printing presses and publications in the face of an increasing threat from communist in Malaya (Mohd Safar 1996:222-24).
The amendment in 1987 gave the Home Minister the power to grant printing permit to any newspapers circulating in Malaysia. The minister’s decision to grant the permit is final, and cannot be challenged in a court of law.
Internal Security Act (ISA) 1960
The ISA was also introduced by the government as a ‘safety net’ at the end of the communist threat in Malaysia. The Act empowers the home affairs minister to impose preventive detention without trial on anyone “acting in a manner prejudicial to the security of Malaysia” (Means 1991:142). Zaharom (2002:124) noted that “over the years, the ISA has seen many people detained not necessarily because of communist connections or subversive activities”.
Official Secret Act (OSA) 1972
The political uncertainty after the May 13 riot provided some justification for the government to introduce the OSA. In theory, this Act prohibit a person from getting information that is deemed an ‘official secret’, but in practice, “it hampered the working journalists and dampened the development of investigative journalism” (Mustafa 2002:151).
The 90s
The improving standards of living of Malaysians, and the general atmosphere of liberalisation after the 1990 “provide the golden opportunity for the profit-driven mainstream newspapers to attract more readers and, by extension, more advertisers by publishing reports and analyses that were politically safe and sanitised” (Mustafa 2002:152).
Mustafa (2002:152) observed that during this period, papers in Malaysia “had undergone cosmetic changes in terms of format and the use of more colours as a way of making themselves visually more attractive”.
Loh and Mustafa (1996:111) observed that “these changes made up for the newspapers’ weaknesses in the crucial area of investigative journalism, and incisive and illuminating commentaries”. Mustafa (2002:152) noted that “these editorial developments constituted a form of social control as they helped newspapers to divert themselves – and the public’s attention – away from controversies, depoliticise issues, and displace people’s rights to political participation”.
The press was generally not critical of the ruling party, but would only give coverage to the opposition when there are opportunities to demonise them. Mustafa (2002:155) observed that “the depiction of political parties in the opposition coalition as disparate and lacking both compatibility and direction, only reinforced the BN’s stereotype of the opposition as being unreliable and unfit to govern the country”.
The mainstream press as a whole was willing to cooperate with the state and place its resources, expertise and influence at the disposal of the BN (Mustafa 2002:161).
Mustafa (2002:162) observed that “the mainstream press under the tense circumstances of September 1998 was unmistakably partisan”. The negative coverage on Anwar after his sacking without him being given any change for rebuttal and the portrayal of street protests as the act that will threatened national security and political stability only goes to show what the press are ready to sacrifice in time of crisis.
The change of editorial of NST is closely linked to the power struggle within the UMNO leadership. Back in 1993, Anwar Ibrahim, then Malaysian Finance Minister, through his associates bought into NSTP and TV3 in a steps widely seen as a preparatory to Anwar’s successful challenge later that year for UMNO’s deputy presidency.
Gomez and Jomo (1999:126) observed that “in the run-up to [UMNO] election, although TV3 and NSTP newspapers were not blatantly supportive of Anwar, they gave him prominent and favourable coverage, while ignoring Ghafar [Baba, then deputy prime minister and deputy president of UMNO] and his camp”.
In the lead-up to the sacking of Anwar Ibrahim in September 1998, Anwar associates, Johan Jaafar, editor-in-chief of Utusan Malaysia, and Nazri Abdullah, group editor of Berita Harian – the leading Malay language dailies – were removed. This removal was seen as an early step in getting ready the media for an all out assault on Anwar after his sacking.
Lee (2004:100) suggested that the purchase of Nanyang Siang Pau and the China Press was an attempt by Dr Ling to deal with the continued challenge fro Team B. While this might be an internal power struggle within the MCA, Chinese in general see this episode as an attempt by the government through the MCA to further domesticate the Chinese press.
Lee (2004:100) noted that “editorial in the Chinese press are relatively more independent compared with the Malay- and English-language newspapers”.
During the proposed use of English in teaching Mathematics and Science controversy, several groups expressed strong reservations. They included Malay language supporters and Chinese educationists. Even Dewan Bahasa dan Pustaka expressed caution. However, the Malay press choose only to highlight the Chinese protests, as if the Malays are united behind this UMNO’s initiative. One could only imagine the Malay press reactions if this idea was mooted by the MCA.
Lee (2004:104) pointed out that the Malay press like Utusan Malaysia labeled the Chinese educationists as chauvinists and exclusionists.
In the period leading up to the 1999 general elections, Utusan was careful not to bash DAP for its political association with PAS. The contest for Malay votes was fierce at that time between UMNO and PAS, and any attempts to discredit PAS will be detrimental to UMNO’s efforts in garnering Malay votes.
Utusan, however, portrayed DAP as a party that do not respect rule of laws, and Utusan is implying that this attitude contradicts DAP’s political struggles. In its 11 August 1999 report, Utusan urged Chinese to deny DAP their supports because DAP do not respect the rule of laws, and not for DAP’s association with PAS.
Perhaps, with the increased sophistication of media consumers in Malaysia, there is hope in this controlled media environment. As observed by Zaharom (2002:131-32), “stringent though the political and economic controls on the Malaysian media may be, raising vital questions about democratic practices, nonetheless it would be rather premature to assert that media audiences are simply duped into accepting at face value what is produced by the controlled media”.
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2.3 Suqiu
Suqiu is the common names for The Malaysian Chinese Organisation Election Appeals Committee. According to Wong Chin Huat writing in Suqiu Document, Suqiu is literally a “voters’ manifesto”. This 17-point appeals (the Appeals) was launched on 16 August 1999, and by the eve of the 1999 general elections, this document was endorsed by 2095 organisations nationwide (Suqiu 2002:13).
These organisations were mainly Chinese organisations because it is a Chinese community’s initiative. However, Wong pointed out that “its spirit and substances are definitely not Chinese but Malaysian oriented”. Lee (2002:184) also noted that the points raised by Suqiu could be divided into two types; the more universal goals similar to the ones promoted by civil society groups, and the one that reflects the usual Chinese concerns like equality in economic, education, and cultural rights.
Plenty of the 17 points raised in the Appeals were universal in nature. For example, Point 14 urged the government to restore confidence in the police force. Suqiu reiterated their stand again on 17 October 2000 by issuing a press statement which urged the government to review the “salary scheme of Malaysian police, to build a clean and professional Police Force, and the regain public confidence” (Suqiu 2002:114).
It is therefore not wrong to say that government do agree and share the same sentiments as that of Suqiu. The 5th Prime Minister of Malaysia Abdullah Ahmad Badawi on 29 December 2003 announced that Malaysian government will set up a Royal Commission to “study and recommend steps to enhance the capability of the Royal Malaysia Police (PDRM) (Bernama 29 Dec 2003).
According the Bernama news report, Abdullah said the proposed commission would modernise all operational and work aspects of the police, taking into account policing techniques and human rights issues, including women's rights.
In fact, Lee (2002:184) noted that the Cabinet voted to support the Appeals in principle. However, during the period leading to the general elections, the BN took the usual strategy to ethnicised legitimate universal appeals in order to whip up ethnic sentiments.
While UMNO’s strategy was to focus on the ethnic aspect of the appeals, PAS and Keadilan avoided the ethnic appeals and focus on the universal ones.
Looking back, Suqiu is not something new from the Chinese community but a “continuation of its previous calls for an inclusive Malaya/Malaysia”. In the 80s, there were also two similar documents – Memorandum of National Culture (1983) and the Joint Declarations of Chinese Organisations (1986).
Back in June 1999, with elections expected to be held anytime, the Selangor Chinese Assembly Hall (SCAH) took the initiative to organise dialogue between the Chinese community leaders and the representatives of both the ruling and oppositions parties.
On 16 August 1999, the SCAH together with 10 other Chinese organisations launched the final version of the Appeals in Malay, English and Chinese.
One interesting episode within the Suqiu was the proposal by the Federation of Chinese Associations Malaysia (FCAM) to include an ethnic Chinese second PM and an ethnic Chinese Finance Minister as part of the final draft. Even though Suqiu rejected outright this suggestion from FCAM, it was eventually accused by the mass media of playing up racial sentiments.
The main theme for the Appeals were promote national unity, advance democracy, uphold human rights and justice, curb corruption, fair and equitable economic policy, review the privatisation policy, enlightened, liberal and progressive education policy, let multiethnic cultures flourish, protect the Malaysian environment, develop and modernize new villages, housing for all, protect women’s rights, fair media, restore confidence in the police force, upgrade social services, respect the rights of workers, and provide for our indigenous people.
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2.3.1 History of Chinese pressure
The three main concerns of the Malaysian Chinese can be summed up in three aspects – politics, economic, and culture.
Politically, Malaysian Chinese always felt that Malay special rights put the Chinese as second-class citizen. Milne and Mauzy (1999:95) noted that the Chinese felt that they “should be hired in the public service, armed forces, etc., in accordance with their proportion in the population”.
Economically, Malaysian Chinese felt that the aggressive implementation of the NEP had compromised their opportunity in business.
Malaysian Chinese also takes the right for mother-tongue education seriously because language vital for the continuation of Chinese culture. Milne & Mauzy (1999:90) noted that the “Chinese seemed to be especially vociferous on language and educational issues”.
Lee and Heng (2000:194-5) argued that Chinese political parties on both sides of the national political divide “have always sought to represent the community bedrock interests: rights of full citizenship, opportunity for economic advancement, preservation of the Chinese language and Chinese schools, and outlets for public cultural expression”.
Politically, Malaysian Chinese had come to term with the Malay special rights, and economically, Malaysian Chinese had been able to form symbiotic business partnership with Malay corporate elites.
The issue of Chinese education has remained a fundamental concern to the Chinese community, and currently the most contentious of all. Tan Liok Ee (2000), in her stuffy on Chinese schools in Malaysia noted that Malaysia is the only country outside of China where there is a well-developed system of Chinese schools that is largely supported by the state. She argued that these Chinese schools are not only educationally significant but also culturally and politically important to the Chinese.
Tan (2000:228) argued that the Chinese schools in Malaysia are an unusual example of education institutions which began as schools serving a migrant community, but were able to evolve into a vibrant part of the education system of a multi-ethnic nation.
According to the Report of the MCA National Task Force (1988:89) published in 1988, and Tan (2002:157) close to 90 per cent of Chinese parents sent their children to Chinese primary national-type schools. This percentage drop a bit a few years later and Lee (2004:105) pointed out that some 70 per cent of Chinese parents send their children to Chinese schools.
This 70 per cent also includes some 60,000 non-Chinese students enrolled in Chinese schools in 2000 (Tan 2002:164). Thus, Chinese educationists maintain that the Chinese school stream is not exclusivist. According to Tan (2002:155), there are today 1,284 national-type primary schools (NTPSs), and 60 independent Chinese secondary schools (ICSSs).
The ruling government also makes it a point to point out that the existence of ICSSs is not an issue and their existence are guaranteed under the Education Act 1996. This issue will surface every time an election is near. In the period leading up to the 1999 general elections, Malaysian government, perhaps anticipating that it will resurfaced again, reminded political parties not to exploit this issue (Chinese school here to stay, The Star, 5 September 1999, p4).
Chinese schools could be found not only in towns but also small villages, wherever there was a group of children needing a school and some local leaders prepared to take the initiative to organise one. According to Tan (2002:157) local leaders “had a social and moral obligation to keep the schools going and, together with Chinese schoolteachers, enjoyed both status and respect for their role in fulfilling a social and cultural need”.
The common complaints of Chinese educationists were that there was no provision for new or additional NTPSs, less generous grants, and insufficient attention on training more teachers (Tan 2002:157).
In the past, Chinese schools grew according to local needs. Since independence, government has played a dominant role in education, seeking control over all schools, including the growth of Chinese schools.
Even in the days leading to the independence of Malaya, Chinese education groups were vocal in voicing their protests in what they seen as steps by the government to sidelined Chinese education and Chinese language values. Roff (1967:318) noted that the Chinese Guilds and Associations response to the release of the Razak Report in 1956 by demanding that Chinese language be accepted as an official language as well, and be accorded the same status as the Malay language in the national education system.
Within the framework of the Alliance, MCA too tried to pressure its partner, UMNO in endorsing Chinese language as an additional official language. After Dr Lim Chong Eu was elected the president in 1958, the United Chinese School Teachers’ Association, and the Chinese Guilds and Associations began to pressure Dr Lim.
It is difficult to tell why an English-educated politician would take up this cause. Certainly by taking up this cause, Dr Lim hoped to draw these Chinese organisations into the national decision making process.
However, this decision was not being received kindly by UMNO, especially after Dr Lim wrote letter to Tunku Abdul Rahman, outlining demands concerning language and the increase of seats allocation in the upcoming elections. MCA threatened to quit the Alliance unless these demands were met. The Alliance National Council, which Tunku was the chairman, announced that MCA must withdrawn these demands. Soon after that, Dr Lim resigned as the president of MCA and was replaced by Tan Siew Sin, the son of MCA founder.
This episode demonstrated that the role of MCA within the ruling coalition is to explain and persuade the Chinese community to support government’s policies, not as a vehicle to pressure the government. This episode is a clear lesson for the Chinese organisations that it is usually fruitless to pressure the government through political channel.
Lucien Pye (1985:251) also pointed out that Confucian culture do not provide any guidelines for Chinese leaders to function in a non-Confucian context. Worse still, the idea of Chinese being the subordinates of a foreign power is “unthinkable”. Pye (1985: 251) added that “any Chinese who acts as a leader must be an imposter, if he is subservient to the Malay majority leadership”.
This observation might explain the low status of MCA leaders in the Chinese community. The Chinese had long dismissed MCA leaders as selling out Chinese rights when they agreed to the deals brokered with UMNO. Gomez and Jomo (1999:12) observed that “in vein of the bourgeois nature of the MCA leadership and its subservient role to UMNO in the ruling coalition, the party has always have much difficulty in galvanising and sustaining the support of the working-class and middle-class Chinese”.
As Pye pointed out, the “MCA leaders who supported the pro-UMNO constitutional deal were characterized as self-serving towkays (merchants) … and who were willing to serve as UMNO lackeys in order to reap the spoils of the political office”.
It certainly did not help the MCA that their early leaders were mostly merchants. Chinese cultural and language leaders, that have extensive networks with the masses were largely aligned to the Malayan Communist Party (MCP), the party that British choose to ignore despite MCP’s contribution to the fall of the Japanese Occupation in Malaya.
Having said that, Lee and Heng (2000:223) argued that Chinese in Malaysia have developed “appropriate responses to successive groups of power wielders, and that Chinese co-operation in the Malaysian political system is central to the maintenance of political stability and inter-ethnic harmony”.
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2.3.2 The chronology of the episode
1999 June – The Civil Rights Committee (CRC) of Selangor Chinese Assembly Hall (SCAH) worked on to organise a dialogue between the Chinese community leader and the representatives of both the ruling and opposition parties.
1999 August 16 – Final version of the Appeals launched in Malay, English and Chinese and Suqiu started the endorsement drive.
1999 Sept 6 – DPM Abdullah said “Suqiu is not allowed to bargain with government”.
1999 Sept 20 – PM Dr Mahathir labeled Suqiu as “a mean to pressurise the government” and criticised it for “damaging racial harmony”.
1999 Sept 23 – 11 ministers, led by Dr Ling Liong Sik, Dr Lim Keng Yeik and Dr Lau Hieng Ding, met with Suqiu and accepted the Appeals in principle. NST quoted Dr Ling as saying that “Suqiu represented 99 per cent of Malaysian Chinese”.
1999 Oct 19 – Suqiu issued a press statement that to date, Suqiu has not received any invitation to sit on the NECC II. However, Suqiu resolved not to do so should the invitation arrive in the future. Reasons given are: Suqiu will promote the Appeals through public education; and since BN, in principle, have accepted the Appeals, it is up to the Cabinet, not NECC II, to realise those Appeals.
1999 Oct 19 – BA expressed their supports to a number of principles and concerns outlined in the Appeals.
2000 May – Suqiu permanent secretariat was set up in SCAH.
2000 August 8 – Judgment day for Anwar’s corruption charge.
2000 August 14 – Malay media tried to plying up businessman David Chua’s call for overview of Bumiputra privileges in an interview with FEER.
2000 August 16 – First anniversary celebration and launching of Suqiu website. The next day, Utusan headlined “Persatuan Cina Ulangi Tuntutan” [Chinese association repeat its demands].
2000 August 17 – 200 UMNO Youth members, lead by its deputy chief Abdul Aziz, demanded Suqiu to abandon its Appeals and to apologise to the Bumiputra society within a week, or, they will burn down the SCAH.
2000 August 31 – PM Dr Mahathir labeled Suqiu as ‘extremist’ and made equivalent to the communist and religious insurgent in his National Day speech.
2000 Sept 15 – 20 members of Suqiu committee meet up with PM to explained Suqiu aspirations. PM admit BN accept the Appeals before the general elections so that BN will not lose Chinese supports.
2000 Nov 29 – BA secured victory in Lunas by-election, a mix constituency which has been BN stronghold since independence.
2000 Dec 11 – PM reiterated his equating of Suqiu with the communists when answering questions by Kota Melaka MP (DAP) Kerk Kim Hock in Parliament. PM admit the government was just forced to accept the Appeals in principle.
2000 Dec 13 – 500 members of GPMS held a demonstration. Its president Suhaimi Ibrahim demanded Suqiu to withdraw all its 83 sub-points within a month or GPMS will call for national demonstration and issue their own 100 demands.
2000 Dec 29 – Suqiu negotiated with UMNO Youth to set aside 7 sub-points.
2001 Jan 5 – Suqiu ‘put aside’ seven out of its 83 sub-point appeals in a joint statement with the UMNO Youth.
Footnote:
[1] Alliance Manifesto for the Federal Elections, June 1955.
[2] Abdul Aziz Ishak had confiscated all the licenses of Chinese rice millers in northern Perak and Province Wellesley (Seberang Perai, Penang) with which to win Malay’s supports.
[3] The Third Malaysia Plan (1876-80) acknowledges the poverty of non-Malay groups, and their need for improved access to education, healthcare and amenities.
[4] New Straits Times, 19 June 1999, p6, 18 as cited in Andaya & Andaya 2001:327.
[5] New Straits Times, March 2, 1991.
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