Trouble in Paradise

Malaysia is a beautiful nation – a rare jewel, a gift.

No other country is as richly endowed with agricultural and mineral wealth, or as well placed along one of the world’s busiest shipping routes.

Add to that a rich multicultural heritage of diverse languages and cultures, and Malaysia looks like a veritable paradise.

It is no wonder that Claudius Ptolemy once called it the Golden Chersonese or the Golden Peninsula, a nod to the region’s reputation as a source of great wealth.

Yet for all its advantages, Malaysia has stayed a ‘developing’ nation for decades, stuck in a middle-income loop. If it does not shift gears soon, dark clouds will gather over this paradise.

And these clouds will be of its own making.

The enemies within

There is an annoying problem in this paradise and it is called corruption.

There is an aberrant elite of rich and powerful people, some straddling both the public and private sectors, including government-linked companies (GLCs). They blatantly erode public trust.

Take Najib’s imminent release under ‘house arrest’. The implications are massive. It clearly points to a flawed system where a man convicted of misusing tens of millions of ringgit from the people and duly sentenced is able to serve his time in the comfort of his own home.

The poor have no such recourse. This is blatantly repugnant.

Yet, it happens in Paradise.

Perhaps a culture of institutional deference is getting in the way of justice. Or perhaps other factors are at play that have never been made public.

And of course, in Paradise, everyone understands partisanship and how elections can be won or lost on a single verdict.

In addition to Najib, two former prime ministers are facing charges of misappropriation and abuse of power. The deputy PM has had 47 charges of corruption, criminal breach of trust and money laundering discharged without acquittal.

Najib has already been convicted. The other former PMs deny wrongdoing, and their cases are still being heard, so it would be wrong to prejudge them.

But taken together, these cases raise an uncomfortable question. How much of the country’s wealth has been diverted by people who were meant to serve it, not themselves?

There’s a related question that rarely surfaces. How could abuses running into billions of ringgit, alleged or proven, happen without help from within the civil service?

Whether it is Tabung Haji or the Football Association of Malaysia (FAM), it all points to a thick culture of abuse of power. This is the very culture that Anwar Ibrahim himself vowed to remove in 1998. Back then, it was after the Perwaja Steel, Renong-UEM and the Bumputra Malaysia Finance (BMF) scandals.

Sadly, the ball has never stopped rolling. Nearly four decades on, we are still plagued by financial controversies, suspicious cases of ‘no further action’ (NFA), discharge without acquittal, court deferrals of landmark cases – and a house arrest saga that most ordinary people can only dream of.

The future no longer looks as secure as it should for this paradise nation – not when it is being preyed on by a class of greedy, rent-seeking elites.

A creeping new virus

After decades of bending and breaking the rules, some of our leaders have taught the people that rules and laws are just for show.

Today, red traffic lights are an invitation for the ordinary motorcyclist to run them. Road offences can become an opportunity for a bribe. Getting a licence or a permit often comes with extra ‘coffee money’.

There is a growing culture of disregard and disrespect for rules in the country. It is like a virus.

Regardless of whether someone is highly educated or not, powerful or not, wealthy or not, there will always be someone who tries to push the boundaries of the rules and the law.

There have even been cases of airline pilots trafficking drugs. That is how confident they are in a system that keeps failing to hold people to account.

For many in the civil service, it has become just another job, without drive or passion – a symptom of poor leadership.

Hopelessness

A friend tells me nothing surprises him anymore. He often shrugs his shoulders and laments: “It’s too late to make any meaningful reforms. The rot has gone too deep. ‘Reformasi’ was just an empty word, used only to catch votes.”

Another friend adds: “The leadership has become too compromising.” Then, he too sighs and looks into an uncertain future.

I understand them. With news like this, it is easy to become paralysed by pessimism.

It is hard to miss Phil Collins’s 1989 song Another Day in Paradise echoing in the background. It reminds us that there is something deeply rotten in a country whose leaders do not see poverty, recognise unfairness or grasp the importance of clean, transparent, ethical practices.

Making hope happen

To bring some order back to our existence, I ask myself: where do we start?

“With ourselves,” my mind whispers back. And this is where we need to act.

We need to use the laws and the Constitution. We need the courage to use civil action to challenge leaders who say and do the wrong things. We need to be watchdogs, reporting and recording every offence we see or hear. We may even need to take to the streets to protest.

We do not always have to wait for the people at the top to change. We need to look beyond hopelessness.

We need to seek young, inspiring leaders who have been tested and have passed. They may not charm with sweet words, but they have stood firm on their values.

We need to inspire teachers to think and ask the essential questions, because the future lies in their hands.

Let’s work through civil society to inform and educate. Use the media we have to influence and persuade.

Stop saying it’s too late.

Sukeshini Nair
Co-editor, Aliran newsletter
21 September 2026

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