Peace Fever?

It would seem that war in Iraq is on everybody�s lips and minds. The manner in which the United States and Britain led by B & B (Bush and Blair) are angling for war has confounded most ordinary people. B & B would have us believe we are on the brink of a situation not unlike World War II when the rise of fascism in Germany, Italy and Japan (that old �axis of evil�) convinced most governments to form an alliance for war, including an initially United States of America, which only responded when Pearl Harbour was attacked by Japan apparently without provocation.

Some would argue that if there is any �just war� in modern history, World War II was one such war. But all the same, it turned out to be humanity�s worst war, where an estimated 60 million people perished. Any victory in war at the end of the day is phyrric, and the lesson of history must be that we must exhaust all avenues of peace and peaceful resolution of conflict before we plunge ourselves into any war � for whatever reason, justified or otherwise.

That is why the B & B position on Iraq is untenable especially when that country has yet to prove that it is currently a threat to the world. More than half of Iraq, north and south, comprise no fly-zones imposed upon the country since the last war of 1991. Iraq also remains under UN economic sanctions and is undergoing UN weapons inspections. It takes a stupendous leap of the imagination to say that Iraq is a threat to the world today! On the other hand, take Israel, which persistently occupied Arab lands, ignores UN resolutions by the score, and is known to have nuclear-weapon capability. Why are B& B not calling for weapons inspections here or military action to eliminate Israeli weapons of mass destruction?

Malaysians have rightly stood up against the B & B war mongering. One can feel buoyed by the fact that more than one million signatures have been collected by the People�s Alliance for Peace, which claims to represent some 1,048 Malaysian NGOs.This Malaysian peace constituency count in its company strange bedfellows ranging from the Sultan of Pahang to the Sabah Inland Revenue Employees Union! This is really quite impressive. But are most Malaysians really against war? A report in a local daily provided some interesting results from a Gallup poll conducted in 39 countries last month. An overall majority of 52% of the respondents were not for military action in Iraq but in Malaysia only 45% were against military action with another 12% saying that such action must be under the UN. Some 3% actually support unilateral US military action but, note this, some 40% had no position or opinion about the matter.

Based on the poll, two important points can be made about Malaysians and their stance on the impending war in Iraq. First, we can barely muster a convincingly majority against war. Only 45% are categorically against war and this is below the international survey average of 52%. Second, almost as many Malaysians (40%) are blank about the situation. Now, this is really sobering. The million signatures and hundreds of NGOs behind it do not really even represent a majority of Malaysians. But worse, many Malaysians remain clueless about the situation in Iraq. These 40% deserve the ancient Grecian entitlement, idiots, that is people with no political awareness! I�m even inclined to think that the vast majority of those who blindly sign the petitions against war merely do so at the behest of their political masters or superiors. So much then for the Malaysian peace initiative.

Terrorising Muslims

If there is transparency in the government these days, it is the current drive to weed out radical Islamic elements which are said to be linked to terrorist networks. In fact, the government has taken the post 9/11 political climate as a carte blanche to witchhunt political opponents, especially if they are connected to PAS.

PAS political chief and Opposition Leader Hadi Awang has been the target of such political machinations. He has been hauled up for something he did two years ago, that is, speaking at a meeting organized by the the Makassar-based �Preparatory Committee for the Implementation of Islamic Law�. The meeting was allegedly attended by Islamic radical Abu Bakar Bashir of Jemaah Islamiah and head of Laskar Jundullah, Agus Dwikarna. (The Star, 11 February 2003). Both leaders have subsequently been detained by the Indonesian government. But this meeting in South Sulawesi also saw the attendance of many scholars, politicians and even businessmen, and Hadi�s attendance was also made known to the Malaysian ambassador at that time. So why bring this up now? The question is whether Hadi is guilty by association even if that �association� is merely to be in the presence of Islamic militants and in an event which long preceded 9/11. An even more important question is whether the Opposition Leader has ever advocated militancy.

In a democracy where rule of law is practiced, a person is presumed innocent until proven guilty. In the post 9/11 political environment, this principle has been abandoned by the American government. The Malaysian government, no great champion of procedural justice, has been highly critical of the U.S. especially with respect to the treatment of Malaysians heading to America. However, with supreme irony, it has itself detained dozens of alleged Islamic militants under the ISA without the benefit of open trials or even clear-cut charges. A government which has such draconian laws like the ISA could hardly complain against the fingerprinting or detention for interrogation of its travelers to the U.S.

This leads me to the case of the USM professor, Mohammed Nasaruddin Ghouse, who, from various accounts, was indeed detained by the US police in Parkersburg, West Virginia for reasons which are somewhat opaque. The US Embassy here has said he was detained for a driving offence and released after questioning. Accounts by TV 3 and RTM said that Ghouse was actually jailed. But the point of this case is simply that the profiling of Muslims as potential �terrorists� has gone so far in the US that any person with a Muslim name, and God forbid, a beard like Osama bin Laden�s, will automatically be a terrorist suspect. This incident, for sure, will augment the �fear of flying� to the US for Malaysian Muslims. But if the US has succeeded in terrorising Malaysian Muslims, our own government has done no less in terrorising its own supposed Muslims �radicals� like Hadi!

War on SARs

There is no misspelling here and I�m not referring to �Star Wars� but merely the government�s attempt to shut down Sekolah Agama Rakyat (SAR). The PM has offered SAR teachers jobs in government schools and the intention is to eventually close these entities. The implicit and even open justification is that the SARs are the breeding ground for Muslim radicals (read PAS supporters). Ironically, the SARs are community-run schools which have been subsidized by the state itself. What the government should do, if it were fair and democratic, would be to ask each of these schools to provide transparent and open rendering of their programmes and activities so that they can be properly managed and monitored.

Meanwhile, the redoubtable MB of Perlis Shahidan Kassim has launched his own personal war against the SARs. He wants to extend normal teaching hours of 82 Perlis national schools into the afternoon, thereby literally eliminating the 9 SARs in Perlis by default. The afternoon session from 2 �4 pm will offer teaching of English, Arabic, fardhu ain (religious instruction). This looks like a good strategy except that the Minister of Education has baulked at the plan. The ministry�s plans are to have eventually have single-session national schools across the whole country and extending the war against SARs into the afternoon session will make nonsense of the single-session plan.

Indeed, why should the Perlis tail wag the national dog, so to speak? Let�s have a proper national system first, which is fully functional, efficient and provide parents with the best choice for educating their children. If such is the case, the SARs will die a natural death. Secondly, Shahidan�s overzealous proposal will strap Muslim children into day-long schooling and give them no time for recreation, reading or sports. Shahidan�s proposals to outdo SARs will in the end do the same damage, i.e., produce children who are not rounded and cannot think critically or well.

NGO Triad under Attack

By most accounts, Malaysia is not particularly noted for having a large number of NGOs (non-govenmental organisations). Some Third World countries boast of hundreds of NGOs. I once heard that the Philippines had some 30,000 such entities. In some other countries, NGOs virtually run the show having more funds combined that the governments themselves. For example, some observers have said that Bangladesh�s economy is virtually run by the Grameen Bank, responsible for providing micro credit to its predominantly rural population. All of this may sound like exaggeration, but if truth be told some NGOs have indeed become quite influential and powerful. Perhaps such is the case with the Third World Network (TWN) and the Consumer Association of Penang (CAP) and Sahabat Alam Malaysia (SAM), arguably Penang�s most illustrious NGOs. The TWN produces a magazine, Third World Resurgence, which circulates world-wide while CAP puts out the influential Utusan Konsumer and SAM is part of the multinational Friends of the Earth network.

However, this triad of Penang-based NGOs has come under a cloud of controversy recently. According to an Melbourne-based think tank Institute of Public Affairs (IPA), which did a study of US funding of Malaysian NGOs, the trio received 11 grants from US sources totaling some USD 1.41 million (RM5.36m) from 1998-2001. IPA alleged singled out the triad as lacking in transparency and accountability over funding sources and also alleged that they did not provide annual reports nor disclose key funders. S.M. Idris, who is chairman of the three NGOs has condemned the report and called it �false, mischievous and misleading�.

I checked the IPA website which appeared to be open and transparent. It claimed to have obtained funding from 2000 individuals corporations and foundations with no single source providing more than 7% of it funding. IPA was formed in 1943 and appears to be a pro-capitalist, pro-business and neo-liberal think tank which argues that NGOs as stakeholders in civil society must, like governments, also come under scrutiny by the public. Nothing wrong with this but one wonders why the Aussie right-of-centre think tank was given the task to scrunitise Malaysian NGOs. What are its motives? Let�s have some transparency here!

As for the TWN, CAP and SAM, the Malaysian public do have a right to expect a transparent and open rendering of who is in the governing board, what funds they receive, from what sources and how these funds have been disbursed through freely available, transparent annual accounts. Otherwise, the sterling work they have done so far may indeed be tarnished by an apparent lack of accountability.

Valuecap - Whose Money, For Whom?

The government�s launching of a RM10 billion Valuecap Sdn Bhd asset management company to buy shares on the Kuala Lumpur Stock Exchange (KLSE) may have raised the prices of shares but it has also raised more than a few eyebrows. This is because Valuecap is basically funded by public funds, coming equally from Khazanah (Treasury), KWSP (Pension Fund) and PNB (Pemodalan Nasional).

In theory, the company could inject its RM10 billion to boost the CI to new heights, say to about 750 points. But so far the excitement over the new move has petered out, with the CI struggling at around 660 points. Market analysts consider this move by the government this time not only unorthodox but highly risky given the current global economic downturn and the impending war in Iraq. In the short run, such pump-priming may also benefit foreign portfolio investors who can cash out when prices rise. Furthermore, the pundits opine that only a number of select shares seemed to have benefited from the move so far. This leads to speculation that some beneficiaries are expected to contribute to campaign funds in an impending general election.

Meanwhile, the Malaysian public will also wonder what RM10 billion can do if it were spent directly on alleviating the current unemployment, poverty, meet the shortfall in housing, provide better medicare, ecetera, ecetera.

D.L. Daun

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