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COVER STORY
UMNO: Maturity or mutation?
Contradictions surface at the 2004 UMNO general assemby
by Martin Jalleh
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Sharing the same ‘depth and dynamism’, Wanita Umno, Umno Youth and Puteri Umno, for the first time in their history, also decided that the posts of head and vice head of each of the three movements would not be contested. In the run-up to the general assembly, UMNO leaders were of one mind in the healthy distraction of urging everyone not to be sidetracked by what Najib had termed — ‘one issue over one individual.’ Tradition of jostling There was a lot of jostling for power, position and prestige and it took a ‘traitor’ to unite them all. Rafidah, Najib, Badawi et al. had to drum into the delegates repeatedly and even dramatically that the man was of no threat to UMNO, no threat at all. Who would have thought that UMNO would one day be able to hold itself up with such high self-esteem and confidence that it could even afford to have for its opening preoccupation, some theatrics on an unnamed and non-threatening ‘traitor’. To do the honours was UMNO Youth leader Hishamuddin Hussein, who went into a formidable fit and frenzy about Anwar Ibrahim being a traitor to the Malay cause — only to discover the morning after that his own lineage was littered with ‘traitors’. The first ‘traitor’ to quit UMNO to form an opposition party was its very founder who happened to be his grandfather, Onn Jaafar. His late father, Hussein Onn, played a vital role in the setting up of Semangat 46 and refused to join UMNO Baru. Hishamuddin, during an interview with Asiaweek in 2001, very proudly spoke of ‘an aunt who heads the Keadilan women's wing’ and ‘and uncle who was vice-president of Semangat 46... who is now back in the fold.’ ‘It just shows we have a very democratic system... We all have our own reasons, our own ways of expressing our concerns. I respect her as an aunt...’ concluded the very same Hishamuddin who made a din and fracas about ‘traitors’. Alas, UMNO can boast of having a fine tradition of outstanding ‘traitors’. There was Tunku Abdul Rahman, another key player in the birth of Semangat 46; Tengku Razaleigh Hamzah, whose supporters got a court to declare UMNO illegal; and Rais Yatim, who rebuilt his burnt bridge with UMNO. There was also one Dr Mahathir Mohamad, who was sacked from UMNO in 1969 and spent his wilderness years criticizing UMNO often on a PAS platform (albeit not being a member of the party). Team B’s Abdullah Badawi was also viewed as a ‘traitor’ inside UMNO. As Hishamuddin hobbled on, hurling everything he could at the ‘traitor’, the above facts made it obvious that the Education Minister was in dire need of some history lessons. Further, Anwar did not declare war on UMNO nor leave the party. In fact he fought to stay on. He was removed. When the delegates debated on the Malay and the ‘poverty of knowledge’ they must have been grateful to the UMNO Youth leader for being a fine and living example this. Hishammuddin had set the tone for the general assembly. Maturity or mutation? In his keynote address at the opening of the three-day assembly, UMNO leader Abdullah Badawi echoed the optimism of Hishammuddin: ‘In the course of its 58-year history, UMNO has become more secure and more mature.’ Indeed, Abdullah was able to see for himself the ‘maturity’ of the 2,520 delegates who had packed the Dewan Merdeka at the Putra World Trade Centre to hear him speak as UMNO president for the first time and to give their mature response. He had challenged them with his speech, entitled ‘Moving Forward – Towards Excellence’ – he did not realize how far forward they had moved away from what he was trying so hard to tell them, even before he started. He wanted them not to be carried away by the euphoria of the historic win in the March 2004 general election in which UMNO did exceptionally well. But they brought him down to earth by not giving him the kind of victory he had expected in the party elections. He preached Islam Hadhari to them and told them that religion was becoming very important in the UMNO struggle; but they progressively ensured that none of the leaders with religious qualifications was elected into the UMNO Supreme Council. He impressed upon them that UMNO has to observe ethics and discipline to ensure that it remains a genuinely respected party; they were so disciplined in carrying out money politics, the worst of its kind in 30 years, that little evidence of their activities was left behind. Abdullah told the delegates that UMNO ‘does not depend on a single individual’; they believed him and formed their own factions, forcing him to declare in the closing: ‘Everyone is my man. I’m not the leader to any particular group.’ He reminded them of the danger that UMNO had faced in the 1999 general election, and how the party only redeemed its dignity this March: ‘It’s too soon for us to start fighting each other’. They agreed, waited for him to finish, and then threw out most of his men in the voting. He thanked his predecessor for his remarkable service to Umno and described his decision to step down as the sincerity of a statesman who did not want to cling on to power; they gave Dr Mahathir Mohamad a standing ovation and voted in his staunch supporters (also read as Najib Abdul Razak). He stressed the need for bumiputras to face the challenges of globalisation and added that the global economy does not recognise quotas. They sent in the newly elected deputy chairperson, Badruddin Amiruldin, brandishing a book on the May 13, 1969 racial riots and warning that questioning Malay rights was akin to stirring up a hornet’s nest. He urged them on to become an advanced race, i.e., to be bold, to compete on the world stage They responded through Higher Education Minister Shafie Salleh, who boldly declared that the doors of Universiti Teknologi Malaysia would never be opened to non-bumiputera students. Abdullah strongly advocated a quantum leap in attitude, a mental revolution for Bumiputeras, a competitive Malay race by 2020. But the UMNO machine decided it would continue to chug comfortably along. It preferred “business as usual”. He warned that a ‘…continuing reliance on crutches will further enfeeble (Malays), and we may eventually end up in wheelchairs’. He found himself in their clutches as their support for him dwindled – as a result of his very own failure to transform his rhetoric into reality. The 55th UMNO general assembly concluded with UMNO deputy president Najib Razak spending half of the time allocated for his concluding speech on a loyalty pledge to the UMNO president and promising never to stab him in the back. UMNO has ‘matured’.
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As Hishamuddin hobbled on, hurling everything he could at the ‘traitor’, the above facts made it obvious that the Education Minister was in dire need of some history lessons. 