Malaysian blogger’s open letter to Lee Kuan Yew

This letter had been published in New Temasek Review. I am republishing it for you to read.

I am Malaysian. And a very proud one at that.

While my former prime minister, Tun Dr Mahathir Mohamad has apparently, and suddenly, agreed with you on what you had apparently said about Datuk Seri Anwar Ibrahim and his alleged dalliance with an ass — “ass” here refers to the anatomy of a human being, not the animal, although sometimes in your country, that word could also refer to members of your government — I, on the other hand, could not give a rat’s ass to what you or any of your colleague say about my country or its people.

I will be blunt because I am not a politician. Nor am I a diplomat or a member of my country’s civil service. So, here goes. Neither you, nor any of your colleagues, have any moral standing, or any standing at all, to pass judgement about my country or my fellow Malaysians or any other country for that matter.

If what was reportedly said by you and your colleagues about my country and our leaders was in fact said by you and your colleagues, than I just have one word to say to you and your colleagues. Buzz off! (Well, they are two words actually, but I don’t give a hoot!)

I am not bothered by what you and your colleagues think about my country or my leaders simply because I have always known that you and your government have always suffered from chronic and almost incorrigible Napoleon Complex (to borrow a phrase from Mariah Carey’s song about someone who has a small appendage).

All those chatters over golf matches with Tun Abdullah Ahmad Badawi, warm embrace between your son and prime minister Najib and nice tete-a-tete over some scones and tea between you and our prime minister’s wife are just for show. I have always, in my heart of hearts, doubted your country’s sincerity in almost whatever you do, whether on a private or even more so, governmental basis.

In short and plain language, I have never trusted you or your government. You and your government, to me, had pioneered and perfected a “cocktail diplomacy” that had, over the years, defined your external policies in South Asia.

To say that I have no respect for you or your government would be, Mr Lee, an understatement. I laugh at the nakedness of the cold and wrinkled anatomy of your cocktail diplomacy.

Unlike many of your citizens, I am not stupid to swallow hook line and sinker your heavily masked political assurances of neighbourly goodwill and co-operation. I don’t believe you or your government because I have always known — from your actions and deeds — your condescending and patronising views about everybody else in this world, save for probably, your masters, the United States of America and, probably too, Israel.

You think you are the best. When in fact you are nothing but an amalgamation of flesh and bones without any semblance of a soul. Your country is consumed by and obsessed with what your neighbours intend to do and the ways and means to defeat your perceived competitors — which, in most cases, only exist in your tiny little mind — and procure a perceived victory over them. In short, you and your colleagues suffer from multiple phobias over nothing.

You boast of economic success. May I ask, at what price? Your people have traded their souls, their freedom and liberty, their right to even think of what is right and what is wrong for just a slice of economic and material gains. How shallow can one be?

Your society is exactly what Herbert Macuse was describing in his “One Dimensional Man”, when he says, finally, under the condition of a mass society, shaped and moulded by the State:

“the multi-dimensional dynamic by which the individual attained and maintained his own balance between autonomy and heteronomy, freedom and repression, pleasure and pain, has given way to a one-dimensional static identification of the individual with the others and with the administered reality principle.”

That is what I think of you and your colleagues, Mr Lee.

You and your colleagues huddled together in cafes, holding whiskies and passed judgment on my country. My country is, apparently, “declining.” And the cause of that decline, apparently, is “incompetent politicians.”

Well, who exactly are you or your colleagues to pass judgment on us? Incompetence, you say?

You and your colleagues boasted that Orchard Road will never ever be flooded. Remember? And this was what happened.

What do you say about that? Competence? Go and fly a kite, Mr Lee.

And true to your government’s multi-phobic affliction, you even arrested, handcuffed and detained a reporter who was photographing the flood. Read about it here.

And what was your people’s explanation for that incident? Your Minister for Environment and Water Resources Yaacob Ibrahim had even copied and used the answer given by our former home minister in explaining why a journalist was arrested under our Internal Security Act a couple of years ago, in trying to explain that incident.

This was what he said (as reported here):

“From what we understand, the photographer was warned because of safety issues, not because of privacy issues.”

Yes, apparently, that guy was arrested, handcuffed and detained because of safety issue. Your minister can’t even be original in his reply! He has to copy what our minister said!

Incompetence you say? Go and stand in front of the mirror and look at yourself. You can’t even predict a flood in the middle of your commercial district!

And what about a certain guy by the name of Mas Selamat? Remember him? Yes. He escaped from your maximum security detention centre.

What do you call that? Excellence?

Who, dear Mr Lee, managed to track him and re-arrest him? Who was the kind soul who, in the spirit of good neighbourliness and goodwill, surrendered that guy back to you? Who else but your incompetent neighbour, eh?

Frankly, would you do the same for my country? Well, don’t answer. That is a rhetorical question. I know the answer already.

You have and know of no other way to deal with public grievances and opposition than to arrest them, harass them with defamation suits and utilise your executive might and power. Your country would think of nothing about utilising your pliant judiciary to mask your purely political actions against your opposition in order to lend a semblance of judicial justification for their extermination.

Democracy you say? I laugh and I laugh. And I laugh at you and your government’s shenanigans, Mr Lee. It is the idea that everybody is stupid that makes me laugh so hard. The stupidity of thinking that every other people could be hoodwinked makes me want to die laughing!

Under the guise of good governance and security, your government would go out of its way to silent critics. What did you do to a web site called Temasek Review, Mr Lee?

You cringed at the thought of intellectual discourse in cyber space. Because really, you are not equipped to deal with it. That is because your society has been shaped and moulded to comply and follow, and not to question and demand. So, Temasek Review had to be stopped.

Because of that your agency, Temasek Holdings, claimed that it had the intellectual property right to the name of Temasek Review. How very convenient? And Temasek Holdings then, apparently, sold the right to use that name to an unknown party for S$1.00.

Sorry, but I have to laugh again. Hahahahahahahha… you think the people are as stupid as your government? You have always had the ability to mask your political moves with commercial dress ups. And that move was so you, so Singapore, Mr Lee.

Speaking of Temasek Holdings, what were they doing in Indonesia so much so they were found liable for breaching anti-monopoly laws there?

What do you call that?

The truth is, Mr Lee, you, your colleagues, your government and your country are not perfect. Nobody is.

So please. Take your smug pimply face away and mind your own business.

Malaysia can survive without you. Can you survive without Malaysia?

.

Art Harun

* The writer blogs at http://art-harun.blogspot.com