Last night, I met a young Malaysian gentleman, who was a friend of a friend. As is well known to most, I am passionate about overseas-educated young Malaysian professionals returning home. This young man (we will call him Dinesh) is one such example. Much to my pleasure, he had recently returned home after studying in Australia. I asked him three questions. Each answer increasingly surprised me, both pleasantly and otherwise.
First question: What draws you to coming back home?
He answers. Well, to be truthful, I want to go into politics.
Second question: Which political party do you support?
He answers. Barisan Nasional.
Now, when people tell me they support BN, I always respond with a mixture of fascination and curiosity. I suppose I surround myself with people of similar ideology, okla left wing hippies, but those who share my beliefs. So when I meet a right-winger, and someone who in my view goes against the tide, I always want to know – why? We engaged in pretty lively debate (which I think I won but I perhaps have the upper hand here as I am writing this) about BN vs PR. I tried to explain that I supported certain PR politicians and policies, but am always worried about supporting parties wholeheartedly and with blind faith as of course their course may run awry. I also stressed that I do not and will not support BN until their fundamental structure of their coalition changes. i.e no more race-based parties. I, like many, think there is no place for that in our political environment any longer. He was of the opinion that PR would become race-based eventually, and shared the understandable fear that all the parties have their own agenda. Fair enough, we agreed to disagree and move on.
Third question: Why do you want to be a politician?
He answers. I want to help my people.
His people. At first I was a bit confused, because I didn’t know who he meant. The penny dropped quite quickly, I can’t claim to be that naive or colour-blind. He meant Malaysian Indians. Which is completely fair, Malaysian Indians are a group that there suffer from discrimination in Malaysia (among many others). I wanted him to be different, I wanted him to say he cared about all Malaysians. Like many in my solidarity hub of a Twitterverse.
I wished I had asked him this question before the one before, because if I had known his political aspiration, I could understand his decision to support and be a part of Barisan Nasional. It would likely be easier to support and work on policies to support Malaysian Indians from a party representative of Malaysian Indians.
I wanted to tell him that racial politics was a thing of a disappearing past. That we vote for non-racial agendas and along non racial lines. I was all ready to start citing examples of politicians, activists, friends, lawyers, doctors, tourist guides in Kelantan that believe that. I remember speaking to a senior BN guy, who told me he didn’t believe there should be a 1Malaysia, that Chinese didn’t want to be Malay and Malay people didn’t want to be Indian, and Indian people don’t want to be Orang Asli. He says we are all equal in Malaysia, fundamentally because we are all Malaysian, as per childhood, as per passport, as per birthright.
I wanted to convince Dinesh, that ‘his people’ were all Malaysians that were discriminated against, all Malaysians that were poor, all Malaysians with no access to health care or education and all Malaysians that needed a young voice to support them.
But then, I stopped myself. I realised that I was upset, not at Dinesh, but at the fact that he might be representative of a young population that I didn’t want to know still existed in Malaysia. I wanted the next generation of young politicians to be Eli Wong-Sivarasa types. Because they believed in what I believed in. They want what I want for Malaysia and future Malaysians. But, I stopped myself (which is amazing for me!).
Because, Dinesh is allowed to have different dreams for Malaysia. What is significant is that he HAS dreams for Malaysia. He has the opportunity for a easier, more convenient life and he chooses to come back home and make it better in the way he believes is best. A young Malaysian who can vote is hard to find these days, but a young Malaysian who wants to make change for our country is rare and should be appreciated, no matter what.
