WanSaiful.com

Several have been asking me what I meant by “incompetent, corrupt and untrustworthy” in my last post. The main question was on the term “corrupt”. It turns out that the other two terms are easily attributable. To explain what I was referring to, let me tell a story of a make-believe organisation. As I write this entry, I am very aware that I am only addressing a very specific set of readers.

This is a story of an imaginary organisation. Let us call it organisation X. It calls itself an “Islamic” organisation and those leading it enjoy some level of respect. Just like the tukang urut, some of them know exactly how to make people trust them.

At the national level, organisation X has a two-layer management structure – the highest level is the unelected Board, and the next one down is the elected executive committee. The Board is headed by a Chair, while the executives by a President. Being unelected, the Board enjoys some level of immunity from questioning.

Upon seeing their authority and influence seeping away, the Board one day realised that they needed to do something. They decided that anyone who might challenge their authority or challenge their trustworthiness must be removed. The Chair of the Board decided to act. He had to act quickly because an election is looming and ‘his people’ are at risk of being voted out.

What did he do? He decided to put pressure on other candidates to pull out from the elections. First, he phoned up the candidate challenging the incumbent President. He asked the candidate to pull put because ‘there are invisible hands working behind the scene’. He said that it is not possible for this candidate to rise up so fast unless ‘someone is doing something behind the scene’. Of course, the talk is peppered with words like ‘maslahah jamaah’ every now and then. Not only is this an insult to the candidate’s ability, it also shows the level of paranoia of the Board.  The candidate refused to pull out.

Not satisfied, the Board continued to put pressure on candidates up to the very last minute. On the very night before elections, the Board called up the candidates for the two top posts – President and Deputy President. Again, they were urged to pull out so that the Board’s preferred candidate – the incumbent – would win unopposed. Various arguments were put forward. As expected, words like ‘maslahah jamaah’, ‘untuk kebaikan semua’ etc etc were splashed all over the session. Still, the candidates decided to remain.

Having failed to make the candidate withdraw, the Board – or, should I say, the Chair? -tried a different game. Perhaps feeling desperate, they tried to mislead the election committee into believing that the two candidates have agreed to withdraw. Of course, the candidates actually did not. Luckily once more, the plot was uncovered and the elections went ahead with the election.

Now, that was what I was referring to when I wrote about ‘corruption’. There are people who openly and unashamedly abuse their positions to pursue their own political agenda. When people abuse their positions for personal agenda, THAT IS CORRUPTION, even though they might say “Ana tidak ada kepentingan peribadi dan hanya buat semua ini untuk kebaikan jamaah”.

What worries me is the fact that many people know about situations like this. They still tolerate it. If it were me, I would firstly expose their dirty scams, and at the same time openly urge these corrupt people to step down immediately. They do not deserve to be protected, and they have lost all dignity to be in leading posts.

I see three possibilities. Either many people are happy to be ruled by corrupt leaders and therefore whatever these people say about wanting to get rid of corruption are sheer hypocrisy, or they simply do not have the guts to speak up, or they just can’t be bothered.

But then again, of course, this is a make-believe organisation. Otherwise, surely someone would have stood up and said something! We are all principled, aren’t we? Sebesar-besar jihad ialah……?

On that note, I think David Cameron made an excellent point in the last PMQ. When questioning Tony Blair about what he thinks cabinet government would be like under Gordon Brown, Cameron said:

I asked the Prime Minister a question about Cabinet government, but he will not answer, so let us ask the Cabinet. Who thinks that they will have more of a say round the Cabinet table when the Chancellor takes over? Come on—hands up! Is not that the problem—they all know it is going to be dreadful, but none of them has the guts to do anything about it?

Filed under: Misc, Personal

Have you seen the tukang urut adverts in Malaysia? How do they try to convince potential customers? They wear a jubah, a serban, and a little goatee. Lady tukang uruts don a tudung even when advertising ‘urut batin untuk lelaki’. To give a slightly more modern outlook, they put a picture of themselves holding a mobile phone. The more mobile phones they have, the more modern they seem to be. The more telephone numbers they have, the more ‘accessible’ they are! Some people may say “Of course he is not lying….. he looks like a serious Muslim”.

Try looking at how some leaders in our society behave. To hide their (or perhaps, our?) incompetence, they would say “if you have criticisms, please send it directly to me or my committee members. It is in the interest of our society (maslahah jamaah) that we deal with it through the official mechanism”. The hidden message is, if you know of their incompetence, do not let others know about it. Instead, use the mechanism that they and their friends devised so that only they and their friends know about it. Don’t tell anybody else because that may cause a revolt. Just tell them so that they can sweep it under their carpets. And…. wait for it…. they would say that this is , of course, in the interest of our society (maslahah jamaah).

I was talking to a friend the yesterday. He tried to convince me that if a Muslim leader makes a decision which I am not comfortable with, I should keep quiet because it is a matter of ijtihad. The other person may be right, and I may be right too. Or we could both be wrong. But because one person is in a position of leadership, we should not say anything that could damage him ‘for the sake of the society’.

My answer was “I am sorry, mate. That is the very double-standard that keeps corrupt hypocritical people in power!” I said to him, if the coming-from-different-angles argument were to be applied to Malaysia, then he should not criticise any politicians who are not in PAS (he is a PAS supporter). The BN politicians come from a different angle, and he comes from a different angle. Using my friend’s own logic,  he should not say anything against Barisan Nasional because they are merely using different perspectives. Speaking up could damage our country’s leadership and our society.

Of course, my friend disagrees. He said that I should not apply the same moral standards to Barisan Nasional and PAS members. He said, PAS and UMNO are different. My answer was, “I am sorry, mate. That is the very double-standard that keeps incompetent, corrupt, and hypocritical people in power.” It is easy to be obsessed with the munkar that we see outside, while turning a blind eye to the munkar pervasive amongst us. We advertise everybody else’s wrong-doings, but when it happens to us, let us keep it hush hush.

In short, the term ‘in the interest of our society’ or in Arabic ‘maslahah jamaah’ can be abused simply because many of us are either gullible or scared stiff to speak up. Many have been indoctrinated with the belief that we have to look after the interest of the society even if that means tolerating incompetent, untrustworthy, corrupt leaders.

The world is full with such people. If we look just over the last few months, there have been cases where the people in charge of running elections were pressurized by higher powers, their decision was changed by the powers above, candidates were pressurized to withdraw by the powers that be. And what do we do? We keep the power-abusers in place.

And how many times have you heard the powers that be saying “we are open to criticism and suggestion, but all criticisms and ideas seharusnya disampaikan terus kepada kami sama ada melalui email, melalui telefon atau apa-apa medium komunikasi lain yang sesuai, bukan kepada umum kerana kita perlu menjaga keharmonian”? 

What they did not openly say was, please do not tell others about their incompetence and corruption because that would tarnish their reputation! If these people were to become politicians, they would perhaps be the first people to destroy freedom of press for fear of being exposed. Rest assured a few Arabic phrases and Quran verses will be sprinkled into the justification. Abusing Islam is the best way to gain trust from us Muslims. Even the tukang urut knew that!

Keeping these incompetent, corrupt and untrustworthy people in place is only a reflection of our own weaknesses. No wonder we are in such a mess. We have no one to blame but ourselves.

Of course there are honest people out there. Unfortunately the abuse by some damages many. Kerana nila setitik, rosak susu sebelanga.

I look forward to seeing a change, and to seeing how serious new faces want to bring change.

Next issue, if I feel like it: How some people attempted to sweep mistakes under the carpet (to protect their reputations), and how weak leaders took hours to ‘consider’ the blatantly corrupt proposition.  
 

Filed under: Misc, Personal

I was hoping to write about my search for Ibn Khaldun’s house in Fez back in November 2006. Yes, after three days of asking (mainly using sign language) around, I did find the house and took some pictures. I also visited the house of Maimonides.

But it is becoming increasingly difficult to find time to blog. Twenty four hours is not enough. I struggle to find time to jot anything worth publishing.

So, I am going to take some time off blogging.

Filed under: Misc, Personal

I said in my previous post that recent events taught me two valuable lessons, viz.:

1. before you decide whom to trust, think carefully.

2. if you want to be evil, put on a religious mask. It is the best disguise ever.

The entry generated many comments, some of which are rather irresponsible. Quite a few people are a bit over-excited.

Filed under: Misc, Personal

David Cameron spoke about the importance of trust in the recent Conservative Spring Forum.

A good friend of mine also spoke about trust when I last saw him.

I am contemplating a post about my experience with the "trust" issue. I have an interesting experience with "trust" but I am not sure if I should post it.

Give me another one or two nights.

Filed under: Misc, Personal