These Malayan clowns just know what to croon...

Patriots who react: 1,347 reminders for Zahid Hamidi

Kuala Lumpur, MALAYSIA: At times you should take offence. Like when your defence minister says maybe why you are not in the military is because your ethnicity makes you lack patriotism. So I’ll take offence, and I’ll ask for an apology.

Since his major misstep two days ago, Datuk Seri Dr Zahid Hamidi has tried to wriggle out of the growing perception he does not think non-Malays are patriotic enough.

A politician lives by perception and when he finds it worthwhile to point out “low patriotism” may be a factor for negligible military recruitment of non-Malays, irrespective of its impact, he has blundered.

More so when this is your defence minister, the man expected to lead the defence of the country by galvanising the spirit of its people to the defence of the “tanah air.”

More telling when you are the Umno vice-president with the highest number of votes, technically you are the third-ranking Umno leader, and the second in line to succeed the prime minister if Barisan Nasional (BN) stays in power.


And there is the minor issue of you being Bagan Datoh’s MP — a mixed seat in highly volatile Perak, with one of its two state seats under PKR. You’ve just suggested perhaps a large number of your constituents are not quite as loyal.

No Zahid, ask your advisers. An apology might be the most sensible way out.
But you did open up an ever-prickly Malaysian issue, is race what determines loyalty? And who is a true Malaysian patriot?

The patriot defends his nation and is willing to sacrifice himself for the well-being of those at home. A patriot at home and away. Home is inside the Federation of Malayan states, Sabah and Sarawak, all those holding Malaysian passports.

And patriotism is not pick and choose. You are obligated to all Malaysians in equal measure, which is a basic construct of the nation-state. All, not some more than others.

Just as a point of curiosity, how many of the 13,115 voters who crossed Zahid’s name at the ballot box in 2008 fall under the category of suspect patriotism? I hope not too many, because if all things remain the same then only 1,347 have to turn their backs on him for his win majority to turn into a loss.

As alluded to earlier, the discussion of patriotism and loyalty can only firm up when equality under the state firms up.

Malaysia is not the only country with the struggle to firm up on that.

The latent mistrust of Jews, even in the more politically-suave French, manifested with the unfair conviction of Captain Alfred Dreyfus in 1894 for treason. Evidence was secondary to Dreyfus’ Judaism, and a nation was divided for years until truth won but not before years of wrongful incarceration.

Emile Zola, another Jew, wrote the famous letter on the injustice — J’accuse — which helped France review its own unstated discrimination within its egalitarian shores.

The current gaffe here started with an earnest answer for the low presence of non-Malays in the military.
But only the naïve would think patriotism is a racial predisposition. There is normal distribution in most traits. The number of disloyal Malaysians among Malays, Kadazans, Sikhs or Serani should be the same in percentage terms. Those who slouch when the national anthem is played and rather run than be drafted into the military at times of war. Those who wait for a better city to move to.

The concern comes from abnormal distribution. The BN government has believed for decades any type of glaring abnormality hurts nation building. So the onus is on them to adopt better policies to rectify the situation, not extricate themselves from responsibility.

Loyalty is a two-way street.

The First World War saw Australians battling in Europe to end the threat of Germany. “The diggers” went through some of the most challenging battles and campaigns and were credited to being instrumental in winning the war.

I keep hearing from right-wingers that I need to read history. I’ll return the complement by asking them to read history more widely and less selectively.

Because leading the Aussies in Europe was John Monash — a German Jew. There were moans in some corners but that did not stop the second-generation engineering graduate whose father migrated from Germany (changed the family name from Monasch) from being appointed. (I hope this also does not upset right-wingers that there is a university in Sunway named after a Jewish general.)

Australia stayed loyal to John Monash, and unsurprisingly he stayed loyal to his home, Australia. Almost a hundred years ago.

And if madness may strike twice, the damn Americans did the very same thing. They got someone with a German bloodline and name to become Supreme Allied Commander to defeat Hitler in World War Two. Something like a Peranakan person from Malacca.

And if it was not enough, they made Dwight “Ike” Eisenhower a two-term president seven years later after hundreds of thousands of American boys were killed by Germany.

What would Tun Tan Cheng Lock make out of that?

Patriotism does take different shapes. Like in the lead-up to India’s independence. Chandra Bose, Patel, Gandhi and Jinnah all stuck to their guns.

One ganged up with the Japanese and hoped to invade India, the other wanted to build a political organisation, the low-frills one starved himself into our conscience when he wasn’t making salt and the last dude fought for a conceptual nation with dodgy cricketers today.

So be very careful when you draw the lines of patriotism; it’s a feeling but it is our personal relationship with the country.

In the 2002 World Cup, Turkey finished third with a slew of German-born, -raised and -trained Turks. They chose to play for the country of their parents, and it was made easier because Germany was only then moving away from being a mono-ethnic nation.

Eight years later, one Turk decides to play for Germany. Mesut Ozil, a Muslim boy who dazzled the world in South Africa and now is playmaker in a Real Madrid team boasting of the who’s who of global football.
Two million Turks in Germany. Are those who choose to place their lot with Germany less reliable because many others still keep their commitment to Istanbul? Are Germans going to downgrade Ozil despite him saying he feels German?

One can go after the low-hanging fruit of betrayal. Major Malik Hasan Nadal, a Muslim US military psychiatrist, picks up a weapon and starts shooting randomly inside Fort Hood, Texas a year ago — killing 11, injuring 31.

Reason enough to doubt Muslims in the US military? Or is it just one troubled man losing his marbles. It does not stop the Yanks from having imams serving along with chaplains and rabbis the world’s sole superpower. Where are the chaplains in the Malaysian military?

Someone says when you are in a war zone it is easy to determine patriotism, when the other side is trying to shoot those in your uniform, and if you shoot them back then you are loyal.

There is a point in that.

We’ve never had to fight on our own as a nation against formidable foes. That might be the origin of our hubris.

You casually mock some of your population because you are confident all of us will never have to complete with our backs against the wall, where only other Malaysians watch your back. Your life in the hands of any given Malaysian.

The US took a long march to racial equality, but every major war gave a burst of life to the issue.
Bullets don’t discriminate and when you see different colours die inside the same uniform, it alters your worldview.

It is a blessing not to be war-ravaged but it has made us not realise how fragile our strength is, and how much we need each other.

The nation state concept needs to solidify full participation in order to accrue full commitment from all its members. Full participation screams at you in times of conflict, and commitment etched into our collective memories by the casualty count.

In this regard, almost all our other Asean neighbours have been forced to confront through their national experiences. From border artillery exchanges across Indochina and Indonesia’s war in Aceh and multiple police actions across their archipelago. Vietnam is a chapter on its own.

We had it easy.

Would these rules of patriotism apply to our modern gladiators, our sportsmen?

Are they likelier to fight harder and with better discipline on the court, field or shooting range because they are one race and not the other?

Will there be a re-weighting of the medals from the Commonwealth Games based on the names of the winners?

I’m not beating a dead horse. Patriotism is a feeling, and when you are glib about my most personal feeling then you always had it coming.

A patriot is not a coward who hides behind the many, or pseudonyms and mocks his countryman. A patriot refuses injustices, refuses hate, respects love and understands family. It is a collection of families which makes a nation.

A patriot acts and fulfils his obligations. He does not question the value of another man’s patriotism.
I don’t know if I am a patriot, it is not my place to judge, but I do try.

Maybe our defence minister has to try to see the good in his fellow countrymen, and perhaps then he can feel us. But for now, and apology would do.