Happy Merdeka!
It’s Malaysia’s 50th year of independence from the British Empire. We gained our independence on the 31st August 1957 andas a nation, we have made substantial progress in various spheres.
Yet there is deep unhappiness over the status quo. It took an Economist article titled “Tall buildings, narrow minds” to eloquently sum up Malaysia at its 50th year:
More so than at independence, it is lamented, the different races learn in separate schools, eat separately, work separately and socialise separately. Some are asking: is there really such a thing as a Malaysian?
As a Malaysian born, bred, educated and earning his rice bowl in Malaysia for the last 27 years, my wish for Malaysia is simple: that each and everyone of us start accepting each other as equal Malaysians, as sons and daughters of the same root. Ethnic identity can only come second to a national identity: Malaysian first!
When I went to university, I was not allowed to share dorm rooms with somebody of a different race. During classes, I was not encourage to share knowledge with those of a different ethnic group. It went as far as lecturers only giving “exam tips” to those from their own ethnic race.
We were forcibly taught to be racist as a means of survival; “protect your own” was the rallying cry. And why not? After all, everybody else was doing it, right? The discovery during the university years for me and those of my generation was the whole system was racist in nature, from the very top to the very bottom.
Fortunately for some of us, racism was a non-palatable plate; I personally found it to be one the most demeaning ways degrade and denigrade for the selfish purposes of self-fulfillment. We rejected this approach and did what we could to live within the endemic racism in university. And as we discovered, not everybody was racist; there were a number of people who were sick of the racism as we were. We took comfort in knowing that such racist policies only had power as long as people believed and followed it; taking a leaf from Satyagrapha movement, we decided that we would never partake in any activities that is racist or communal in nature. That way, we could be assured that we would not be helping perpetuate an unjust system.
A few years have past since my graduation from the university. Exposure has taught me that there are those who intentionally seek to divide Malaysians among racial and cultural lines for the sake of conquering and consolidating power. 50 years ago, the British stopped dividing and conquering us and we gained our independence. With independence, we had hope of a united Malaysia. Today, we see that the powers-that-be are still dividing us into a communal Malaysia for their own purposes.
Some have asked me, “What can we do?”
That’s a very good question. Keep asking yourselves that; observe what others are doing. You will find your path to a better Malaysia soon enough.