Oblivious to our own failing

It's disturbing, to say the very least, of the political events here in Malaysia during the past week or so. I've stopped commenting on political developments for quite a while now but I feel that I've to say something in these circumstances. 

First, a legitimate government elected by the people in 2018 was deposed by a backdoor government in February 2020. That was bad enough, these actions by a power-crazy group of politicians. And then, when this failed backdoor government resigned last week, they opened the doors for another illegitimate government to replace them. 

What galled me was that this latest reincarnation of a government is led by a scandal-hit political party. Remember 1MDB? That's UMNO, the political party behind it. What's more galling is that 21 of the 114 non-UMNO elected representatives that supported this new government were turncoats of their original political parties. Take note that they are now supporters of corruption, since February last year! 

This whatsapp message was forwarded to me by a friend this morning. The writer's observation on the state of the nation is very acute and disturbing. In his message, he said: 

"It was very remarkable how the political upheaval in the last two years have actually shaped outsiders' views and how other countries look at Malaysia. One would not realise if one is here in Malaysia. That is because, those of us here are also sucked into it and unable to perceive the gravity until we step back from the descending chaos and reflect. 

"I had one such moment this week when I was having a conference call meeting with Singapore and Japan. We were reviewing our situation here and in around the world and how the pandemic has affected our projects. We were trying to craft a way forward, now that borders are being gradually opening up. We were assessing the markets in the region and strategy for new opportunities or tenders. During the discussions, one of my Japanese colleagues working in a civil project in Singapore remarked that Malaysia is now worse than a third world country. He further said that Malaysia has not developed and we should be concerned and wary of taking projects here. 

"I was quite literally shocked, because other Japanese in the meeting were all in agreement. They all told me that this is how Japanese people and investors now look at Malaysia."

In response, another friend has commented: "Absolutely. Just like sitting in a stationary train at a station and parallel to the train another train is moving just a few feet away from the stationary train. We sitting in the stationary train feel that we are moving in the opposite direction. 

"That’s Malaysia we are in. Unmoving and just that momentary illusion. In such situation we can do this. Tell the train driver to move on, or if this not possible and we don’t know whether the train is going to move or not, get out and get another right train, or force the driver to move or change the driver. The latter (is) not possible by the passengers unless we hijack the train. 

"Many options. If we give up, just sleep in the stationary train and hope sooner or later it moves. Not knowing where to and at what speed. The last one is precisely 99.9% of what Malaysians do!"