I am surprised that Mohd Ali Rustam, aspiring to be one of Umno's vice-presidents, still has the narrow-minded mentality that Umno's business is not the business of non-members.

He had told off Lim Guan Eng when the latter lodged a report calling on the Anti-Corruption Agency to investgate money politics within Umno following an allegation by the former chief minister of Malacca, Abdul Rahim Tamby Chik .

A letter writer to malaysiakini recently explained why the general public should be involved in what is going on in Umno as its president invariably becomes the prime minister of Malaysia. How can Umno regard its business as party business only when its leader wants to be the leader of the country as well?

Looking at the history of the prime ministers of Malaysia, Dr Mahathir Mohamad started of as an extremist but had to moderate his views within the Barisan Nasional coalition in the course of his rise within the party in order to become prime minister.

Most Umno Youth leaders started of with extremist views in order to gain support from the Malays, yet only those who were willing to change their mindset can achieved any higher ambitions. The outgoing Umno Deputy Youth Chief Abdul Aziz Sheikh Fadzir, who once threatened to burn down Selangor Chinese Chamber of Commerce, will find that his future as a national leader limited unless he shows positive change to his extremist rhetoric.

Azalina Othman was impressive for being objective when hosting Dateline but lost her credibility once she joined Umno as she had to appear as an apple-polisher. Her threat to burn down Harakah's office , one of Umno's usual youthful fiery rhetoric, will only damage her

standing.

Only the present leadership find her good enough to be rewarded with a ministerial post. She had won her parliamentary seat unopposed, so she has yet to prove her popularity among the masses, especially the non-bumiputeras.

Umno, being the anchor party of Barisan Nasional, should be exemplary in its conduct, especially in the selection of its leaders. Ideally, only the most popular candidates should be chosen. But given the unique system we have in this country, this is not so.

The so-called BN 90 percent majority in parliament was won with only 64 percent of the votes, and Umno is just a component party in the BN, though the controlling one. I leave it to you to form an opinion.