The Malaysian scene is full of racial politics and now a strong tinge of Islamic religious politics. Any new political party that emerges is promptly labelled as Malay/Islamic, Chinese, Indian, Kadazan and the like.

This situation is the creation of the present ruling BN coalition that has successfully ingrained the racial seed, giving a false belief that each race is taken care of by the racial party in the coalition, while, in reality the main policies are laid down by the biggest party in the coalition.

This coalition has the advantage of being in power, and is able to give each of the races a 'stake' in the government. In the Malay-dominated areas, PAS has shown that the Islamic fervour in politics does have a strong clout. Of course, Umno retaliates to show that it can be just as Islamic as PAS.

In these circumstances, any new multi-racial party that emerges ends up being labelled as racial depending on the race of the top leader(s) who are perceived to be calling the shots. None of the parties that have just emerged on the Malaysian scene have been able to really portray a multi- racial or Malaysian outlook.

As reality dictates that any party that seeks to rule the country must have the support of the Malays, Malay leaders have to be seen as dominant in that party, while if the non-Malay leaders are dominant, it could at best be an opposition party or seek to be coalition partners in a coalition where there is a dominant Malay-based party.

Religious issues seem to hamper the emergence of an alternative front along the same lines of the present ruling front in Malaysia. As PAS has Islam as its main objective and strength, it may not want to compromise and join forces with others to form a viable alternative, more or less in the same pattern as the ruling coalition. Given this reality, can PKR take over and play the role in the opposition as is played by Umno in BN?

Will the Malays view Anwar Ibrahim and his men as a good alternative to Umno leaders and without having to rely on PAS? If PKR relies on PAS for the Malay votes, then the non-Malays will be fearful of the religious factor and will turn towards BN, as is happening now. PAS is playing a very significant role as a spoiler and is indeed helping Umno to Islamise further to keep the Malays happy. Either way, the non-Malays are in a dilemma. This situation has further weakened the non-Malays in the country.

There is also fact is that no party has a well-conceived policy that embraces the needs of all Malaysians including the small minorities, with effective representation guaranteed at the various levels with a well-planned check-and-balance mechanism in place. If our politicians are only looking at the next election, they are never going to be far-sighted.

It is an irony that we have more and more 'educated' Malaysians as time goes by but we are drifting further apart due to the various differences and extremism that have been engineered by our own political leaders for their own survival.

It is little wonder that we see politicians everywhere though unfortunately we are unable to see Malaysian statesmen anywhere. We are about to celebrate our 50th Merdeka anniversary on Aug 31. What a pity.