Can those people thumping their chests to condemn Selangor Mentri Besar Khalid Ibrahim’s suggestion to allocate 10 percent of student admission of Universiti Teknologi Mara (UiTM) to non-bumiputera and foreign students please answer one simple question.

Is there a single university in the world which practices 100 percent racial discrimination for its student enrolment?

If there is none, shouldn’t these same people start to do some reflective thinking now as to whether it is a plus or minus for Malaysia to have this unique distinction? Should they not contemplate whether they are proud or not so proud of this ‘achievement’?

Should they not be concerned of what the rest of the world might think of a country that is still fanatically defending its policy of total racial discrimination in its highest seat of learning when the whole world has either abandoned or criminalised racial discrimination of all kinds?

Are they not worried that Malaysia may soon acquire the image of ‘Jurassic Park’ or ‘Lost World’ of this globalised age?

Yes, I use the word ‘fanatically’ because the outburst against Khalid’s suggestion was swift, vituperative, irrational, racist and spearheaded by top Umno leaders and reverberated down to UiTM students who gathered in the thousands to protest in front of Khalid’s office.

Vocal assails include - unfortunately - from the Higher Education Minister Khaled Nordin and UiTM vice-chancellor Ibrahim Abu Shah; and vitriolic criticisms include ‘selling out Malay special privileges’, ‘insult to his own race’, and ironically even ‘playing with racial sentiments’.

Surprisingly, even the constitution was brought in to defend UiTM’s 100 percent racial discrimination policy, displaying wide-spread ignorance of the constitution. Vice-chancellor Ibrahim specifically referred to Article 153 of the Constitution as legal basis for his refusal to open the door of UiTM to other races.

Whereas the reverse is true – Article 153 only empowers the Yang Di Pertuan Agong to request for the reservation of such proportion of positions as deemed reasonable for the Malays and natives of Sabah and Sarawak in educational institutions funded by the government. Coupled with Article 8 which prohibits discrimination of any kind on the ground of race, UiTM’s 100 percent racial policy is clearly unconstitutional.

The fanatical zeal displayed by the ruling party (Umno) in condemning even the tiniest opening of its mono-racial institution to others in this multi-racial nation half-a-century after independence is undoubtedly a terrible indictment on the miserable failure of nation-building carried out by the only ruling power this nation has ever known – Umno.

It should be pointed out that this UiTM fiasco is the latest in a long string of world-renowned scandals that have shamed this country in a short spell of time – starting with the Lingam tape scandal that revealed our judicial rot, the Mongolian high-level murder trial that drills on endlessly and aimlessly, the Anwar sodomy frame-up saga II which symbolises the regime’s moral bankruptcy and the violent disruption of the Bar Council forum on family problems arising from conversion to Islam that displays religious intolerance.

What alarms the public even more is that these scandals seem to roll in with increasing frequency and speed, destroying what little trust and confidence the people may still have in the government. Are we as a nation already in the reverse gear sliding into an abyss?

With these self-destructive maneuvers, apparently self-engineered for its own political survival, Umno is actually stretching the political and social fabric of the nation into the danger zone.

How then could Prime Minister Abdullah Ahmad Badawi in all honesty announce that the country ‘is doing quite well in terms of the economic fundamentals’ when the economy is already deeply troubled with slumping demand amidst spiraling inflation in an ambience of administrative incompetence coupled with escalating political turmoil and uncertainty?

The latest two incidents – Bar Council forum and UiTM enrolment – appear to be linked to the imminent Permatang Pauh by-election through which Anwar Ibrahim is planning to make his grand return to Parliament. It is apparent that Umno is hell bent on exploiting every bit of potential religious and racial friction and blow it up to inflame the primordial instincts of the 70 percent Malay electorate in the Permatang Pauh constituency.

Its policy seems to be that there is no price too high for Umno to retain power, including stoking the fire of racial hatred and religious animosity that may eventually rip the nation apart.

The nation must decide whether it can tolerate such an incumbent political power continuing to hold the reins of government. And that collective decision, if in the negative, can be put into effect (to a significant extent) by the electorate of Permatang Pauh by giving Anwar Ibrahim a resounding victory.