COMMENT Selangor Legislative Assembly Speaker Hannah Yeoh’s return to Malaysia after a four-month work stint in Tasmania right after her graduation was never on her bigger plans of things.

And, the idea of joining politics seemed so remote to her until six years ago, when she was picked to represent the DAP in Subang Jaya state constituency against an MCA candidate, Ong Chong Swen.

Ong, despite a newcomer, was inheriting the constituency from former MCA strongman, Lee Hwa Beng, who represented the Subang Jaya state seat for several terms.

Lee ( right ) was picked to contest the Kelana Jaya parliamentary constituency.

Yeoh was like the boy, David who fought the giant, Goliath, and won the battle. However, unlike David with his simple faith, Yeoh mulled through it for some time.

“Over time, I was influenced by (who was her co-leader in the cell group at church) Edward’s fervour. I began to see the logic, the moral imperative even, of participating in politics if I wanted injustices in the country to be corrected,” she wrote in her memoir, 'Becoming Hannah' which was launched recently by Penang Chief Minister Lim Guan Eng.

In Yeoh’s case, it was an unfolding of a series of events that caused her to turn 180 degrees from being the “apolitical” Hannah to become who she is meant to be. She created history by becoming the country’s first woman speaker for the Selangor legislative assembly.

A Christian, Yeoh said, this was to her like the fulfilment of a prophetic word given to her by one Pastor Frank Cole, who had been a good friend and mentor while she was studying in Tasmania, Australia.

'The Hannah Generation'

Yeoh’s rise in politics has certainly paved the way for more aspiring young people to take part in Malaysian politics.

Prior to her candidacy in 2008, Yeoh admitted that she was, like most people of her age, “apolitical”.

“For someone who hardly understood the difference between a member of parliament and a state assemblyperson, to become its speaker, this is indeed something!” she wrote.

Prior to 2008, Yeoh was prepared to only encourage fellow Malaysians to vote. But, when the demand was made clear that Yeoh was the best candidate for Subang Jaya, she rose to the situation.

She went into the election campaign as a green horn - as how we would describe her - because she did not know how to go about it, or even how to plan for it. She did not have the funds to even kickstart the campaign.

How many of our young people today would be prepared to take up the challenge when this nation needs their involvement in the political arena? Are they, like Subang Jaya assemblyperson Hannah Yeoh, willing to respond to their calling – that still small voice saying to them, “Enter politics!”

One reason, perhaps, why our nation has become what it is today with so many political “snakes” and “crocodiles”: is it not because the good people are doing nothing about it?

As the Irish statesman Edmund Burke once said: “The only thing necessary for the triumph of evil is for good men to do nothing.”  

Yeoh’s participation in politics is an encouragement to other young people to think about giving themselves to serve the people through her involvement in politics.

Elaborating further the meaning behind the title of her book, Yeoh explains: “Even though politics was not a natural choice for me, I ended up becoming a career politician despite having no inclination for it and no experience at all.”

Hannah in the Bible is a childless woman, who badly wanted a child, and God gave her what she desperately prayed for.

If the younger generation of Malaysians say that they desperately want to see change in the country, the question lies within the hearts of the young people: “Are they prepared to join the Hannah generation?”

As Yeoh put it in chapter four of her book: “…I felt a desire to let go the familiar and head towards the unknown. The idea of working as a lawyer for the rest of my life grew less and less appealing.” The bottomline is: “Are our young people willing to venture out beyond their comfort zone?”

STEPHEN NG is an ordinary citizen with an avid interest in following political developments in the country since 2008.