With so many countries around the world finally apparently awake to the criminality of the gang that has spent the past five decades systematically stealing from the rakyat, right now the time seems ripe, if ever it was or will be, for Malaysians to get their own back.

To get their own back not just in the sense of wreaking vengeance on those who have so venally and viciously misruled them for almost six decades, as sweet as vengeance so assuredly is, but far more vitally in the sense of wresting back the ‘untold riches’ that the Umno/BN regime has allegedly stolen from them.

Of course the first riches that spring to mind for rightful recovery, in light of the 1MDB and ‘donation’ scandals that are currently attracting such avid international attention, are the literally countless billions of ringgit in cash and natural resources that members, supporters and cronies of the Umno/BN regime have plundered from the public purse.

Though the culprits are frantically trying to pass-off their plunders as nothing but honest blunders, as in the recent pathetic attempt by Communication and Multimedia Minister Salleh Said Keruak to counter what he called “ unfounded allegations that Malaysia’s prime minister is a thief”.

In support of this desperate bid to let the nation’s alleged chief crook off the hook, Salleh had the hide to imply that the ongoing RM42-billion 1MDB and RM2.6-billion ‘donation’ scandals are, as he claimed that “Perwaja, MAS, Proton, the RM30 billion Forex losses, Maminco, BMF and much more” have all been, “cases of either bad management or bad business decisions”.

In support of this patently false proposition, he added that in all of these cases, “no one was asked to be sent to jail for theft involving the taxpayers’ money”.

This was not just an outright lie, given that millions of Malaysians have been clamouring in vain for decades for regime wrong-doers to be brought to justice, but also a vivid reminder of the fact that, along with Malaysians’ money and other publicly-owned wealth, the Umno/BN kleptocracy has also stolen most of the people’s most precious rights and protections.

In other words, it is not just their own rightful property that Malaysians need and deserve to demand back from their Umno/BN predators, but a whole slew of their proper entitlements of which they have been plundered.

Everything that they have a constitutional right to and has systematically been stolen from them, from a free and fair one-person one-vote election system and equitable and equal treatment under the law to news media that can be trusted to inform them of the truth about their nation’s public affairs without fear or favour.

And there are a great many Malaysians who, besides their stolen money, natural resources and rights and freedoms as citizens of constitutional democracy, would like to get their own religions back.

Turning a blind eye to graft

Umno/BN has so hypocritically employed Malaysia’s majority faith as a pawn in perpetuation of its monopoly on power and plunder that most of the nation’s so-called ‘religious’ authorities are not only blatant propagandists and preachers of sermons in support of the regime, but also prepared to turn a totally blind eye to its corruption and criminality.

And regime members shamelessly employ their false piety to try and excuse their outrages, as witnessed most recently by the claim by Umno/BN puppet portal MyKMU.net that sums amounting to US$14 million paid by Najib Abdul Razak to Jakel fashion house in KL between 2011 and 2014 were for ‘ charitable contributions of clothing for orphans and disaster victims’ as well as ‘carpets for mosques.’

It’s no wonder, then, in view of such unholy displays of false sanctimony, that a great many good Muslims are yearning for a return of sincere and well-intentioned official expression of their faith, just as members of minority religions long for release from the way the regime routinely attempts to demonise them as alleged threats to the supremacy of Islam.

Finally, however, and arguably applying to each and every Malaysian above and beyond considerations of either God or mammon, is the matter of national and personal self-esteem.

Admittedly there seem to be millions of citizens so lacking in self-esteem or even a smattering of self-respect that they are capable of kidding themselves that Umno/BN is so irrelevant to them and the country they claim to love that they can’t be bothered to complain about these crooks, let alone to help their friends and neighbours vote them out of government.

But most Malaysians, thank goodness, sufficiently value themselves as sentient members of the human race to care a very great deal indeed about who they choose to govern them, and how, and thus hate to be disgraced in their own and their children’s eyes, not to mention in the sight of the rest of the world, by a criminal embarrassment like Umno/BN.

So for this if for no other reason, let us all hope that this enlightened majority, of which Malaysiakini readers must be counted as a considerable part, soon finally get together to rally, strike, sue, or whatever else it takes to get their own back on and from the criminal gang that has so long exploited and shamed them and their beloved country in every possible way.

DEAN JOHNS, after many years in Asia, currently lives with his Malaysian-born wife and daughter in Sydney, where he coaches and mentors writers and authors and practises as a writing therapist. Published books of his columns for Malaysiakini include ‘Mad about Malaysia', ‘Even Madder about Malaysia', ‘Missing Malaysia', ‘1Malaysia.con’ and ‘Malaysia Mania’.