I applaud Abakjr ( Champion the 'Malaysian' race for unity ) in his efforts to articulate the problems Malaysia faces with unity and a national identity and the equally unfair criticisms of Islam and Malays as being the sole 'thorn' in the issue.

It is a testament to Islam if you must, but more importantly to the Malays, who decided not to 'throw' Indians and Chinese out of the country at independence which they very well could have, or to have forcibly 'nationalised' them like in Indonesia and Thailand.

There has been an abject lack of cooperation and understanding why Malays feel the way they do towards them. Successive governments succumbed to the mercantile and intellectual classes of Indians and Chinese and to the lure of their vast holdings of wealth to corrupt an otherwise workable system. At the brunt of all of it were the Malays.

We have as much of a political, historical and moral burden to carry for the exclusion of the Malay from voluntary participation in our everyday activities as do the British who imbued into our collective psyches the notion that the Malay is good for nothing but being baggage carriers and drivers.

The Indians must not forget that their plight (especially the Tamils) is the result of reinforcement of the negative stereotyping by the British who created the situation, later aided and abetted by Prime Ministers Tunku Abdul Rahman and Abdul Razak Hussein in furthering that stereotype. I will include Indians in being an integral part and parcel of that problem as they have never let go of their abhorrent caste system wherever they go.

Unless the non-Malays let go of their attitude that they are better equipped with business skills and more acceptable to the West because they are not Muslims, they will continue to be perceived by their Muslim fellow citizens as agents of an imperial past desperately attempting to re-assert themselves on a more prosperous Malaysia.

Understand the bitterness they must feel when they support corrupt and unworkable systems which they cannot grasp not because they are stupid but because it is alien to their culture. Learn to build bridges rather than to burn them.

I can now speak with the benefit of a better experience having a niece and nephew married Malay Muslims and converting. After the chest beating "Where have we gone wrong?" and lamenting, we have come to terms now with ourselves and feel more a part of this great nation. (I don't live in Malaysia any more but cannot detach myself from my upbringing there).