In its half century in power, the Umno-led government has been extremely successful in one area - neutralising dissent and opposition without creating too much of instability or fuss.

It has refined it to the kind of fine art that many crude Third World dictators would do well to study.

That expertise is at work once again, and as is usually the case with a well-done job, underlying all the moves are some basic, time-tested rules:

1) Threaten the pocketbooks of the dissenting masses and they will fall in line. That does not usually work in poverty-ridden places, but in Malaysia, it has always worked. Malaysians have always been kept well-fed enough to keep the level of anger lower than the level of fear.

What is different this time around is that the dissenters are the Malays, and particularly Malay students. Never mind, Umno says. Let's threaten their privileged position (easier entry into universities), and they will come back to the fold.

Will it happen? Only the next election will tell. But in case, it doesn't, there's the next step...

2) Throw more crumbs to those who are still with Umno. And it is the Chinese, Sabahans and Sarawakians who are now money in the bank for Umno. The party remained in power after the last election in 1999 because of the support of these groups.

Lo and behold! The MCA gets its long-sought university. And Prime Minister Dr Mahathir Mohamad even appoints two Chinese advisers! (Never mind that in this multiracial country, it would seem that the prime minister never had advisers before this from the second-largest community.)

3) Get tough with the leaders of the dissenters. Vilify them. The most immediate threat no longer comes from the opposition parties. It is the students and other intellectuals - mostly Malays - who are capable of whipping up mass dissent. So the whip comes down on these people. Students get detained under the ISA, are sacked by their educational institutions and generally get harassed.

In addition, there is suddenly this 'huge' number of militant 'underground' organisations intent on overthrowing the government by force led by - you guessed it - all those who have proven themselves fearless and capable of challenging Umno.

But now they are no longer 'communists'. They are 'radical Muslims'. That's because the people you need to frighten are no longer the Malays, whose support is gone anyway.

No, the people Umno needs to frighten are the non-Malays to keep them in line, and those pesky Westerners who keep insisting that there be greater democracy. We are fighting 'radical Muslim terrorists' here, so leave us alone.

The biggest surprise in the government's recent activities has been the apparent decision that there is no real hope of regaining Malay support.

It has always been accepted as conventional wisdom that without Malay support, a party cannot govern Malaysia. Mahathir's Umno seems determined to prove this wrong by writing off Malay support and yet retaining power.

Knowing Mahathir, would anybody bet against him coming out on top again?