I read in a local tabloid recently that the Prime Minister of Malaysia Abdullah Ahmad Badawi, responding to the victory of Barack Hussein Obama as the 44 th president of the US, said that ‘even in Malaysia, anyone could also be the prime minister’.

That statement, instead of arousing my feeling of patriotism, sent a shudder of disbelief down my spine. Is this not the same prime minister who had many times said one thing but decided on another? For example, he assured the nation in February 2008 that the parliament would not be dissolved but immediately the following day we read in the newspaper that the parliament had been dissolved!

Again, in September the same year he assured the nation that the petrol price would not be adjusted until 2009, yet the next day we suffered a whopping 78 sen increase. Is this same prime minister now unable to remember that he had cheated the nation?

I dare not think of what the Umno elite would do if, really, a non-Malay were to helm a key government agency, say Bursa Malaysia, not to mention holding the premiership in Malaysia.

I could imagine Hishammuddin Hussein frantically searching for his keris to wave at the most public place demanding that the rights of the Malays be re-instituted.

The Mohd Khir Toyol will be conferring with the chief editor of Utusan Malaysia to whip up the most racial of lies at the expense of national unity while Rahim Tamby Chik will be urgently demanding an Umno special meeting to discipline the culprit who initiated this ‘disgraceful’ move.

Meanwhile the police stations and all courts throughout the country will be jam-packed by the Umnoputeras to demand that ‘justice’ be restored.

In Malaysia, as long as Umno continues to maintain their selfish, self-serving mentality, Malaysians will not be united and Malaysia will not progress and be competitive in this fast- progressing global economy. We will continue to live within the illusion of Umno's lies.

After 51 years of independence, I think the Malays are confident enough to be able to compete globally. I have many Malay friends who are successful academics, researchers, businessmen and professionals working and residing outside Malaysia.

They do not need Umno to tell us or them what to do and to decide what is best for them. They do not need a mediocre guardian like Umno to snoop over our backs daily. This has done more harm than anything else because whenever they succeed there would be this murmuring that these Malays could not attain what they had attained without Umno's help.

Even after the March 2008 political tsunami, Umno is still in a self-righteous slumber oblivious to the happenings around it. To the Umno politicians, Malaysia is their world and their world alone.

While the whole world is celebrating in jubilation of the triumph of Obama as a mark of the ratification of racial unity, to them, I think, it does not really matter as the bigotry of Umno must be served first.

I would like to advice Umno to loosen its grip. Until and unless the Umnoputeras are more rationale and mature and are willing to look at global views from different angles, they will continue to stifle the nation.

Malaysians today are more informed and matured - treat them with respect.