ADUN SPEAKS More than a year has passed after one of the most exciting general elections in Malaysian political history.

The general election has not brought many changes at the national level as the ruling party has been in the government for more than 57 years. However, the elections have brought some changes at local level or state politics.

The political discourse of Johor, the southernmost state of the peninsular and neighbour of Singapore, has remained stagnant since the people used to have only the BN  dominating everything.

The opposition has hardly broken through at the birthplace of Umno.

Hence, it was a biggest ever breakthrough for Pakatan Rakyat to win 18 state seats in the 13th general election in Johor.

However, does the result show that Johoreans are slowly abandoning racial politics  played by the BN to solidify its ruling ground?

Sadly, we are still far away from the Malaysian Dream we want to achieve, there are even a few Malaysians regardless of their political affiliation who are brave enough to admit they are racists.

For instance, the tussle between mostly Malay small business holders and Chinese shop owners at Jalan Tan Hiok Nee over the Johor Baru Bazaar.

Road to city’s past

MCA and their friends in certain NGOs made the issue of JB Bazaar and Jalan Tan Hiok Nee an issue of racial rights over the street.

Undoubtedly, the Jalan Tan Hiok Nee street ( late Karpal Singh portrait is displayed at the street ) is one of the streets in JB that reminds people of the earlier history of the city when the downtown was developed mostly by influential Chinese business tycoons who had good rapport with the Johor royal family.

Johor Bahru has never been like other cities in Malaysia where most of the residents are Chinese. From the very beginning until now, Johor Bahru has been always the city with a non-Chinese majority population.

Jalan Tan Hiok Nee, a street named after one of the Kapitans and Chinese merchants, was slowly left behind in the development tide after the JB checkpoint was relocated.

The street which used to be busy and congested in its earlier days is now very quiet during the daytime; it only comes lively again at a corner every weekend evening after the JB Chinese Association decided to develop it into a Chinese cultural street.

Yet, most of the time, it remains as an abandoned old street.

The quiet place is now in the midst of an argument about who owns the street because of the JB Bazaar that is slowly crawling over from the Sungai Segget area and “penetrating” into the street.

Small traders, who are mostly ethnic Malays, sell second-hand stuff, handmade art works, fashion accessories and a lot of things you would not find anywhere else in the market while Chinese business holders who rent or own the pre-war shop lots try to make the place an artistic cultural spot.

One example of 1Malaysia trouble

In fact, they don’t necessary conflict with each other and should be able to achieve a win-win situation if the local authority has a good plan for a flea market. Sadly, the Johor Baru City Council possess neither city planning ideas nor the political will to enforce it.

Therefore, the problem between the Malay majority small traders and Chinese majority shop lot owners has suddenly been turned into a racial issue when it is actually an outcome of bad urban governance.

First of all, the street doesn’t belong to anybody or specific group of people but should be owned by the whole Johor Bahru community regardless of race, skin colour, language and cultural background although it is named after a powerful Chinese figure.

The history of Johor Baru should be acknowledged and taught in the schools so that everyone would have a sense of belonging to the city.

Secondly, JB City Council should take the responsibility to plan the local market, especially a market like JB Bazaar which attracts both locals and foreigners.

Anyone who has visited Bangkok or any bazaar overseas could tell how bad and poor is the imagination of our city council has been in planning the bazaar.

A huge flea market like JB Bazaar can easily be categorised as a second-hand, fashion, artistic/creativity, local food and etc, yet, ours is more like a “rojak” market where people who like to go treasure-hunting would definitely like it as it seems so challenging.

Since the business holders along Jalan Tan Hiok Nee intend to develop that area as an artistic spot, the local council should just follow the trend that has been set by the market and make it   strictly for artistic and creative small traders which will  actually provide a huge platform to our local artists.

Local authorities fast asleep

Besides that, the local authority has no planning over the cleanliness, traffic flow and parking issues brought about by the JB Bazaar.

Therefore, shop lot holders are frustrated that their interests are being jeopardised since even urine can be found in front of their shops, and trash is everywhere.

It's not surprising it has become a problem wit local authorities not having the political will to plan, and with the group of small traders feeling ridiculed by shop lots owners trying to stop them from coming into the street whe it should be a public-owned place to churn out money.

Moreover, the MCA, which labels itself a party representing Chinese community, saying that the street belongs to the community, worsens the situation, suddenly it becomes a racial issue when it should not be in the first place.

Don’t forget that this is a city developed not only by the Chinese and also by other communities. Masjid India, Hindu temple, Gudwara Sikh and the old Chinese temple are all within a kilometre of each other.

The tussle between JB Bazaar and Jalan Tan Hiok Nee is clearly a result of bad urban governance and not a racial issue, however MCA tries to act the hero to show to the JB Chinese society that they can voice out on their behalf while Pakatan Rakyat parties are trying to bring about new political ideas, especially in regard to urban governance.

We can be sure that the MCA and their followers would definitely ignore the issue if the shop lot owners are mostly Malay although it is still a result of a big urban governance problem in the town.

While the JB heritage zone shows how diversified our local cultures is, it is unfortunate that there are still a lot of people who make their judgements based on skin colour and race.

Jalan Tan Hiok Nee, a street where Malaysians can be proud of our diverse culture or be ashamed of our racism.

WONG SHU QI (Suki) is Senai state representative. She is Wanita DAP publicity assistant secretary.