Malay rights will not erode if local elections are held because the majority of local councils are in Malay areas, said former deputy higher education minister Saifuddin Abdullah.

Justifying his statement, Saifuddin said that “more and more people are not thinking about race any more” and instead, people are beginning to become more “colour blind” towards such things.

“Out of the 144 local councils that we have, the majority of the people residing in the local council are actually Malay, with the exception of maybe three or four (majority non-Malays), and because of that, the Malays should not worry,” he said today.

Saifuddin was serving as a special speaker during a conference on ‘Local Authorities in Malaysia: Revisiting the Athi Nahappan Report For Our Times’, where he addressed the possibility of erosion of Malay rights.

Last January, PAS president Hadi Awang had warned DAP that their ambition to bring back local polls may lead to another May 13 race riots.

“We should not propose something that will lead to instability, widen the gap between villages and towns and more frightening is such tension can build up and result in a repeat of the May 13 incident which is a black mark in our country’s history,” he had said in a statement.

Saifuddin, who is also the CEO of the Global Moderates Movement (GMM), stressed that local polls will not threaten the rights of the Malays.

He also urged Umno to understand that local elections have got nothing to do with race.

Giving credit to Umno Youth chief Khairy Jamaluddin, he said that many Umno Youth members are starting to understand this, but are still lurking in the shadows as they are not in decision-making positions in the party.

Siafuddin, who is a former Umno supreme council member, said that if one interprets Article 153 and Article 3 of the federal constitution correctly, one will definitely see that Malay rights are still guaranteed, in fact, they are not even touched.

“Depends on how you interpret the federal constitution, that is Article 153 and Article 3. The first one refers to the special position of the Malays in peninsular Malaysia and the natives in Sabah and Sarawak, and Article 3 is about religion.

“Then you will be assured that the Malay rights will be there anyway because it will be guaranteed by the constitution. It is there, and it is enshrined. It’s not even touched,” he said.