YOURSAY | ‘Let’s worry about Bersatu after it has wrenched the rural Malays from Umno.’

Syed Saddiq: If Bersatu is racist, can I join MCA and MIC?

Anonymous_1421806811: Although I am not an advocate of any racially-based political party, I have to agree with the setting up of Bersatu as a Malay-based party.

The reason is simple. The rural Malays are the core supporters of Umno and Umno has survived by playing these simple rules:

1) Keep the rural folk poor.

2) Keep them ignorant and feed them with propaganda.

3) Blame other races when Umno faces a crisis.

4) Give them handouts once in a while to show how "caring" Umno is.

After 50 years of indoctrination, sadly, the rural Malays are unable to accept a multiracial party. In order to go head to head with Umno, Bersatu has to show it is representing them.

Let’s worry about Bersatu after it has wrenched the rural Malays from Umno. The priority now is to get rid of this evil party called Umno and put its allegedly corrupt leaders behind bars.

Dingy: Yes, by forming another multiracial party, it will only compete with other multiracial parties. This will allow Umno to continue to command the bulk of rural Malay votes.

Bersatu's first aim is to weaken Umno by drawing those members who are unhappy with PM Najib Razak to join them. The second aim is to take away the majority of the rural Malay votes, which traditionally voted for Umno.

It is a good strategy to weaken Umno which had captured 88 seats in GE13. The old strategy was to weaken BN component parties but this strategy cannot weaken Umno. Once Umno is weakened, BN will fall.

Tembikai: Bersatu pro tem committee member Syed Saddiq Abdul Rahman, you are going to lose all the good reputation that you have built.

Bersatu is race-based, which many people cannot accept as they have enough of so many things in the country being divided according to race.

However, if you explain that a Malay/bumi party is needed to take away the rural votes from Umno, people may be more forgiving.

P Dev Anand Pillai: At the end of the day, they all come out from the same mould and pander to the same whims.

Divide and rule is not going to work anymore; the Malay community is being diluted by globalisation and inter-marriages so at the end of the day, finding a true Malay would be difficult, and yet they seem only to bother about race and religion.

Syed Saddiq, you should have shown the way by refusing to join this party. The thinking people of Malaysia would have had some faith in you.

The Analyser: How do you expect young Malaysians to think "outside of the box"?

This whole society is determined to ram its young people back into the box and firmly slam the lid on them. Then on the top of the box, sit the repressive minds and bloated egos that are on display on the pages of Malaysiakini.

Regardless of race, parents, peers, religion, schools, universities, the workplace and the government, all conspire to control and repress young people.

Then before they know it, you are demanding they pass exams, and become high-income earning innovative entrepreneurs just so they can support you in your dotage. Malaysians are their own most destructive force.

One Malaysia: Syed Saddiq, your youthful enthusiasm about Malaysian politics and walking the talk is uplifting and we hope will inspire others to do the same.

Along the way, we also hope that you will discover the means and solutions that is a true, 1Malaysia solution and not be distracted and waylaid by race and religion.

If this new party is aiming at reforms, it needs to put Malaysia and all Malaysians first.

FellowMalaysian: I am flabbergasted and caught non-plussed over how our young, learned, much-acclaimed debater could have made such a bewildering comparison when, in his very own words, he had denounced MCA and MIC as “defunct and powerless” in the same breadth.

Syed Saddiq even had the cheek to issue a challenge to MCA and MIC to cajole them to take the road to reform gradually from race-based politics. And yet, you Syed is asking, “If race-based MCA and MIC can do it and seemingly survived for the past 60 years, why can't Bersatu?"

Let's just say that two wrongs don’t make a right. Do you seriously think the non-Malays will become foolish enough to be enamoured and enthralled with the faux-laced offer of associate membership?

It looks like MCA has decided to scuttle its own idea because it wasn't such a bright one after all. And Bersatu just walked into it and proclaimed, “MCA, I beat you at your own game.”

Existential Turd: MCA, MIC and Umno are an anachronism from a bygone era. They have long since passed their expiry date and should be consigned to the dustbin of history.

You know what they say about doing the same thing over and over again, but expecting a different result?

Hang Babeuf: Syed Saddiq said, “If Bersatu is racist, can I join MCA and MIC?”

He has a point. In a crazy world, crazy logic can apply. But how are we ever to get beyond craziness, this specific craziness?

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