Parit Buntar MP Mujahid Yusof Rawa, almost lurched into a rendition of the lilting pop hit ‘The Great Pretender’ when speaking in Parliament yesterday on the Agong's Address.

The Amanah vice-president denounced as corrosive the tendency of powers that be to view as hunky dory evident signs of social malaise, such as rampant obesity among the populace and a willingness to sacrifice money, suspected as laundered, in foreign bank accounts.

“Adrift in a world of my own” is a line from the Platters' top hit that resonated with what the two-term federal legislator conveyed in his brief speech to the Lower House, decrying rampant corruption and a pretention that deludes about the perils the country is facing.

“The world is watching but the government pretends all's well that can be said to seem well,” said Mujahid, resorting to the Malay allegorical device of pantun to convey his point.

“No matter how clever the pretense, the end result will be disaster for the country,” he asserted.

A signal member of Amanah's brain trust, Mujahid observed that the country's founders had placed it on a strong constitutional foundation to cope with the plurality of beliefs among its diverse peoples.

He noted that this foundation was being eroded by behaviour among present day leaders that was “transgressive of Islamic tenets.”

“Islam views corruption as destructive of community wealth and violates the high status that Allah has conferred on humankind,” observed Mujahid.

He said that more destructive still was conduct that is plainly corrupt but indulging the pretense that it is licit.

He said perdition is the certain consequence of such delusive pretension.