Malaysia must learn from the lessons of the 14th and 15th General Elections and not allow Malaysian democracy to be hijacked by the toxic politics of lies, fear, hate, race, and religion
Malaysia must learn from the lessons of the 14th and 15th General Elections and not allow Malaysian democracy to be hijacked by the toxic politics of lies, fear, hate, race, and religion.
One of the lessons Malaysians must learn from the 22-month Pakatan Harapan government is the frightening reality about the intersection of digital technologies and the health of democracies, how digital technology could change the entire political landscape by lies, falsehoods, and fake news through the social media of WhatsApp, Facebook, Twitter, podcasts, Telegram, and TikTok.
The first step to topple the 22-month Pakatan Harapan Government was the campaign of lies, fear, hate, race, and religion by falsely accusing the DAP of anti-Malay, anti-Islam, and anti-Royalty by masterminding of the proposed ratification of the International Covenant on the Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination (ICERD) although DAP Ministers and leaders knew nothing about it.
In the 15th General Election, the DAP was again falsely accused of being anti-Malay and anti-Islam with the additional false accusation that the DAP as communist and promoting Islamophobia, causing racial and religious fear and hatred in the land to hijack democracy.
The first Anwar Ibrahim Cabinet must deal with the problem of disinformation and polarisation of the social media, which pose an existential threat to Malaysian parliamentary democracy.
We must not allow the toxic politics of lies, hate, fear, race, and religion free rein for they can destroy Malaysian parliamentary democracy and condemn Malaysia to the fate of a third-rate failed, divided and kleptocratic state.
Before the 14th General Election, such toxic politics alleged that I would be the Prime Minister of Malaysia if Pakatan Harapan won the polls in the 14th General Election.
When such lies and falsehoods were proved wrong after May 9, 2018, new lies and falsehoods were manufactured to allege that I was the real power in the 22-month Pakatan Harapan government in Putrajaya and that Mahathir Mohamad, Anwar Ibrahim, Azizah Ismail, and Mohamad Sabu were merely my stooges and puppets — although at the same time, I was cast as a traitor of the “Chinese race” to the Chinese in Malaysia?
I was alleged to have received RM1 billion from Mahathir for him to join and head Pakatan Harapan and alleged to receive RM1.2 billion from Israeli sources to promote their cause.
There were other allegations of other fortunes coming my way to make me one of the richest men in Malaysia — except that these billions existed only in the realm of the toxic politics of lies, hate, fear, race, or religion of opportunistic and desperate political leaders.
I was accused of being a communist; responsible for the May 13, 1969 riots, leading the street demonstrations in Kuala Lumpur shouting anti-Malay and anti-Islam slogans, although I was never in Kuala Lumpur after the May 10, 1969 General Election; painted as quite a devil, a puaka, even jembalang; that I am anti-Malay, anti-Islam, anti-Royalty; an agent of KGB, CIA, MI6, and even Australian Intelligence.
I was even accused of wanting to split Peninsular Malaysia into two, East Coast for the Malays and the West Coast for the Chinese.
DAP had been demonised with all sorts of lies and falsehoods, but DAP National Chairman, Lim Guan Eng is the only political leader in Malaysia who had crossed ethnic and religious lines to sacrifice his political future and position as Member of Parliament, and even went to jail, in the defence of honour and dignity of an underaged Malay girl, when he was a MP for Kota Melaka in the nineties.
No political leader, whether UMNO, MCA, MIC, PAS or any other political party, had ever made such sacrifices.
We must ensure that in the 16th General Election, Malaysia does not have to grapple with the toxic politics of lies, fear, hate, race, and religion and that Malaysia has learnt from the lessons of the 14th and 15th General Elections.