The White Rajah Brookes were an English dynasty which ruled over Sarawak from 1841 to 1946. The current Chief Minister of Sarawak, Taib Mahmud, is in his 30th year in power and like the Brookes, aims to start his own dynasty - the Muslim Melanau dynasty of the Rahman-Taib Family.
Kuala Lumpur helped Taib and his maternal uncle, Abdul Rahman Ya’kub, scupper Dayak plans to lead Sarawak. Now that allegations of fraud and corruption have surfaced, on the national and international arena, pressure is bearing down on Taib step down.
Before he leaves, a successor is needed to look after the interests of the dynasty and to make sure the state can be milked further. Until recently, Taib has been unwilling or unable to find someone capable enough, to step into his shoes.
Taib’s new wife is too young and too new, to learn the ropes in a hurry. Morevoer, there wil be language problems and being a foreigner will not augur well with the Malaysian public.
Taib’s two sons have proven useless. Too much of the good life has spoilt them. The older son, Mahmud Abu Bekir is going through a RM400 million divorce settlement. He hates the political limelight.
The younger son, Sulaiman Abdul Rahman, the political hope in Taib’s family, has allegedly been disowned by Taib because he is suffereing from a lifestyle disease. His love of fast cars and women have messed up his life.
Taib’s two daughters are stong feisty women but one, Jamillah lives in Canada and together with her husband, manage Taib’s billion dollar empire in the northern hemisphere. The younger daughter Hanifa, who is married to a Singaporean lawyer, has to look after her father’s business interests in Sarawak.
However, Taib cannot risk fielding a candidate from his immediate family because of the allegations of corruption and abuses of power. He has also been hit by waves of accusations of nepotism, and the anti-graft body Transparency International Malaysia (TI-M) has joined the call in asking the Malaysian Anti-Corruption Commission (MACC) to investigate the allegations.
On a trip to the Said Business School, University of Oxford last July, very few people noticed one person whom Taib was pushing into the limelight and whom he was quietly grooming.
That person addressed the delegates and helped promote Taib’s SCORE project which included the Tanjung Manis Halal Hub Development. That person addressed a roundtable meeting with UK-based small and medium enterprises and exchanged views on policies across the halal industry and business opportunities in Tanjung Manis. A meeting at the House of Lords in London soon followed.
That person is the MP for Tanjung Manis and is the executive chairman for the Tanjung Manis industries, Norah Abd Rahman.
In plain life, Norah is Taib’s cousin as Taib’s mother and Norah’s father, the previous Governor and Chief Minister Abdul Rahman Yakub, are siblings.
Taib’s long-awaited replacement is a settled issue which Umno/BN is reluctant to acknowledge. In Taib’s eyes, the throne is safe for the Muslim Melanau dynasty of the Rahman-Taib Family.
Taib’s long-awaited replacement is a settled issue which Umno/BN is reluctant to acknowledge. In Taib’s eyes, the throne is safe for the Muslim Melanau dynasty of the Rahman-Taib Family.
Norah, 51, will be chief minister, but not just yet.
Taib will step down and in doing so, will deflate Pakatan’s push into Sarawak and also deflect the pressure of allegations of corruption, away from his immediate family.
Norah is at present the MP for Tanjung Manis, a seat this first-timer won ‘unopposed’ after taking over from her cousin Wahab Dolah who moved to the new Igan parliamentary seat. He had also ‘won’ Tanjung Manis unopposed in 2004.
While Norah cuts her political teeth, to be further groomed for her role, Taib’s “seat-warmers" are to be selected from the oft-mentioned few.
There is PBB deputy president Alfred Jabu Numpang. Jabu is needed to help ensure that the 5,000 longhouse chiefs in Dayak country continue their allegiance to Taib.
There is the PBB deputy president Abang Johari Abang Openg, but he’s Malay and the Melanau and Dayak communities would rather avoid him. It is believed that Najib prefers Abang Johari who is also a Deputy Chief Minister. Having him would mean continuing proxy rule by Putrajaya which is driven by its Ketuanan Melayu (Malay supremacy) and dominanation by the Malays, mindset.
There is the state minister Awang Tengah Ali Hassan or Taib’s ex brother-in-law, Adenan Satem who was beaten twice for the PBB deputy presidency by Abang Johari who clinched Dayak support, state speaker Mohamad Afsia Awang Nassar and Effendi Norwawi, 62, all Melanau.
Whilst the others are bickering, Norah will quietly watch and just take stock of everything, then quietly slip into her new role.
Many doubt that Norah’s elevation would happen this year, but if it did, it would be a political and personal coup for Taib to crown his successor Norah, as the first woman Chief Minister in the 100th anniversary of the International Women’s Year.
The system only changes when people find the courage to band together and challenge authority. When enough do that, they break the wall of fear. Tunisia and Egypt are the latest countries to do just that, the people winning their freedom and fanning a contagion effect across the Middle East and North Africa.
This isn't the first time it's happened, and as history has shown, deposing a dictator may be the easiest part of building a nation. No country knows this better than the birthplace of people power, the Philippines, which is celebrating its 25th anniversary this week.
The 1986 people power revolt sparked pro-democracy movements across the world: Thailand, South Korea, Taiwan, Romania, Mongolia, Indonesia and many more.
1986 in the Philippines had many similarities to Egypt: Ferdinand Marcos, a U.S.-backed dictator in power for 21 years, was pushed out by more than two million people facing tanks and troops. The call to come to the streets and peacefully protest was also spread by the technology of the time -- not Facebook and Twitter -- but radio.
Euphoria infused the entire society: it was a moment of redemption. Spontaneously created, people power in the Philippines was triggered by a failed military coup; the calls of the powerful Catholic Church to help the soldiers; the journalists who risked their lives to get the message out; alternative political figures who rallied around a widow, Corazon Aquino; and the people who answered the call and came to the streets. In those moments of uncertainty, Filipinos took a stand and risked all they had.
Globally, the social movement that creates people power is driven by activists who call for passionate volunteers. They are more motivated than those who join political parties and government bureaucracies because this is an outpouring of emotion with only one general goal: depose the dictator. They are good fighting evil.
Sarawakians should reject the “ghosts and demons” coming in large numbers from the peninsula for the state elections, Deputy Prime Minister Tan Sri Muhyiddin Yassin said today.
He said they could destroy racial harmony and unity, which is the cornerstone of political stability in the state and country.
“It is this stability that we need for the state and in fact the whole country to develop and progress further.
“We are already among the best developed countries in the world,” Muhyiddin (picture) said at a meet-the-people session at a 29-door Iban longhouse in Lingga, about 20km from here.
He said the “ghosts and demons” would do their best to trick the people into supporting the opposition.
“We are worried that if the people allow themselves to be tricked, development would slow down in the state,” he said.
“Pakatan Rakyat or opposition pact is not real... they are a loose grouping with no real programme to help. What they have are only rhetoric and promises.
“Parti Kedalian Rakyat is now better known as ‘Parti Kian Runtuh’ (party on the verge of collapse) with leaders and supporters leaving daily.”
Its partners in the pact, the DAP and PAS, have conflicting ideologies, Muhyiddin said.
On the other hand, the 13 component parties in Barisan Nasional have a single ideology of sharing power to serve the people,” he added.
He said BN leaders enjoyed a very close and cordial working relationship at both federal and state levels.
Muhyiddin said the federal government understood that Sarawak was a huge state which needed more development funds than some of the other states.
“We fully realise this. That is why we are helping and spending a lot more. Please allow us to continue to help, especially in bringing more and better infrastructure, in social development and in providing education,” he said.
He announced allocations of RM60.82 million for building Sekolah Menengah Kebangsaan Lingga, RM18.5 million for the 15km Stumbin-Tanjung-Bijat-Stirau road, RM50 million to upgrade the Sembau-Stumbin road, RM1 million for flood mitigation projects at five Malay villages and RM600,000 for several longhouses.
Muhyiddin also announced government development grants of RM580 for each of the 1,022 families from 51 longhouses in the area
Lim Kit Siang said today he believes Tan Sri Abdul Taib Mahmud will still continue to be Sarawak’s chief minister after state elections despite his announcement that he will resign.
The country’s longest-serving chief minister said today that he would resign after leading Barisan Nasional (BN) to victory in the state polls.
“I will lead this election so that new blood can come up, but after that, when the people I have groomed can form a new team and can work for this country, for the people of various races, and that these people can work as part of a team, then I will call it a day,” said Taib.
However, DAP veteran Lim (picture) pointed out that Taib has hinted that he will only resign when he has found a suitable replacement.
“This means Taib will have no qualms to continue as Sarawak chief minister, for instance, if he is not satisfied that he has got a ‘new team’ that could work for the country or not assured that the new team could ‘work as part of a team’.
“This can take anything from one year to five years as he may have to keep trying ‘a new team’!” Lim said in a statement.
He also said that Taib has yet to name a successor or a new team, adding that the resignation announcement was a ploy to deceive voters.
“His preparedness to step down as chief minister is to counter and neutralise the Sarawak Barisan Nasional’s Achilles’ heel in the impending state elections — that Taib had overstayed as Sarawak chief minister,” he said.
Lim said that Prime Minister Datuk Seri Najib Razak has also only echoed the wishes of Taib when he cautioned that the chief minister should not be pressured to quit.
“It will be known soon enough whether Sarawak voters are so gullible that such a political ploy and bluff can work so as to return Taib for another term as Sarawak chief minister,” he said.
Legal-trained Taib started his career in the state legal service before turning politician in 1963, serving in the state’s legislative council. After a period in the federal government, he returned to the Sarawak assembly via a by-election in 1981. A month later he replaced his uncle Tun Abdul Rahman Yakub as chief minister in March.Taib has ruled the hornbill state since 1981.
In Egypt, the protesters changed the fight against Hosni Mubarak. In the past, it was led by a political party, the Muslim Brotherhood, with clear leadership, hierarchy, structure and ideology (making it easier for government to track and control). Then the organizational framework changed when it became a social movement, largely leaderless, with no clear goals beyond demanding the end of Mubarak's regime.
Protesters broke the wall of fear and reached a tipping point quicker, amplifying their new-found courage through social media. That shift surprised the Egyptian government, creating uncertainty, volatility and the breakaway of the military which ended Mubarak's rule. Turning a social movement into a political system that delivers on the exuberance of people power is not easy. Only two nations have done it in the past 25 years: Indonesia and South Korea.
They did it by combining the revolutionary zeal of the social movement with working institutions and the experience of government bureaucracy. They did not abolish everything overnight. South Korea, where people overthrew a U.S.-backed military dictatorship, introduced reforms at a calibrated pace to create a stable democracy.
In 1998, Indonesia, which has the world's largest Muslim population, had much in common with Egypt today: a Muslim majority with a large Christian minority; strongman ruler in power for at least 30 years; a powerful military intertwined with government; an Islamist underground that was seen as a threat and also the best excuse for authoritarian rule.
Once the government was toppled, Indonesia combined reforms with a balance of its institutional past -- strengthening its political parties and systems, painstakingly building its democracy.
Thirteen years later, Indonesia is the democratic model in Southeast Asia, turning its political successes into tangible benefits for its 237 million people. Its $695 billion economy, Southeast Asia's largest, continues to grow. It is politically stable, has controlled its Islamist threat, and has a vibrant civil society. Last week, senior U.S. officials said Indonesia is "widely seen as the best example" of where Egypt could go.
Contrast that with Thailand's 1992 revolution against a military regime. It changed the government but failed to nurture its newfound democracy. Elections since then have been rituals, full of sound and fury signifying nothing. Now as it prepares for elections later this year, it faces an insurgency in the south, a border dispute with Cambodia and two different groups (red shirts and yellow shirts) staging regular protests. Their dissenters are addicted to the streets -- much like the Philippines.
People power in the Philippines became a political tool, brandished by its people and its symbol, Corazon Aquino. She led mass protests against her three successors: fighting charter change under President Fidel Ramos; successfully deposing President Joseph Estrada in a second people power uprising which bastardized its meaning because he was a democratically elected leader; helping install President Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo, then later calling for protests against her.
Mrs Aquino's attempts to rekindle people power and repeat her extra-constitutional triumph challenged her primary legacy -- democracy -- and further weakened the fledgling institutions she left behind.
What's clear is that American-style democracy has largely failed in the Philippines. More form than substance, it has given little back to the people who risked their lives in the streets 25 years ago. Figures from the Asian Development Bank show the Philippines is the only Southeast Asian nation to record an increase in the absolute number of poor people since 1990 (although no figures are available for Myanmar).
On World Governance indicators -- Voice and Accountability, Political Stability, Government Effectiveness, Regulatory Quality, Rule of Law and Control of Corruption -- the Philippines actually slid backwards between 1998 and 2009. A survey done in 2006 showed that only 36% of Filipinos believed Ferdinand Marcos should have been removed by people power.
His son, Ferdinand "Bongbong" Marcos, Jr. is now a senator and tweeted this after Hosni Mubarak stepped down: "25 years from now in 2036 -- a pretty long time -- I hope Egypt does not look back and lament that things have since gone for the worse."
Ironically, Aquino's son, Benigno "Noynoy" Aquino, III, now has the challenge of fulfilling the promise of people power (which brought his mother into power). Elected by the largest margin since 1986, he was a reluctant candidate with a hodge-podge political machinery that has yet to translate to effective governance. (One of the main problems of the Philippines remains its underdeveloped political parties, depriving politicians of the chance to practice running institutions before they actually get into power).
Still, no one doubts his good intentions. So in its birthplace, where is people power 25 years later? The daily and exhausting drama of real-life political theater and the repeated attempts to replay the now tired script of people power -- all this have only succeeded in trivializing its meaning.
By the third time, people power became a parody of itself. It prevented the painful but necessary growth of all sectors of a society that needed to learn accountability for its choices during elections and a government bureaucracy that needed to institute systems of transparency so it could be held accountable.
People power should never have become part of the regular political arsenal; it was a once-in-a-lifetime act that should have been followed by the hard work of building democratic institutions. That never happened. That is the work that, 25 years later, desperately needs to be done in the Philippines -- and the lesson Egypt should take to heart.
The opinions expressed in this commentary are solely those of Maria Ressa.
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