Umno finds another excuse: sabotage.

Lost In The Hands Of Their Own People

9 April, 2008

UMNO finds another reason for the elections setback: The sabotage by its own members has caused the loss of 36 safe constituencies. It has also resulted in the loss of BN's two-thirds majority, Kedah and Perak.

UMNO has been set up for 50 years, and it has a membership of more than 3.25 million people. The party's main purpose is to recruit more members, in bid to achieve the target of “UMNO is about Malays, Malay is about UMNO”.

Since its establishment in 1964, UMNO stresses the “Malay agenda”. Its situation is similar to MCA's “MCA is Chinese, Chinese is MCA”. After all, these two parties are meant to defend the interests of their own race. If it is spurned by their own race group, it will lose its power.

"What is the reason for the sabotage?"

Its membership of 3.25 million is even more than the population of many small countries. It is surely a fantasy if it wants all the members to be faithful. The political tsunami caused by the recent polls is caused by the UMNO's black sheep and self-sabotage.

In fact, internal sabotage is not confined to Umno alone. Based on the size of its party membership, the BN can win the elections easily. However, the situation is just the opposite. All five component parties (UMNO, MCA, MIC, Gerakan and PPP) lost miserably. Obviously, all parties face the same problems.

The opposition is also having the same problem. Three DAP members run as independent candidates to contest against their past companions. They have been expelled from the party a day after nomination. Two of them have split the votes, and the DAP candidate lost by only 51 votes.

The growth of UMNO is due to its large membership base. Unity brings peace, and the opposition parties are not their rivals.

Look at the UMNO party elections of the past decades. Money politics has always been the political problems. Therefore the party constitution was amended and those involved in it were suspended. However, many of them escaped due to lack of evidence. Even when the party was sloganeering against money politics, the practice is still rampant and slowly it corrupts the party's strength.

Party Chairman Datuk Seri Abdullah Ahmad Badawi's claim on the sabotage is certainly not empty talk. The problem now is on how to deal with these “traitors” to restore party discipline. Perhaps UMNO will have to eliminate many members, but quality is always more important than quantity, for long-term interests of the party. UMNO has more than 3 million members. As long as the party can have a new image, sacking thousands or even tens of thousands of members is unavoidable.

The party's strength comes from the grass-roots party members. However, it is not certain. If the party accepts all kind of members, it will damage the party's image. When the members ignore their moral responsibility for the sake of their interests, it will further harm the party's interest. Therefore, UMNO must act decisively if it wants to deal with the internal sabotage. Otherwise, it would make the situation worse.

Which BN component parties can guarantee that their parties do not have its fair share of sabotage? The incredible big majority the opposition gets reflects the situation that the BN members don't even support their own people.

There is an old saying goes “Things go rotten before insects”. What is the reason for the sabotage? Regardless of whether is involves UMNO or its component parties, they must severely punish the people involved. The party leadership should also find out why they lost in the hands of their own people? (By LOW YAK BUANG/ Translated by LEE MEI NYEE/ Sin Chew Daily)