Do you know this country?

There is a country in one corner of the planet earth. It exists if you want to think it does, but feel free to think it doesn’t if you think it doesn’t.

First, the leaders. They run the country on the platform of deceit, lies and fear. Take the first one, deceit.

On this one leader once said that “Only racists know of other racists. So if they call me a racist, then they are racists themselves”. He also said that the opposition is so much against the Sedition Act. “Yet they are all in favour of the rule of law. So why are they against the Act?” Logicians and philosophers would call this line of thinking as syllogism, a subtle term for deceit. But you go figure.

Another says that this country is on its way to the world’s best democracy. He goes all over the world saying so, and adding that moderation is the key word to his leadership. Sure, only that this is in view it conducts a general election once every five years or so when the people elect their representatives and ‘confirms’ the selection and handing over of the prime minister.

In other words, the people’s participation in the running of the country is reduced to this one sole event. Is there democracy here? You figure. Is it leading the country to the world’s best? You go figure, too.

The fear element comes from the fact that the leaders operate on the basis of ‘binary’ logic, i.e. one or the other: I am right you are wrong; if you are not for me you are against me. More pointedly intimidations, threats and punishment await the individual on the wrong side of this logic.  

This same leader too says that this country is united under the banner ‘1M’, with M standing for Mystery, Magic, Myth, Majority, My Godsend. You choose.

The people, both leaders and followers, have a tenuous existence, psychologically speaking of course. They think that Truth is the existence of their God, i.e. something absolute and fixed, a piece of wisdom handed down from one generation to another. In reality however, Truth is something flexible and never absolute.  

The point is that this society has no flexibility of thought. To this community if it says food is delicious, a girl is beautiful, this man is tall then these descriptions must remain so, because they say so.

To the rest of the world what is delicious food to some may be poison to others, what is beautiful to one may be ugly to another, what is tall can be short in another, depending on context. To these people blessed with flexibility of thought truth is relative.

As for the society, it comprises of two races, first the human and the second the M race, i.e. the one you pick from the immediate paragraph above viz., the Mysterious, Magical, Mythical, Majority, or My Godsend race; you pick the drift. Yes, those belonging to the M race are the leaders due to their ancestors having reached the shores of this country backdated to 40,000 years ago or so in history.

As a tag has been given to one, and to be fair and just, the human race is also given another. It is termed as ‘I’ race, with I standing for Immigrant, Imbecile, Ignorant, Inferior, even Incomprehensible. This race’s Inferior and Incomprehensible (to use two adjectives) ancestors have reached the shores of this country a mere 500 years ago or so. First to reach the shores is everything, even if this magic idea can be so mysterious and a mere myth. Uh, did you say that? 
Now, for the government. This country runs on the basis of democracy. As mentioned above it is on its way to become the world’s best. Only that a few things are attached to it.

The king is law

Take the rule of law, for instance. In a democracy, yes, there is such a thing as the rule of law, where the law is king. But in this country it has been altered to become the rule by law, and the king is law; not king as per the Westminster type, or even of the raja or sultan type, but of the prime ministerial and former-PM types.

In this country the government disposes of the law selectively. It is applied not on the basis of its spirit and technicalities, and on their interpretations, but on the preference and judgment of some private individuals masquerading as civil servants.

Also in a democracy there is such a tricky thing known as check and balance, where the government is divided into the legislature, executive and judiciary. The legislature formulates laws, the judiciary interprets them and the executive implement them. The important thing is there is this arms-length operating distance between them, the idea being that they function independent of one another.

To the people this check and balance also known as trias politica is most confusing, and they do not like to be confused. (More on this word ‘confuse’ later). So this country has done away with such niceties; it lumps all three together into one.

So of the three branches, who leads? The politicians, or those people in control of the legislature; the ones the people elect once every five years. So this country has no legislature, executive or judiciary per se. It only has ‘the government’ run by politicians.    

The government, too, has to contend with the universal call for human rights. Here ‘human rights’ is defined as the right of the individual pursuing his own happiness: his right to do what he wants, say whatever he wants, mingle with whomsoever he wants, travel anywhere he wants, marry whomsoever he wants, adheres to the religion of his choice. The choices and alternatives to him are wide open.

Of course all these rights are limited to the fact that his pursuit of his brand of happiness does not cross or break any accepted norms or civil and criminal laws.  

In this country, human rights are also claimed as being assiduously followed. But these rights, or their choices and alternatives, have been narrowed by what can be termed as the ‘so long as’ factor.

The individual can say anything he wants so long as he says things that put the leaders in a good shiny light, pursue his religion so long as it is the one approved by the 1M community, marry anyone so long as he or she is also of this same religion, do things so long as he conforms to what this religion says is admissible.

In other words limits are set even before the sentence “Of course all these rights are limited to the fact that his pursuit of his brand of happiness does not cross or break any accepted norms or civil and criminal laws” appearing three paragraphs above.   

Confusing people taken as a great sin

This country is quite a one. It brooks no criticism and demands loyalty, nay, subservience, from its citizens. If the people do or say anything unsavoury, then the people are deemed to be disloyal. Or worse, the 1M people do not like the ‘I’ people telling the 1M people are, or can be wrong. So such charges are labelled as confusing (yes, this confuse word again) to the 1M community. And mind you confusing this august chosen people is taken as a great sin and crime.  

Now, do you know this country? Some readers might say yes, I do, while some others might say no, I don’t. Yet some others might say I don’t know and don’t want to know.     

To those who say yes, or no, we can say at the very least that you have a clear head. You know your stand. But those who say they don’t know and don’t want to know are pitiable - they do not know that they do not know. They are the confused ones. And remember, confusing them is a cardinal sin in this country. 

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AB SULAIMAN is an observer of human foibles, and has written and recently published a book ‘Sensitive Truths in Malaysia’.