Personalized Politics: The Malaysian State under Mahathir

6. Politics in the 1990s: Regime Change or Regime Consolidation

209 Politics in the 1990s: Regime Change or Regime Consolidation?© 2003 Institute of Southeast Asian Studies, Singapore Why not say bravely that the people of Malaysia are too immature for a workable democracy? Why not say that we need some form of authoritarian rule? We are doing that anyway and it looks as if we are going to do that for a very long time to come. The racial composition of our country is such that real democratic process can promote as much ill-will as authoritarian rule. The disadvantage of the democratic process is that it satisfies no one. Authoritarian rule can at least produce a stable strong government. … we must accept that there is not going to be a democracy in Malaysia; there never was and there never will be. (Mahathir Mohamad 1969)1 DAP’s defeat in the last 1995 general election was not because DAP did not make reform … BN’s great victory was because Mahathir was more liberal. Several issues, like language, culture and education, which DAP fought for before was adopted and practised by the BN government. (Lim Kit Siang 1997)2 As shown in the period 1987–90, the presence of substantial opposition within the dominant Malay community did not necessarily bring about greater political openness or democratic accountability in Malaysia. On the contrary, since the mid-1980s, deepening UMNO factionalism seemed to encourage the dominant Malay political élite to adopt a more assertive approach. The élite curtailed the political and civil liberties of Politics in the 1990s: Regime Change or Regime Consolidation Reproduced from Personalized Politics: The Malaysian State under Mahathir, by In-Won Hwang (Singapore: Institute of Southeast Asian Studies, 2003). This version was obtained electronically direct from the publisher on condition that copyright is not infringed. No part of this publication may be reproduced without the prior permission of the Institute of Southeast Asian Studies. Individual articles are available at Chapter 6 210© 2003 Institute of Southeast Asian Studies, Singapore its opponents, while provoking racial sentiment when politically expedient. As a result of the political challenge from UMNO dissidents, regaining Malay support became a priority for the Mahathir government. Under these circumstances the government could hardly exhibit greater sensitivity to the demands of non-Malay supporters, despite their growing political importance. A series of tactical appeasement gestures, before and during the 1990 general election, was also implemented in ways that avoided alienating Malay support. The situation during 1987–90 was such that the Mahathir government could not afford to appear to be making concessions to non-Malays which might incite Malay emotions. However, in the 1990s, there was greater tolerance for traditional non-Malay concerns, despite the expected erosion of the consociational elements in Malaysian politics, resulting from the vulnerability of the Chinese component parties within the ruling coalition. Soon after UMNO secured its political dominance in the 1990 general election, the Mahathir government introduced a series of accommodative policies aimed at the non-Malay communities through the so-called “cultural liberalization”. It was therefore in the years after 1990 that political sensitivity towards the non-Malays, involving minority cultural heritage, language, and education, was noticeably tolerated. Moreover, some issues that were central to Malay demands, such as the position of the Malay rulers, Malay language, and Islam, were treated in a more relaxed way, or at least redefined, on the initiative of the UMNO leaders, and Mahathir in particular. Since the non-Malay communities have long been sensitive to preserving cultural expression as a political right, the Mahathir government’s initiative in liberalizing these controversial issues was politically attractive. Even the Chinese-dominated DAP regarded the years after 1990 as a period of “minor liberalization” in Malaysian politics. 3 Nevertheless, as implied in the term “minor liberalization”, growing cultural tolerance was not necessarily accompanied by greater political liberalization. Instead, the tolerance level for political expression in the Malaysian political system became increasingly limited, despite the cultural liberalization of the 1990s. Continuing political detention, using selective and politically motivated discriminatory laws, highlight the 211 Politics in the 1990s: Regime Change or Regime Consolidation?© 2003 Institute of Southeast Asian Studies, Singapore vulnerability of Malaysian civil society at this time. In the 1990s the political dominance of the ruling coalition, especially its dominant partner UMNO, was further consolidated. By the mid-1990s, loose alliances among the opposition parties were considerably undermined by internal weaknesses, as well as by external pressures...