The Next Best Thing

I am proud to say that I am a government and UMNO supporter.

To be a government or UMNO supporter in Malaysia in my current age group seems to be the unpopular choice nowadays. Most often than not, they are viewed as ignorant of the so called injustice against the people and supporters of homophobic policies that continue to persist. As a result, a lot of us who support the government and UMNO tend to stay in the background and become the silent majority while our peers continue to be vocal about their displeasure with the current administration. While I may agree on some of their points, I deplore their methods of execution. Unnecessary public disturbance and character assassinations are not the tools to incite policy changes.

What other alternatives do I have to UMNO? On one hand I have a hardline Islamic political party whose main goal is to implement a fundamentalist theocracy in Malaysia. Leaders and members of this political party are not above using religion to suit their own political aspirations. I find their methods distasteful and they represent Islam in the narrowest interpretation which suits their goals. They tend to promise heaven while all the while pave the road leading to it with acts that by all accounts makes one be condemned to the inferno.

The other alternative is to join another opposition party that espouses the fight against social injustice. While the ends are noble, the means to the end are not clearly defined or identified. If the fight is to end social injustice, why does the so-called justice party be more concerned with the release of fallen personages and not the release of downtrodden individual from poverty? They want to change the inequality that persists in Malaysia even and yet they have no clear plan on how to do it. Without a clear manifesto of action and goals, even those among us who are sympathetic to their cause would later be disillusioned by their incompetence.

By process of elimination, I believe UMNO is still the current best choice for me. I may not agree with some of their policies but at least they do have clearly defined goals and, for most of the time, been honest with their execution. This is not the perfect choice, this is the next best thing. This choice may not make me popular at my local coffeeshop but for now, I am happy with my choice.