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KUALA LUMPUR, Aug 24 – Tun Dr Mahathir Mohamad mocked proponents of meritocracy today, calling them racist and decried Malays who support meritocracy as having misplaced pride.
Dr Mahathir also described his Umno party as weak and mismanaged.
The former prime minister blasted advocates of meritocracy, calling them “meritocrats” who are pushing for dominance by one race in all aspects of the country.
Mahathir’s diatribe will likely embolden supporters of conservative Malay NGOs such as Perkasa which has already threatened several times to punish the Najib government over potential reforms intended to make Malaysia a developed high income nation.
“Today we see a lot of Malay NGOs trying to defend the Malay position. Invariably they have been labelled racists,” said Mahathir (picture) on his blog today. “The unfortunate truth is that those who labelled them are equally racists because of their advocacy of meritocracy.”
“If ‘Malaysian Malaysia’ conjures equality between races, ‘Meritocracy’ implies something stronger,” he added referring to the DAP’s old slogan.
“It implies dominance by the race with the greatest merit in every field; in education, in business and in all fields of human endeavour.”
Dr Mahathir said that the campaign for meritocracy is not a campaign against racism but a campaign by racists against racists.
“The meritocrats are as much racists as the Malay NGOs, and Perkasa,” he said. “Incidentally by writing this I know the meritocrat racists will condemn me as racist. So be it.”
The attack on meritocracy by Dr Mahathir comes as the nation grapples with a brain drain that has seen talent from all races abandon the country out of frustration due to decades of government administration that favoured ethnicity and political connections over ability.
The lack of a meritocratic culture and loss of talent is widely acknowledged as the main reason the country has fallen behind its regional peers such as Singapore, South Korea and Taiwan in terms of development and per capita income and is caught in a middle income trap.
Bloomberg columnist William Pesek recently blamed four decades of affirmative action for Malaysia’s lack of competitiveness.
Dr Mahathir also took a swipe at his party Umno, calling it “weak” and “mismanaged”.
“That is why today we have Perkasa and other Malay NGOs who are as openly concerned about the Malays as Umno once was,” he said. “The condemnation by those said to be advocating meritocracy is because they see the racism of the meritocrats, just as the Malays of 1964 saw the racism of ‘Malaysian Malaysia’.”
Islamist party PAS also did not escape coming under fire from the veteran politician who said that it was using religion for political gain.
“There are quite a large number of Indian Muslims in Malaysia but they do not figure in the political party said to be Islamic,” he said.
“The party, by using Islam, knows full well they are appealing to Malays almost exclusively. But the intention is not to defend the Malays but merely to gain their support. One can say they are not Malay racists. Rather they are Malay political opportunists.”
Dr Mahathir said that Malays who protested against meritocracy were condemned as racists and many therefore dared not support the race based New Economic Policy (NEP).
“Some, perhaps due to mistaken pride have begun to support meritocracy, undermining the Malay position further,” said Dr Mahathir.
