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 ©The
Malaysian Insider (Used by permission)
by Wan Hamidi Hamid, Political Editor
• The chameleon
AUG 2 — All he wants to do is expose the political antics of Datuk Seri Anwar
Ibrahim whom he described as nothing more than a very ambitious politician who
will stop at nothing to become prime minister.
Ezam Mohd Nor is offering himself to Umno to become the candidate for the
Barisan Nasional in the coming Permatang Pauh by-election.
As Anwar's former confidante and Parti Keadilan Rakyat rebel rouser, the former
party Youth chief believes he has the capability to turn over those who were
converted to his ex-boss' politics of charms.
"Anwar has betrayed himself and the very people who support him. He was a strong
advocate of the New Economic Policy, now he wants to abolish it. Granted there
are corrupt politicians but why should we abolish the NEP which is the basis of
our constitutional rights?
"Anwar also tried to dilute Islam whereas he proclaimed himself to be a champion
of the religion. Why? Because he wanted to have the non-Malay support, and well,
he got it in the last general election," Ezam told The Malaysian Insider.
However, the 41-year-old Ezam claimed that the PKR de facto chief changed his
stance again when he began to court the Malays after the election, knowing that
despite the opposition's victory, the Malays were still loyal to Umno.
This dirty political game must stop if we're all serious about reforming the
country and improving our livelihood, and not for anyone's personal agenda, he
added.
"Even if Umno doesn't want me as the candidate for Permatang Pauh, I'm willing
to be at the constituency day and night to campaign for BN as well as to strip
Anwar of his populist claims," he said.
The Permatang Pauh parliamentary seat is vacant after the resignation of its
three-term MP Datuk Seri Dr Wan Azizah Ismail, also PKR president, to make way
for her husband to contest.
With rumours of his alleged imminent arrest and be charged for sodomy
allegation, the former deputy prime minister pre-empted the authorities by
whipping up an election fever. Already popular with the masses with his
nationwide roadshow, the by-election is seen by some people as an attempt to put
aside the possible court case.
With no action from authorities till today, Anwar supporters begin to feel that
there may not even be a case for them to prosecute. With strong support from
PKR's allies Pas and DAP, the election momentum has been solidly built for the
past few weeks.
But Ezam is unfazed with the fanfare. "If I contest I'm going to be the
underdog. I know it's difficult to unseat Anwar in his former constituency. But
it's not about winning or losing. It's having the opportunity to face Anwar and
to tell the voters that they have been duped by the very man they revered."
Would the investigations into the sodomy allegation help BN to regain the
parliamentary seat?
"It's a different issue. For me, both Anwar and his accuser (Mohd Saiful Bukhari
Azlan) are innocent until proven guilty. I never say Anwar is guilty but I hope
his supporters including people like (Datuk) Nik Aziz Nik Mat (Pas spiritual
leader) should stop calling the case a conspiracy as if Saiful is already
guilty.
"If you notice, Anwar doesn't talk much about Saiful. Actually it's just a case
between him and Saiful who claimed that Anwar had victimised him. But Anwar
would rather tell his supporters that it is a battle between him and the
government. He must always be seen as a great man."
Ezam too thought Anwar was a great reformer some 15 years ago, prompting him to
join Umno in the hope that there would be a serious reform for the country.
After Tun Dr Mahathir Mohamad sacked Anwar in 1998 and subsequently jailed him,
Ezam's name was synonymous with street demonstrations demanding the release of
Anwar.
After some time including a stint in jail and embroiled in internal politics,
Ezam left the party last year. It was also the time that Anwar wanted to make a
political comeback but failed because the law still barred him form holding any
position or contesting elections until May this year.
It was the political tsunami of the March 8 general election that Anwar is
accepted not only by his party but also the more senior opposition parties Pas
and DAP as the de facto leader. And three months ago Ezam rejoined Umno.
"Anwar has gone overboard. He crossed the line and lost the statesmanship. Anwar
lost all these in his pursuit for power.
"People are not stupid. Even Pas leaders have realised that. I know there are a
lot of resentment against Anwar and PKR especially in Selangor where the party
is governing," he said.
For him, joining Umno at a time when the party and its leaders are struggling
over the negative perception about the government is a challenge.
Still committed to the struggle for reform, the man who has lodged a number of
reports to the police and Anti-Corruption Agency against several ministers said
the Abdullah administration had provided some space for reform.
"The ACA is now independent and has prosecution power. Even Anwar couldn't do
that when he was in power. When I met Pak Lah I asked him whether he was serious
about combating corruption, he said 'Yes. I won't be long (as PM) but I want to
do something good for the country'. That's what the PM told me
"I know some people have accused Pak Lah of being politically weak but I see a
strong resolve in that man. He is serious about fighting corruption. I might be
wrong about the PM but at least he gives me the space to do something right for
the country," he said.
He also said Abdullah had given him the mandate to monitor Umno elections,
particular the divisional-level meetings in October and November, to ensure
money politics would not rear its ugly head again.
"I will do it. That's my commitment to Umno. If we don't clean up the party from
bad elements how are going to reform society," he added.
For him, reforming Umno will also mean exposing more of Anwar's "deceit" as he
believes his former boss could derail the true effort to bring reform with
promises of things he can't keep.
The chameleon
By Khalid Jaafar
AUG 2 — "If you ask me what kind of image I want" he once told me at my office
in Jalan Telawi, Bangsar, Kuala Lumpur, "I want an image of a liberal."
He does not want to be a true liberal as the notions of spontaneous order, the
virtue of the market and limited government are too strange for him. He just
wanted a public perception that he wasn't an Islamic fundamentalist or a Malay
ultra.
Datuk Seri Anwar Ibrahim was still languishing in prison when I had this
conversation with Ezam Mohd Nor and our party was dogged with an identity
problem. I had yet to know then that he was already a mole, a Reformasi Lai Teck.
But today, as he turns away with vengeance against his former mentor, hurling
vituperative against Anwar's cosmopolitanism and inclusive social and political
philosophy, Ezam has re-embraced Umno's most decadent form of racial ideology.
His return to his old party will only help plunge Umno into a deeper ideological
crisis, alienating its power-sharing partners, and his strident Malay rhetoric
will drive away idealistic youths in search for an integrated Malaysia in
disgust.
He must be suffering from a lapse of memory that we are now living in the 21st
century. There are the unstoppable and irreversible forces of globalisation
affecting everybody and Umno’s exclusivist philosophy of Ketuanan Melayu is
grossly out of key with time.
There is market still for Ezam's venom but a rapidly shrinking market. If Umno
is really for the Malays there is still a political base to be consolidated. But
the implementation of the NEP has been so corrupt in the last two decades only
the naive would swallow government propaganda without being squeamish.
Many of us who know the internal problem he created within the party heaved a
sigh of relief when he submitted his Umno form and it was a joke among us that
his application was accepted but as a second-class member.
Still, I am often asked: "Why? What really happened?" Many find it difficult to
comprehend why those who have found themselves estranged with the party for
various reasons returned to the fold after Anwar was released but Ezam was at
odds with everyone and finally left us.
The popular explanation was that it was the bitter personal rivalry between the
two former secretaries for their boss's attention. As a person who has worked as
Anwar’s press secretary for 10 years I found the explanation rather silly.
"The party has no discipline," he blurted out on the only occasion we had a
heated argument. He wanted the party to take stern measures against his rivals
who deliberately skipped party meetings. But in the years when I was a member of
the supreme council he was known for his sparse attendance, and while present he
was in the habit of being the last to come and the first to leave.
In the media he made innuendos on a particular person who is rich and
comfortable while other Reformasi activists were slogging to make ends meet. But
very few know that he received salaries from at least three companies, pocketing
a salary equivalent to a CEO of a listed company. He was always being
chauffeur-driven in fancy cars, and moved around with unproductive auxiliaries,
reminiscent of the habits of Umno politicians.
His attacks have always been personal, spewing venom at Azmin Ali, and me on
much lesser scale. Now he has upped the ante by mounting personal attacks
against Anwar himself. A corporate person whose company provided Ezam with a
fancy car told me recently: "All the time he tried to poison my mind on Anwar's
character. He claimed to know Anwar inside out."
He created the impression that as political secretary he has opened Anwar's
closet and found piles of stinking skeletons in there. The next prime minister
has met his nemesis. I was more amused than alarmed at his threat.
Of the three of us — Azmin, Ezam and I — Ezam knows Anwar the least simply
because he joined the office of the deputy prime ministry — regrettably on my
strongest recommendation — barely two years of the DPM's tragic sacking. I
served as Anwar's press secretary for 10 years, and Azmin preceded me by a few
months.
During the two years Ezam could not have seen much of Anwar Ibrahim. He only met
him during weekly staff meetings of which he was mainly silent perhaps for being
too young and too much in awe of the future prime minister or when he
accompanied him in public political functions.
Azmin, being the private secretary, saw the boss the most in private. He was the
gate keeper, arranging meetings and communicating messages to the corporate and
political movers and shakers of Malaysia.
I had the singular honour of dealing with the most uncelebrated visitors, people
whom other secretaries prefer to make themselves scarce when they knocked at the
door of the DPM's office. They are intellectuals, genuine and occasionally
pseudo, great scholars as well as deep thinkers. It was a real pleasure to open
the door for Seyyed Hossein Nasr and Ali Mazrui, and it was a real treat to sit
in and to listen to Anwar’s conversations with Nobel laureate V.S. Naipaul and
futurist Alvin Toffler.
Ezam, I suppose, must be the Special Branch's biggest success story in turning
over. If he wasn't turned over how he could have written a letter to Datuk Seri
Abdullah Ahmad Badawi while serving his prison term in Kajang. He was the most
celebrated of the ISA detainees but upon his released he refused to be present
with them at a press conference. He also avoided being on the same platform at
any rally.
When Anwar was released and regained his health, leaders fought tooth and nail
to have him speak at their constituency. But Ezam evaded offers by Anwar to
speak in Shah Alam, his division, and asked Shamsul Iskandar to sit in for him
as Anwar toured of the country.
Why Ezam failed the test while the rest continue to walk tall as Reformasi
heroes? I think he suffered from a disease I call Alcibiades syndrome.
Alcibiades was the most controversial Athenian politician during the
Peloponnesian War and one of the disciples of Socrates. He was immortalised in
Plato's dialogue called "The Symposium". Instead of trying to understand
Socrates' philosophy he was enthralled with the personality of the philosopher.
His speech in the symposium was all encomia to his teacher. In his politics he
betrayed Athens by joining the city's mortal enemy, Sparta, then rejoined Athens
to fight against Sparta and later betrayed Athens to join the Persians.
I saw Ezam giving a similar speech in Jakarta, when we were in a short exile, at
the launching of the Indonesian version of Anwar’s Asian Renaissance. He didn't
say a sentence on the book, or about Tagore, or Iqbal, or Rizal and Okakura. He
was saying "Anwar this, Anwar that" and I at the time was praying that lightning
and thunder would strike so that he could end his dumb speech.
I saw him in Ipoh where I heard him say: "I joined Umno because of Anwar
Ibrahim, and left Umno because of Anwar Ibrahim." Of which he received a
standing ovation among the youth delegates.
I saw his character in the Romance of Three Kingdoms, in the personality of Lu
Bu whose politics is marked with a series of betrayals. But both Lu Bu and
Alcibiades ended in ignominious deaths.
Khalid Jaafar is a Parti Keadilan Rakyat supreme council member and a
close confidante of Anwar.
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