After half a century, still not awakened from the dream

 

By: Hu Yi Dao (translated name)

Kwong Wah Daily, February 26^th 2016.

“PAS went all out to woo the Chinese voters through the recent Green Silk campaign.  Recently some Chinese attended the CNY gathering organised by PAS. Is Hadi so naïve to believe that the Chinese voters will still remain with PAS?  Do Hadi and PAS still think wearing red shirts, giving red ang pau, eating yee shang together and lighting fireworks will secure Chinese votes?”

In the last two editions, the writer ridiculed PAS and Hadi. To curry favour, some PAS leaders announced to the world: “Hadi’s son married a Chinese. This proves that Hadi is neither anti-Chinese nor a racist.”

Today again he cannot abstain himself from not ridiculing PAS. On the 23rd of February ( 223 ),PAS organized a CNY gathering at the Klang Hokkien Association. Hadi and his group dressed in red shirts like aliens on earth, giving out ang pau, using chopsticks to eat yee shang, lighting fireworks and with a lion dance performance to jazz up the atmosphere of the celebration. It really caught me by surprise as if we were in planet Mars.

Earlier PAS had organized the first CNY gathering 2016 in Taiping and the number of Chinese attending the function was very low. On the 23^rd of February, they changed the venue to Klang. The number of Chinese attending the CNY gathering was better. Hence PAS media Harakah reported that the response was good and they were confident the non-Muslims’ support for PAS was still intact.

Is it true? Let’s look at the photo from Harakah. The writer observed tables meant for the Chinese were few and at the background were tables mainly occupied by PAS members wearing “kopiahs”. However Harakah happily claimed that there were 1500 participants at the gathering including Malays and Indians. The response of the Chinese was extraordinary good.

However a friend of mine told me the capacity of the hall can only accommodate 140 tables. Under normal situation, it usually accommodates 130 tables. In other words the full capacity should be around 1,300 participants.

Based on the findings of Harakah, PAS still received support from all races. The Selangor PAS will continue to advance into the non-Muslim society. It hoped to break the prejudice of “Islamphobia” created by people with ulterior motives.

The Selangor PAS unity committee chairman Mohd Ibrahim delivered a Chinese song entitled “The moon represents my heart” at the gathering. Harakah stressed that Hadi not only explained the teachings of Islam to Chinese and non-Muslims present but also Islamic Hadith in front of the Chinese.

Hadi also mentioned history had shown that China and India were dominated by socialism and capitalism. There were no reasons why the Chinese and Indian communities could not accept the perfect lifestyle practiced by Islam?

He also gave examples of Chinese and non-Muslims leading a peaceful livelihood in the state where Islamic influence was strong like Kelantan, Terengganu and Kedah. “Under the strong Islamic administration, incidents of ill-treating or abusing non-Muslims were never heard of. Just like during the May 13^th riot, there were no incident of racial clashes in Kelantan and Terengganu.

However the writer is worried about the nonsensical remarks and the twisting of the truth by Hadi. He can only cheat himself but not the Chinese and non-Muslims in this cyber era.

Maybe Hadi still doesn’t understand this and his intelligence misled him. Strictly speaking the non-Muslims are not fearful of Islamic teachings but the party PAS led by Hadi. It is very true regarding the conservative and radical religious fanatics who insisted on implementing the hudud law without any compromise.

PAS took the CNY gathering as an opportunity to introduce the Green Silk campaign which denoted that the approach taken by PAS was as soft as silk. However, the state assembly woman Halima who was heading this project was not soft in approach at all. She had a bad reputation in the Chinese community.

Can we recall the Selangor Menteri Besar issue in 2014? Among the many despicable political figures other than Hadi was the former State Exco of Selangor, Halima.

Before the issue of the Menteri Besar candidate was finalized around 10^th September 2014, Halima started an intrigue to occupy another’s office. Halima was not satisfied with her small office space and intended to force into the office of Senior State Exco Teng Cheng Khim.

Why was Halima so impatient? Was she so confident that the new Menteri Besar would drop Teng Cheng Khim or DAP? After Azmin was appointed as the new Menteri Besar, he reduced the number of exco from PAS from four to two and Halima was dropped. The intrigue of occupying another’s office caused her to be dropped from the state Exco line-up. She deserved this, didn’t she?

Nevertheless Halima played a good role in garnering support from the Chinese community. Pulau Ketam was under her constituency and the village head was selected from a PAS member of Chinese origins. This was the one and only Headman from PAS among all the Chinese fishing villages.

Besides that Selangor PAS also had two Chinese municipal councillors. One of them was Kang Teck Hwa from Sepang and the other one was Huang Kok Chuan of Selayang. In addition there were 4 municipal councillors from PAS members of Indian origin and Selangor PAS Chief Iskandar appointed Li Shu Zhen as his special aide.

Did the Chinese participants at the PAS CNY gathering attend due to the effort and influence of these village heads, municipal councillors or Iskandar’s special aide? The crucial point was the presence of some Chinese at the CNY gathering which Hadi assumed the Chinese support for PAS was still strong, wasn’t it?

Maybe Hadi and PAS were dreamers who thought wearing red shirts, giving ang pau, eating yee shang and lighting fireworks could ensure the Chinese votes remain with PAS, right?

Just like netizen Sara Shatila posted on the Harakah website: “During the general assembly, everyone agreed not to befriend DAP because Chinese are anti-Islam. Everybody supported except the Erdogan( the liberals)…… now we are saying a different set of things. Hopefully this is not cheating.”

Searching on the internet and found this poem: “More than half a century had passed, there are people who are still not awakened from their dreams yet.” Ah? Najib is in politics for 40 years and the political tenure of Hadi is not much different. Why is Hadi still living in a dream?