Towering search for elusive towering figures

It was heartwrenching to hear the Prime Minister’s plea to the Malays not to waste any more time with useless activities. And this plea comes after almost 50 years of Merdeka. It sounds unbelievable, but sad enough it is true, making the search for a towering personality, as Datuk Seri Abdullah Ahmad Badawi put it, rather elusive. To be sure, it is not as though there is none among the Malay community. Only that the community itself is divided by so many vested interest groups or constrained by narrow “political correctness”. Base on divisive strategies, it pits one against the other and destroys anything in between, including the potential towering personalities. Like all cultures, the Malay society too harbours negative traits that are bearing it down, best described by three acronyms: BA, MS and PHD. The first stands for berpurapura and ampumengampu, disguised as playing safe, for fear of rocking the boat. Thus, today, many choose just to go along with anything as long as they are assured of some kind of returns