Hisham's apology the right step
Malaysiakini.com
May 2, 2008 
Daniel Wong

I was drawn to the comments made by our Prime Minister Abdullah Ahmad Badawi on ‘Ketuanan Melayu’ (Malay supremacy). In my opinion, his comments on race supremacy are very uncalled for and totally against the concept of
MCPX
aqidah of the Malays.

To draw from the lessons of the past like how the Germans thought of themselves as the superior race and opined that they have the unilateral right and qualities to create and rule over others is tantamount to looking at other races as somebody less than themselves.

That goes for the Japanese, too, whose culture believes that the whole world revolves around the Japanese race and that they are destined to rule the world and over all other races. As we are aware, all these proclamations of supremacy of race led to World War II.

The present leaders of these ‘race supremacy’ countries would not like to bring up their past tainted ideologies as it would only bring them shame and regret. In short they have learned and moved on. And moved on they did as Japan and German are now two of the fastest growing economies of the world.

Why are we regressing to commit the mistakes of others in our ideologies? Has not the world suffered enough for these divisive ideologies? As leaders, we have to remember that Malaysia is our country. For us to be united, look not at our differences but our similarities. If each race made the call of the supremacy for their own race, how would it affect race relations?

In this day and age, reformism against racism is getting stronger by the day. As evidenced by the present US presidential race where race (and gender) is of no concern to the American voter.

‘I am an American first and foremost’. Whether the candidate is black or white should not be a consideration. That is the benchmark we should strive for.

Racism is seen as the cause of internal strife and conflict. Our leadership should always strive to prevent racism from propagating in our country and focus on unity. They should take the lead to criticise any divisive ideologies that create tension and not repeatedly promote outdated ideologies.

Along the same vein, Hishammuddin Hussein’s apology for wielding the keris is in the right direction. It should be noted that numerous societies/political parties all over the world, have a coat-of-arms as their symbol/emblem.

Some even include a cannon. But you don’t see them attiring themselves with their coat-of-arms going to do battle at their annual meetings. It is totally inappropriate. Anyway kudos to Hisham as his public apology showed that he is a man of calibre.

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