Dear readers, look at this face. In light of our Prime Minister, Datuk Seri Najib Razak's solemn and painful announcement on the fate and whereabouts of the missing Malaysian Airlines flight MH370 last night, a nation mourns. A nation is grieving, and the rakyat are in collective sorrow over the loss of the 239 who went aboard the plane to Beijing.
Now, why would this writer want to draw a connection between those departed and Anwar Ibrahim? He wanted it. He wanted to use an unprecedented tragedy that fell onto our nation as a political point, as leverage for his party, Parti Keadilan Rakyat (PKR) to win the N51 Balingian by-election. Now, based on a speech he made in Boulevard Setia Raja Mukah, let us look further into the audacity of this person.
Firstly he thought, that based on information he gathered from almost twenty years ago as Finance Minister, that he knew exactly what our radars can and cannot do. All the complexities that have befuddled aviation experts across the world and all the navies that helped with the search of the plane for the past two weeks were disproportionately dismissed as solely our government's fault. This is scapegoating at its finest, purest form. As if all the charts, graphs and info-graphics shown by various media outlets around the world were not enough to explain just how difficult it is to find anything in the middle of the Indian Ocean. During the time when we should stand together regardless of partisan affiliations, instead of offering his knowledge and resources he turned his back on our Government and joined our detractors in criticising our efforts.
Secondly, he had the gall to call our handling of the search and rescue effort "weak and incompetent", before pointing out that our supposed ineptitude caused countries such as Vietnam and China to condemn our efforts. In a multinational search and rescue effort involving twenty six nations and sensitive information that could jeapordise our national security, it is only natural for our government to try and be as delicate as possible.This means that, when it comes with countries such as China, who before this were sending warships close to our coastal waters to lay claim on Spratley Islands, no rational government in the world would want to openly share sensitive information to these countries. And yet, we looked past all this and made a plea to other countries to share data and collaborate. And even then, Anwar was not satisfied.
Thirdly, he made himself part of the news. He claimed that because Datuk Seri Najib was afraid to open up the floor to international media, that organisations such as BBC, CNN, Al-Jazeera, New York Times and Wall Street Journal all ended up asking for his help to make sense of the tragedy. His cozy relationship with Western media aside, he took it upon himself to be the go-to spokesperson in dealing with this tragedy. Basically he tried to turn this unfortunate event into a popularity contest, to opportunistically gauge his media savvy against the Prime Minister and the acting Transport Minister Datuk Seri Hishammuddin Hussein. What exactly did he want to prove when he haphazardly tried to link our search and rescue efforts and partisan issues in front of media luminaries such as CNN's Christiane Amanpour?
This is a masterclass in political opportunism. It is as clear as this writer's glass of Balingian tap water that we are seeing a desperate man spearheading a desperate campaign to ensure that he gets into power. Should we put our trust in him and his party? The choice has been made informed enough, so this writer will let the Balingian constituents decide.
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