Can the MCA reinvent itself?

Finally, the Malaysian Chinese Association (MCA) is displaying signs that it now realises what a sorry state the once-powerful party is in. This it managed to do at the party elections held on Dec 21 and 22.

In the general election held in May this year, only about 15 per cent of the party’s traditional Malaysian Chinese constituency had supported it; and in the process, it saw the number of parliamentary seats it held in 2008 more than halved, from 15 to 7. To press home the seriousness of its fall from grace, in the 2004 general election, it had won 31 such seats.

Whatever compromises may have been made behind locked doors before voting began for the party leadership last weekend, MCA delegates did show that there is now sufficient unity within the party for it to begin planning its future.

Optimism is running higher within the party than it had in a long while. Newly elected President Liow Tiong Lai, though winning only by a margin of 185 votes, is supported by his long-time ally Wee Ka Siong, who became Deputy President with a decisive majority. At the same time, polling for the women’s wing also showed impressive accord among the delegates.

BIG-PICTURE CHANGES

However, in planning for the future, Mr Liow and Mr Wee will find their options rather limited.

For one thing, the party took a long time getting its act together after the disastrous 2008 elections. This naturally undermined its credibility as a Chinese-based party able to argue its case against the Malay-based United Malays National Organisation (UMNO), the dominant party in the ruling coalition, Barisan Nasional (BN). UMNO, in the meantime, has been growing in parliamentary size.

What has also been happening is that the opposition coalition, Pakatan Rakyat (PR), especially its largely Chinese-supported member, the Democratic Action Party (DAP), has shown a surprising ability to retain support and expand its influence, especially in urban areas.

With MCA playing possum since 2008, Malaysian politics has changed dramatically. BN has been shifting to the right, led by UMNO members fearing loss of power and privilege.

Today, it is the traditionally Islamist Parti Islam SeMalaysia (PAS) that styles itself as the moderate Malay party, and it is UMNO that has lost the all-important middle ground that BN once commanded.

Whatever the degree of ethnocentrism or religious fundamentalism declared by right-wingers, the fact remains that Malaysia is a very diverse country, ethnically and religiously. This acts as a check on the practice of extremism. No doubt, cultural tolerance has dropped in recent years, but resistance to that tendency has also grown to counteract it.

The revealing question is, what are the coalitional contexts within which MCA can try to regain ground?

RETURN TO ALLIANCE MODEL?

First, it can try to revive the Alliance Model of the 1960s, when MCA was the alter ego of UMNO. Together with the Malaysian Indian Congress (MIC), they formed a unique compromise within which each community’s ethnocentrism could live on within a multi-ethnic umbrella of race-based parties.

As long as each party could maintain its reputation as champion of its own community and as long as enough voters supported each of them, the model worked.

But once that model was reformed into BN in the early 1970s, the dominance of UMNO became a reality, and it was only a matter of time before the hollowing out of MCA and MIC influence within BN became irrefutable.

For Malaysian Prime Minister and UMNO President Najib Razak to tell MCA delegates last week — be it in jest or otherwise — that MCA was in need of a dose of Viagra was not only in bad taste, but was also seen by many as the rubbing of salt into the party’s gaping wound.

MCA’s present sorry state is, after all, due to its continued subservience to UMNO, and for it to rebound would mean a heightened level of activism — but that activism, to be effective, will have to be aimed largely against UMNO’s present unhampered ethnocentrism.

Only if Mr Najib is able to rein in extremist elements within his administration and his party, can pro-activism on the part of MCA win it seats in the next general election. Otherwise, BN will continue to evolve as an UMNO-East Malaysia creature, with no need for MCA.

Second, MCA can refuse the Viagra and continue accepting the BN Model. But that is to go further down the route that ruined it in the first place.

As it is, BN is definitely not a coalition of equals, neither in name nor in practice. Strangely, it may only be MCA, if it plays hardball, which can force UMNO back towards the middle ground.

THE RADICAL OPTION

Third, MCA can accept the present state of play, which is a struggle between race-oriented politics and governance-oriented politics. Being essentially a race-based party, just like UMNO and MIC — and PAS — the party will find it arduous to compete on opposition territory. Despite its many weaknesses, PR has the dynamic advantage where political discourses are concerned.

Lastly, a radical option for MCA would be to restyle itself as a small party with strong principles on inclusive growth. Whether it will need to exit BN to do that is an open question. But by placing itself in the liberating space between being a non-government organisation and political party, it could contribute greatly towards pulling the country back to the middle ground.

I know it sounds idealistic, but this is, after all, the time of year for wishful thinking.

ABOUT THE AUTHOR

Ooi Kee Beng is Deputy Director of the Institute of Southeast Asian Studies. His latest book is Done Making Do: 1Party Rule Ends in Malaysia (2013).