Night markets, I have found, are the perfect place to strike up a political conversation. The low lighting, the free-flowing lager, people of all cultures, ages and races – all this seems to be conducive to delving into the nitty-gritty of governance, the shoulda, coulda, woulda of those in control of our lives.
And so it was last night, as Jamie and i were squished onto a table for our tiger and noodles with an old Scottish teacher called Mac. Inevitably (as there was more than one Brit present) the conversation turned to the horrors of the expenses crisis and our corrupt, money-grasping leaders, with their moats, pornos and bath plugs. The same people who are supposed to be leading by example and instead have shocked us all with how little power it takes to corrupt.
Mac, who’s been teaching over here for more than 20 years now (he spent a good decade tutoring maths to the Sultan or Brunei’s children), was as disgusted by all this as the next person (Jamie). In fact, I think the poor man was more upset than us, as for the many years he’s lived among the corruption of the Malaysian government, so he told us, he now has no iddyl, no purity of the homeland.
The stories he told us about the corruption in Malaysia made me almost proud to come from a country where corruption is an extra bath mat or two, not using your influence to have your rich girlfriend killed for money, or turning a blind eye to two prisoners killed in custody every week, say.
In Malaysia, according to Mac, every policeman is on the take. Every official is bribed, and every action comes with a price.
At least our leaders aren’t providing help and succour to the leaders of corrupt regimes (Myanmar) in the form of healthcare, while prosecuting refugees of the same regime for being without identification, leaving them in camps with open sewers and no medical care; their belongings treated “as a money spinner for the local security”.
At least old GB and his cronies push towards a multi-cultural society, while the poor old Malaysian immigrants, whether their families have been here for 2, 20 or even 200 years, get no share in the immense oil wealth, the chance to study overseas, or any of the other perks that the favoured Malays get.
Although it’s obviously not the first time that tales of the developing world have shocked and dismayed me, Mac’s stories made my hair curl. Staying in a country where the only thing that talks is money and the common man has no protection, no voice, no way out of the racist heirachy and total oligachy of a corrupt state, I feel more strongly than ever that the corruption in the UK over expenses should not be allowed to go unpunished. The world of politics is a slippery slope, and each and every one of those MPs who have lost their footing could take us down with them. And we’ll wake up one day and find that we too are at the bottom of it.
PS. For those who are interested there are websites where people explain exactly what is going on in this country far better than I can. www.malaysiatoday.com
