Any ‘tsunami’ bears the same resemblance

beer festivals in the country.

PAS’ propensity to play with fire appears to bear the hallmarks of a temerarious assertion of selfsanctioned righteousness.

Attacking Umno on the right and Pakatan Harapan on the left is the typical trait of the party. Whenever PAS plays with fire, other like-minded groups will chime in with the chorus.

Radical and extreme religious issues in our country are the result of this inter-play of inward looking and parochial sentiments among radicalised movements.

Parti Amanah, looking askance at PAS’ apparent upturn, also frequently plays up similar issues. The party has even called for the banning of the world famous Latin song – Despacito.

It wants to be a substitute of PAS but looking at how things are, this dream of the PAS splinter could remain just a dream. There is a very high chance it will be dominated and marginalised by the bigger opposition parties.

In the Pakatan Harapan pact, PPBM president, Tan Sri Muhyiddin Yassin, has described the next general election as one that will witness a Malay Tsunami.

His strategy is said to be to counter Umno’s influence, particularly among the Malay middle class and heartland.

This is even accepted by DAP which has always portrayed itself as a multi-racial party albeit public opinion differs, given that the party’s membership does not reflect the true nature of its selfproclaimed racial composition.

PAS is using religious issues to attack Umno while PPBM is playing up grievances – imagined or otherwise – of Malay community to hit at Umno.

With this seemingly no-holdsbarred rhetorical feuding, the political milieu in our country appears perilously borne down by communal intransigence, further undermining our country’s ethnic harmony.

Almost all the political parties right now appear to be ditching their principles and casting aside their election pledges to serve their own ends.

They play politics to achieve their goals and compete for power. They have all but forgotten about the change they promised to make at the very outset.

The touted pursuit of change in the 505 election seems to have slipped into oblivion. The people’s disillusionment over broken election pledges is clearly indicated by the low registration of new voters.

In an article in Malay Mail Online, the columnist Boo SuLyn said: “If both coalitions insist on retaining their racial political structures and racist government policies, then they can forget about my vote.” (translated from Oriental Daily)