Some are born great, some achieve greatness, and some have greatness thrust upon them.
— Malvolio in Twelfth Night, by William Shakespeare
The shredding of our values goes unabated due to nihilistic policies as if we were once a great nation that fell by the wayside. We are victims of the Durkheim constant where unacceptable conduct becomes agreeable and acceptable due to unabated defiant downward deviancy. Read: unpunished corrupt politicians.
The self-induced slumber by power brokers and kingmakers motivated by the lust for snap elections or by-elections must be strictly outlawed as treason. More grating is at work with all eyes shut closed to conventions, rules, regulations and sheer common sense.
Big Brother operates a huge sieve to winnow away the genuine and the real leaving behind the vaunted dregs of avarice. Unabashedly, an avalanche of applause and accolades abound at our institutions of power concerned with opinion and attitude formation.
In Afghanistan, Syria, Somalia, Ethiopia and other war-grated nations, every child by the age of fifteen becomes adept at using a M-16 because staying alive is the norm. There is no such thing as a silent generation, baby boomers or baby bust phenomena in these nations that have become pawns to warlords and warlocks intent on empire building.
In Malaysia, by comparison, our school-going children are engaged in a different genre of warfare with an ethnocentric education system that does not bode well or cater for the future of young Malaysian professionals. Many jingoistic attempts have been made to right these wrongs.
What will make our nation great is a total obedience to common sense to sharpen our national sense of innovation with change. What makes our nation grate, again, is the total indifference to the rule of law that has become an election slogan more than a way of life for honest government to operate.
The proper utilisation of Malaysia’s human capital bereft of ethnicity is a key economic indicator which will obviate the need to depend on imported labour with its associated problems that make fat cats fatter and our national hopes leaner. The false cries of unemployment among the not-so-scholastic individuals associated with poverty is abhorrent and nonsensical.
Public and private sector leadership require major overhaul, repairs and replacements. Youth must be encouraged and prepared to take charge of the affairs of the nation with a renewed effort to go beyond the school curriculum. Anachronistic politics and purveyors of abusive practices must be replaced swiftly if we are destined to be great.
We should not be slouching towards nihilism despite the ‘Malaysia-boleh’ mindset which has become an outrageous cultural celebration. Malaysia needs a decoupling from the tried, tasteless, tired and tested tribulations we have been forced to experience as a nation of maladjusted malcontents yearning to breathe free.
We should not allow poverty to sprout shoots because we failed to kill the roots. What policies do we really have in place to eradicate poverty? We must break free of the deadening intellectual conformity and social injustices that assail the poor with wealth at their feet.
The handout mentality is not merely wrong but morally evil. It may be trite to repeat that old mantra: teach them how to fish and they eat for a lifetime. We must encourage change and reform. We must not encourage the retreat of reason.
Educating the leadership is the sole ingredient that will make our nation great, and not get grated in the bargain. There ought to be a willingness from those at the helm of business and politics to accept this challenge to put an end to egregious politics.
Professional training by the likes of Warren Buffet, Charlie Munger and Jack Mah should blaze trails for our leaders. We need a Thought Leader like Rita Gunther McGarth. Problem Solving methodologies as developed by the management guru Tom Peters should also be vigorously sought.
The Father of Modern Marketing, Dr Philip Kotier is another expert who should be encouraged for a tenure in Malaysia as should John Kotter, the Change Maestro, whose Our Iceberg Is Melting is a best-seller. Dr Bob Nelson is another titan specialising in employee motivation, performance, engagement, recognition and rewards.
Malaysia needs a new refreshing culture of learning and innovating to excel. We need to inculcate the DNA of innovation and change to survive in this globalised competitive environment. We should become patently impatient when no signs of alleviating our collective consciousness are visible.
The views expressed here are those of the columnist and do not necessarily represent the views of New Sarawak Tribune.
