NO one likes to be left behind. Especially if you are part of the majority.
Consider this. The Department of Statistics tells us there were an estimated 29.06 million Malaysians last year.
Of this, 20.07 million or 69.1 per cent were Bumiputeras while 6.69 million were Chinese and 2.01 Indians.
Incidence of poverty is highest among the Bumiputeras. Household income, too, paints a similar dismal picture.
According to a 2016 survey quoted by the Centre for Policy Research and International Studies of Universiti Sains Malaysia in this newspaper on Sept 9 last year, Chinese households received the highest average income per month at RM8,750 followed by Indian households at RM7,150, and Bumiputera household income came in third at RM4,951.
Disparity is a legacy inherited from the past. We should not carry this baggage any longer.
The nation must not apologise for wanting to eradicate disparity. Because the national equation is an equation of happy balance.
Disturb the balance, you disturb social cohesion. The centre of a nation is held together by its social fabric.
This thread must not come loose. For if it does, the centre may not be able to hold and things will fall apart.
Disparity is a disease that must be cured. Better still, it must be prevented. Neither is easy.
What’s more, the GE14 has brought in its wake a complication of sorts. Bumiputeras feel un-represented. Most of them voted for Umno and Pas, neither of which is represented in the current government.
A community as large as the Malays need their voice to be heard. Ignoring almost 70 per cent of the population is not an option.
No nation can afford to do it. Malaysia certainly can’t.
It is the nation builders’ duty to create a happy balance. No one should be left behind. Every community must be given a place under the nation’s sun.
Shade and shine must be shared. And proportionately, too. Such is our national compromise.
Malaysia as a nation must move forward.
We cannot look back in anger, now and then.
Anger has not served any cause well.
We have been blessed with a chance to start afresh. We reached for the reset button on May 9 because we wanted a new beginning.
Now we have what we wished for, we must use it as best as we can. Some of our past may have been not as good as we hoped for; but we must not build our future based on this memory.
Bad memories have never taken any nation forward. Malaysia is a nation of many, but we must not allow this diversity to divide us.
It is a nation of plenty, too.
There is enough for all of us. All we need to do is strike a happy balance.
Let not excesses of the past destroy us.
Let’s come together to grow the national pie so that each of us can have a larger piece than the one we had before. Otherwise, the cry of the many will only get louder.