COMMENT | Can non-Malay politicians be anything other than 'pak turut'?

"Clowns to the left of me, jokers to the right. Here I am, stuck in the middle with you.”

- Stealers Wheel ('Stuck in the middle with you')

COMMENT | People often caricature Abdul Hadi Awang when it comes to politics in this country. Partisans are dismissive of him as if whatever he claims is not mainstream politics. Hadi and PAS are relegated to the fringes of the political discourse.

All of which is complete horse manure, of course.

The PAS president says what the politically correct Malay establishment does not want to say out loud, but in practice engages in exactly the kind of behaviour, which makes all this talk of democratic norms and rule of law meaningless when it comes to the ketuanan ideology.

Hadi’s latest attempt at some sort of restatement of mainstream Malay political discourse envisions a political landscape where undesirable...