LETTER | Be wary of Muhyiddin and Zahid’s doublespeak

LETTER | In 1946, George Orwell wrote that political language is expressed in vague or meaningless words because it was intended to hide the truth rather than express it.

It is designed to make lies sound truthful and murder respectable - and to give an appearance of solidity.

Doublespeak makes the bad seem good and the negative appear positive, and limits and corrupts thought. It disguises the nature of the truth.

In Malaysia, unemployment is on the rise but no one gets sacked. It is branded as the company is right-sizing, relayering, downsizing, re-engineering or having a workforce imbalance correction.

When you are axed from the company, you are being let go, laid off or offered career alternative enhancement or early retirement so you can "pursue other interests" and "spend more time with the family”.

Job flexibility often means no contract and little or no job security. Reducing costs mean cutting jobs and salaries.

Banks don't have bad loans or bad debts - they have non-performing assets which are rolled over or rescheduled.

This is the danger of doublespeak - most often heard from politicians and bureaucrats - is that it obfuscates meaning.

One of the reasons most politicians now shy away from using the term “increase revenue for the government” is because it simply means taxes.

Defending the indefensible

The recent political speeches by former prime minister Muhyiddin Yassin and ex-deputy prime minister Ahmad Zahid Hamidi to their respective parties are largely based on defending the indefensible.

The political language from both of them clearly demonstrated a large gap between what are their real and declared aims, question-begging and full of insincerity.

Their ability to use lies and choose and shape facts selectively, blocking out those that don’t fit their agenda or programme whether knowingly or unconsciously, and to get away with it is mind-boggling.

For starters, it was Muhyiddin and his party Bersatu who withdrew from the Pakatan Harapan coalition that resulted in the collapse of the then government, by teaming up with BN to form a new administration.

Thus, the bellicose language used interchangeably by Muhyiddin with calls for voters to reject BN in the coming general election when it was him that invited BN to join his party and formed a new government in Feb 2020, is doublespeak in action.

If not for the treachery of Muhyiddin and his party, BN would still be in the opposition now. Instead, BN is now going into the general election as an incumbent.

As the incumbent, they have easier access to campaign finance, as well as government resources that can be indirectly used to boost their re-election campaign.

In May 2018, 5.5 million Malaysians voted BN out but because of Bersatu’s treachery, Harapan was ousted from power.

And Muhyiddin is now calling for the same or more voters to reject the same coalition that he had “re-energised” against the wishes of 5.5 million Malaysians.

Zahid’s hypocrisy

Is he treating Malaysians as mentally challenged?

How voters would be voting in the next general election remains a mystery but for sure they will never vote for Bersatu or Umno, and the coalitions they respectively lead.

Zahid, meanwhile in his speech to his party, claimed that from the day the Pakatan government collapsed, Umno has been calling for the mandate to be returned to the rakyat.

Such magnanimity!

If Umno and BN were sincere from day one, upon Bersatu withdrawing from the Harapan coalition that resulted in the collapse of the government, it should not have pledged allegiance to Muhyiddin in his attempt to form a new government.

At that time, 5.5 million Malaysians vociferously demanded the mandate be returned to them to decide. Instead, BN ignored their voices.

They gladly affirmed their support for Muhyiddin to form a new government.

And when several Umno MPs withdrew support from Muhyiddin’s government, did the former call for the mandate to be returned to the rakyat? No!

Instead, Umno nominated one of their own, Ismail Sabri Yaakob to be the prime minister to helm the government.

Since then, Umno chose the hypocritical route of continuously sniping at the prime minister to call for snap polls.

If Umno is sincere in wanting the mandate to be returned to the rakyat, it does not require a rocket science approach.

Just withdraw their support for the prime minister, who would then have no choice but to call for a general election.

Bear in mind that the people’s wishes are not for the politicians to manipulate at their whims and fancies.

Both times, in Feb 2020 and in Aug 2021, Umno had the chance to walk the talk – that is returning the mandate to the rakyat.

Instead, they ignored and acted against the people’s wishes.

For the rakyat, once bitten twice shy. If the people still believe in Muhyiddin and Zahid’s doublespeak, then we deserve to be tagged as fools.

The views expressed here are those of the author/contributor and do not necessarily represent the views of Malaysiakini.