KUALA LUMPUR, Malaysia: Winds of change

MALAYSIANS have gone through another Christmas with much joy and happiness among all races at the fun of celebrating it like other countries do around the world. For Muslims , they have their own religious beliefs about the birth of Jesus Christ. But this is not about faith. Its about enjoying the holiday season with the rest of the country and having fun with the kids who are always thrilled at seeing the Santa Clause costumes and jingles. For the older generation, the Christmas songs bring back happy memories from their younger days, especially those who were fans of the great singers. Many still circulate the video clips of their past favourites on chat groups, even in these final years of their life on Earth.

We are a blessed country in that no one has to live in abject poverty or in refugee camps for displaced war victims or give away their underage daughters for marriage, like we saw this morning on a foreign news channel . . . Our leaders have built a strong foundation for our economic and social development through their pragmatic policies in handling the multicultural and multi-religious character of the country. Our policies based on tolerance and multiculturalism have won praise from international institutions and also business leaders, including foreign investors.

As a result of sustained growth, we have become a more diversified economy with commercial and industrial activities spreading across states to transform the country from rural to urban, with a rising middle class expecting for more democracy, human rights, gender equality, as well as freedom of speech and assembly . This is not unique to Malaysia. Its a typical development everywhere that after the basic needs for survival and creature comforts have been met, the people expect something more from the state to enrich the quality of living. It happened to the newly emerging economies in East Asia, including our immediate neighbours.This expectation has nothing to do with western imperialism, Christian missionaries or Jewish conspiracies. It is a natural, spontaneous characteristic of all developing economies that after they have passed through the bread and butter issues, they want their life to be more meaningful as citizens of the country they love. They want to have the life of a developed country.

Those who say that Muslims should not be part of the winds of change or should distance themselves from non-Muslim celebrations are not being realistic. The reality is that Malaysian Muslims are now an integral and influential part of the modern urbanised community, thanks to the government’s remarkable success under the New Economic Policy to restructure the economy to increase their participation in the modern sectors of the economy and to give them opportunities to study locally and abroad so as to increase their participation in the professional, technical and managerial occupations in the corporate sector, professional firms, banks and financial institutions.

They are now the middle class – bright young corporate leaders, executives in GLCs and private sector institutions, political hopefuls, academicians and intellectuals. They all have a personal stake in a progressive country practising the right mix of economic, social and religious policies. They are the silent majority demanding for change, while the older retired people like those serving in civil society consider it their duty to the nation and to the young generation to do their part to make the country become more progressive, with tolerance for our diversity, respect for the rule of law and moderation on matters of race and religion as envisaged in the Federal Constitution and the Rukun Negara. This is the only way forward towards achieving the government’s ambitious goals of 2020 and TN50.

Tan Sri Mohd Sheriff Mohd Kassim
Kuala Lumpur

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COURTESY:
THE DAILY SUN
Posted on 28 December 2017 – 07:59pm

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