I felt that for the most part, DAP has the interests of the Chinese in mind.
The response I got was:
which non Indian-based party has so many Indian leaders, and not just now but since its inception - starting with founder Devan Nair to Patto to Peter Dason to Karpal Singh (chairperson) to his sons Gobind Deo & ?, Perak speaker Siva, Kula, Dr Rama (Penang DCM), Dr Xavier, Sivanesam, Manogaran, Charles Santiago, John Fernandez, Gunasegaran etc etc
I do not deny that DAP has many politicians of ethnic Indian origin, and some of them are the country's best.
But it is not about ethnicity. Merely having an Indian in a position of authority within a political party does not automatically mean he/she has an Indian's best interests at heart.
Heck, look at the multitudes of parties, falling over themselves to represent the Indians as described in Who speaks for Indians?
Indeed, Malaysian Indians are the smallest minority with the largest number of political parties (groups) representing them.
Given the state of a huge number of Malaysians of Indian descent, obviously someone isn't doing a good job.
Now on the surface, DAP appears to be very fair and equal in its treatment of all races.The DAP logo, for instance, has all the 4 main languages embellished on it - supposedly to be all-inclusive. Of course, what it does is exclude those who don't come under the category of Malay, Chinese of Tamil.
While Mandarin is representative of all Chinese, Tamil is what the majority of Indians speak. The rest speak Malayalam, Telegu, Hindi, Punjabi etc.
The move to be inclusive fell flat on its face.
Theoretically, it's noble, but in practice, this sort of symbolism does not mean anything.
The Rakyat need people who can cater to their basic needs. In many cases, it is the need for education, jobs and even basic human rights.
Sometimes, it is forgotten in light of reaching to the majority of voters - a fine line, a tricky balance, but an important one nevertheless.
5 comments:
Quote:
"While Mandarin is representative of all Chinese, Tamil is what the majority of Indians speak. The rest speak Malayalam, Telegu, Hindi, Punjabi etc.
The move to be inclusive fell flat on its face.
Theoretically, it's noble, but in practice, this sort of symbolism does not mean anything."
end quote
The other chinese speak hokkien; teohchew, khek, hakka; hockchew; cantonese and a lot more that i can think of; need therefore these be included so as to satisfy them as you would want Malayalam, Telegu, Hindi, Punjabi etc. to be included.
I think its more important for all parties to serve everyone than to send out symbolic gestures that they are in fact inclusive.
Inclusive practice carries more value than inclusive symbols.
as a voter, i do not trust dap even a bit, regardless of the many indian "leaders" in the party.i have seen their(dap) true colours regarding other races(well,rebuke me as much as you want but that's the dark truth).but i will still vote dap as long as they remain within the pakatan rakyat but never as stand- alone party,hell no!.
oh! you might want to look up devan nair(bangsar mp,singapore 3rd or 2nd ? president)and see what happen to him when he had fallout with lee kuan yew.the devious weasel(lky)as usually, played his dirty little tricks again.
Crankshaft,
It its very hard to please each and everyone, if majority can be pleased and be happy about it, then count our blessing, and this country will be a very pleasant corner on earth to live in.
Cheers.
Su - you have a point, but do you write hokkien or cantonese differently from hakka or teochew? Or are they universally expressed in Mandarin?
Naga - exactly. Practice is so much more worth the effort than symbols.
Funnyfella - I believe that people improve if they can accept constructive criticism and work on it.
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