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MALAYSIA TODAY SPECIAL REPORT PART 1
SYNOPSIS: The most powerful man in Malaysia
Political journalist Yahaya Ismail recently wrote a book called Khairy
Jamaluddin: Bakal PM?. While the book contains many facts and
educated guesses on the future of Khairy, the title itself is in gross
error. Khairy Jamaluddin is not a future Prime Minister. He is already
the de facto Prime Minister.
Abdullah Ahmad Badawi is legally the fifth Prime Minister of Malaysia,
having taken office in November 2003. However, even before he assumed
office, it was quite clear that Abdullah Badawi was not his own man –
that all his thoughts, actions and deeds were heavily influenced, if not
directed by his then 28-year old son-in-law, Khairy Jamaluddin, and his
coterie of friends. While some talked of the three Ks being the power
behind Pak Lah, namely Khairy, Kalimullah (the Group Chief Editor of the
New Straits Times) and Kak Endon (Datin Paduka Seri Endon Mahmood Ambak,
wife of the Prime Minister), there is no doubt that the first K is the
most powerful, having appointed the second K to his post and having
married the third K’s daughter at a time when the third K was and is
fighting breast cancer, an illness that has already claimed the third
K’s twin sister.
Many say that this is not unusual. After all Nixon had his Kissinger and
the Tsar of Russia had Rasputin. There are similarities between these
figures and Khairy. For one thing, all seem to act as puppet-masters,
pulling the strings of the wooden characters who are the rulers of the
country in name. All came from rather obscure backgrounds to emerge
suddenly upon the national scene in a blaze of glory. Yet all had the
fatal flaw of a congenital defect which led them to believe that they
were immortal, invincible and all-knowing. In the end, all succumbed to
the temptations of power. Will this also happen to Khairy?
The signs of discontent are quite clear. The person who perhaps is most
wary of Khairy is former Prime Minister Dr Mahathir Mohamad. While Dr
Mahathir himself at first warmed to Khairy and his friends, appointing
for example Khairy’s bosom buddy from Oxford, Dr Vincent Lim Kian Teck,
as his second Chinese political secretary, he eventually found Khairy an
overbearing presence upon Abdullah. But at that time it was already too
late. Mahathir had announced his retirement and Abdullah Badawi was the
heir-designate. For whatever bad that Mahathir had done, he knew he
could not afford to change his mind on the succession after the
crippling failure of the removal of Anwar Ibrahim.
So Khairy was kept on in the Deputy Prime Minister’s office in spite
of Mahathir’s misgivings. Mahathir turned red when Khairy Jamaluddin
asked him in a Pemuda UMNO gathering whether he was really serious about
stepping down. He thought it discourteous that Khairy insisted Mahathir
send Abdullah for an overseas tete-a-tete meeting with the US President,
even when Mahathir had dismissed the idea as “premature” and
“unnecessary”. Mahathir rankled when his former political secretary,
Matthias Chang, reported to him that Khairy had mentioned in an informal
student gathering in London that both Mahathir and Daim deserved to go
to jail after Abdullah Badawi takes over.
But like all of Khairy’s enemies, Mahathir underestimated “the
boy”. He thought that as leader of the country for 22 years, and the
most powerful man in the country, Khairy could be pushed off the scene
as and when Mahathir likes even when he was no longer in charge.
Mahathir trusted that his immensely strong iron grip on UMNO could be
utilised behind the scenes to bend Khairy to the Mahathir whim. But it
was not to be. Mahathir’s son, Mukhriz found himself humiliated when
he tried to challenge Khairy for the deputy leadership of UMNO youth. In
spite of Mahathir’s monetary support, several large gatherings to pep
up the Youth voters and the far-reaching tentacles of ANSARA (the former
Mara students alumni group headed and funded by Mukhriz as a closet
political tool), Mukhriz found that the rising son-in-law was more
powerful than the fading son. He humiliatingly lost the UMNO Youth Head
position in his father’s own constituency and got pitiful support for
his national ambitions.
Mahathir at last realised that he had stepped down in November 2003, the
most powerful man in the country, only to be replaced by a 28-year-old.
Khairy is now and for the near future the most powerful man in the
country. Even more so than Abdullah Ahmad Badawi, Najib Tun Razak or
anyone in the UMNO Supreme Council who are mere tadpoles in Khairy’s
big pond.
Here is how he influences decisions that affect you and me.
First, Khairy is the main gatekeeper in Abdullah Badawi’s office. No
letter, fax, proposal, document, appeal, communication, correspondence
or presentation lands onto Abdullah’s desk without first going through
the screening of aides Datuk Wan Farid and Zaki Zahid. Both Wan Farid
and Zaki Zahid act as Khairy’s eyes and ears. When any proposal comes
through to them, they immediately make copies for Khairy Jamaluddin.
Copies are necessary because Khairy is no longer officially with
Abdullah’s office. Yet, official or not, he is still the gatekeeper
and needs to see all that comes to Abdullah’s office.
Wan Farid and Zaki Zahid together with Khairy also vets the appointment
list to see Abdullah. In spite of the existence of the post of Chief
Private Secretary held by Dato’ Thajudeen Abd Wahab (a long-time
Abdullah Badawi loyalist and civil servant), those appointments made
through Dato’ Thajudeen’s office inevitably get copied to Khairy and
get vetted by him. Make no mistakes. Though Dato’ Thajudeen is annoyed
by this unorthodox arrangement, his long-time friendship with Abdullah
is not strong enough to overrule his boss’ son-in-law.
Of course it is not cheap to get an appointment to see Abdullah. The
gatekeepers also act as toll-collectors. And UMNO is rife with
mutterings of dissatisfaction, due to the high price (some say up to
RM50,000) exacted by people close to Abdullah merely to secure an
appointment with the Prime Minister. While this “custom” has always
existed in varying degrees throughout the rule of all five Prime
Ministers of Malaysia, it has never been so thorough and blatant as it
is now. This is because payment of RM50,000 alone is not sufficient to
secure an audience. There must also be promises of involving some of
Khairy’s companies in eventual projects if such audiences are to be
successful.
Some may argue why this happens in spite of Abdullah Badawi’s image as
Mr Clean. But that image is merely a perception. Compared to other
ministers Abdullah is relatively clean, but this was not because of want
of trying. Abdullah was in charge of ministries with little
“opportunity” to exact “tributes” such as the Ministry of Youth
and Sports and the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, and for many years he
was out of the government. His political position as a former Tengku
Razaleigh–Musa Hitam supporter was always very precarious and Abdullah
Badawi was too fearful to drink from the poisoned chalice of corruption.
However the situation has now changed. Abdullah Badawi is all-powerful
as Prime Minister and relies on Khairy to prop up that position. Khairy
Jamaluddin knows that it is not long before Pak Lah will be challenged
by Najib or anyone else backed by Dr Mahathir. Thus he must make hay
while the sun shines.
The second method by which Abdullah is controlled by Khairy is through
Khairy’s insistence on appointing key personnel at the
decision-forming level within Abdullah’s office and also in other
powerful ministries. No less than ten of Khairy’s friends from his
university days who are all in their late twenties or early thirties
currently occupy posts equivalent to chief executive in many of the
ministries (more will be detailed in later parts of this report).
Abdullah Badawi cannot function if these figures do not function. In
other words, he is completely reliant on their actions.
For example, let us say that Abdullah goes for a foreign trip to
Venezuela for a trade mission. The person who prepares the itinerary is
a Khairy appointee (a fellow ex-student from the UK). He submits the
paper to Khazanah’s Director of Investments (another Khairy appointee)
for discussion. It is discussed with people from Ethos Consulting (a
Khairy-related company) and finally gets approved by a meeting of
Foreign Ministry civil servants which willy-nilly is often attended by
Khairy himself in spite of him having no official position in
government. When Abdullah comes back from Venezuela, discussions with
President Hugo Chavez is discussed with the private office of the Prime
Minister (headed and made up completely of Khairy’s appointees) and
decisions are made by Abdullah Badawi after a night’s discussion at
home with Khairy himself. Little wonder that Khairy Jamaluddin has such
an extensive control on Abdullah – and this was exactly how the
Venezuelan trip of the Prime Minister took place!
Thirdly, Khairy Jamaluddin controls Abdullah Badawi through his
insistence on exerting his unofficial role as the Prime Minister’s
closest advisor. An incident that took place in the foreign ministry
shows it all. A meeting was called by Minister Syed Hamid Albar. It was
a top-level meeting, a briefing to the Prime Minister in a closed
session. In attendance were the Prime Minister, the Minister, the Deputy
Ministers, the Secretary General of the ministry and his deputies –
and Khairy Jamaluddin, at that time neither in the Prime Minister’s
office nor holding any official post. Syed Hamid insisted that the
meeting be closed to Khairy. Abdullah demurred, partly out of fear that
if Khairy was not in the room he would be ill-advised. So Khairy stayed.
Such a situation shows not only how strong Khairy is, but how weak
Abdullah can be.
Therein lies the danger of Khairy Jamaluddin. He is an unelected person
within the government, yet his influence outweighs that of the whole
cabinet; even that of the Deputy Prime Minister Najib Tun Razak. As long
as Abdullah is in power and Khairy is married to his daughter, Khairy
Jamaluddin will continue to be the actual ruler of Malaysia. Whether
knowingly or not, democracy in Malaysia has been reduced considerably
since Khairy Jamaluddin came to the fore and there is no longer any
check and balance within the government.
Surely the people of Malaysia should know about the phenomenon of Khairy
Jamaluddin since their lives now so much depend on it. Malaysia Today
will chronicle the rise of Khairy, how he influences UMNO and the
government, name his allies and enemies and how he interacts with them.
More importantly, Malaysia Today will try to lay bare the mystery of
Khairy and identify the tentacles he uses to reach for power
MALAYSIA TODAY
SPECIAL REPORT PART 2
Out of the wormhole
Before we delve into the heavy stuff, let us start with the basics.
Where did this guy KJ come from?
Today, Khairy Jamaluddin has become the most powerful man in the
country. Unlike most politicians whose origins can be easily traced and
whose records are in the realm of public knowledge, Khairy is like a
“dewa kayangan” (fairy godfather) who appeared from nowhere into the
mainstream of Malaysian politics. Many began to wonder whether he was
planted by certain sinister forces, such as the CIA or maybe the
Singapore intelligence services. After all, no one can attain power so
easily and so quickly unless they had some help, could they?
Certainly this is what Yahaya Ismail tried to hint at in his book. Dr.
Mahathir was so worried about this that, at the end of his premiership,
he commissioned the Special Branch to prepare a file on Khairy, which
was also copied to Najib (another report was also prepared on Khairy’s
bosom buddy, NST Group Managing Editor Kalimullah Masheerul Hassan –
but that is another story for another time). But for all its promise to
be “Mesra, Cepat dan Betul”, the officers in charge of the report
did not want to risk rousing the anger of Khairy’s father-in-law and
Prime Minister-designate Abdullah Ahmad Badawi. After all, at that time,
he was only a few months away from power. So the report reported that
there was nothing to report.
Though it is not unusual for members of the administration to be
recruited as foreign spies (remember Mahathir’s former secretary,
Siddiq Ghouse, who turned out to be a mole for the KGB), the truth about
Khairy and his relationship to foreign intelligence services will not be
publicly known for the simple fact that he is already too close to the
seat of power. Unlike Siddiq Ghouse, Khairy is a member of the Badawi
family and you cannot really say a member of the Prime Minister’s
family is a spy, can you? But people still wonder: could he have gone so
far without some “extra” help?
The truth is that Khairy did get “extra” help, though probably not
from foreign agents. The time was quite ripe for the appearance of an
eloquent, well qualified UMNO leader such as Khairy because twenty two
years of Mahathir rule had made UMNO a party of dead zombies. There was
simply no one else, as few had the courage to say anything remotely
critical of the current (i.e. Mahathir’s) system. In the party of the
yes-men and the corrupt, the slightly more intelligent fellow who can
speak well is king.
So Khairy became the biggest worm in the giant wormhole that is UMNO.
Let’s start from the beginning. Khairy Jamaluddin was born 29 years
ago to career diplomat Datuk Jamaluddin Abu Bakar (now deceased). Datuk
Jamaluddin came from a little kampung in Rembau and is politically
connected enough to be a relation of several Negeri Sembilan
politicians. One of Datuk Jamaluddin’s nephews is Datuk Shahziman Abu
Mansor, currently a deputy minister in Abdullah Badawi’s
administration and MP for Tampin.
The late Datuk Jamaluddin served in various diplomatic overseas posts
but died during one of his postings there. It was this nomadic lifestyle
which resulted in Khairy receiving an overseas education, including in
Singapore and the United Kingdom. Suffice to say, Khairy never went to a
local school and, for a very long time in his life, could hardly speak a
word of his native language, being ill at ease with Malay and unable to
converse with his own relatives.
While he spent most of his time overseas, Datuk Jamaluddin did have one
important posting locally. This was at the Ministry of Youth and Sports,
during the time the late Tan Sri Samad Idris was Minister. It so happens
that at that time the Director of Youth and later Deputy
Secretary-General of the Ministry was a certain Abdullah Badawi. Fellow
civil servants, the two shared some common interests including being
part of the so-called “Malay ultra” group and when Abdullah left the
civil service in 1974 to become MP for Kepala Batas (a seat previously
held by his father, former PAS Youth Chief Ahmad Badawi Sheikh Abdullah
Fahim), Jamaluddin kept in touch.
When Jamaluddin died, Abdullah and his wife, Endon Mahmood Ambak,
continued to keep in touch with Jamaluddin’s widow, a lady from Kedah.
Frankly speaking, Datuk Jamaluddin’s reputation as a civil servant was
lackluster. He was seen as aloof, pompous and arrogant. Often despised
by his subordinates, he was a stickler for form rather than substance. A
former subordinate of Datuk Jamaluddin once remarked that he valued a
person more for “his ability to do a proper knot in his tie rather
than the quality of his reports”.
As a student Khairy was a fast learner, though a bit of a rebel. He was
critical of government policies. In spite of his later pronouncements of
admiration for Mahathir, he was not a Mahathir worshipper. Indeed, he
was opposed to many of Mahathir’s actions – though only on the sly
and never publicly.
As a student at Oxford, expressing his doubts about Mahathir to fellow
Malaysians overseas, he came to the attention of a certain Omar Ong.
Omar Ong, as can be seen from his rather peculiar name, is an ethnic
Chinese. He is the son of Mustapha Ong, former Private Secretary to
longtime Minister of Information Mohamad Rahmat and for some time in the
diplomatic service in New York and Brazil. Currently living in New
Zealand, Mustapha Ong became infamous during the Anwar Ibrahim trials
when it was revealed he had tried to bribe a New York ethnic-Arab taxi
driver called Jamal Amro to “confess” that he had procured boys and
women for Anwar. Jamal Amro refused and instead made police reports
accusing Mustapha Ong of trying to bribe him. Of course Mustapha Ong was
shielded by Mahathir, even though his over-enthusiasm in trying to
“fix” Anwar caused some embarrassment to the government, especially
amongst the diplomatic community overseas.
Anyway, Omar Ong was a bit of a social climber and very ambitious. He
tried to hitch his star to rising politicians as a means of
fast-tracking his own ascent to power. He knocked on the door of Deputy
Prime Minister Anwar Ibrahim through the good graces of some of his
political secretaries.
This was partially successful, as Anwar was persuaded to receive Omar
Ong and his group in a private audience. Several more meetings followed
and Omar Ong was hopeful that Anwar would be his ticket to heaven. In
spite of that, there was still some opposition from Anwaristas such as
Suhaimi Ibrahim, Fuad Hassan and Zahid Hamidi, who really wanted to keep
Anwar all to themselves.
But a chance meeting with Daim Zainuddin made Omar Ong soon realise that
something was brewing in the very highest circles and Anwar was going to
be hit by a runaway bus, so to speak. Quickly, while thanking his lucky
stars, Omar Ong dropped “the Anwar project” like a hot potato and
tried to go for Najib Tun Razak instead. This was around three months
before Anwar was sacked by Mahathir.
Najib, however, was a hard nut to crack. Omar Ong realised that Najib
was surrounded by long time loyalists from his earlier days in
government who screen newcomers to his circle with a parent’s
protective eye. So it was decided that the next best thing would be
Hishamuddin Hussein.
Hishamuddin Hussein was then just a junior UMNO politician. But he had a
very big name behind him. There was no doubt that, after Hussein Onn
died, Dr Mahathir felt that he owed a debt of gratitude to the former
third Prime Minister and his family. Dr Mahathir began to put
Hishamuddin on the fast track of politics, even over and above
Hishamuddin’s superiors in the UMNO Youth movement such as Nazri Aziz
and Zahid Hamidi. Hishamuddin got promoted several times within a year.
These fast promotions took its toll on Hisham. He was never a bright
student or a sharp intellectual. Neither was he a good speaker nor a
great orator. He had an unfriendly face and almost permanent crooked
smile which reminded a fellow Minister of “the dead pope – after he
had died”. Omar Ong set about helping Hishamuddin and his fellow
student from Oxford, Khairy, came along as well. Soon, Hishamuddin began
to rely more on Khairy than on Omar Ong.
To pay his debt, Hishamuddin introduced Omar Ong and his group to people
close to Dr Mahathir such as his Political Secretary, Datuk Johari
Baharom, and ISIS Director-General, Dr Noordin Sopiee.
A coincidence at the time was that Abdullah Badawi’s daughter had
joined ISIS as a research assistant. And it was Noordin who introduced
the two. Abdullah Badawi was then a Vice-President of UMNO and next
inline should, for example, Anwar Ibrahim’s helicopter fall suddenly
from the air.
Anwar’s helicopter did fall (though he was not on it at that time) but
Anwar himself was booted out in September 1998. Like most other
Malaysians, Khairy did not believe some of the more bizarre accusations
hurled against Anwar by Mahathir. But it was the best of times, and the
worst of times. There was opportunity and both Khairy and Omar took it.
A myth developed after Anwar’s fall from grace that Khairy had always
been sympathetic to Anwar’s “Reformasi” struggle. Rumours grew
that a student who had publicly asked Mahathir to resign in a gathering
in London was really Khairy. Another story was that Khairy was the then
boyfriend of Anwar’s daughter, Nurul Izzah, but they broke up when
Anwar’s wife, Dr Wan Azizah, refused to make Khairy her political
secretary but instead appointed another young man by the name of Nik
Affendi Jaafar (now Senior Public Relations Manager of the EPF).
It seems all these rumours were created later by some hallucinating
Anwar supporters who wanted so much for the young and powerful Khairy to
be on their side, at least on the sly. But, in reality, Khairy saw a
vacuum created by Anwar’s sudden “fall from paradise” (as Anwar
himself described it) and he took the chance to catapult himself to the
highest reaches of political power in the country.
At this time, Khairy tried to get close to the man in trouble at that
time, Dr Mahathir. Khairy used Noordin Sopiee to try and get a job in
the Prime Minister’s office. In this he was backed by Hishamuddin. But
when Mahathir rebuffed the offer, seeing through Khairy’s ambitious
moves, Khairy went for the next best person. No, not Abdullah - he went
to Najib again.
Najib was then seen as the most likely candidate to succeed Anwar as
Deputy Prime Minister. In fact, Asiaweek went so far as to say that
Najib was the man to watch when it came to that post. But Najib was
careful not to include new people who may arouse the jealousy of his
already tightly knit inner circle. Indeed, he had no reason to take on
Khairy as he had strong confidence that Mahathir would choose him and no
one else. This was a decision Najib was to regret bitterly.
What Najib dreamed of was not to be. Mahathir thought he could better
control the country by having Abdullah as his deputy. To Mahathir,
Abdullah was a non-entity due to his onetime support for the Team B
faction in UMNO (or more correctly to Tan Sri Musa Hitam). These types
of people make better puppets.
When Abdullah’s name was announced, Najib and his wife Rosmah wept
outside the meeting room, desolate and disbelieving. At this stage, as
the new Deputy Prime Minister, Abdullah began to pack new people to fill
in posts of which he had many to fill. For example, as Deputy Prime
Minister, Abdullah would have two political secretaries instead of one,
and eight Special Officers instead of two. One of these Special Officer
positions went to Khairy.
How did he clinch it? It was a scratch-your-back-scratch-my-back
situation. Abdullah had asked Noordin Sopiee in his capacity as the
Prime Minister’s brain to suggest a few names of bright chaps who
could fill posts in his office. Two names came out – Khairy’s and
another ISIS researcher (now also ensconced in government). But the ISIS
researcher failed the security check (his mother was a Reformasi
supporter). And Abdullah’s lovesick daughter Nori warmly and
enthusiastically endorsed the first name.
So far, so good. The climb of Khairy Jamaluddin had begun. And he
quickly paid his dues by ensuring that the person who put him on track
to these successes got his rewards as well. Omar Ong was swiftly
installed in Najib’s office as Special Officer in order to ensure that
all went smoothly in the deep, dark wormhole that is UMNO politics….
Part 3: How Khairy killed off his enemies within UMNO…
Part
1: SYNOPSIS: The most
MALAYSIA TODAY
SPECIAL REPORT PART 3
The enemies within
Most of Khairy Jamaluddin’s enemies within UMNO are made up of younger
leaders who believe that he is an upstart. They do not acknowledge that
he has substantial knowledge in government though having served in
Abdullah Ahmad Badawi’s office for the last four years. They think
that he is put there merely because he married the daughter of the Prime
Minister. At the same time, they are disgusted by the way Khairy puts
his cronies in charge of various branches of government ministries,
ranging from the Communications Office of the Prime Minister’s
Department to Khazanah Nasional.
This is not of course simply a matter of puerile jealousy. They believe
that Khairy is a real threat and quite a significant one at that too,
given his meteoric rise to power. They too have ambitions of their own
to become Prime Minister. Indeed, some of them even feel the Prime
Minister’s seat is their God-given right. So they try their best to
parry Khairy’s every move and block it by hook or by crook. The normal
UMNO method of poison pen letters, backstabbing SMSes, and secret
alliances grafted in smoke-filled rooms are some of the normal methods
employed to keep Khairy at bay. But Khairy is not the usual UMNO
political enemy by far….
Many of Khairy’s enemies are content to bide their time and wait for
the day when Abdullah Badawi is kicked out of the office of UMNO
president. They believe that, then, Khairy will lose his godfather and
protector, laying himself bare and exposed to attacks from the
grassroots. Khairy’s enemies hope that the seething anger at Khairy so
openly displayed at the last UMNO General Assembly will reach boiling
point and explode once Abdullah is removed from office. Then Khairy will
be led to the altar of sacrifice and his throat slit from ear to ear.
Yet, Khairy understands this plus that he has to strike first. And the
last two years since Abdullah became UMNO President has been spent
precisely doing that.
Khairy utilises two methods: neutralising what enemies that can be
neutralised, and extinguishing the dangerous ones who cannot be
mollified by titles and positions. There are many of the first category,
such as Azimi Daim, Norza Zakaria and Aziz Sheikh Fadzir. All three used
to be seen as potential challengers to Khairy’s position, especially
in UMNO Youth.
However, they could be easily bought as they are in politics merely to
gain positions and make money. They fear ‘going the whole way’ and
doing things that may risk their comfortable current positions. So Azimi
was given the UMNO Youth Information Chief title as well as an EXCO
position. Aziz was given a seat in the last general election. Norza not
only got a post in the UMNO Supreme Council, but a license to ‘print
money’ through the powerful ‘toll-keeper’ position he was awarded
in the Second Finance Ministry. UMNO politicians such as these are not a
real threat to Khairy because, whenever they rear their ugly horns, they
could be led to the trough of patronage and fed to their fat stomach’s
content.
The more dangerous threats come from the second category made up of
established politicians who are scions of UMNO leadership even before
Khairy appeared on the scene. One such personality is Khairy’s own
boss, Hishamuddin Hussein, who was instrumental, prior to 1999, in
bringing Khairy to the attention of then Prime Minister Dr. Mahathir
Mohamad. Hishamuddin believes that it is his birthright to be a future
Prime Minister of Malaysia given that, like Najib (his cousin – his
mother Tun Suhailah being Najib’s mother Tun Rahah’s elder sister),
his father had held that august office before being deposed by Dr.
Mahathir.
At first Hishamuddin thought that Khairy would do like what he is doing
- play the ‘patience game’. Hishamuddin started out a strong
supporter of Mahathir and his then heir-apparent Anwar Ibrahim. Through
his constant brown-nosing of Anwar, Hishamuddin quickly found himself
Deputy Minister of Finance and Minister of Youth and Sports, jumping
over the head of his own boss, UMNO Youth Chief Mohd Zahid Hamidi. But
Hishamuddin did this in his late thirties after years of legal practice
and with at least the perception of patient unobtrusive building of his
political career.
But Khairy does not believe in such things. He wants what he wants fast
and he wants them now. So he has become the youngest Vice Youth Chief of
UMNO since Nazri Aziz. Though this was suggested by Hishamuddin himself
to save his own position, Hishamuddin now realises Khairy is a bigger
threat than Aziz Sheikh Fadzir or anyone else could be.
In addition, Hishamuddin is unhappy that Khairy set up his own network
within the UMNO Youth machinery, e.g. nominating Norza to the Supreme
Council over and above Hishamuddin’s own choice. Khairy also set up an
informal network of UMNO Vice Youth Division Chiefs throughout the
country, a phenomenon unheard of when Hishamuddin himself held that
post. Hishamuddin realises that he now holds office by the grace and
favour of Khairy. When the latter is ready for the post of Youth Chief,
the former must go.
If the situation continues, Hishamuddin might find it is time to go to
the only place where he can go, which is the position of UMNO Vice
President. But the stage is already filled to the brim with aspirants to
the leadership. Hishamuddin may well find that, in the next UMNO
election, Khairy will win the post of UMNO Youth chief with ease while
he will lose the battle for the UMNO Vice-Presidency.
Hishamuddin is stuck because Khairy has already laid a trap for him. He
makes pronouncements that forces Hishamuddin to accept his view of
national politics. Hishamuddin cannot play the Malay racial card because
Khairy has played that first, especially in areas such as education,
which comes under his own ministerial purview. More importantly, Khairy
is opting in several of Hishamuddin’s ex-allies such as Dr. Adham Baba
and Razali Ibrahim (the MP for Muar) to slowly begin accepting the
duality of UMNO Youth, where Hishamuddin is just the nominal official
chief, but Khairy runs the daily show.
This is how Khairy is ‘fixing’ Hishamuddin. He has already planted
key allies within Hishamuddin’s ministry. Some of Hishamuddin’s
former loyalists have been given ministerial responsibilities and
parliamentary seats, not to strengthen Hishamuddin himself but to
distance his advisors from him and make them preoccupied with their own
careers. This has created vacancies in Hishamuddin’s office and Khairy
has filled them with his own allies, notably from the YPCS (Young
Professionals Consultative Society), people of Khairy’s own batch,
nominally loyal to Hishamuddin but in reality stooges of Khairy himself.
Nothing goes by Hishamuddin's office that is not reported to Khairy.
Indeed, Hishamuddin’s own Special Officers are the eyes and ears of
Khairy.
Removing Hishamuddin will be easy because Hishamuddin is not a
‘fighter’ – unlike, for example, another potential Youth Chief, Dr
Mohamad Khir Toyo, the Menteri Besar of Selangor. Khir comes from a
different background than Khairy though they share the first syllable of
their names. While Khairy comes from a diplomat’s family with a high
ranking in the civil service, Khir’s father, known locally as “Wak
Joyo”, is of peasant stock and a former PAS member to boot. Khir built
himself into national politics by his good-natured bonhomie
with Mahathir’s children, notably Mokhzani and Mukhriz. It was
Mokhzani, who was then UMNO Youth Treasurer, who recommended that Khir,
then a one-term assemblyman and not even a division leader, succeed Abu
Hassan Omar as Menteri Besar of Selangor after the shameful revelation
of Abu Hassan’s incestuous sexual scandals.
UMNO Selangor was of course not happy that this young upstart was
suddenly propelled to the leadership. And Khir had more ambitions to
fulfil. At only 37, Khir is by far the most visible Youth leader in the
country after Hishamuddin and Khairy. He would not want to stop merely
at being an UMNO Supreme Council member. Indeed, if Hishamuddin had
decided to leave the post of UMNO Youth Chief last time, Khir would have
been the frontrunner to succeed him. With money in his pocket due to the
extensive giving away of land to the Lebar Daun group and other key
business allies, Khir is well suited to assume the leadership of the
UMNO Youth Wing - except he has to contend with Khairy…
Khairy had tried fixing Khir by exposing some mistakes he had made as
Menteri Besar. Khairy is in luck because Khir has been greedy and
rapacious in making money out of his position as Menteri Besar. Khairy
merely needed to exploit some of these corrupt practices. One of the
methods he used was to expose Khir’s wrongdoings in the award of
development land within the Bukit Cahaya Seri Alam nature reserve. Khir
had granted substantial pieces of land to companies related to his
family and the family of his wife. The head of news at TV3, Datuk
Kamarul Zaman Zainal (an ex-officer of Abdullah Badawi’s office) had a
meeting with Khairy in which the latter gave the go-ahead for TV3 to air
these misdeeds. Datuk Kamarul Zaman had no love for Khir as he is an
Abdullah loyalist and believes that, in doing so, he is helping Abdullah
strengthen his position against residues of the Mahathir era.
But Khir fought back and he had some powerful help. It was not only his
related companies that had been given land in Bukit Cahaya Seri Alam but
also companies associated with members of the Selangor royal family and
other key political and business personalities close to Abdullah. When
TV3 began airing the problems, they panicked and asked for help from
Dato’ Thajudeen Abdul Wahab, Chief Private Secretary to the Prime
Minister. Dato’ Thajudeen used his authority to ask Datuk Kamarul
Zaman to back off and stop the attacks. So it gradually subsided.
Then Khairy used another tack. He tried to show that Khir was an
incompetent administrator. At a Selangor UMNO Liaison committee meeting
in May 2005, through a whisper from Khairy, Abdullah Badawi questioned
the logic of declaring Selangor as a ‘developed’ state. His plan -
which was hatched way back before Abdullah became PM - was to emphasise
Selangor’s unique position as an economic powerhouse by declaring it a
developed state on the 31st of August 2005. Admittedly, Khir had
massaged the statistics and figures in order to make such a
proclamation. However it is nothing unusual in the scheme of UMNO
politics where even the former Prime Minister Mahathir had made
unilateral declarations such as that Malaysia was an ‘Islamic
state’.
Abdullah blasted Khir for making such a declaration during the
closed-session meeting. In order to soften the blow, he emphasised that
he had earlier criticised Kedah Menteri Besar Syed Razak Syed Zain for
the impossible promise he made to make Kedah a ‘developed state’ by
2010. The real target of attack however was Khir. In Abdullah’s simple
uncluttered mind, he was making a genuine criticism based on the lack of
reasons for the declaration of a developed state. But, to Khairy, this
carried a more valuable message, which was to show that Khir was a liar,
incompetent and bumbling. After all, the aim to declare Selangor as a
‘developed state’ was something that Khir had been working on since
2001, and he had announced it far and wide to everyone.
This is just the beginning of the attack on Khir. Of course Khir will go
ahead and make the declaration in August. But he is wounded by the
collective attack on all fronts, especially in the mass media against
his administration. Nor is he supported (at least in the public eye) by
the Prime Minister. The most Khir could gather was lukewarm support at a
Selangor UMNO meeting by Deputy Prime Minister Najib Tun Razak.
By the time Khir announces that he is ready to go for the UMNO Youth
leadership, many of his mistakes would have already been exposed by
Khairy for public consumption. That is not to say that Khir is a less
competent man than Khairy, but Khir does not control the media, whereas
Khairy does. Either through his own plants such as Kalimullah Masheerul
Hassan (the Group Chief Editor of the New Straits Times) and his breed
of Singapore trained hired hacks such as Brendan Pereira, or the
Heavenly Kings of The Star, or Datuk Kamarul Zaman in TV3, these will be
the methods by which Khir is eventually destroyed. And Khir can scarcely
fight back given his own past misdeeds and the fact that his press
officer is a university dropout with not even an SPM credit in
languages.
Hishamuddin and Khir are Khairy’s seniors, as far as ranking in UMNO
is concerned. But Khairy also faces challenges from his peers in UMNO
who are almost as close to Abdullah as he himself. He has not neglected
these threats and, like the fratricides of the Middle Ages, Khairy has
plans to strangle his own brothers…
MALAYSIA TODAY
SPECIAL REPORT PART 4
Strangling your own brothers
It was one thing for Khairy Jamaluddin to dispatch his challengers who
openly stood in his way, but what was he to do with those young
politicians who have Abdullah Ahmad Badawi’s confidence? Before Khairy
came along, Abdullah did have some other young protégés who he had
groomed. These were the dark horses who might challenge Khairy for the
throne in a few years time. One who has already declared this intent in
private gatherings is UMNO Perlis Deputy Liaison Chief, Datuk Zahidi
Zainol Abidin, 41.
Back when Hishamuddin Hussein contested the UMNO Youth Vice-Chief post,
Zahidi was one of the few who dared challenge him -- even though
Hishamuddin was the son of a former Prime Minister and Zahidi was a
‘nobody’. The former Air Force pilot with a UiTM mature student
degree stood against Hishamuddin knowing full well he would lose, given
Hishamuddin’s popularity and backing from Dr Mahathir. Yet he still
went head on against Hishamuddin. Why?
Zahidi is one of those strange people in UMNO. One cannot call him a man
of principles, yet he did have over-riding beliefs. He has an
unshakeable confidence in his own abilities and he has always been proud
of calling himself the underdog candidate. Zahidi does not think that
UMNO should always be led by the scions of established political
families such as Hishamuddin Hussein. He believes in going against this bangsawan
mentality.
So Zahidi took up the cudgels against Hishamuddin. Though he lost
heavily, he could always rely on a fallback ‘tilam’ as he
had been a loyalist of Abdullah Badawi since his Team B days. Abdullah
counted on Zahidi’s support throughout his wilderness years and even
considered Zahidi an anak angkat. When Khairy appeared on
Abdullah’s radars screen, Zahidi was annoyed. He felt that Abdullah
was being led up the garden path by this young Oxford graduate with a
smooth tongue. Zahidi wanted Abdullah to be more true to his Malay
nationalistic background and not be swayed by Khairy’s new-age
politics.
Zahidi tried his best to keep Abdullah on the straight and narrow. But
of course he was no match for Khairy and his friends. Try as he might,
he could not shake ‘the boy’ off -- and neither did Khairy succeed
in turning Abdullah completely against Zahidi. Between the two, Abdullah
struck an uneasy balance. Khairy stayed Abdullah’s closest and most
influential advisor, but Abdullah still relied on Zahidi to give him an
alternative view, though most times it did not matter as much as the
opinion of his son-in-law. To soothe Zahidi’s wounded heart, Abdullah
planned to make him the Perlis Menteri Besar during the last election if
Shahidan Kassim failed to dent the PAS onslaught. To Zahidi’s chagrin,
Shahidan pulled off a coup by defusing the PAS ‘green wave’ with the
help of a few members of the Perlis royal family, thereby guaranteeing
his stay in office. Nevertheless, Zahidi got promoted to Senior State
EXCO Member.
Since then, he has openly announced his intention to challenge Khairy,
ostensibly to teach these bangsawans a lesson. So Khairy planted a mole
within Zahidi’s midst, in the form of a young and ambitious leader
called Ben. Ben, or Rozabil Abdul Rahman, as his full name goes, is one
of Khairy’s strongest supporters. In fact, since 1999, he has been a
shareholder of Khairy’s mother’s company based in Penang and Kedah
that supplies goods to schools in that area. Ben has ambitions to make
it big in national politics, but Khairy told him to first prove himself
by ‘fixing’ Zahidi in Perlis.
Ben is not even from Perlis. His father, Abdul Rahman Kader, an ex-trade
union leader, is an Anwar loyalist, Parti Keadilan Rakyat (PKR) national
chairman, and one-time PKR Chief for Penang. From 1999 to 2004 Pak
Rahman was the PKR State Assemblyman in the Permatang Pauh Parliamentary
constituency. Pak Rahman hails from Perak while Ben himself is based
mostly in Kuala Lumpur. But anything can happen in Khairy’s weird and
wonderful world of politics. So Ben suddenly became a Perlis
‘native’ and winged his way there to serve Khairy’s wishes. One of
these wishes is to make sure that Zahidi gets politically tarnished.
In the last general election, Ben created a ruse on Khairy’s behalf.
He arranged to meet with Zahidi on the pretext of seeking his support to
win the post of UMNO Youth Chief in the Kangar Division. He promised
Zahidi substantial ‘campaign funds’ to facilitate this task. Zahidi
readily agreed, accepting RM300,000 as a first payment.
In fact, Ben was not doing this out of the goodness of his heart but to
manufacture evidence that Zahidi was involved in money politics and
therefore liable to be hauled before the UMNO Disciplinary Committee.
That was what happened next. Zahidi found himself the object of an
investigation by Tengku Ahmad Rithaudeen’s committee. Letters accusing
him of paying bribes appeared on the Tengku’s desk and an anonymous
tape-recording of a telephone conversation in which Zahidi had asked Ben
to make prompt payment of the campaign funds to his bank account found
its way to the committee’s hands.
Zahidi was duly convicted of the crime of money politics and given a
warning. The public was told his offence was of blocking certain people
from being elected UMNO delegates by bad-mouthing them. Secretly though,
Tengku Ahmad Rithaudeen had warned Zahidi not to ‘rock the UMNO
boat’ if he did not want them to announce his other offences, which
included payments of up to RM1,000 each to members in the Kangar
division. Zahidi was informed during the hearings that he was not to
repeat to the press what the committee had said to him.
He was told that he was lucky to get off with a warning because he was
one of Abdullah’s blue-eyed boys. But if he dared challenge the
‘status quo’ of the bangsawan leadership again, the committee would
find a way to ‘sembelih’ him.
Of course, no one expects Zahidi to take this lying down. But he has no
doubt been made aware that challenging Khairy would not be a ‘clean’
and friendly battle like the Hishamuddin Hussein challenge some years
back.
There is another fellow like Zahidi, also a long time Abdullah loyalist
and not a bangsawan. Reezal Merican Naina Merican is an Indian Muslim
from Penang who had managed to bring himself to the attention of
Abdullah Badawi three years before Khairy ever showed his face in the
Jalan Bellamy house.
Reezal Merican (often called ‘Ustaz Reezal’) is an IIUM graduate
with a penchant for high politics and beautiful women artistes. He was
aghast when the years of relationship he had built with Abdullah prior
to his being appointed Deputy Prime Minister was suddenly interrupted by
the appearance of Khairy. When Abdullah ascended that high office,
Reezal Merican thought that his time had come. His years of being the
‘lightning rod’ in IIUM -- attracting the ire of his fellow students
who were mostly supporters of Anwar Ibrahim -- would finally pay off
when Abdullah recognises his loyalty and perseverance in defending his
image. Reezal had hoped that Abdullah would reward him with a suitably
high post in government.
But when the call finally came and the appointment letter landed on his
desk, Reezal found himself in the much less exalted office of Shahrizat
Abdul Jalil, in charge of issues such as making sure that people hugged
each other in the name of national unity. Khairy had blocked his way up
by writing a memorandum to Abdullah Badawi containing the list of people
who deserved to be promoted to the office of advisors to the new Deputy
Prime Minister and Reezal Merican’s name was not one of them.
Reezal persevered. He tried to make himself out to be a more important
part of Abdullah’s future government by showing that he had good ties
with the student community in local universities. He promptly got
himself elected head of the IIUM alumni and therefore a nominal head of
quite a substantial group of the local student support base. Perhaps it
was in view of this that Abdullah finally relented and, in November
2003, Reezal was made Political Secretary to the First Finance Minister.
It was not as important as being Political Secretary to the Prime
Minister himself, but as the two posts were conjoined in the same
person, Reezal did not complain too much.
Khairy did not take this lying down though. He shot off another official
memo to Abdullah, informing him that the IIUM graduate did not deserve
the post as he added no value to the effort to show Abdullah’s
administration as being a professional team of bright young things.
Khairy also accused Reezal of involvement with several young recording
artists and newsreaders. The letter found itself on Abdullah’s desk,
but not before chief private secretary Dato’ Thajudeen Abdul Wahab (no
friend of Khairy’s) had made a copy and given it to Reezal. Seething
with anger, Reezal swore to eliminate Khairy from the Abdullah circle.
That promise was made in the white heat of anger. Eventually, Reezal
realised that it was better to be seen to support Khairy, at least for
the time being. He took a step back and allowed Khairy to go for the
UMNO Youth Vice-Chief post while he himself contested as an ordinary
EXCO member, though he had a longer relationship with the UMNO Youth
delegates. In the meantime, he gathered his forces. While Khairy is
largely supported by foreign graduates, non-Malays and the liberal Malay
faction in UMNO, Reezal Merican is more popular with the under-30s from
local universities.
A head-on clash was about to happen if not for one stroke of Khairy’s
genius.
What could Khairy do to counter Ustaz Reezal’s influence? Khairy
looked at it from a hierarchical point of view. If Khairy, as an Oxford
graduate, was the highest chimp in the tree, Reezal, as an IIUM
graduate, was the lower monkey. So, to topple the guy, Khairy needed an
even lower ranking primate –- more aggressive, perhaps, but definitely
a follower rather than a leader. This he found in the form of Datuk
Abdul Azeez Rahim.
Abdul Azeez shared many of Reezal Merican’s attributes. A fellow mamak
like Reezal, he had a weakness for beautiful women and both had married
twice. More importantly, Abdul Azeez was a self-made businessman of a
rather thuggish outlook and could counter Reezal’s influence among the
locally educated UMNO Youth politicians. Khairy pushed through a new
wing called Putera UMNO under Abdul Azeez’s stewardship that spread
its tentacles to local universities and institutions of higher learning.
Khairy understood that he himself lacked support from this political
base and badly needed it. Abdul Azeez was tasked in getting this support
while at the same time weakening Reezal’s influence.
So Reezal became a neutered tomcat, surrounded by the well-oiled and
well-financed Putera UMNO. If at any time in the future Reezal tries to
shake Khairy’s throne, the trap would be set for him and he would find
himself on the receiving end of Putera UMNO’s whack. Khairy no longer
needs to fear that he would be seen as an arty-farty Oxford graduate
without support from the lower middle classes. Abdul Azeez would now
take care of that for him.
The juggernaut rolls on. But Khairy cannot afford to confine himself
only to dealing with potential threats from UMNO Youth. There was a
bigger and more immediate threat to his plans to become PM of Malaysia
by the age of 40. The most important fish for Khairy to fry is one
called Najib…
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