Mamu Anwar And The Theory Of 2nd Best. Part 1.

1. It's common knowledge that I do not agree wirh Mamu Anwar on many things. In his thinking, that is. I have no quarrel with the person. Nothing personal, just business.

2. As a person, he can't be that terrible as some people see him as. Pak ya said that he is a peliwat tua. We don't know that as a fact.

3. He is the father of Nurulizzah and the husband of the iconic lady of Malaysia, Dr Wan Azizah. The real first lady of Malaysia. That makes Mamu Anwar as the first Man of Malaysia.

4. Which makes I want to opine whether he is pm material. That he ought to be chosen as the 10th pm.

5. That is my personal opinion in as much as my disagreement with him is personal.

6. Because of that, I consider the views of Mamu Mahathir and Yahya Ismail as personal.

7. Therefore, irrespective of what I think personally, Mamu Anwar is the person we need as the next pm. In this zaman pancaroba. Anwar's zaman edan. For the sake of Malaysia.

8. In substantiating my claim, I borrow the idea of the 2nd best theory. It's an economics idea associated with R. Lipsey.

9. It is obvious that Mamu Anwar is my second choice as pm. My first choice is the hermit at langgak golf. But that is my subjective choice. He is a good and honest person, but held back by crooked umno.

10. The theory of second best as applied to an economic union states that-the removal of one economic distortion will not lead to an optimal state if other distortions are not first removed.

11. Mamu Anwar represents one market distortion, while umno represents many. Then the rational thing to do, is to remove the entity representing the many.

12. Translated politically, it means better to remove umno than removing Anwar.

13. Perhaps for that reason, the knee-jerk idea asking him to resign as head of pkr and defacto head of ph, does not gain substantial traction. That proposition was an exception rather than a norm.

14. The same can be said on the opinion of an 'accidental' ex mb, that Anwar is no longer saleable.

15. Rather, I think those who support a personal opinion like that or that anwar is no longer relevant, will themselves drown in the sea of irrelevancy.

16. Take the case of pejuang for example. Pejuang, post Mahathir, under the leadership of diffident mukhriz or other jittery unknowns, will itself fade away. The one that won't be sellable will be mukhriz himself and with him, pejuang. We will be asking Pejuang who?

17. Now, what are the many 'market distortions' that umno represents, which we find so repulsive? That the only option opened to us is to slaughter umno?

18. Corruption is a 4-letter word. It's called umno. Corruption is the only non malay cultural element readily accepted by ethnic intolerant umno. That and chinese ah mois.

19. We shall be forgiven for thinking that the objective of umno for wanting power is they can plunder the country.

20. For that reason, I find it laughable when an umno runner, from up north, says that umno still has a track record which the rakyat appreciate. No one believes that now.

21. It has gone off track and its record is broken. The use of the adjective 'still' could mean it has lost some of its legitimacy. The only rakyat who believe umno are those given RM50 when shaking hands with umno candidates seen only during erection, er I mean elections.

22. The sad truth is, my friends, umno has failed us. Take land ownership, for example. See the following illustration.

23. Similarly, I find it laughable when catfish-mouthed Zahid Hamidi saying that umnos manifesto, in the context of johor prn, is doable.

24. That is debatable, since people are increasingly aware that umno has no ideology.

25. Its 'welta nshauung' is profiteering on brainwashed people. Its 'underbau' is corruption.

26. Consequently, the only aspect of its manifesto that is doable,is to slip 50 ringgit when umno people go around and 'salam kokot' with voters. Isn't it the age of cash is king?

27. While the majority of the people are nauseatingly aware of umnos duplicitous and farcical ways, the point is to convert the 'best lepak dengan the rider crowd' to not support umno.

28. We all, especially the people of Johor which is closest to Indonesia, should be ashamed when the Indonesian president openly said that Malaysian leaders come to that country to take photos with the president at the istana and later sit down to borrow money.

29. In the past, we have often joked that corruption was so rife in Indonesia and that her people are eating rats. But now have to grudgingly acknowledge that our national income is only a third of that rat eating country.

30. The sad truth is that we have become a basket case. We walk around with bowl in hand, hoping to benefit from other's altruism.

31. Nobody is going to care for our well-being if we ourselves are loose with money.

32. If jokowi for instance, refuses the requested loan to us, it's because he knows a portion of the money will end up with corrupt politicians and shylockian civil servants.

33. A sizeable portion of all monies coming in, is sapped away by greedy politicians and avarcious civil servants. Corruption has become a protocol.

34. Therefore, when the ph finance minister rationalises allocations to the agricultural and rural sectors, there is sound logic behind it.

35. It's not cutting down allocations as stupid ahmad maslan sees it. It's aimed at preventing skimming off the top and reducing leakages.

36. For, the bigger the budgetary allocations, the more opportunities there are for corruption and leakages.

37. There are two things at work here. First, corruption has reached pandemic proportions. It has affected every bone and sinew of our body politic. It is our culture.

38. Second, it is worrying that some people find it best lepak dengan riders. Instead of spending more time with people who enrich your life all around, you choose to laze around with people with animalistic intents. These are probably the people who continue to idolise the felon, 'red lips' Najib.

39. It's worrying because it is symptomatic of something more ominous. It indicates that some people are purposeless and listless. And when they continue to idolise the perpetrator of a grave felon, it shows they have fucked up values.

40. Now the person with the credentials and pull power to arrest these enervating influences is Mamu Anwar.

41. So despite my own often adversarial inclinations against Mamu Anwar, he is our best hope as the next pm. 

Mohd Ariff Sabri bin Hj Abdul Aziz
Mantan adun Pulau Manis(UMNO)/oomno
Mantan ahli Parlimen Raub(DAP)/da-ap