Gangsters the Malays' last line of defence?

When the Terengganu CPO Aidi Ismail boasted that his state is free of gangsterism because Terengganu's residents were 97% Malays, implying Malays could not be gangsters. our dear sweetie Mariam Mokhtar wrote in Malaysiakini's The racial snowball started by the Terengganu cop (extracts):

Tiga Line was the first thing that came to my mind when Aidi claimed that there were "no records" of gangsterism in Terengganu. For those who mudah lupa (easily forget), Tiga Line is a Malay triad, which was formed as a splinter group of the "Pertubuhan Kebajikan dan Dakwah Islamiah Malaysia" (Pekida).

Tiga Line is Home Minister Ahmad Zahid Hamidi's good and loyal friend. He claimed that Tiga Line triad members were neither malicious, nor thuggish. He said Tiga Line were benevolent "festivities kenduri-kendara gangsters".

In October 2015, several shooting sprees throughout Malaysia, prompted the Home Ministry to ban 49 secret societies including Tiga Line, in a crackdown on violent crimes. Despite the ban, Zahid endorsed Tiga Line. If gangsters have been sanitised, then their activities in Terengganu will not be considered "gangster-like".

Most cops would include police statistics to back-up their assertions, and some background information to support their inferences.

It;s not so much Tiga Line (the front combat troops) but Pekida that's the very sinister organisation, an organisation which has been rumoured to form the Malays' last line of defence.

I once read briefly an article by a French female academician who apparently spent years researching Pekida for its political connections.

Here's an extract of what she wrote:

In August 2013, when police sting OPS Cantas, or Operasi Cantas, was organised by the Malaysian government, politicians with suspected links to ‘gangster’ groups eluded the police. 

At the time, the interior minister assured the public that Pekida groups were not gangsters. The crackdown on gangs looked more like a cleansing of UMNO-linked Malay gangs’ Chinese and Indian competitors.

This re-organisation of the grey zone where politics and crime meet, and where connivance militants burgeon, took place as I was on the verge of finishing my PhD dissertation, events rubber stamping my entire argument.

In early 2015, when my first articles on Pekida were published by New Mandala, and republished across several news portals and blogs from every political persuasion, hundreds of comments were posted praising my work, sometimes with exaggeration. Others accused me of defamation, often falling into personal, sexist and racist comments or threats of deportation and death.

In a news interview, a Malay NGO leader offered to date me, rather than having an intellectual debate (I have not made my mind up yet).

In another interview, the President of Pekida said I was confused. According to him, UMNO had no ties to Pekida and Pekida had no links to gangsterism. Others, on the contrary, felt empowered to join the debate, adding that former prime minister Abdullah Badawi was Ayahanda, or ‘father’, of Pekida, but not of the gangster faction.

Over the past two months, in a magical twist, some Pekida affiliated leaders have now been re-cast in Yayasan Ayahanda Semalaysia (YAS); what is described as a ‘foundation’. These leaders have slowly gained new attention in the media, portraying themselves as legitimate political voices, including president Syed Husain.

Ayahanda is in fact one of the highest titles (after Paduka) given to leaders within several Malay NGOs including Pekida. These groups are like a pyramid with several branches and lines led by an Ayahanda who counts several members under him.

The successive declarations of YAS president Syed Husain reveal very clearly and unambiguously the nature of Pekida, its relationship with UMNO, and the entire patronage system.

Only yesterday, in the wave of accusations against Prime Minister Najib Razak, Syed Husain officially expressed YAS’s reluctance to keep supporting UMNO, and its intention to unite the more than “hundred Pekida splinters and over 3,000 Ayahanda”; including those “splinters” comprising individuals who have turned to “gangsterism” and who are “too egotistical” to work with.

These declarations show that the link between patronage, Malay NGOS and UMNO is so strong that internal UMNO politics and successive crises (like in 1998) directly impact on the nebulous organisation.

Secondly, the support of the organisation to the party would seem to be important enough, or made to be believed so, that its loss could jeopardise UMNO’s constituencies.

Thirdly, the leader of YAS clearly reaffirmed the underworld link of Malay NGOs “turned to gangsterism” and the existence of leaders “too egotistical” who have created their own groups, almost totally independent of the mother organisation.

Moreover, Syed Husain gives a hint of the numbers of members that could be counted in this nebula: indeed each Ayahanda may have a dozen to hundreds of followers. The YAS president has spoken about 3,000 splinter leaders.

Finally, the fact that Syed Husain reveals this information in the press is a very transparent indicator of the level of impunity that has be gained by Ayah, or ‘Bosses’, in the last decade.

The leadership of connivance militant groups used to remain discreet. But in a context where ruling politicians are feeling threatened by growing demands for transparency, connivance militant groups have become key political actors.

In an illusory democracy like Malaysia, the primary strategy of politicians on the verge of losing power is to tighten up the public sphere and silence oppositional voices within or outside their party rankd. To do so, it is necessary to create a climate of fear that justifies the maintenance of authoritarian laws that are indeed used as a tool for political repression and the control of the masses.

This climate of fear is being instigated by images and rumors of religious, ethnic or political violence, orchestrated by connivance groups. The problem is what happens when the potential perpetrators of violence, like the disenfranchised youth who join these groups hoping for a social and economical lift, cannot be controlled anymore.

The Low Yat Plaza events in July were a small scale show of what these youth are capable of if their despair is not addressed by proper political and social reforms. And what happens if connivance militancy continues to be an essential part of local politics.

What intrigues me is the assertion of the Malays' last line of defence?

Defence against what?