Identity Crisis

(2 of 4)

Minority Report
The man who must minister to Malaysia's malaise is Abdullah. When he was handpicked for power four years ago by longtime Prime Minister Mahathir Mohamad, Abdullah was dismissed as a political lightweight. But Abdullah surprised even his harshest critics. He vowed to combat corruption, liberalize the press and restore the reputation of a judiciary whose independence had been repeatedly questioned during the latter part of Mahathir's 22-year rule. To underscore Malaysia's commitment to economic efficiency, Abdullah initially scaled back several of Mahathir's prestige megaprojects, including a money-losing national auto company and a massive dam in Borneo. The son of a moderate Muslim cleric also brought a measure of spiritual authority to the ruling coalition, which had been fighting the rise of an Islamic-based political party that attracted Malay votes even as it alienated non-Malays. "The important thing is that everyone's rights are protected," Abdullah told TIME. "Malaysia is the country that it has become because of the contributions of all the different races and people that populate the country."

But honeymoons don't last forever. Abdullah will almost certainly win re-election in polls expected early next year, because of the well-oiled political machine of the governing National Front, which has dominated the country since independence. Yet the 68-year-old PM's tenure is dogged by the same ills — alleged graft, inefficiency, ethnic and religious rivalry — that he had promised to combat. Questions about Abdullah's leadership came to the fore earlier this year when his deputy, Najib Razak, stunned the country by defining Malaysia as an Islamic state, going so far as to say the country had never been secular. (The nation's constitution is unclear about the issue, stating both that Islam is the religion of the federation and that freedom of religion is guaranteed.) Abdullah told TIME, "We are not a secular state, but neither are we a theocracy." But such hedging seems unlikely to satisfy all constituencies. Liow Tiong Lai, the head of the youth wing of the Malaysian Chinese Association, part of the usually cohesive National Front coalition, asserted that Malaysia was indeed a secular nation. Bernard Giluk Dompok, a minister in Abdullah's Cabinet who is Christian, concurs. "If we define Malaysia as an Islamic state," he told TIME, "the implication is that non-Muslims do not belong."

Abdullah points out that the ruling coalition is composed of parties representing various ethnic communities. "We have adopted a power-sharing formula for over 50 years now, so every community gets a seat at the table when it comes to governing the country," he told TIME. "Everyone participates, and everyone's voice is heard." Many non-Malays don't agree — and their sense of alienation starts early. Government primary schools that used to be essentially secular now feature Islamic prayer halls. Today, only 6% of Chinese parents send their children to such schools, while in the 1970s more than half did. Chinese students have a much harder time securing places in Malaysia's public universities because of quotas, so those with sufficient funds head overseas. Many do not return. Those who do find workplaces are increasingly divided along ethnic lines. "[In the 1970s] there was a bar at Parliament, and we would all socialize together," recalls Lim Kit Siang, the Chinese head of the opposition Democratic Action Party, who has served off and on in Parliament since 1969. "Now, everything is separate, and non-Malays feel like second-class citizens in their own country." Many ethnic Indians, whose economic gains have lagged behind those of Malaysia's other communities, feel the same way. On Nov. 25, thousands gathered under the shadow of Kuala Lumpur's Petronas Towers, the world's tallest twin buildings, for a rare protest to call attention to what they believe is an unwillingness by the government to address the root causes of their marginalization. The demonstrators were dispersed by tear gas; the day before, three rally organizers had been arrested on sedition charges, but were later given a conditional discharge.