The water talks: Malaysia's brilliant but needless response
THE STALLED WATER TALKS BETWEEN Malaysia and Singapore can now
restart only with a meeting of the two Prime Ministers. The two
negotiating teams cannot overcome the impasse, for one does not
understand the other and the other only too well. For the talks to
resume, Singapore must ask for it. But she would not without some
guarantees from Malaysia. Singapore botched the talks, in the Malay
mind, when she revealed confidential documents in an unresolved
issue. And proved she would in future in a regional dispute when
she published confidential correspondence between Singapore and
Indonesia over trade statistics. Singapore insists the letter of
the law must be honoured.
Malaysia has now released a series of advertisements putting her
case public for Singapore to rebut when, if, talks resume. The
National Economic Action Council (NEAC) placed the advertisements
but behind it is the Prime Minister, Dato' Seri Mahathir Mohamed's
deft hand. It is brilliant. It tells Singapore what she must
resolve before an amicable settlement. It is also pointless.
Malaysia need not have to make its case public. For Singapore is
painted into a corner. It is all but impossible for the talks to
resume until the two Prime Ministers, Dr Mahathir and Mr Goh Chok
Tong, meet in Putra Jaya. Both Malaysia and Singapore know this.
But Dr Mahathir is on his way out, and it would be Dato' Seri
Abdullah Ahmad Badawi, who would in his place. Would Singapore
allow it or send in the deputy prime minister instead? More than
the water talks, Dr Mahathir has raised the spectre of, to use the
current buzz-word, regime change in Singapore.
Singapore ignores the historical past. Why did Malaya, as she then
was, agree to three cents (the sen came later) per 1,000 gallons in
the agreements of 1961 and 1962? Johore had wanted a far higher
price, but Singapore was making its case to join Malaysia, and the
then Prime Minister, Tengku Abdul Rahman Putra, decided that since
the two states would be in the newly formed Malaysia, there was no
need for the island state to pay too high a price. But Singapore
left the Malaysian federation two years later in 1965. The
agreement provides for a review after 25 years, and when the
purchasing value of the dollar declines. Singapore does not accept
this. She did not in 1986 and 1987, and that was unravelled only
when the then Singapore prime minister, Mr Lee Kuan Yew, came to
pay, in the Malay mind, homage to Dr Mahathir. That is how it is
view here. Nothing can erase that.
Singapore goes for broke in talks when there is political
uncertainty in Malaysia. In 1986 and 1987, Dr Mahathir was fighting
for his political life. UMNO had been declared an unlawful
political organisation by the courts, and few concentrated their
attention on the water talks. It is an issue now when there would
be a new Prime Minister of Malaysia in three months. And stumbled
in both because the Malays close ranks when there is an external
threat like this, when an outsider tries to take advantage of
internal mayhem. If anything, the new Prime Minister, Dato' Seri
Abdullah, must, indeed would, be unbendable in the water
talks.
Malaysia has over the years created an efficient smokescreen with a
number of pointless issues, which Singapore saw as proof of Kuala
Lumpur's perfidy. The second bridge, the needless quarrel over the
CIQ, the railway land, and others were brought out for the end
game. At first I wondered why but it was a deliberate plan of Dr
Mahathir's to seize the advantage in Malaysia's favour. He has. It
would not be easy for Singapore under his successor, or the
successor of his successor, to reach agreement without the two
prime ministers meeting.
In the next stage in the talks, over raising the price Singapore
pays for water, a similar deadlock has occurred: the Singaporeans
insist on its pound of flesh and it is not agreed presses for a
public humiliation of Malaysia. All that matters in Singapore is
the present, devoid of the historical past, framed in graphs and
pie charts. And she cannot understand a Malaysia, for all its
commitment to a technological future, is still mired in a cultural
and religious mindset. In Malaysia, there is an acceptance that
nations, no matter how powerful, blunder through, and that must be
taken into account in every matter. Especially in talks.
Singapore does not understand or accept this. Which is why a think
tank in the republic holds a seminar next month on the Malay mind,
with two prominent Malaysians, neither Malay, leading it in an
attempt find an instant answer. Could cultural forms be understood
and learnt at seminars like this if the national mood is to drag
the other side's nose to the ground? When Singapore positions
itself, with Israeli help, as a Chinese island in a hostile Malay
sea, as Israel in the Middle East, and believes its military might
could flatten its neighbours armed might at the onset of
hostilities, and conducts its talks with its neighbours as it does,
is it not inevitable that many in Malaysia believe that this issue
must result in open hostilities? Especially when it was Singapore
that began the military arms race with Malaysia when she bought
tanks in the late 1960s. And continue to taunt the Malaysian armed
forces by her military aircraft straying deep into Trengganu and
Kelantan and back into international waters when the RMAF jets
scramble from Kuantan.
Malaysia has quietly shown Singapore over how weak her security is.
She has slapped the Singapore armed forces in ways that caused it
to come unstuck. The most dramatic was when its commandos
invaded its high security air missiles base in Bukit Batok
overlooking the Straits of Johore and pasted Malaysian stamps on
the missiles and replaced the Singapore flag on the commanding
officer's table with the Malaysian flag. Several Singapore officers
resigned or were reassigned or demoted. The major who carried it
out, who is known by his nickame, Sam, is still around and in the
business.
Malaysia believes this tough talk on water is to force the issue to
be resolved on the battlefield. A book on Singapore's armed forces
suggest it as a way of reinforcing its own security and ensuring
the republic gets all the water she needs. When Jordan said she
would divert a river from the Lake Galilee for agricultura, Israel
warned Amman that would be a cause for war. Malaysian defence
planners say that its armoury is outclassed by Singapore's. But the
Malaysian fighting machine after the war is not. Besides, neither
Israel nor the United States would rush to Singapore's aid should
hostilities break out. Not after the quagmire of one in the Middle
East and engaging another Muslim nation of the other. As one
military planner asked: "Would Singapore cut its nose to spite
Malaysia's face? For should war break out. Singapore would be
destroyed no matter what happens. Is that the brinkmanship it
displays?" The talks are preferable, but it is Singapore which must
ask for it.
[An edited version of this appears in my Chiaroscuro column in
malaysiakini (www.malaysiakini.com) today, 18 July 2003]
M.G.G. Pillai
[email protected]
Anyone knows the truth? Did it really happened? All lao jiaos
please verify.[/b]