Two articles in MK today about Pakatan’s path, one centered around Zaid Ibrahim, the other around Aziz Bari.

The former is a tad more controversial, and I won’t go into the ‘juicier’ speculations regarding its context and implications. Some criticisms aren’t too far off the mark, I reckon.

Aziz Bari’s points are more ‘universal.’ He’s the chap who was at the centre of some PAS noise a few weeks ago. I’ve heard him speak, he’s quite entertaining to listen to :)

His views on there being an old vs new politics dichotomy pervading all the parties are interesting. Old politics = based on race, patronage and sectarianism; new politics = broadly defined as “a framework of broader issues and ideas forming the basis for discourse.”

I agree that this is more relevant in PAS than a ulama-professional division, and that having read the writing on the wall, even Umno under Najib is trying slowly to make this shift.

I wrote recently about the ten year cycle of reform in Malaysia, starting in the late 80’s with Ku Li’s Gagasan Rakyat, through Reformasi in the late 90’s and our own recent ‘tsunami.’

I suppose the ‘bad news’ is that we may have missed the boat once again, although it is clearly too early to tell yet.

The good news is that even if we do, the progress of these ten year cycles suggest that each time a mini-revolution happens, we get closer to getting the formula right.

So let’s work on a dual track basis: doing our best to succeed this round, and learning from any mistakes that will clue us in as to how to succeed the next round.

I concur with Aziz Bari’s sense of hope in the coming generation of change, and I feel deep down that one day we really will get it right.

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