It was a brave speech. It was also full of wisdom when Premier Tun Dr. Mahathir Mohamed reinforced the basics of multilateralism and peace work in the realm of international diaspora. The speech does not have to be complicated and advanced upon explaining. In fact, it was delivered using a plain language even a non-diplomatic background young people could easily comprehend. As a result, it goes further to deliver a message of a small developing country from Southeast Asia – a message of justice and peace. The aftermath is something sweet to be remembered. We are remembered for choosing a Prime Minister who is brave to speak for the minorities, a leader who does not bow to big powers, yet a strategist communicator who gets his message across loud and clear to all UNGA 2019 delegates.
As an IR political analyst, the first thing comes to mind is – how could we aptly summarise the behavior of the speech itself? Having gone through all messages and points, what could be the best character we can describe for the speech? Certainly, the speech portrays an indirect message to the world audience – change in continuity.
The Prime Minister does not urge one to be anti-establishment despite all the failures of the United Nations. He does not plea the citizens of the world to abandon United Nations who have been working hard to make the world a better place to stay in terms of ‘better health, alleviation of the sufferings of some of the poor and the needy.’ He sets a good moral compass that we should thank people who have worked hard to achieve goals of an organization. Even with consistent power abuse of the veto countries by the veto powers, we should still maintain the veto powers, subjected to gradual changes. He proposed that ‘the veto should only be valid if two veto powers together with three non-veto members agree to apply it.’ Abuses in this way, could be minimized.
We support establishment with providing changes. We continue to progress by introducing change in continuity.
The UN is still relevant. It only needs to be resuscitated. The Prime Minister urges the citizens of the world to resuscitate the original purpose of the United Nations as a great organization.
WE NEED TO BE FAIR AND PROPORTIONATE
True enough, it is hard to be fair. The larger stakes an organization holds, it is even more difficult to be fair to its members. Nevertheless, it must be seen to be fair to all countries, including failing and developing states. It is an open secret how Washington will always defend Tel Aviv on the former occupation towards Palestine. Not only defending, the Prime Minister has aptly describe an act of glorifying the world’s murderer by re-allocating the U.S. Embassy to Jerusalem. While Jerusalem is still on an ongoing crisis, Washington and the western blocs have not being fair in assessing the situation at hand.
Proportionality requires all decisions to reflect on proportionate numbers. The veto power setting clearly diminishes the voices of remaining non-veto powers, which is far more than the veto powers. Having more than hundred countries to reach consensus is never easy. That consensus can simply be vetoed by 5 major powers which can simply crush the hope and visions of the majority. Not only that is unfair, it is clearly disproportionate. Up to date (from 1992 till present), Russia has exercised 114 votes, United States 81 and China 14 veto votes to incoming resolutions.
IDENTIFY THE ROOT CAUSE
International issues are prone to be politicized in various levels and scales. Trends seem to suggest a global scale conflict often being involved by many actors instead of a single perpetrator. Terrorism is simply a political communication of a dissatisfied agent as a result of syndicated deprivation by political entities and nation states. Hence, international terrorism or terrorism as a result of a narrowed interpretation of religion could not exist organically. Instead, there are gradual syndication of deprivation by the powerful agent towards the minorities. The minorities are left without an option but to commit terrorism as a response.
The Prime Minister, by all means does not condone terrorism. In fact, Malaysia has always being active in combating terrorism and religious extremism, locally and internationally. However, we must be fair in our calculation. Malaysia believes in ‘prevention is better than cure.’ Hence, our assessment of risk in undermining terrorism and terrorist organization has to begin with a fair judgment as why it happens. In the early years of Al-Qaeda’s reign, Robert Greiner of U.S.’ Counterterrorism Centre has established the organisation’s motivation towards 9/11, is a response to Israel occupation in Palestine and how the world has becoming silent (silent approver) towards such action. The emergence of ISIS is very much affliated with the regime change in Iraq, orchestrated by Washington and its Global War on Terror’s allies.
The message of the Prime Minister is simple. In finding solutions for global conflicts and catastrophes, the UN has to be fair in identifying the root cause. The ability in doing so will render more effective mechanics in solving the problems. The world could not be bias or one-sided in approaching issues, if we are all sincere in making the world a better place to live.
INTERCONNECTEDNESS IS THE WAY FORWARD
Contemporary scenarios have manifested how interconnected we are in this single world. Isolation (though a populist reaction for local political mileage) is not the way and would lead to further deterioration towards development and peace efforts. Trans-boundary haze in Southeast Asia is not a fault of a single country, but has been linked to non-state actors across the regions. Similarly, unilateral intervention towards peace should be discouraged as it leads to unchecked actions and omissions of the relevant actor. Multilateralism should be brought actively at the international agenda and concerted efforts of many agents should be the culture of the near future.
Ultimately, our relations with neighbouring countries and political actors could not outweigh the relations with surrounding nature i.e. the environment. In fact, our relationship with countries should be geared in combating a common threat that we are all facing. The journey is definitely more rewarding. More lives can be saved, a better life quality can be generated and a sustainable future can be further constructed. In contrast, we could reduce bloodshed, lost of lives, properties, hunger and famine if we channel our effort for a common concern, i.e. the environment.
Moving forward, the Prime Minister is promoting consistency after deliberating all failures and weaknesses – he calls for people to support the UN. The imperfection of UN could not be the reason for its members to abandon the organisation. Instead, it should garner more motivation to strengthen the organization, to further solidify its working models and to ensure that all of its operation to be effective in all levels.
CONCLUSION – AN EQUILIBRIUM
The conclusion of the speech is indeed a provocation to all individualist and self-centred nation states. Actors who are disrupting peace must be brought forward. Injustice and cruel authorities must be brought to justice. It is no other than to show that we are moving towards a healthy ecosystem for peace and conflict free.
The citizens of the world shall make no mistake.
We must resuscitate the original purpose of this great organisation – the United Nations Organisation. We must punish warmongers. We must make the world peaceful for all. That was our mission and that must remain our mission. Only if we succeed can we claim that we are civilized (Mahathir Mohamed, 2019).
Thank you.