What's In A Name?

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"In an effort to brand itself as “progressive” and “egalitarian”, and move away from feudalistic connotations, the party has introduced new descriptions for its organisational structure. The supreme council (majlis pimpinan tertinggi) is now replaced with central leadership committee (majlis pimpinan pusat) while “bahagian” or division has been superseded by “cabang”, and “cawangan” or branch will be referred to as “ranting”."

Central leadership committee?

Anybody else thinking of Lenin's Council of Commissars?

PKR, you do not sound 'progressive' or 'egalitarian', you just sound out of touch with reality.

Yes, this smacks of Socialist 'egalitarian' rebranding, ladies and gents.

And before I get flamed as a crackpot Commie-basher, here're my arguments. So finish reading before you click the Comments link.

A committee, by definition, is a group of ordinary party members who get together in order to accomplish a particular goal or target.

Ostensibly, this implies that the members of the Committee are, in fact, just your everyday, run of the mill PKR party members.

So, by rebranding the Supreme Council a Central Leadership Committee, the party's saying, "Hey, we're democratic! Look! Our leaders are normal people! Just like you! And you! And you, the homeless unemployed guy who lives off his brother smoking pot over there! Yes, you too!"

I disagree with this.

Why pretend that a group of leaders that are higher ranked (and by extension, more valuable) than the other members of the party are 'the same as everyone else'?

Why pretend that the men (and women) who contribute most to the party are the exact same as the ones who join it for the glamour of being part of 'the Opposition' or, worse, the money?

I say keep the title 'Supreme Council.'

I believe that Parties are not run by Committees.

Scratch that, Parties CANNOT be run by committees.

Parties are run by councils, with a clear hierarchy and a leader that leads with integrity, with a clear succession plan to an intelligent, competent successor. There is no cooperation in leadership.

Cooperative Leadership does not and cannot exist. It is an oxymoron.

And the 'Feudalistic connotations' of the term Sepreme Council? People, the Supreme Council, i.e. the notion of an enlightened form of organised leadership is not FEUDAL at all! It is the absolute base of the modern Government! The idea of a 'Leadership Committee' is the perverted version of this noble ideal! Why are we equating the single greatest breakthrough in human governing systems with something that is ancient and 'bad'? This makes no sense.

Look.

PKR's supreme council is (mostly?) made up of competent, intelligent individuals, and I, for one, respect who they are and what they have to offer to Malaysian politics.

And so they deserve to be recognised as maybe a little better than all of us for what they have achieved as the main opposition to the admittedly slightly wayward ruling party we have now.

PKR has never been led by a committee. PKR is what it is today because of a council, a team, the leaders, men with vision, a wise group of elders and not-so-elders, and there is no point calling them otherwise. To do so would be an insult.

Calling them a 'committee' will just draw derision from Malaysians sick of these half-assed attempts to 'democratise' PKR's image (which I personally think is too democratic already). We want good government, not fancy committees. The most democratic titles in the world will not get you anywhere when the economy crashes, GLCs go bankrupt, the crude oil runs out and pop stars are falling left and right.

PKR's leadership has given much to us all, and even I, who privately lean towards the ruling coalition (they can be saved, people!) ungrudgingly admit this. They deserve to be treated as such.

Call a spade a spade, ladies and gentlemen. After all it's done for you, it's the least you could do.