JOHOR BAHARU, Dec 5 — The formation of Bait Al-Amanah (BAA) in Johor as a think-tank to plan a roadmap for Umno’s reform process, is seen as apt with the current times.

While the sacred party is facing various internal and external challenges, Johor Umno has come forward and taken its own initiative to set up a think-tank that will come up with a long-term plan for the 69-year-old party.

When launching the BAA on October 9, Johor Umno liaison chief and Menteri Besar Datuk Seri Mohamed Khaled Nordin, said the knowledge of the professionals in Umno was important in contributing new insights and approaches, thereby preparing them to take up the mandate to lead the future.

BAA chairman Tan Sri Shahrir Samad said the establishment of the think-tank had come at the right time, when Umno as a long-standing party, was seen by many as having deviated from its original ideology and struggles.

Yes, after more than 60 years in power, we may be different from what was expected. Maybe we have diverted a little...have become fat and bloated, with a lack of endurance.

“So, in a precarious situation like this, we have to look at ourselves to self-recognise, and not just when everytime there is a problem, we say (allege) it is caused by outsiders or people who deliberately want to provoke and so on,” he said in an interview recently.

Due to this, many interpretations have been made about Umno’s ideology which is said to only take care of the interests of the Malay community, thus there is a great need for BAA to be established to prevent the party to continue to be misunderstood by the public, especially the non-Muslims.

Umno is indeed a conservative party, but it is conservative because it is defending its ideology, which has become part of what is contained in the country’s constitution.

While it is conservative, its policies and strategies can still be applied as pragmatic policies and strategies for all, but all this is not understood by the people,” he said.

Still deemed to be in its infancy, BAA is currently in the process of listing down the names of personalities who will be involved in research work and planning the roadmap

Informally, the BAA has already thought of several names including academicians, scholars and former party leaders to be involved in the initiative.

Not being left out of the list is former prime minister and Umno president Tun Dr Mahathir Mohamad, as his views and thoughts are still required to look at and understand certain situations or bigger scenarios than in the context of Johor Umno alone.

“BAA is not huge and will only look at Johor Umno, but if we want them to get views and ideas outside the context of Johor, then of course we have no qualms in inviting (Dr Mahathir). We are always ready,” said the Johor Baharu MP.

Apart from that, he said what was more important was not to marginalise the voices of young people in carrying out studies while planning the roadmap to return Umno onto its course.

For Shahrir, BAA could not move on its own, so it needed to interact with civic groups, non-governmental organisations (NGOs) and youths with various expertise.

At the same time, BAA will reconsider the aspirations of past generations into its strategies, as they have placed high hopes on a change in the education system for the better, as well as various other improvements.

However, Shahrir believes the effort is not an easy task as Johor Umno has to contend with the opposition to ensure that the strategies implemented are effective in winning the hearts of voters in the 14th general election.

So, our challenge now is to reignite our frame of thought and political philosophy which has already existed in Umno, but not implemented well enough right down to the grassroots level,” he said.

He also hoped that the establishment of BAA could become a thrust in contributing ideas to the top leadership in order to resolve national issues and at the same time, reaffirm Johor Umno’s role in strengthening the party.

We cannot escape the impact of national issues, but in a positive way, we should present rational and substantiated points of view so that we do not become part of the problem, but bring about solutions for it,” he said. — Bernama