NOVEMBER 24 — It’s disheartening to see our politicians being loud Palestine advocates yet being curiously silent about the atrocities towards Rohingya and Uyghurs.
However it seems that some reps from PAS and Amanah, cut from the same cloth but in different coalitions, have now started calling for support for... the Taliban.
This is the same Taliban that just this week banned TV shows featuring women (RIP women newscasters) and restricted schooling for girls, just the way they did before they were ousted.
Why are our politicians so interested in trying to rehabilitate the image of the Taliban — is defending the indefensible the new conservative religious hobby in Malaysia?
It is well-documented how badly the Taliban treat women and I find it appalling to find Malaysian men so eager to jump to their defence.
Perhaps I should send a copy of Malala Yousafzai’s book I am Malala over to PAS and Amanah HQ, though for PAS I would probably need to hunt down the Indonesian translation in case I get an angry note to only send Bahasa books.
The bigger question is why are politicians so obsessed with helping the Taliban instead of our own people?
It’s disturbing that these male politicians are so concerned for the welfare of a foreign administration with a track record of atrocities and war crimes, instead of standing up for their constituents.
The Taliban do not need Malaysian aid. Who does then? The many people who have suffered and continued to suffer during the pandemic.
Now, more than ever, Malaysians need politicians to do their jobs.
Money going to ever more ridiculous posts including special envoys we don’t need keeps ballooning and yet we cancel free breakfasts for children, citing waste as one reason.
You know what’s a real waste? The entire prime minister’s department. We don’t need it. We have so many ministries and deputies as well as staffers for each one, that having special appointees is just more unjustifiable expenditure.
Instead of feeding our kids, we seem to be more keen on fattening the pockets of politicians and that is the true tragedy, not the justifiable global shunning of the Taliban.
In the meantime let’s hope the children of the Taliban-supporting Malaysian reps do their patriotic duty and delete WhatsApp on their fathers’ phones so they will stop reading terrible messages detailing “how the Taliban are misunderstood.”
* This is the personal opinion of the columnist.
