On Nazri Aziz S Pluralism And The Law Student Who Goaded Him

---

 
From Terence Netto
Almost alone among Umno politicians, Nazri Aziz is a professed pluralist when it comes to the issue of the peoples of Malaysia.
He rejects the notion that Malaysia is a nation only for the Malays and for Muslims. Nazri disdains the monism that lies behind this conception of Malaysia’s composition and identity.
Just the other day, in remarks that were startlingly refreshing for a politician of his ilk, Nazri insisted that Malaysia is a multiracial and multireligious country.
He said the peoples of Sarawak and Sabah exemplify the pluralism that he insisted is an essential characteristic of the country.
More intrepidly, Nazri advised peninsular Malays to emulate this attitude and not pretend to be Malaysian when fishing for votes when it’s general election time.
Not many Umno politicians would be caught espousing such views, the public discourse having been riven in recent decades by the sectarianism of race and religion.
Of course, those who have been acquainted with Nazri’s career, culminating in a two-year contract as ambassador to the US, would readily recall his famous clashes with Dr Mahathir Mohamad, Perkasa firebrand Ibrahim Ali, and more recently, with Umno Youth’s Dr Akmal Saleh, over issues involving race and religion.
In widely reported verbal jousts with them, Nazri was remarkable in staking out positions that showed him as plural in his conception of the country’s composition and inclusive in his vision of its future.
Malaysians of pluralistic instincts were buoyed by Nazri’s stance but what jubilation they felt could not offset the gloom of an otherwise pervasive racism and religious bigotry.
What explains Nazri’s exceptional pluralism of outlook? Perhaps an episode from his student days in London where he read law from 1974 to ’77 may suggest the genesis of his multiracialism.
Sam Markand Ganapathy.Nazri was fortunate to have made the acquaintance of a mature student in Sam Markand Ganapathy, a Malaysian who quit his job as a senior assistant at a school in Kulim to read law at the Inns of Court in London.
Nazri fell in with Sam, the two attending lectures and dining together as often as they could.
In a chat with this reporter, Sam recalled the day when he went to Nazri’s room, knocked and found that the 20-year-old was reluctant to get ready to sit for an examination on the law of contract later that morning.
Sam chastised Nazri, telling him he was wasting his father’s money by not taking his studies seriously. After berating Nazri a further bit, Sam stalked off to the examination hall, only to see Nazri saunter in 20 minutes after the start.
It turned out Nazri passed the exam but Sam failed and had to repeat the paper the following year.
“I had known he was a smart student and I used the episode to encourage him to persist in his studies,” recalled Sam, who, like Nazri, passed out of law school in 1977 and returned home to start work – he as pupil under Karpal Singh in Penang and Nazri as a budding politician in Umno Youth.
Ever grateful to Sam, Nazri brought Sam to his parents’ home in Kuala Lumpur where his father, Aziz Yeop, a former Malaysian High Commissioner to the UK, was joined by his wife in hosting Sam to a meal whose subtext was gratitude.
Nazri’s pluralism in the politics of his maturer years may have had its origins in how he was saved from lassitude as a law student a half century ago.
Teluk Intan-born Sam, a sprightly 87, is not infrequently on the phone to Nazri. The long-time friends exchange visits.
In his ninth decade Sam continues to serve on the Appeal Board in Penang, which listens and decides on public demurrals over development projects. -FMT
Terence Netto is a senior journalist and an FMT reader.
The views expressed are those of the writer and do not necessarily reflect those of FMT

---