The Malaysian Insight

BARISAN Nasional (BN) suffered its first electoral defeat after 61 years of power because its leaders had become complacent over time, said author Dr Vaseehar Hassan.

“It’s called the boiled frog syndrome: when you put a frog into a boiling pot of water, immediately it will jump out. “But if I put (it) in cold water (and) slowly heat up the water, the frog won’t notice.

“This is what happened with BN. They did not see the heat growing underneath and they were boiled to death,” said Vaseehar in a public forum on Malaysia’s changed political landscape at Sunway University, today.

BN leaders became out of touch with the people and the realitiy of their hardships and discontent at the corruption scandals that erupted during the time of prime minister Abdullah Ahmad Badawi, said the author of The Malay Leadership Mystique.

Although the first three prime ministers of Malaysia were of the ruling elite class, they would go out on the ground to listen to the commoners and understand their struggles and sentiments, said Vaseehar.

As a commoner, Dr Mahathir Mohamad, a well-known Malay nationalist, could empathise with the low- and middle-income earners.

“(But in the years) after him (Dr Mahathir), even cabinet members (with ordinary backgrounds) behaved like pseudo elitists,” said Vaseehar. – July 9, 2018.