It is fortunate for Australia that our business and education ties with Malaysia are very strong. It means that as soon as the present Malaysian Prime Minister Mahathir Mohamad leaves office, political and diplomatic ties with Malaysia can return to the close, warm and strong ties that they should be. Dr Mahathir asserted this week that Australia had turned tis back on Asia and had adopted a bullying attitude to regional Asian partners. He accused Australia of taking advantage of countries like Indonesia that had been hard hit by economic and political crises. He said that the best way Australia could be a friend to Asia was for Australia to mind its own business.
It was an inconsistent, incoherent and ill-informed attack on Australian foreign policy. And heaven alone knows there is much about Australian foreign policy that can be attacked. Dr Mahathir was playing the race card and making a tough-guy stand for domestic political purposes. He seems now to have quelled his opposition – largely through abuse of power and subversion of the judicial system – and he seems to have settled his succession question in a way that will not destabilise his twilight of power. So now he obviously feels he can let of some steam so he can look to be in charge. And what easier target is there for him that Australia? He upsets no-one in his own country. No other country in the region will publicly come to Australia’s help, so it is essentially a free kick.
In the short-term it is quite damaging because he black-balled Australia from the EC-South-East Asian forum and proposes to do the same thing with the South-East Asia and East Asian forum. At present these groups are not enormously influential, but they have the potential to be significant politically and with respect to trade. It is telling that every other nation associated with these groups is happy to go along with Dr Mahathir’s stand.
Dr Mahathir was obviously upset that Australia rebuked Malaysia over the trumped up charges and trial against Dr Marathi’s former deputy, Anwar Ibrahim, who looked like challenging Dr Mahathir for the top job before a time of Dr Mahathir’s choosing. The rebuke was phrased very mildly at the time, but Dr Mahathir obviously wanted silence. Dr Mahathir probably also feels that Australia is silent about much grosser human rights abuses in Vietnam and China, but puts its trade relations first in those cases. He has a point there.
Dr Mahathir also appeared to put aside his earlier disagreement with former Prime Minister Paul Keating which arose after Mr Keating referred to Dr Mahathir as “”recalcitrant”. Dr Mahathir said that Australia, having formulated a [pro-Indonesian] policy under Keating should not change it and impose Australian will on Indonesia just because Indonesia had been weakened by the Asian crisis. This statement highlights the weakness in Dr Mahathir’s thinking. It was the overwhelming demand by the people for democratic reforms which caused changes in Indonesia’s thinking on Timor which in turn caused Australia’s change in thinking. True, Australia should have pushed for a slower process of democratisation in Timor given the inevitability of bloodshed. Dr Mahathir obviously would prefer to close his eyes to the power of calls for democracy in the region. He does not like the idea.
As for suggesting that Australia is being a bully, it is a bit rich coming from the bully who has engineered trumped up charges and the jailing of his main political opponent.
The personal animosity Dr Mahathir holds against Australia will not be overcome. This highlights the needs for Australians to keep up business and educational ties with Malaysia, and where possible political ties, and to maintain and strengthen ties with other countries in the region so that any damage can be quickly repaired when Dr Mahathir leaves office.