TRIBUTE ABDUL - Perdana Library

A TRIBUTE
(S. Rajaratnam)
In an age of revolutionary violence and leaders whose
bellies rumble with ideological wrath Tunku Abdul Rahman,
Prime Minister of Malaya is the "odd man out". He offers
no coherent and complex ideology for his followers to annotate
and elaborate into a grand political philosophy. If the Tunku
has a political philosophy at all, it is the earthy common
sense, one of the man-in-the-street. It is the political philosophy
of a man with a philosophic attitude to life. It is based on
an understanding of the frailties of human nature for which he,
unlike the moral zealot, makes allowances. It is this tolerance,
this refusal to treat all men as wholly saints or wholly villains
which has made the Tunku a leader loved by his followers
and respected by even those who disagree with him.
It is this innate sense of tolerance of other peoples beliefs
and weakenesses which makes the Tunku the right leader at
the right time. In a multi-racial and multi-cultural society
such as ours a leader who sees the world in sharp contrasts of
black and white, good and evil, right and wrong could have
been a major disaster. It is because of his ability to interpose
a large shading of grey between the extremes of white and black,
good and bad and right and wrong, that the Tunku has been
able to make Malaya, which whatever its defects and shortcomings,
is one of the most stable, prosperous and peaceful
countries in the whole region.
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