IN light of Datuk Dr Muhamad Akmal Saleh’s daring call for UMNO to leave the federal government and work with PAS and Perikatan Nasional (PN), I think it’s time to dissect the underlying perception held by UMNO towards the Chinese community (both Peninsular Malaysia and Borneo Chinese)
In general, UMNO holds deeply negative and prejudiced views toward the Malaysian Chinese community, often viewing them as a threat to the Ketuanan Melayu (Malay supremacy) and national unity.
These prejudices can be summarised into four main points:
Rejection of national unity: UMNO sees the Chinese community’s strong support for separate Chinese-medium schools – including the Unified Examination Certificate (UEC)) – as evidence that they reject a unified Malaysian identity.
They argue that a common education system using Bahasa Melayu is essential for fostering patriotism and unity while viewing multi-culturalism/pluralism as unworkable in Malaysia as it is directly the opposite of Ketuanan Melayu.
Selfishness and ingratitude in business: UMNO sees the Chinese as greedy, unethical and unwilling to share commercial knowledge or partner with Malays without government intervention (eg the National Economic Policy [NEP] and quota system).
UMNO believes that Chinese businesses are exploiting the Malays and label the community as “ungrateful” for citizenship granted at independence, claiming no other country would have allowed so many Chinese – many who cannot speak Bahasa Melayu – to be granted citizenship.
Refusal to assimilate: UMNO believes it is reasonable to expect Chinese Malaysians to assimilate fully, ideally by converting to Islam and adopting Malay culture.
They contrast this with assimilated Chinese communities in Indonesia, Thailand and the Philippines. UMNO sees convert independent preachers Prof Dr Ridhuan Tee Abdullah and Firdaus Wong Wai Hung as the “ideal-type” Chinese.
That is why UMNO supports Malay marrying the Chinese although they will not say so in public. Marrying means assimilation since the Chinese have to convert and their children are registered as Malay.
Constant challenges to the social contract: UMNO accuses the Chinese of undermining the social contract where non-Malays accepted Malay special rights, Islam’s status as the official religion and Bumiputera privileges in exchange for citizenship.
Questioning these is seen as breaching this “contract” and provoking the Malays. Many in UMNO think May 13 occurred partly because of the Chinese challenging the social contract.
UMNO is unbothered that historians cannot find the social contract used by Malay politicians prior to the 1970s. UMNO believes that social contract was written in stone even before 1955.
The views of UMNO towards the Chinese are also influenced heavily by twice former premier Tun Dr Mahathir Mohamad’s The Malay Dilemma which warned that meritocracy would leave Malays behind due to perceived Chinese superiority in work ethic and entrepreneurship, hence risking “Sinicisation” of the economy without protective policies.
Thus, those who support UMDAP in DAP are fooling themselves that UMNO will learn to accept DAP and the Chinese community.
As long as UMNO is driven by the above four factors, I can assure you that UMNO will be reluctant to accept Malaysian Chinese as full citizens and will never treat DAP as an equal. – Jan 6, 2026
An inaugural director of the Asia Institute at the University of Tasmania, renowned political commentator Prof James Chin is also the senior associate at the Tun Tan Cheng Lock Centre for Social and Policy Studies of Universiti Tunku Abdul Rahman (UTAR). His above view was a re-hash from his latest Facebook post.
The views expressed are solely of the author and do not necessarily reflect those of Focus Malaysia.
