I don’t know what to say,
really. Less than 24 hours to our biggest match of the season. All comes down
to to night. The Red Warriors' football jersey looks set to stay on the back of
the majority of Kelantanese youth for the weeks ahead as a testament of their
pride. It has been a daily uniform of choice for some since TRW, the state
team's popular acronym, began enjoying good fortunes for some years now.
A solitary goal was all it
needed to bring cheer to Kelantan. For the 90 minutes of play, they also
dropped all pretensions and class distinctions to collectively scream their
lungs out for their favourite team.
The local football team turn
to be the giant in Malaysia football is a great success story. The team was
struggling to compete in the league, and was even relegated back in 2004. Yet,
the supporters remained faithful.
Fast forward a few years
later, as a product of the combination of visionary ideas and strong support
base, the Kelantan football team has emerged as the new powerhouse of the
Malaysian football scene.
From the Kelantan
experience, it highlights the power of sports as unifying factors. We cannot
dispute that there is great polarisation among Malaysians because of the
differences in our political convictions. It is thus on this basis that the
government has called for national reconciliation.
There will be no single way
to foster national unity and rise above our political differences, for
multiracial reconciliation is a complex process. Indeed, sports have proven to
be instrumental in fostering unity in our country. We put our support as a nation
behind Lee Chong Wei and we were all disappointed when he failed in his bid for
our first gold medal in the Olympics.
Sports can be the potential
medium to bring Malaysians together, but to rely on it as a solution would be
too simplistic. The fundamental element in national unity lies in our ability
to speak and interact with each other.
This is precisely what we
can learn from the case of Kelantan. As a local boy myself, I have observed how
Chinese restaurants and coffee shops are filled with Malay Muslims in serban
and jubah after the prayers.
The Malays and Chinese will
sit at the same table discussing current issues in the local dialect, casting
race and religion aside. In fact, other races including Indians and Thais can
also relate to each other comfortably through this common language. Despite
being a predominantly Malay-Muslim state, there is no racial strife and the
people live in harmony.
Kelantanese are always
associated with the term ‘asabiyyah’. It means a really strong sense of origin
and belonging to people of the same background. The reason is because
Kelantanese has always had a strong bond with each other. A Kelantanese would
never let another Kelantanese down’, the famous Kelantanese motto. Even in
another state you can always tell those who are Kelantanese and those who
aren’t. Kelantanese always stick together. Kelantanese are also people who are
not afraid to reveal their identity. When you’re hanging out with a bunch of
Kelantanese you’ll feel like you’re in Kelantan itself. They never abandon
their slang and mindset.
National reconciliation
calls for us to understand and tolerate our differences, but none of that can
be achieved without a common language that will remove the stumbling block of
our interaction within society.
Thus, in search for national
reconciliation, it is high time for Kelantan to be viewed positively in terms
of how we manage our racial and religious differences. I am sure that some
lessons can be drawn from the Kelantan experience as we move forward for greater
national unity.
Note:- Invictus :- A film about how Nelson Mandela, in his first term as the
South African President, initiated a unique venture to unite the
apartheid-torn land: enlist the national rugby team on a mission to win
the 1995 Rugby World to unite South African nation.
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