Author: Hafiz Noor Shams

Let’s be frank. Indonesian Sumatra is a pain in the ass. Anything that happens in Sumatra affects Malaysia. Any Indonesian action, or rather lack of, which concerns Sumatra, produces externality on Malaysia. Two clear examples are illegal land clearing via open burning and piracy in the Malacca Straits.

Granted, Indonesia, Malaysia and Singapore are responsible for the security in Malacca Straits. Yet, with vast undeveloped and swampy area in eastern Sumatra, Indonesia will need to do a lot more than what Malaysia and Singapore have been doing all along. Unfortunately for us all, Indonesia doesn’t have that kind of resources to start with. Subsequently, Indonesia’s inability to act within its own domain is producing negative externalities on its neighbors.

Malaysia, along with Brunei and Singapore are probably the most stable nations in Southeast Asia. Indonesia’s relative inability to act however is a threat to the three stable states. One way to stabilize the region is to internalize all Indonesian Sumatra’s problems, including their environmental and security mess.

Yes, in other words, one mean to solve all these problems is by making it exclusively our problems. Malaysia will need to encourage and convince all Sumatran states, perhaps including Aceh, into joining the Malaysian Federation. Once that happens, Malaysia will be able to make sure haze and even piracy along the busiest waterway in the world are things of the past. Apart from internalizing the environmental and piracy threat, imagine the wealth that will be made available to the Federation. More crude oil for us all, timbers, fishes, all the minerals. It will be as if Malaysia has just stumbled upon El Dorado.

Of course, the main issue remains the 250,000-strong Tentera Nasional Indonesia along with its pool of almost 60 million people according to CIA’s The World Factbook. In event of war, Malaysia’s only hope is for Indonesian fragile economy to collapse along with its cranking warships. If war ever broke up, an appropriate comparison would be the Iran-Iraq War where Iran had vast military reserve but with aging equipment while Iraq’s small but well-equipped force. The war was a stalemate but hey, Indonesia declared war on Malaysia back in the 1960s but we along with our allies kicked Jakarta and the commies’ ass. So, we might actually have a chance against Indonesia.

And hey! We know how hawkish Indonesia could be. Let’s see if they have the muscle to match their “ganyang Malaysia” spirit. After all, it was our frigate that rammed into an Indonesia’s warship in the name of Malaysian sovereignty over a piece of land under the Sunda Sea and Indonesia couldn’t do anything but accussed Malaysia of bullying them. And I doubt Indonesia has even repaired that warship.

But then, let’s give Indonesia’s retaliation a blind eye, assume that Indonesia’s economy will collapse, there will be no backlash from the international community and we all have nine lives. With so many assumptions, you’ve probably realized that I’m an economics graduate. Regardless, assuming Brunei accepts a re-invitation to join Malaysia as the new 14th state:

The new Malaysian Federation will look something like:

And we’ll probably need a new flag too. Our current flag would have too few lines. Unless, Sumatra is decreed as the fourth Federal Territory! Yeah, that’s more like it. We would be able to keep our pseudo-American flag! w00t!

O say does that Jalung Gemilang yet wave…
O’er land of meritokrasi, and the home of boleh.

Heh. Selangor should be particularly happy – the federal government would have little reason to appeal to Selangor for more land.

Or, instead of invading them, maybe Indonesia should just sign the ASEAN Agreement on Transboundary Haze Pollution.

Next entry on Malaysian federalism: Pattani.

p/s – I’ve just read Utusan Malaysia and someone finally mentioned about the haze agreement. But, heh, there are seven countries that have ratified the treaty, not six. Somebody needs to check his fact…