[Rencana ini bukannya 100% pro-reformasi tetapi ia perlu dibaca kerana ada beberapa fakta penting di dalamnya yang agak berguna. Lebih 50% daripada pengundi di negara adalah kaum hawa dan 26% berada dalam lingkungan umur 21-35 (golongan muda).

Umno sudah 'out of touch' dengan rakyat - khususnya golongan muda dari kalangan kaum hawa yang tidak begitu berminat kepada politik atau isu semasa. Dengan memimpin Puteri Umno sedikit lain daripada Wanita Umno, Azalina diharapkan dapat mendampingi dan memujuk kaum itu untuk menyokong Umno. Wanita Umno lebih bersikap sehala dalam pendekatannya dan terlalu berbau politik yang tentunya kurang disukai. Puteri Umno mempelopori bidang kemasyarakatan ala-NGO yang mungkin mengancam jika dibiarkan sahaja.

Besar kemungkinan Puteri dilancarkan untuk mencuri kaum hawa yang mungkin cenderung untuk memasukki parti keADILan..... kerana mereka yang condong kepada PAS tentu sukar untuk menerima Azalina sebagai pemimpin teladan.
- Editor]

http://www.asiaweek.com/asiaweek/ magazine/nations/0,8782,165852,00.html

Asiaweek
Issue 6th July 2001

Defense Force

One of Mahathir Mohamad's hopes for rebuilding his party is an uncompromising feminist with a love of martial arts. But can Azalina kick hard enough?

By ARJUNA RANAWANA

Azalina Othman Said strides across the room and extends a strong hand backed by a warm smile. Behind her, in a Kuala Lumpur community center gym, young women work out with weights. Others practice taekwondo moves. Azalina, a lawyer, leads the way briskly to her small office - the temporary headquarters of Puteri, the newest wing of Malaysia's ruling party. At 37, she has been called the new face of the United Malays National Organization, hand-picked by Prime Minister Mahathir Mohamad to lead Puteri and to attract young women into the fold. Her sudden elevation has drawn sniping from other UMNO women, dismissive snorts from the opposition and an open questioning of her sexuality in the press. She has denied she is gay. "I know I am risking a lot," says Azalina. She's not the only one.

When Mahathir declared war on money politics on the eve of the June 21-23 UMNO general assembly, most delegates were impressed. Leaders "have gone out of the denial mode," said Zulkifli Alwi, deputy chief of UMNO Youth. UMNO could now sit down soberly over the remaining assembly days, take stock of its waning popularity and devise a strategy for winning the 2004 general election. But having ambushed any complaints about his leadership, Mahathir then returned to a more familiar theme when he addressed delegates. Malays were ungrateful, corrupt, lazy and disunited, the prime minister said. Not only that, he was thinking of sticking around for a while rather than retiring after the next poll.

The resulting party gloom was discreet, but palpable. Those awaiting their turn in power - particularly Deputy Prime Minister Abdullah Badawi - saw their "apprenticeships" extended indefinitely. Worse, the perception of Mahathir as out of touch with the Malay body politic was merely enhanced. "We are wasting too much time demanding gratitude from our younger generation," says Zulkifli. "The Malays have gone through a paradigm shift. They want an accounting, and faulting them is not going down too well." Indeed, the assembly heard very little about how Mahathir plans to staunch a rising tide of rural and youth dissatisfaction, or how to turn around a shaky economy that is forecast to deteriorate further this year. "The more UMNO harps on history, the more it might be history," observes P. Ramasamy, a political science professor at the National University of Malaysia.

Azalina, then, represents one of the few UMNO moves that might conceivably translate into votes. Perhaps Mahathir heard an echo of himself in this unconventional, outspoken Malay woman. In any case, her appointment was canny politics. More than half of Malaysia's voters are women and, by 2004, 26% of the population will be aged 21-35. Many professional women dread the rise of leading opposition group Parti Islam SeMalaysia (Pas), whose ideologues look askance at women in public life. "Frankly we are terrified of Pas," says Masnita Abdullah, a company executive in Kuala Lumpur. Says Azalina: "My biggest task is to make young people - young women - see UMNO as a party that is still relevant."

It's a tough job. The daughter of civil servants, Azalina plunged into Malaysia's fledgling feminist movement soon after gaining her Master's in law from the London School of Economics. She joined UMNO 10 years ago, but has been bold enough to criticize the system - especially over women's rights. Since forming a non-government group called the Women's Sports and Fitness Foundation in 1995, the black belt taekwondo master also has won considerable respect as a civil and Islamic litigator. "I wanted to do something to empower women, not just talk about it," says Azalina. Remarks Ivy Josiah from the activist group Women's Aid Organization: "Azalina has made the transition from being just another lawyer to someone who wants to actually make reforms in the law."

Detractors say Azalina is mere UMNO window dressing. She has no power base in the party, and even the senior women's group, Wanita, has been hostile toward her. Pas calls Azalina a "desperate measure" that won't work. The women's leader of opposition party Keadilan, Fuziah Salleh, claims Azalina's hard-line feminist stance makes her a poor role model for Muslim women. Critics in UMNO think that while she might appeal to urban youth, she will have trouble reaching rural people in the villages. Dina Zaman, a columnist for Internet newspaper Malaysiakini, says her peers admire Azalina but are wary of her politics. "We're waiting on the sidelines and thinking before we jump in," she adds.

Mahathir continues to encourage Azalina - just as he supports his daughter Marina, a high-profile AIDS activist. Puteri-UMNO will be officially inaugurated next month, and Azalina already has been appointed to the UMNO Supreme Council. "Don't judge me by what I wear and how I look," she says. "Judge me by my work." Upon that verdict, some say, hinges much of UMNO's future.