jelas.info

pre-script: Happy Mother’s Day Mom! And here’s a belated gift for all the other mothers out there :)

Update, 5.20pm:

If mass mobilisation is indeed key, as I believe it is, a perfect vehicle would be BERSIH – an organisation dedicated to ensuring that the people’s voice in choosing their own government democratically is heard loud and clear.

I think this is also time to tap into figures such as Ku Li and Zaid Ibrahim, whose objection to the Perak power grab and support for fresh elections has been noted before.

Maybe it’s even time for Mahathir to put his money where his mouth is (instead of using these issues and his position on them to bargain for influence in the Najib administration).

ps- According to MK, YAB Nizar on the way to Kuala Kangsar to see Sultan, YB Zambry on way to Kuala Lumpur for Umno anniversary – what does that tell you :P

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Update, 5pm:

Alright, now that I’ve had some time to breathe, let me rephrase in a hopefully clearer manner.

BN has some important decisions ahead of them. Basically, to fight, or to cooperate.

BN Perak (Umno especially) will obviously be fighting tooth and nail to stay on. But on the other hand, Najib is probably now thinking, what are the costs?

Yes, BN can move a vote of no confidence against Nizar, now that they have employed thugs to physically eject Sivakumar and install the pretender Ganesan. They can even win the vote of no confidence, now that they have liars and turncoats on their side.

But can they win the hearts and minds of the rakyat?

Will Najib gamble so much – risk the country (certainly every urban center on the peninsular, if not the entire peninsular itself), for the sake of one state?

Risk making a complete mockery of all his own goody two shoes PR?

Our job now, is to remind Najib of the costs of trying to maintain a stranglehold on Perak. To remind him of how much people will despise any attempt now by BN to prolong this rape of democracy.

We must tell Najib, if you want Perak, fight for it. Do it with honour, and you may yet be spared the ridicule and hate of not only Perak, but the rest of the country.

Insist on backstabbing your way to power, and you will at most hold Perak for a few years, and surely lose everything thereafter.

I think mass gatherings and actions are needed now.

I’m definitely not one to protest for the sake of protesting, but our feelings MUST be made known to Najib, and to the Perak royalty. Don’t stand in the way of democracy – history is full of the fates that met those who have.

ps- Sivakumar should also immediately instate court proceedings to challenge his removal.

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Original post:

Oh sweet victory :)

Well, there’s still a long way to go, no doubt. The legal appeal process, etc etc.

Perhaps they will attempt to move a motion of no confidence moved against YAB Nizar in the house.

But perhaps YAB Nizar can now go back to the Sultan and request a dissolution – by God, there are enough compelling ethical and political reasons to do so.

There are all sorts of tricks BN can play. But if Najib is not just spouting empty farts with his ‘olive branch‘ and if he really is serious about putting up a real fight in GE13, he should acede to this judgment, and pave the way for fresh elections in Perak.

Hopefully, Najib and gang will realise what a devastating blow to BN it will be if he truly attempts to hang on to illegitimate power at all costs in Perak.

Zambry and his entire team is welcome to contest fresh elections, and meet honourably in the battleground of Perak. If the elections are free and fair, and Zambry wins convincingly, jelas.info will advise YAB Nizar to akur and leave the matter be.

There are infinite elements to the Perak crisis and just as many opposing views.

To my mind, through it all, there is only one inviolable truth – that a government must be elected legitimately by the people.

Aside from the legal quandries, the politicking that has turned many off, and the overall crisis this situation has wrought, that one thing remains constant: a fresh election is the single best resolution to every single problem faced in Perak.

No matter what one’s political persuasion, legal view, or moral interpretation, there doesn’t seem to be a single plausible argument against the manner in which fresh elections will lead to a solution acceptable by all.

I think based on this premise, mass gatherings and other civil actions should be organised to maintain pressure on BN to join the call for fresh, free and fair elections.

We talk a lot about 1Malaysia, putting our differences aside for the good of the rakyat, fixing the economy together, etc. Well, it’s time to put our money where our mouth is; an election could solve the problem in Perak once and for all, and have us moving forward within a month.

FRESH ELECTIONS NOW!!

What a horrible 48 hours it has been for Malaysia.

Today, I’d like to write mostly about experiences with the police.

I know how Chin Huat must have felt, when almost ten policemen descended on one him on Tuesday, starting this whole mess.

That night, those same policemen who once held me rudely denied even the President of the Bar Council from something as simple as allowing him access to see a detainee.

The next day, a group of young men trying to commemorate the birthday of the slain Altantuya, in parallel with her father’s wishes that Najib not let this incident merely fade away.

They and the cake they were carrying were deemed threats to national security and hauled away by the Putrajaya police.

This of course was followed by another violent police arrest – Mat Sabu in a scuffle outside a restaurant.

Then that night, the police took in 14 people at Brickfields, who had gathered in solidarity with Chin Huat.

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After this point, my experiences with the cops got even more personal.

“Democracy by barbed wire,” was one of my first thoughts on arriving at the Perak State Assembly. This is what we had come to, the People’s House had to resort to barbed wire to keep those same People out.

We were allowed the tiniest bit of leeway for a little while, before the police decided to show ‘strength’ and come down hard on us.

This was the first of many times that single Thursday I felt as if I was being set upon by mad dogs.

I can’t stress this enough, I think it’s an extremely apt description of my experience.

I know there are good cops, and there are bad cops. The ones burnt into my memory are the bad ones. The ones I swear you couldn’t differentiate from a common thug (or Umno Youth sponsored ruffian perhaps?)

Every time the paranoid and idiotic guy in charge ordered an advance on us peaceful, defenceless citizens, a few of these guys would get this glint in their eyes.

Thinking about it reminds me of the soldiers that committed the very worst atrocities imaginable across Africa in the cases I used to study.

These cops looked to me…. well, eager to beat the shit out of us.

In Perak, instead of regular FRU, they had a large contingent of the police Field Force. If I recall, these guys were established to fight the communists in the jungle, machine guns and all.

That’s who we had become to the cops and authorities – communists in the jungle.

They growled and rushed into us with all their implements of violence, we fell back. We waited. The growled and rushed into us, we fell back.

I think my first full on experience of this was at Hindraf. I’ll never forget the feelings I had, being bullied by rabid cops over the course of a whole morning.

It was the same bloodthirstiness I felt directed at me on Thursday.

As if facing that was not enough in the morning, we had to see it again that very night at Brickfields (for a more detailed accounting of the evening, see Hafiz).

The biggest similarity is the feeling I got that I was facing mad dog paranoia.

I say paranoia too because what difference does it make where we stood on Thursday morning? (except to BN politicians who may not want pictures of crowds)

In Brickfields, had they released Chin Huat as they should have after his statement was taken, there would have been no vigil. If they had let the simple low key vigil continue, there would have been no fracas. Instead, the cops at every stage escalated the conflict, step after step, until 20 were arrested, and 200 lawyers protested this morning in Jalan Duta.

Ego crazy, paranoid, cari pasal, are the only words that come to mind.

The way the cops in charge barked at us both in the morning and at the night, you felt as if they had encountered not peace-loving citizens, but the most scariest alien species imaginable (perhaps to them they are one and the same), and failing to understand them, fell in fear to the last resort of inferior intellect: brute force.

Imagine a teacher who is surrounded by little kids who he feels suddenly wants to him harm (regardless of what the actual intentions of the kids are), and in a state of uncontrollable panic, all that teacher can resort to is yelling at the top of his voice, saliva practically flying left right and center as he tries desperately to scare the little kids with his cane or whatever.

First thing Thursday morning, and last thing Thursday night, we were that little kid. The only difference is they were waving batons, handcuffs and machine guns, not just a cane.

So we fell back. And fell back again.

One day though, one day…………………

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Quite frankly, I don’t know what the cops or the authorities are up to. I will continue to reflect and try and gain some understanding of what is behind all of this.

I greatly welcome the release of the 13 ISA detainees, and will do my best to be part of the crowd that will welcome them.

But clearly, the government must think us morons if they think we fail to see the disconnect between what its left and right hands are doing.

13 releases, but almost 100 detained in just 2 days. Not just in Perak or KL either. The dragnet extended to Penang, Putrajaya and faraway Kuching.

Friends remarked last night as well on the possibility of targeted profiling in the manner of arrests.

Something fishy may be afoot, and it falls upon us to be vigilant.

Soon, I hope to expand on thoughts and fears regarding civic participation, effective mobilisation strategies, and how in general we are going to win this war over the long run. Your thoughts are always welcome.

In the meantime, please at least show up tonight!

Facing brutal cops in the morning,
Facing brutal cops at night.

God, I’m tired. But probably not as tired as those rotting in jail, even as I write.

Up and down the country, peace-loving citizens for a better Malaysia now suffer under the heavy hand of police detention.

Penang: Ng Eng Kiat, a very old friend of mine, and an excellent young man, has been arrested. See Anil and Susan.

Ipoh: Some 15 still rot.

Kuching: did not escape! Dominique Ng and 9 others were arrested for trying to light candles.

KL: I just got back from Brickfields, where once again, I had to suffer the unbearable lack of common sense on the part of the police. At time of writing, some 20 are still being detained. 14 for caring about Chin Huat, 6 for caring about the 14.

Some friends tonight noted a distrubing profiling trend in these arrests.

I’m not lucid enough after a day like this one to write much more tonight, more tomorrow hopefully.

Suffice to say that the torrents I have been feeling from having been face to face with such blind, stupid hatred on the part of the cops have ensured that this has indeed been the blackest, blackest day Malaysia has seen in a long time.

I took strength from the presence of my comrades, but I wish I had seen more of you there.

It’s an exhausting battle, but if those fools think they can outlast us, they’ve got another thing coming.

MK:

2.41pm: Several uniformed police personnel grab hold of Sivakumar and forcibly remove him from the speaker’s chair.

He was then dragged out of the House by a group of plainclothes personnel wearing tags which read ‘official’. Sivakumar resists and shouts, “I am the legal speaker. Why am I being treated like this?” It cannot be ascertained if these were police personnel.

Pakatan reps try to shield him but more plainclothes personnel enter the House and manage to breakthrough the human barricade.

If you’ll kindly pardon my French, who the fuck were these guys?

“Official” ?!??!

Basically, for all we know, power in the Perak state assembly could now be enforced by Umno Youth thugs.

As if it wasn’t bad enough that we had police in the hall.

Do you have any idea what stage a country has to be in for armed personnel to have to enter a state legislature?

Aiya BN, don’t bother with the charade anymorela, why don’t you just go ahead and install some army generals as heads of state – you’ve pretty much done just that, or worse!!

ps- Since I have already breached the word, can I lepas a bit more geram ask what the fuck this idiot Wong Chun Wai is thinking when he says: “No anti-hopping laws, therefore no need elections.” Oh, the ass-kissing moron has outdone himself this time. And this after all Chin Huat has done for the Wong name :P

It’s been a long and hard morning in Ipoh.

If there’s one thing I hate, it’s yelling and screaming cops trying to imitate a stampeding horde.

Once again, the rakyat are at the receiving end of completely unnecesssary police brutality. Many friends were taken in by the cops today, their fate as of yet unknown.

Over the course of the morning, I had a lot of time to wait and think. Hopefully, I’ll later have more time and space to recount experiences and expand on thoughts.

Imagine, a hall of people’s representatives needed to be cordoned from those same people by barbed wire. What a day.

I feel less like I’m in Ipoh, and more like I’m in some sort of twilight zone where good sense is suspended and only horror prevails.

They haven’t beaten us down though. The rakyat will rise one day, I have no doubt.

Time to review the news. More to come.