With Bersih seemingly given the green light on holding its rally (albeit in a stadium), the common citizen would perhaps wonder whether a solution has finally been found, that we can put all this behind us and go back to our normal lives.
Maybe? Maybe not? I don’t know myself but one thing is for sure; the Bersih 2.0 rally, or rather its build up, has caught the attention of virtually every Malaysian, and for better or worse, has forced every one of us to consider and ask more questions about the state of the electoral system in our country. Among other things, it has also revealed some insights into how we feel about public rallies/demonstrations, but more importantly, it has further revealed the level of fear that the current ruling party has of losing its grip on power and the lengths which it will go to in order to keep that power.
In my opinion, that was the objective of Bersih all along (even from 2007 during the first rally), to shift the focus away from all the distractions by the government and back on to the real issue, i.e. the government itself, specifically its flaws, its very large flaws; flaws that it continually and shamelessly tries to cover up. For Bersih, it was really just a matter of opening the can of worms, as one might say, and everything else falls in readily. The fact that none within BN but only PR jumped on the Bersih bandwagon is not a mere coincidence, but a smart move, as evident in the 2008 GE results.
It wasn’t really about the rally itself; in fact I would go so far as to say that the upcoming rally is now quite irrelevant, sort of like the after-party to the Oscar’s, or the Community Shield, or the Emirates Cup trophy. It’s still necessary to hold the rally, but Bersih basically just have to show up now.
So far, more than 200 people have reportedly been arrested in connection with the Bersih 2.0 rally1. A non-violent rally that calls for free and fair elections, the very foundation of a democracy. To those who are still wondering about whether these arrests are justified or not, let me remind you of one thing:
i.) Malaysia is a democratic country.
These arrests amount to are examples of political imprisonment and to a democracy like ours, that is simply unacceptable whichever way you spin it, whether it be the absurd idea of a communist insurrection or not. It borders on lunacy when you consider the fact that anyone wearing yellow colored or Bersih-related clothing items were arrested (or were at least threatened to be).
Seriously though, it’s no laughing matter, and to give the term ‘political imprisonment’ the weight it deserves and to help you grasp its significance, this is exactly the same type of oppression that Nelson Mandela and Aung San Suu Kyi went through, and in the case of the latter, still goes through.
Thankfully, I’m only speaking to the minority here, I hope.
The arrests, together with the initial ban on the rally, UMNO Youth and Perkasa’s (ridiculous) counter-rallies, the smear campaign against Bersih activists and PKR members and the thuggish attempts by Perkasa and Ibrahim Ali to turn it into a race issue (among other equally bad attempts in what was a hilarious series of performances where they continually shot themselves in the foot, in fact, Ibrahim Ali will henceforth be referred to by me as ‘foot-shooter’), the eventual resignation of the PM to allow the rally to go ahead, have all combined to make a satisfactory outcome for Bersih.
I guess the idea of the Bersih rallies is a very solid one; it was always going to achieve what it was set out for, whichever way it went about. All it needed was support and support was what it got, plenty of it.
All that’s left to do now is for the Electoral Commission to do the right thing, to do their job. I’m not convinced they will, but fingers crossed.
1 Chooi, C 2011, ‘Najib lets cops decide on Bersih arrests’, The Malaysian Insider, July 5, viewed July 5 2011, <http://www.themalaysianinsider.com/malaysia/article/najib-lets-cops-decide-on-bersih-arrests/>
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