BERSIH and the inane responses

This present government has developed one distinguishing characteristic not unlike the previous administration. If the previous administration was maligned as being uninspiring and sleeping through its job, this present government isn’t that far from being similarly aspersed. How so?

It has shown it has a knack of being inept at handling small shocks to the system. Many of us for example are not supporters of Anwar Ibrahim, but the manner the government handles the Anwar affairs- whether it’s the sodomy 2 charge or the recent video clip showing a person resembling Anwar in a sexual tryst, the administration has shown its ineptness and incompetence.

In the video clip affair for example, people see the court as being a manipulated instrument to serve the interest of the siting government. The court has allowed itself to be the pulpit for making political statements; lawyers representing the three people accused of possession and distribution or broadcasting pornographic material, used that occasion to declare the authenticity of the video and its main actor. How was it relevant and moreover we heard it through a secondary source- i.e. regurgitation from the defense lawyers. That become hearsay evidence and can be contested.

Its Anwar again this time having his hands tied behind and walloped defenselessly. Last time it was the physical black eye. This time it is the legal black eye. The last time, it nearly cost the loss of Najib in Pekan, this time it could probably cost more to UMNO as a whole.

The current shock to the system- a system made merry by numerous announcements of projects by the PM and his chief major domo in this field of auta-mania, Idris Jala, is how the government handles the Bersih NGO. 

This is an NGO led by a Malaysian Indian lady by the name of S Ambiga. This lady has managed to rattle almost all the top guns in UMNO and those wishing they were part of UMNO.

Ibrahim Ali is responding mindlessly justifying his conduct as an answer to his interpretation of Bersih as being a movement to (1) unseat the government and (2) attacking the position of Malays. So he steps in as the self-appointed warrior defending the position of Malays. He says he is willing to be murderous and warned the Chinese to stay away. But he hasn’t asked his Chinese business backers to do the same.

Bersih was a godsend re-invigorating Ibrahim Ali from an otherwise political stupor. He now has an issue and Ibrahim Ali lives.

But why is Ibrahim Ali defending the UMNO led government? Ibrahim Ali is not even an UMNO member. Two, has UMNO not got enough warrior politicians to defend it in its hour of need? UMNO does not need Ibrahim Ali to speak for the party. If it does, then the warrior politicians in UMNO have since become eunuchs.

The other reason for attacking Bersih as a movement to endanger Malays and Malay interests is too far-fetched to be dignified by answering it.

Who is the right mind will entertain the idea of unseating the government through undemocratic means? The only one that did, were the UMNO politicians who engineered the downfall of the Perak PR government. Already there are signs that the Perak government will be retaken by the PR forces.

Ambiga and the Bersih people must be absent minded or must have suffered a bout of spontaneous amnesia to not be aware that Governments can be unseated only though democratic means, that is by way of free and fair elections. Therefore to seriously suggest that Bersih is a copycat version of the mass movements in Tunisa and Egypt is not acceptable.

Our response becomes more bizarre when the discovery of the portrait of Shamsiah Fakeh among Bersih rally paraphernalia is taken as proof that Bersih is communist inspired! The whole handling becomes even more macabre with the ‘discovery’ of weapons said to belong to Bersih would be participants. Oh yes. Oh yes- more of the incompetence. The discovery is a miracle to happen just before the planned rally. I hope the people masterminding the discovery will also be ready with some creative answers to tell the PM, how the weapons were ‘planted’ there. How convenient! The gods must be smiling at the politicians and police.

And now the investigation into the finances of Bersih shall be used as proof that Bersih is a Trojan horse for foreign subversion. That would probably provide an aphrodisiac for the recuperating Dr Mahathir who is a well-known opponent of any form of colonialism.