Over a Patch of Grass

ARCHIVES 2012

By admin-s On May 2, 2012

“What will be the worst consequence if the crowd breaks through the police barrier? The consequence will be about 100,000 gathering on Dataran Merdeka and sitting there for another hour. It is not like they were trying to storm a sensitive government facility or a military installation, so where is the balance?”

Reformasi Mom

On 28 April 2012, the Malaysian Royal Police Force beat up, gassed and hosed hordes of unarmed, peaceful and nation-loving civilians over a patch of grass! Not over armed uprising, not over looting or berserk rioting, BUT over a patch of grass. How much more bizarre can we get in this nation?

Right down to the last minute of the fateful hour when the arsenal was to be unleashed on the protestors, the powers-that-be could have walked away as the heroes of the day. But no, they could not and would not give up the opportunity to flex their muscles as the “masters” of the rakyat. No, they just could not resist showing off their impeccably lousy gamesmanship.

Now, three days after the event, amidst all the finger-pointing in the blame game of who actually “started” the breaking through of the barricades, we the rakyat ourselves could end up playing an even lousier game that could whittle away the moral victory gained on 28 April by biting on the bait of “who started it”.

Let us get one thing straight: none of this would have happened if the people had simply been allowed to gather as they had wished. Did the crowds that gathered at KLCC, Brickfields, Masjid Jamek and Jalan Sultan cause any public disorder detrimental to national security? Were there any disturbances of any kind before 3pm? The answer is pretty obvious!

So then why the battle by DBKL and the police over a patch of grass? Why such punitive action on a group of harmless civilians? Why? As the Bar Council deputy president Christopher Leong rightly asks, “What will be the worst consequence if the crowd breaks through the police barrier? The consequence will be about 100,000 gathering on Dataran Merdeka and sitting there for another hour. It is not like they were trying to storm a sensitive government facility or a military installation, so where is the balance?”