I was in Bangkok for training last week, and most of the participants came from the Southeast Asia region. During my stay, Malaysia's politics and its future was a popular topic.
As Asean chair, it seems like Malaysia’s critical domestic political problems have grabbed more attention than other Asean matters.
A counterpart asked why it took so long for the Malaysians to take to the street and protest on a mass scale. Well, that is a question that has intrigued many.
Protest analysis in Malaysia is a peculiar one to some extent.
Last month, former Bersih 2.0 co-chair Datuk Ambiga Sreenevasan was called for questioning under Section 124 of the Penal Code for activities detrimental to parliamentary democracy, over alleged calls for the public to stage street protests to topple the government.
In responding to the Bersih 4.0 rally on August 29 and 30, Deputy Inspector-General of Police Datuk Seri Noor Rashid Ibrahim was quoted as saying that the rally would be allowed to take place with the condition that it’s done according to the law.
He warned that the police would not hesitate to intervene if the rally voiced any seditious remarks or encouraged the public to topple the government.
Reacting to the series of political scandals and economic downturn, Prime Minister Datuk Seri Najib Razak in a blog posting put forward several reasons for the ringgit’s decline against the US dollar.
One of the reasons is the intense political speculation which he said resulted in uncertain sentiments towards the administration.
As you read and hear more about protests in Malaysia, though, it can be easy to fall into some misconceptions about reality.
Amid political uncertainties, protests remain some kind of a taboo. They are considered an act to topple the government, and that is the biggest misconception about protests.
What’s misleading about this idea? Protests are often labelled as violent, causing destabilisation and public disturbance.
The fact is, protests are a response to the degrading economic and political conditions, that leads to the rejection of the key representative institutions of the political system.
Following that thought, a protest is, in fact, a rational act.
Against that backdrop, while the government in the past regularly relied on the tags of "national security" and "public order" in controlling protesters, several earlier attempts to forcibly disperse the protesters backfired.
Wael Ghonim, the Egyptian democratic activist was right when he said, “Power of the people is stronger than people in power.” This time around, repressive reactions will only spur greater support and spark more outrage, bringing even more protesters to the streets. – August 17, 2015.
* This is the personal opinion of the writer or publication and does not necessarily represent the views of The Malaysian Insider.
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