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.
*
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…………………
*
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!
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