Cops shoo away local ‘Occupy Wall St’ offshoot

Police direct attendees of the “Occupy Dataran” event to disperse, four hours after the even started.—Picture by Jack Ooi

KUALA LUMPUR, Oct 15 — A 50-strong crowd gathered in Dataran Merdeka today to show solidarity with the Occupy Wall Street movement in New York, only to be dispersed by police after four hours of fun and games.


About 10 uniformed policemen cut short the “Occupy Dataran” event at 7.35pm after telling the organisers they could not gather in the public square without a permit from Kuala Lumpur City Hall (DBKL).

The gathering, organised by the Kuala Lumpur People’s Assembly, had been scheduled to go on for 14 hours from 4.00pm today until 6.00am tomorrow.

The police and DBKL officials kept close watch on the proceedings, which kicked off earlier this evening with sketches, a picnic, games and musical performances, including a spirited rendition of the Zee Avi hit, “Kantoi”, on the ukulele.

Unlike more confrontational Occupy Wall Street solidarity protests held in other cities around the world today, the mainly twenty-something participants of “Occupy Dataran” — some clad in Bersih and anti-Lynas T-shirts — waved no placards and chanted no slogans.

Authorities only stepped in after three-and-a-half hours of merrymaking when the KL People’s Assembly convened in earnest.

An attendee at the “Occupy Dataran” event stands under the national flag at Dataran Merdeka. — Picture by Yow Hong Chieh

An autonomous gathering without hierarchy, the assembly seeks to give the public a forum through which they can air their views on issues of concern without the involvement of political parties or elected representatives.


Participants in tonight’s assembly, the twelfth since the weekly exercise began on July 30, were only 30 minutes into mooting topics for discussion — including the “injustice” of capitalism and the need for free tertiary education — when the police told them to disperse.

The officer in charge, a Chief Inspector Karthik, stressed that the police were not treating the gathering as an illegal assembly but was merely helping DBKL enforce regulations governing the use of Dataran Merdeka.

“The group there, you’re doing something, you must have permission from DBKL... Dataran Merdeka is under DBKL so you must talk to them,” he told the assembly’s representatives.

After deliberating for some 20 minutes on whether to stay and risk arrest, the assembly adjourned but many chose to remain. Some continued playing music while others went to watch a screening of the Liverpool versus Manchester United English Premier League match there.

Bar Council human rights committee chairman Andrew Khoo, who watched the proceedings from the sidelines, said he failed to understand the rationale behind the order to disperse.

“It’s okay to come here and to sit in a group and to watch a football match, but it’s not okay to sit down and to gather and to talk with one another. What’s the logic of that?” he said.

“I think sometimes we have... to question the reason behind the rules and people who implement the rules have to ask themselves, are they just robots mechanically enforcing a rule without trying to understand.”
During his Malaysia Day address, Prime Minister Datuk Seri Najib Razak pledged a raft of security reforms that included, among others, changes to the Police Act to allow for freedom of assembly.