Featured Filmmaker: Arvind Raj

by yerry — 

We interview Arvind Raj, a video journalist working with Free Malaysia Today, one of the country's most popular independent online news portals.

 
Name: Arvind Raj
Age: 36Location: Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia

1. Tell us who you are as a filmmaker.

I am more of an activist filmmaker than a commercial filmmaker - I feel the subject, the issues deep in side the heart before making an effort to create a film or video.

2. Why did you decide to work with the moving image?

Video is the best tool for showing evidence of what really happened in any situation. No one can deny or manipulate the issue or the incident once it is recorded in a genuine way.

3. What radicalised you as a filmmaker? Did it happen in the moment, or was it a process?

I became a filmmaker not by choice but by chance - I participated in many street demonstrations and protests to fight against injustices and to give a voice to the voiceless, but without a medium such as video I couldn't explain a lot of the incidents because I am not a good writer.

I created a blog and updated it frequently from the scene where marginalised people were being bullied. I took photos and videos from my mobile phone to show this. Later, I attended the Citizen Journalism training by the International Centre for Journalists (ICFJ) and progressed from there.

4. As a videomaker, what are the challenges of working in Malaysia? What are the restictive laws?

A general challenge is that journalists and videomakers do not have immunity or security in this country. If the authorities feel that it is not safe for us to film something, they will go all out to stop you from filming. Arresting us for no reason is a way for them to stop us, especially in the street demonstrations where the police brutality can be seen in an open space.

5. What are the main issues you address in your video work?

The issues that I have highlighted in my videos all relate to human rights: poor and marginalised society, the transgender plights, demolishing the poor heritage villages, estate-worker issues, the promises made by some politicians and the disappointment they engender.

6. Tell us about your favourite piece of video you have made, in regards to social justice or the environment.

I did a video called GATCO - 33 Years of Dreams Shattered, on the plight of estate workers in Negeri Sembilan (which is a 2 hour drive from Kuala Lumpur). The victims are poor Indian estate workers who have been working on a piece of land for more than 36 years, believing that they will own the land one day. However, to their dismay, the land was recently bought by a private company through an auction. State and federal governments failed to help them despite making past promises of help, during elections, in order to win their votes.

7. How do you think online distribution is changing the field of independent video making? How do you use online tools in your work?

Let's compare it with several years ago when the internet was not widespread in Malaysia. People believed what they saw in the mainstream media - for them that was news and that was the most trustworthy medium - but now it has changed.

People realise that mainstream media is merely a tool of the political party that governs the nation. People tend to compare the news in the mainstream media with online media, which is also known as alternative media. They know that not everything that is shown in the mainstream media is accurate. We have many tools, sites and online platforms to share, spread and distribute the videos that we make.

EngageMedia, YouTube, Free Malaysia Today, Papuan Voices and Komas are some of the platforms available to highlight our issues as an independent filmmaker. If a video is made in any foreign languages or dialects, tools such as universal subtitles help to spread the message. Anyone in the network can contribute the subtitles, which helps further distribution of the issues.

8. Tell us more about the role of video in this coming elections, and how film/videomaker can contribute to this democratic process?

As a filmmaker for Free Malaysia Today, I have the advantage of publishing videos of interviews, speeches and peoples' opinions from both parties; the ruling government party and the opposition party, together with the independent candidate. These kinds of videos cannot be seen in any mainstream media.

We are giving a clear picture of the political scenario in Malaysia for people to evaluate the political parties' genuineness, sincerity, contribution and manipulations. We are fair in reporting both angles, although sometimes we lean more towards the opposition activities to balance their limitations in mainstream media coverage.

Ex-Hindraf supporters burn Waytha's effigy in Kulim

 

KEDAH A group of former Hindraf supporters gathered in Kulim today to burn an effigy of the organisation’s leader, P Waythamoorthy, to express their dissatisfaction with his decision to endorse the leadership of caretaker Prime Minister Najib Abdul Razak.

A spokesperson for the group, M Asogan, said that Waythamoorthy had “pawned the self-respect and dignity of the Indians to Umno merely for his own interest”.
He said that in 2007 and 2008, thousands of Indians went to the streets to demonstrate their unhappiness and displeasure towards the BN and Umno-led government.
“But forgetting these historical events, Waythamoorthy has now aligned himself to Umno.
“The Indians in Malaysia will never forgive Waythamoorthy for betraying the trust of these marginalised and sidelined Indians,” he said after the protest held by about 500 people in Paya Besar.
Paya Besar is within the Padang Serai constituency where former Hindraf lawyer and current PKR vice-president N Surendran is contesting the parliamentary seat against incumbent N Gobalakrishnan and BN’s Heng Seai Kie and two other Independents, Hamidi Abu Hassan and Othman Wawi.

Waythamoorthy incurred the wrath of some of his supporters when he signed a memorandum of understanding (MOU) with Najib in April, asking them to return BN’s two-thirds majority in Parliament.

This had prompted his brother Uthayakumar, who leads a faction of the group, to sack him from the movement, saying he has hijacked their struggles.

Asogan said Waythamoorthy had “dramatised” his fast to get sympathy from Indians, but it had failed.

Immediately, he made an about-turn by meeting Najib, saying an MOU had been signed to solve all critical issues faced by the Indians.
“But little did he realise that many MOU appeals have been submitted to the Umno-BN government by various parties in the past, including MIC, and so far, none have materialised,” said Asogan.
“So it is a foolish thing to say that the Umno government has agreed willingly to implement those demands forwarded by Waythamoorthy,” he added.
“We Indians understand well that whatever Waythamoorthy had staged was a good political drama,” he stressed.
Asogan said another person who received much hatred from Indians is Zulkifli Noordin, the former MP for Kulim Bandar Baru.
He had “criticised and condemned” the Hindu religion, saying Malaysia does not belong to the community and they should return to India, Asogan claimed.
This statement from Zulkifli has angered Indians and those in Shah Alam, where he is contesting under the BN banner, want to teach him a lesson.
“Now he is apologising and requesting the Indians in Shah Alam to vote for him but the Indians know his true colours that he is an opportunist and racist,” he said.
“We, the Indians, are showing our displeasure and are condemning his act as seditious which will harm the harmony and peace of this country,” he added.

Survival launches tourism boycott of India’s Andaman Islands

Still of video showing Jarawa girls forced to dance for tourists. © Anon

Survival International has today launched a tourism boycott of India’s Andaman Islands, until the degrading practice of ‘human safaris’ to the 400-strong Jarawa tribe is stopped.
The tribal rights organization is calling on the 200,000 tourists visiting the islands every year to stay away – until tourists are banned from the road through the Jarawa’s forest and an alternative sea route is put in place.
Survival has written to over 200 travel companies and websites in eleven countries urging them to stop their tours to the Andaman Islands, and will place ads targeted at tourists to discourage them from visiting the popular travel destination. Survival is also asking members of the public to pledge not to travel to the islands until the demands are met.
Hundreds of tourists from India and around the world travel along the illegal Andaman Trunk Road every day to ogle at members of the Jarawa tribe – treating them like animals in a safari park.

Survival has launched a tourism boycott of India's Andaman Islands until the 'human safaris' to the Jarawa are stopped. © Ariberto De Blasoni/Survival

When asked how he felt when outsiders took pictures of him, Enmai, a young Jarawa, said, ‘I don’t feel good. I don’t like it when they take photos from their vehicles.’
Earlier this year, India’s Supreme Court banned tourists from the road for seven weeks, reducing the traffic along the Andaman Trunk Road by two thirds. But the ban was lifted after the Islands’ authorities changed their own regulations in order to let the ‘human safaris’ continue.
The tours have been widely condemned both in India and around the world. India’s Minister for Tribal Affairs called them ‘disgraceful’ and ‘an embarrassment’, and last year, in response to a submission by Survival, the United Nations expressed their ‘deep concern’ about the ‘human safaris’ and called for the illegal road to be closed.
Survival’s Director Stephen Corry said today, ‘The Andaman government is arguing that the road is a necessary lifeline for the north of the islands. It’s nonsense: in fact there’s no reason for the road. The route by boat is faster, more convenient and cheaper for islanders, so providing an alternative sea route is better for locals, tourists, and the Jarawa alike. There will be no end to these degrading human safaris until tourists stop using the road, and we’ll continue the boycott until that happens.’

FPP E-Newsletter Special, April 2013: Safeguarding Human Rights in International Finance

Click here to read the PDF version of this e-newsletter

Dear Friends,

As multiple international agencies adopt and update their social and environmental policies, this special edition Forest Peoples Programme E-Newsletter reviews experiences of communities and civil society with the safeguard policies of various international financial institutions. 

 

The E-Newsletter contains articles on indigenous peoples’ experiences with safeguards in Asia, Peru and Central Africa, emphasising the importance of robust safeguard frameworks to ensure that development finance does no harm to people and the environment. It also features articles on safeguard issues at the World Bank; the Brazilian Development Bank; the African Development Bank; in forest and climate financing schemes and in the private sector.

 

We hope you find this special edition interesting and informative. 

Best regards,

Forest Peoples Programme

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Introduction: Why safeguards matter

So-called “safeguard standards” for international finance institutions emerged as a consequence of destructive forestry, agricultural colonisation and extractive megaprojects financed by the World Bank in the Amazon, Indonesia and India in the 1970s and 1980s. Since then many other multilateral development banks and development agencies have adopted their own safeguard policies and related complaints mechanisms. In addition to the need to protect community rights from destructive development investments, it is increasingly recognised that even well-intentioned conservation and ‘community development’ projects can cause damage and violate rights if they are poorly designed and fail to protect human rights and fragile habitats. Read more

INDIGENOUS PEOPLES’ EXPERIENCES WITH SAFEGUARDS:

The experience of Asian indigenous peoples with the finance lending policies of international financial institutions: A select overview 

Projects and programme interventions of multilateral development banks have a record of systematic and widespread human rights violations for indigenous peoples in Asia. In many countries, indigenous peoples have been subjected to widespread displacement and irreversible loss of traditional livelihoods. Behind these human rights violations is the denial of indigenous peoples’ rights to their lands, territories and resources and to their right to give their free, prior and informed consent (FPIC) to projects and programme interventions, including those in the name of sustainable development and human development. Among them, the large infrastructure (dams and highway construction) and environmental “conservation” projects have had the most detrimental adverse impacts on indigenous peoples. Read more

The IDB, Camisea and Peru: A sorry, sorry safeguards story

The Inter-American Development Bank (IDB) played a catalytic role in the development of the Camisea gas project in the Peruvian Amazon in 2002/2003 despite having no specific policy for projects impacting indigenous peoples. When the Bank adopted one in 2006, a key provision on isolated peoples was ignored when it made a US$400m loan the following year. Meanwhile, attempts by the Bank to ‘protect’ a reserve for indigenous peoples in ‘voluntary isolation’ directly impacted by the Camisea project have proven almost entirely ineffective and are now being further undermined by plans to expand operations within the Reserve. The IDB is required to approve these plans and could do so imminently. Read more

Experiences of indigenous peoples in Africa with safeguard policies: Examples from Cameroon and the Congo Basin
The notion of indigenous people has sometimes been controversial in Africa. There are some opinions that consider all Africans as indigenous people liberated from colonial powers, while others simply stress that it is very difficult to determine who is indigenous in Africa. The setting up in 2001 by the African Commission on Human and Peoples’ Rights (ACHPR) of a Working Group on Indigenous Populations/Communities and the Group’s report submitted to and adopted by the ACHPR in 2003 have brought a new perspective to this problem. In this report for the first time there was a unanimous acceptance of the existence of indigenous peoples in Africa and this kicked off discussions on how countries could begin to integrate the rights of these peoples into the human rights mainstream. Read more

SAFEGUARDS AT THE WORLD BANK:

Forwards or backwards? The World Bank’s safeguard review and update (2012-14)

The World Bank is currently undertaking a two-year “review and update” of eight of its ten social and environmental safeguard policies. NGOs have highlighted how the World Bank must use the review as an opportunity to upgrade its standards and bolster implementation and compliance systems to increase Bank accountability and deliver sustainable development outcomes. At the same time, they have raised concerns that the Bank’s plan to “consolidate” its policies, with greater emphasis on the use of country systems to address safeguard issues, could end up in weakened standards and less accountability of the Bank and borrower governments to affected communities and the public. Read more

The World Bank’s Palm Oil Policy
In 2011, the World Bank Group (WBG) adopted a Framework and Strategy for investment in the palm oil sector. The new approach was adopted on the instructions of former World Bank President Robert Zoellick, after a damning audit by International Finance Corporation’s (IFC) semi-independent Compliance Advisory Ombudsman (CAO) had shown that IFC staff were financing the palm oil giant, Wilmar, without due diligence and contrary to the IFC’s Performance Standards. Wilmar is the world’s largest palm oil trader, supplying no less than 45% of globally traded palm oil. The audit, carried out in response to a series of detailed complaints from Forest Peoples Programme and partners, vindicated many of our concerns that Wilmar was expanding its operations in Indonesia in violation of legal requirements, Roundtable on Sustainable Palm Oil (RSPO) standards and IFC norms and procedures. Almost immediately after the audit was triggered, IFC divested itself of its numerous other palm oil investments in Southeast Asia. Read more

The World Bank’s Forest Policy 

As the World Bank reviews its environmental and social standards, a major opportunity to overhaul World Bank approach to forests must not be missed.

The negative impacts of World Bank-financed projects on tropical forests have been an issue of concern for civil society and forest peoples for decades. In the 1980s, World Bank megaprojects in the Amazon and in Indonesia in support for infrastructure projects, agricultural colonisation and transmigration generated major criticism from the public. This in turn generated the political pressure that was a key factor in leading the World Bank Group to adopt mandatory social and environmental standards, known as safeguards, to demonstrate its commitment to preventing harm to people and the environment. Read more

OTHER INTERNATIONAL SAFEGUARD STANDARDS:

The lack of an effective safeguards policy at the Brazilian Development Bank
Despite the Brazilian Development Bank (BNDES) being a signatory of the Green Protocol, which ties favourable lending rates and terms to the adoption of social and environmental standards, and the Bank’s initiative to develop a specific policy for the cattle sector, the Bank’s environmental policy is still very vague and lacks transparency and concrete criteria. Read more

African Development Bank set to introduce Indigenous Peoples standards for the first time
The African Development Bank (AfDB) is nearing completion of its new set of environmental and social safeguard policies. The AfDB is currently the only multilateral development bank without a standalone safeguard policy on indigenous peoples, and the new environmental and social safeguards are not expected to change this. This is despite strong advocacy from indigenous peoples’ organisations in Africa, and despite the existing jurisprudence and standards on indigenous rights in the African human rights system. Read more

Safeguards in REDD+ financing schemes
Among the many aspects of REDD+ under close scrutiny by indigenous peoples and civil society organisations, the issue of safeguards and their implementation is the one that continues to attract the most concern. This is particularly true now in the current debate on REDD+ and its degree of implementation and operationalisation. Since 2010, when the 16th Conference of the Parties of the UN Framework Convention on Climate Change adopted its decision on REDD+ and related safeguards, a continuous process of elaborations, negotiations, and adjustments has taken place at various levels. The debate on safeguards has become both an opportunity for indigenous peoples and civil society to further enhance their calls for respect of internationally recognised rights and standards, and a leverage opportunity for donors to seek compliance for the use of funds transferred to REDD+ countries. Read more

Safeguards and the Private Sector: Emerging lessons from voluntary standards and commodity roundtables
Public indignation about the depredations of ill-regulated business has led to a growing recognition of the responsibilities of businesses to respect human rights, as well as the need for stronger regulations to improve the way products are made and ensure that environments and peoples’ rights are respected and protected. There is now greater awareness that what is urgently needed is strengthened environmental stewardship and land governance, reforms of land tenure, and improved enforcement of revised and just laws. Such reforms have been slow to take effect, so consumers and buyers have pressed for faster change. This has given rise to standard-setting by the private sector for the regulation of commodity production and processing to respect rights, secure favourable and sustainable livelihoods and divert pressure away from areas crucial to local livelihoods and of high conservation value. Read more

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What is the real threat to Hinduism?

From PM Sivalingam, via e-mail

Much noise has been made by the Opposition about BN’s choice for Shah Alam, Zulkifli Noordin. When he was a PAS member, he made some ignorant and disrespectful remarks about Hindus. After becoming a BN friendly candidate, he has finally apologised for it, twice.

He never apologised when he was a PAS member all those years ago. He never apologised when he stood on a PKR ticket for the 2008 elections and won in a seat with more 20% of the voters are Hindus! He never apologised when he was Anwar Ibrahim’s family lawyer.

Furthermore, the leaders of PAS and PKR never told him what he did was wrong. For 10 years, Anwar and Hadi never bothered about Zul’s remarks. Their cries of anger against Zulkifli now are clearly motivated purely by political considerations. Even a child can tell that they are only using this politics and don’t really care about what he did.

On the other hand, MIC leaders immediately criticised him for saying what he did and, have since accepted his apologies. BN has made a clear stand that any racist statements from any BN representative that is disrespectful to the culture and beliefs of any group will be dealt with severely by a joint disciplinary group.

So what is the real threat to Hinduism behind this smokescreen of anger about 10-year old remarks by a former PAS member?

The real threat to Hinduism, and indeed to Christianity, Buddhism, etc. is the fact that PAS is adamant about implementing hudud. They have said that the DAP disagrees but will not oppose it. God only knows what that means. The latest Anwar has said on this is: “For now, in general, in principle, I believe this (hudud) can be implemented”. Again, good luck interpreting what Anwar means.

Meanwhile, Karpal Singh remains the only consistent figure on this, saying that DAP will never allow hudud. But Karpal does not control the Lim dynasty-run DAP. The father-son Lims are keeping silent hoping to avoid answering difficult questions about their commitment to non-Muslim Malaysians and indeed to Muslim Malaysians to keep hudud out of Malaysia.

This lack of agreement amongst Pakatan’s top leaders have led to confusion on the ground in terms of their execution. From bans on women hairdressers for men to the demolition of seven Hindu temples and shrines by PR state government’s, the consequence of the lack of agreement on hudud and the rights of non-Muslims is tangible and clear to see.

So to recap, again I ask: Which is the real threat to Hinduism:

1 The stupid ignorant remarks a BN candidate said 10 years ago while he was a PAS member about Hindus.

OR

2 The implementation of hudud which will affect every aspect of a Hindu’s right to worship as he or she sees fit and threaten the very existence of Hindu temples all across the country?

Zulkifli, for all his obvious faults has apologised. All of us were taught by our parents and our priests, et al. and our teachers to forgive when someone apologises for their mistake, to give the person a second chance if he or she comes clean about what they have done wrong.

Anwar, Hadi and Kit Siang have not come clean about their real intentions on forcing hudud on the Malaysian people. Apologies don’t come easy to this trio who still have not apologised for the seven Hindu temples and shrines demolished by three Pakatan Rakyat state governments since 2008.

So finally, what is the real threat to Hinduism in this general election and going forward?