by mahatma manu, Donplaypuks® intrepid correspondent for hindu affairs
HINDRAF or The Hindu Rights Action Force burst forth on the Malaysian political landscape in 2007 like a blazing comet from the Kuiper Belt. It dealt such a forceful blow to UMNO's (United Malay National Organisation) solar plexus as to knock the wind out of its lungs, body and sails completely, and lay it flat out on the ground, paralysed for a few days.
UMNO never saw it coming. Malaysians never saw it coming.
For once, some Malaysian Indians showed huge gutsy balls!
Ground to dust by UMNO and the MIC (Malaysian Indian Congress) which was (correctly) seen as increasingly, if not already wholly, representing the personal financial interests of party leader Samy Velu and his cronies, HINDRAF rose majestically, to restore pride and dignity to the vast numbers of marginalised Malaysian Indians, who number some 2.2 million or 7%-8% out of a total population of 28 million.
The MIC and its leaders were (again correctly) perceived as spineless and consummate brown-tonguing and brown-nosing (read as UMNO arse-licking) artistes who had since1981 when Mahathir became Prime Minister, allowed, through sheer lack of cojones, UMNO to walk and trample over the rights of Malaysian Indians, like Serbians over Bosnian Muslims in 1995. What happened to Malaysian Indians between 1981 and 2007 in economic and social terms, was not quite a kind of ethnic cleansing or attempted genocide, as claimed by HINDRAF. Nevertheless, it smacked of carefully orchestrated acts of economic, educational and jobs deprivation, and religious and racial bigotry promoted by rogue leaders within UMNO. Illegally deploying taxpayer's money to fund government department BTN (Biro Tata Negara) courses to brainwash the minds of the mainly Malay-dominant (85%) civil service employees into embracing the Ketuanan (Lord of The Land) concept, and that the Malaysian Indians and Chinese were "pendatang" (immigrants), and by inference, inferior citizens not deserving of equal respect or treatment the Constitution notwithstanding, is as racist an agenda as the regimes of Hitler or Stalin had conceived and promoted.
UMNO was so shocked out of its skin that any Malaysian Indian would actually stand up for his human rights, that its pathetic leaders like PM Badawi ran around like chickens with their heads chopped off. Who the hell, UMNO leaders demanded to know, HINDRAF thought it was? Who the hell were these Malaysian Indians who had the temerity to organise and demonstrate peacefully against the "caring and fair" UMNO government? UMNO, like its former leader Mahathir, at once suffered from a (as is usual) bout of selective amnesia syndrome, forgetting that it was the police who, without an iota of provocation whatsoever, turned on on the pepper spray and tear gas apparatus.
The laws of public assembly had been breached with impunity, and at that, by, how dare they, good God, low class Indians? That law was of course, an ass, and completely ultra vires the right of peaceable assembly guaranteed in our Constitution. But do remember that we are living in the era of PM Grossemajib and Najibonomics, where UMNO thinks nothing of blowing $160 million ringgit to to dubious and shadowy foreign organizations like APCO and FBC, to spindoctor that black is white, and that we are 1Malaysia, but with 3 or 4 or any number of arbitrary systems that suits UMNO. This kind of wretched spindoctoring rhetoric goes back a good 60 years when the War Office was replaced by the Ministry of Defence, and the Department of Unemployment, by the Ministry of Labour, in the United Kingdom. UMNO/BN being an organisation of mindless copycats, has predictably followed suit.
UMNO lost huge face, publicly. UMNO's embarrassment and shame in handling and treating Malaysian Indians like second-class citizens was palpable. So, predictably too, mindless and Stalinistic-minded UMNO, Badawi and Najib retaliated with the draconian ISA (Internal Security Act) and Sedition Act to try and silence HINDRAF leaders. Hindraf was declated illegal. They succeeded partly, through physical and psychological intimidation, in breaking up HINDRAF and forcing one of its founder-leaders, Waythamooorthy, into self-exile in London.
HINDRAF had started off protesting against bigoted action by state authorities, primarily Selangor state under Khir Toyo's regime, in tactlessly and wantonly bulldozing down century-old Hindu temples. Most of these temples had been legally built during the British colonial era, to cater to the needs of Indians employed in the plantation sector. Egged on further by greedy brown envelope armed and rapacious property developers, UMNO controlled state governments paid short shrift to Indian and Hindu rights. UMNO/BN really paved the way for HINDRAF to rise, when they continued to ignore the plight of displaced Indian estate workers and, disproportionately high numbers in poverty, unemployment, criminals and the poorly educated from within the Indian community.
Mahathir's and UMNO's economic pie sharing out policy of 7 for us (Malay/Bumiputra), 2 for the Chinese and 1 for others (if they can find it) was designed and constructed in its practical implementation to virtually exclude the Indian community at large (Samy Velu and MIC ruthlessly commandeered it for themselves with impunity, as they saw fit). And when it turned out after some 25 years that the reality was 7 for the Chinese (by virtue of the Ali Baba fraudtrepreneur and direct-nego non-tendered out government contract procurement legalised thieving system), 2 for the Bumiputra (in practical terms, Malay) and 1 for the others (excluding Indians), the Malaysian Indian was doomed.
So, where exactly is Hindraf today, on the eve of our General Elections, with Waythamoorthy back home on his own terms, and Uthayakumar now heading the Human Rights Party of Malaysia (HRPM)? CLICK HERE and HERE. What are their strategies? Waytha and Uthaya think that the Indians hold the balance of power in many marginal electoral constituencies, and therefore, can become Kingmakers.
One must preface this with the observation that many who fight for human rights would like to think they are on par with Gandhi and Mandela, and would go so far as to embark on hunger strikes, to emulate their heroes and show their resolve and credentials. But, the times and circumstances are different, and Gandhi and Mandela were no mere intellectual giants. Personal integrity was their calling card.
So, what are we to think of Waytha and Uthaya who having seemingly snubbed PKR and Anwar, propose to enter the fray during General Elections 13, to secure their long list of demands to redress the economic injustice committed wilfully on the Malaysian Indian since 1981, by joining forces with UMNO, incumbent PM Najib and his Government of Thieves?
Thieves in power who have over the last 32 years, allowed the siphoing out of over a TRILLION ringgit, through gross mismanagement and wilful acts of fraud, and concealed the money overseas in Swiss, Singapore, Channle Isles, Hong Kong, Mauritius, Maldives, the Bahamas and Panama bank accounts? Thieves, who have closed one eye to countless deaths in police custody and murder and failed to instruct the IGP to investigate and charge the person(s) who ordered the killing of Altantuya? Thieves who have amassed $40 billion in personal wealth while in office as Chief Ministers, and Chief Ministers who spend $500,000 on their daughters' weddings? And money mules who when caught with $40 million of tainted, corrupt money, are let of the hook, claiming it constituted legal donation? Thieves who deliberately over-price government-linked and guaranteed bonds, to allow cronies to fraudulently cream off $2 billion from the top, and then protect them by classifying the contracts under the OSA (Official Secrets Act) and BAFIA (Banking and Financial Institutions Act)? Thief Prime Ministers who sell IC's and citizenships for money to illegal Muslim Filipino, Pakistani and Indonesian immigrants in social re-engineering experiments and then blame others for it? Thief Ministers and Prime Ministers who spend billions of ringgit on submarines, aircrafts, ships and national defence and protection equipment, and then fail to detect an "incursion" of 300 fully armed Filipino Muslim Sulus whom the Thief Home Minster declares are "non-militant and non-terrorists". Is this the kind of government any sane person would willingly be identified or be associated with?
This is the thinking of intellectual dwarfs, not giants. When you sup and sleep with the devil, your soul is damned for an eternity. When you knowingly embrace thieves, looters, plunderers, racists, religious bigots and protectors of murderers, you become guilty of the greatest crimes by association. What exactly do Waytha and Uthya think Najib will deliver to the Malaysian Indian? At a time when the country's borrowings are at an all time high ($503 billion) Najib is giving away my and your money, and claiming he's giving away his and UMNO/BN's money. How much more deceitful can any Prime Minister be? It would be wise to remember that Mahathir promised Sq Qui heaven and earth before the 1999 general elections, and then completely reneged on it after securing victory, declaring that he would not deliver on Chinese "blackmailing" terms!
So, my advise to Hindraf is simple:
- Forget PKR IF you cannot come to an amicable compromise on a worthy partnership. But do not cut your nose to spite your face!
- Drop Najib and UMNO/BN like a hot potato, NOW! You do not want to become an accessory after the fact to a Government of Thieves and Protector of Murderers, which is the credo of the men and women now leading UMNO/BN.
- Contest GE 13 independently as the HRPM or as independent candidates. Then you will win our respect and votes.
- Like PKR and DAP, move away from religion and race-based politics. The writing is on the wall.
Otherwise, my advice to all Malaysians is to vote PKR or DAP, and consign Waytha and Uthaya to the dustbin of historical footnotes. Let Gandhi not turn in his grave or Mandela expire from a premature heart attack.
Waytha and Uthaya, we may have only this one opportunity to change this country for the better, for all. Don't blow it by allowing ego and false pride to cloud your minds and judgement over who you you will forge a political alliance with.
Donplaypuks® with a Government of Thieves, man!
