• BERSIH - Calling for Malaysia electoral reform!

Having recently been blessed with a baby girl a few months ago, I rarely have the time to read or let alone blog about national issues. With work piling up and trying to find time to help out my wife taking care of the baby, I don’t have much spare time anymore.

Which is good though. If you’ve been reading our local newspapers, you’d know the General Election is coming soon. The first 10 pages of the newspapers are filled with hypocritical nonsense by Malaysian UMNO ministers. I’d skip those first few pages so fast I could finish reading the newspapers in 10 mins.

But no matter how tied up I am, BERSIH gathering which took place on 10th of November 2007, a few days ago, deserves all the attention it could get in the blogosphere. It’s a clear indication of the nation’s sentiment towards the government and it doesn’t look good at all. Malaysians are sick and fed up of the current government. The only way to bring justice back is the voting box. Thats why the objectives of BERSIH, quoted from it’s official website, tackles the root problem found in electoral process:

Objective:

BERSIH’s campaign for electoral reform is endorsed by 66 NGOs and 5 political parties. Our immediate demands are:

1. The use of indelible ink
2. A cleanup of the electoral roll
3. The abolition of domestic postal voting
4. Fair access to the media

As expected, the local government-controlled media published lies - labelling it an illegal demonstration, 4000 demonstrators instead of a whopping 40,000 strong gathering, cut out sections of police violence against demonstrators, accused the gathering and petition as an attempt to drag the king into politics, twisting an NGO organized event into a political opposition-led event.

Forget the local media, get the truth from blogs and global news coverage instead. Again, I wish to stress it is our responsibility as bloggers, big or small, to spread the message and show the world that the Malaysian government is rotten to the core. Pretending to be democratic while clamping down peaceful public demonstrations asking for fairness and transparency.

In recent months, The Malaysian government had two very serious issues shoved up it’s arse with the election closing in. The lack of urgency in tackling the Lingam tape judiciary matter and it’s anti-democratic stance against BERSIH demonstration.

Read it, watch it and spread it! That’s the least you can do for the sake of Malaysia’s future.

Democratic Action Party (DAP) - Lim Kit Siang’s blog:

• You Have Been Challenged, Abdullah Ahmad Badawi!
• Mammoth BERSIH gathering - People have spoken but will Abdullah listen or will he remain deaf, blind and mute?

Rocky’s Bru blog:

• Yellow Day!
• Kids and women hit, too

Elizabeth Wong:

• Rakyat pantang dicabar!

DAP’s Jeff Ooi:

• PAINT IT YELLOW
• How they painted it yellow
• Nov 10 and ZAM turned yellow
• BERSIH tops Technorati & YouTube

Pictures of November 10 2007 BERSIH gathering on Flickr:

Get a better picture of the demonstration, head over to Flickr and check out more than a thousand photos BERSIH gathering!

Get some popcorn and enjoy the videos

Just a quick search on Youtube reveals tens of video clips related to BERSIH gathering.

Make sure you DO NOT MISS the telephone interview with Malaysia’s Minister of (Mis)Information - Zainuddin Maidin (aka ZAM) by Doha-based TV Network Al-Jazeera (AJ). He’s speaking in English, believe it or not. Refer to this transcript if you couldn’t get what he’s saying. It helped me figure out what he said.