June 30th, 2010
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March 8, 2010 Make Democracy the only game in town Two years ago, Malaysians wrote history by weakening UMNO/Barisan Nasional’s electoral one-party state. For the first time since independence, the ruling coalition lost its two-third parliamentary majority and a total of five states were ruled by the opposition parties. As a result, Malaysians have benefited tremendously from the vibrant competition between Barisan Nasional and Pakatan Rakyat. As Pakatan Rakyat advocates “Ketuanan Rakyat” and values like competence, accountability and transparency, Barisan Nasional under Prime Minister Najib Razak has responded with his “1Malaysia” campaign and “Government Transformation Programme”. In brief, Malaysians are enjoying the bonus of democratisation. Unfortunately, the budding democratisation is also threatened by some politicians from both sides of the divides who refuse to accept “democracy as the only game in town” and try to subvert or undermine the voters’ verdict through some or all of these four unscrupulous means: (a) defection and change of government without fresh elections; (b) politically-motivated investigation, prosecution, harassment and detention of opposition leaders, civil society activists, journalists and bloggers; (c) discrimination in development funding against opposition-run state governments … [Read more] Saturday, January 09, 2010 Dear Colleagues, The Press Conference turned out well. There are about 20 of us representing different NGO sectors at the press conference. Journalists from the print, broadcasting and electronic were there. Reports are here: Al Jazeera also carried the news in its news report. I attach here the statement with the latest list. As at 1809 hours, we have had 125 civil society groups and 5 political parties endorsing it. Do forward to interested groups and send us new names. We shall update the list of endorsers if necessary. It will still make news if the number of endorsers soars phenomenally. We may set up a facebook page to archive and update statements in defence of peace, diversity and reason, which include this and also previous statements in response to the cowhead protest. Do volunteer if you could help administering the page. Yours Joint Statement of Civil Society on 22nd January 2010 Attack against one faith is attack against all faiths We the undersigned Malaysian civil society groups from different spiritual, cultural and ideological backgrounds condemn unreservedly in the strongest possible terms the latest arson attacks against two suraus in Muar in the early morning of January 21. Any attack on any faith in Malaysia is an attack on all faiths in Malaysia. We express our solidarity with the Sirratulrahim Surau in Kampung Sabak Awor and Parit Beting surau, and to the Malaysian Muslim community at large.  The attacks on the suraus seem to be a deliberate and desperate move to provoke Malaysians into sectarian conflicts. The earlier attacks on nine churches, a mosque, a surau, a gurdwara and a convent school, have failed to trigger even distrust as Malaysians of all faiths and creeds stand united in the wake of violence. While the Police must act swiftly in investigation and defeat any act of violence and terrorism, we call upon all Malaysians to have faith in peace, freedom and reason. After all, these attacks are at most a … [Read more] |
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