May 13 threat: a cheap political gimmick
By Pak Bui
The “postponed” Gerakan Kebangkitan Rakyat (Gertak) May 13 rally in Terengganu is the latest in a series of xenophobic publicity stunts by Umno and their stunted supporters.
The rally’s leading organiser Gertak’s Razali Idris announced, “I don’t want the rally to be hijacked by irresponsible parties. At the moment, a lot of people still don’t really know the purpose of the gathering and have been making comments about it without knowing the full picture.”
The “irresponsible parties” are, in fact, Gertak and the horde of similar, so-called NGOs. They have hidden their hate-filled faces behind the term “NGO”, showing scornful disdain for the description used originally by altruistic agencies such as Mercy Malaysia, Oxfam, Médecins Sans Frontières or Friends of the Earth.
Our home-grown, pathetic, Malay supremacist organisations boast grand, mock-heroic names like Perkasa (headed by Attack Frog Ibrahim Ali) and Gabungan Pelajar Melayu Semenanjung (GPMS, whose website appears to have been hacked, and bears the unfortunate tagline “This account has been suspended, please contact the billing/support department as soon as possible”).
Holding a rally to “motivate” Malays to mark the May 13 riots is immoral and “irresponsible”. Insecure outfits sharing such bigoted sentiments are, of course, found around the globe, from neo-Nazis in Austria and British National Party skinheads to the Klu Klux Klan in the United States. Zionists organise similar celebrations every year to commemorate David Ben Gurion’s victory in the 1948 war to evict Palestinians and to carve out land for Israel.
There are no prizes for guessing what the “purpose” of the May 13 rally was: to drum up support for “Malay supremacy” and to whip up feelings of ethnic hatred (“Melayu Bangkit!”). This in turn is meant to provide Utusan Malaysia more “news” to distribute to its credulous readers.
It is pure racist polemic, attempting to instigate antipathy against other ethnic groups. It happens each time the racist Umno leadership feels under threat, as it has done since the setbacks of the March 2008 general election and subsequent by-elections.
Najib has played a charade of being an “inclusive” PM, while encouraging ethnic and religious extremism under the guise of these NGOs. The Umno paymasters have sub-contracted out the jingoism, the ranting and raving, while Najib smiles and waves on 1Malaysia advertisements.
Najib, as we recall, allowed Malay supremacist NGOs to protest against the High Court’s decision to overturn Umno’s ban on the use of the word “Allah” by the Herald. Then he called for restraint and calm, akin to applying a band-aid plaster after an explosion has gone off.
His special aide Nasir Safar insulted Indians as beggars and Chinese as prostitutes, and escaped, so it seems, unscathed. It is conceivable that he will be “transferred” to another cushy job in future. Noh Omar made similarly incendiary remarks at a Selangor Barisan Nasional conference and offered an almost identical, insincere “apology” to Nasir’s.
It is also conceivable that Nasir and Noh were let loose by their master to spew poison, in order to make headlines in Utusan Malaysia, and stir up ethnic hatred – and then simply apologise, with a hint of a sneer, amidst the resulting uproar.
