E Contrario

Photo: Farha

This was a great banner for the night. I spent half the night holding it up while sitting on the wall like Humpty Dumpy.
The vigil was a very spirited event. Yes, we saw some of the usual faces. But there were also many people who were not the usual NGO/political activists.

I am so glad that there are more and more Malaysians showing concern for human rights of our neighbouring countries. I recalled there were only a handful of human rights activists cared to take up solidarity campaign for Burma. It was exactly 10 years ago, May 1997 a dozen of us from the Burma Solidarity Group Malaysia stood in front of Regent Hotel to protest against the admission of Burma into ASEAN.

Mahathir was the strongest advocate for granting Burma a full membership amidst the regime’s brutal repression of human rights.

hose who were arrested then were: Fan Yew Teng, Raymond Chong, Sharaad Kuttan, Steven Chan, Elizabeth Wong, Lee Siew Hwa, Sheela Colandai, Teresa Kok, and myself.

I would say these are among the pioneers who pressed for solidarity with Burma’s pro-democracy movement. We had stated numerous times, ASEAN’s “constructive engagement” would not work and the policy would only encourage the junta to continue with its violent oppression.

Today, even the PM admitted the failure. However Syed Hamid has done nothing so far. The reason is simple: Malaysian Petronas is making a lot money in Burma. Indirectly Malaysian investments help the military to buy bullets to shoot the monks and the innocent civilians.