E Contrario

Krishna & Arjuna

Malaysian Government has received quite a lot of international criticisms over the way peaceful protests have been squashed. The Government’s usual line of defense was “mind your own business” and “don’t interfere with our internal affairs”.

A few unusual critics joined the chorus in criticizing Malaysia in particularly on the crackdown of HINDRAF rally. There were unprecedented demonstration in Bali. There were also expression of solidarity in Fiji, Sri Lanka, UK, Canada and by Tamil speaking communities around the world. The PM of India and Chief Minister of Tamil Nadu too had spoken words of concern.

Predictably the Government was angry. Nazri the self appointed spokesperson for PM Abdullah asked all the critics to shut up. Needless to say, the BN officials were also angry at Anwar echoing the voice of international community.

Some Malaysian commentators were also uneasy over the position of Anwar. Perhaps they think it is unpatriotic to be critical of our own motherland on the international stage.

It is odd that some people even agree that India or any other foreign countries have no right to interfere with issues of internal nature. They responded negatively as they felt India’s criticism was ‘contaminated’ with ethnic or religious sentiment. This line of argument was fallacious. We cannot deny human beings have a tendency of affinity driven by identity. It is common that we feel a sense of solidarity with our own ‘kind’. However as a humanist and idealist, we always strive to care for all regardless of ethnicity, religion, gender, etc.

Yet it is nothing wrong if Indians or Hindus in other parts of the world showing concern for people of their own religion or ethnicity. In fact, the global support for HINDRAF works just like Muslims’ international mobilization against Danish cartoons or US aggression in the Middle-East.

Malaysian Muslims feel they are part of a global Islamic community, and they often act in solidarity with the plights of other Muslims in the world. In the past, Malaysia had been actively supporting Palestine, Kosovo, Bosnia, etc. Within this region, the Government had criticized repression against Muslim minority in our neighbouring countries such as Burma, Singapore, Thailand and the Philippines. Malaysian concern might had even been a form of deterrence against excessive human rights violation or cultural assimilation.

I don’t fault India for its concern for Malaysian citizens of Indian origins. We remember during the outbreak of riots in eve of Suharto’s demise in 1998, China too had reproached Indonesia for the killing and rape of Chinese women in Jakarta.

In recent months, the violent crackdown of the Burmese monks had sparked off protests across the globe. Naturally, the emotional impact was much greater on Buddhists worldwide than on followers of other religions.

In a globalizing world, transborder solidarity has become an irreversible trend. The solidarity activities will be part of the hazards of modern civilized world. Democracy is now emerging in our region and even in most of the developing nations. Malaysia will not only be judged or condemned by the West, increasingly our fellow developing countries are more and more critical in voicing up objection against our human rights violations.

All these showed that the world has changed. Unfortunately our ministers like Nazri, Zam and the whole lot in the Cabinet are not aware of it at all. (Who can blame them if the PM is asleep all the time?)

No doubt, it would be great if all people could have acted with no ethnic or religious preference/bias. However different events motivate or influence different people differently. We hope one day solidarity would be based purely on altruistic principles. Nevertheless any forms of transborder solidarity are welcome.