E Contrario

Lately, the canteen of IPK became a regular hangout for me.

Whenever there was a mass arrest, the canteen area would be used for temporary retention site. Probably the area is the only available space big enough to hold a large number of people.

The atmosphere of arrest had been quite different in comparison to the Reformasi days of 1990s. Nowadays police just left us sitting ‘freely’ or mingling among ourselves. This time, there were about 60 arrested.

Something didn’t change. I remember the code name of mass arrest in those days was “Ops Padam”. Today operation to mop up protesters was coded as “Ops Padam” too.

Unfortunately for the ruling parties, the police still failed to padam the flames of protests.

We were in fact quite cheerful while being held in the IPK. Many of the activists were arrested for the first time. About one third of the arrested were women. The presence of leaders like Mat Sabu, Dr Hatta, Dr Nasir, Arul and others helped to the group to lessen tension. The big group did not feel intimidated by the police officers at all.

The group solidarity prevented the police from extracting self-incriminating information from the arrested activists. However our demand to see our lawyers was denied.

I could sensed that the police were not sure what to do with us. It was obvious that instructions from the higher authorities had been conveyed to the officers on the ground. There were minimum investigation. Even recording 112 statement was left till late night.

Initially I was expecting to be released in the evening. I had promised to go to the ceramah at Kota Raja that night. I was indeed very pissed off for unable to go.

By midnight, the decision was clear: there was an order to detained us overnight and produce us in front of a magistrate for remand the next day.

Our accommodation was Pudu Jail. By the time we got into the cell it was already 5:00 in the morning. Nonetheless, I managed to catch up some rest as I slept through the entire morning.

Before going into the prison cells, we managed to catch up with some fun for camera: