THE CICAK.com

theCICAK IJOK EXCLUSIVE: Student Affairs Department and MIC Youth Brigade stalk and threaten university students on election grounds

Three men, in blue and yellow shirts, from the MIC Youth Brigade intimidated Tuan Mee estate residents who were looking at election survey forms handed out by students. A youth brigade member snatched a survey form from a participant.

By CHUA SUE ANN

I went to Ijok last Sunday as a student and an “election tourist.”

I went to feel the election buzz and see the political circus in a little town 60 km from Petaling Jaya.

I went to Ijok to find a story, conduct several interviews and complete my assignment for a journalism class on key factors influencing voters, such as the Selangor Menteri Besar, Dato’ Seri Mohamad Khir Toyo’s promise to spend RM36 million on new development.

I got more than what I signed up for.

There is an intense by-election in Ijok, as its assembly seat is up for grabs. Its former assemblyman Datuk K. Sivalingam died of heart attack while on vacation in Chennai, India.

Both sides, the ruling party, Barisan Nasional and the opposition camp, Parti Keadilan Rakyat (People’s Justice Party) have been campaigning relentlessly in the area.

Barisan Nasional’s candidate is K. Parthiban, 38, former teacher and division secretary of the Malaysian Indian Congress (MIC).

The other contender is Party Keadilan Rakyat’s Tan Sri Khalid Ibrahim, 61, former CEO of Pemodalan Nasional Berhad and the Gutherie Group. Both locals and political observers have predicted a close call, with the opposition giving the ruling party a good run for it’s money. The much anticipated results will be announced at around 8 p.m. tonight.

After visiting the Pekan Ijok, the town area with a large concentration of Chinese residents, we broke off into little groups for lunch. I joined some Malay girls, also participants of the survey project, at a nearby mamak store. It was packed. I wondered, how many of the mamak patrons were locals. Were most of them outsiders, “election tourists” like us?

Our lunch was interrupted by a group of men, very much like paparazzi photographers, who blatantly took photographs of us. Just our group. It was perplexing.

We asked them, “Who are you? Why are you taking photos of us?”

No answer. No apology. No identification. Nothing.

It was rude and offensive.

“Why do you keep doing this? Why are you following us?” our group demanded.

Realizing who they were did not make us feel at ease.

They were from the Department of Student Affairs, sent by various government universities to monitor student activity during the elections.

We knew this, not because they told us, but because they came in vehicles with their department logos. There were five vehicles from various public universities, waiting around our bus to see where we were headed.

A vehicle belonging to Darul Iman University’s Student Affairs Department.

Some of them followed us all the way to our next destination, Kampung Bukit Badong. Malaysiakini journalist Wong Yeen Fern, who was also on the bus, later told us that these men were carrying out orders from the ministry.

The University and University Colleges Act 1971 forbids students and lecturers to have political affiliations.

Gee, would it be OK then if we campaigned for Barisan Nasional?

But that’s not why we were at Ijok.

We weren’t there to champion any party. We were there as students, under the banner of Youth For Change to experience an election. Simple as that. If the student affairs officials had bothered to ask, it would have saved them petrol money. They had five cars tailing us to our next destination.

A few of us stood up against them. The Malay girls I had lunch with didn’t. They couldn’t. They had too much to lose. If you are in a government university or if you’re on a government scholarship, you’re helpless. They can take it all away from you and there is nothing you can do about it.

“Sure,” my Malay friends told me, “you can fight back because you’re in a private university!”

I was absolutely shocked. I realized that sometimes, it’s not that you don’t want to stand up for your rights. Sometimes you can’t, and sometimes it’s not worth it.

It’s funny that the Election Commission and the government often complains that many young Malaysians are not registering to vote. And at the same time, they trample over our rights to be informed voters and citizens. They use fear to put us in our place, a place that is convenient for them. What kind of democracy is this? A democracy dressed in drag?

Fear. Intimidation. Aggression.

Hmmm… must be a popular tactic. Our group had another unpleasant encounter that day while visiting our third destination, Tuan Mee Estate. The estate is home to mostly Indian residents who also work in palm oil estates. It is a small housing area, not too far away from Pekan Ijok.

Krishnamurti, a resident in the estate, was our host.

The residents and our host were extremely hospitable. But we were forced to leave by Dewamany S. Krishnasamy, Cameron Highlands’ parliamentarian and three men from the MIC Youth Brigade.

We were told that election season was an inappropriate time to conduct such a survey.

Tensions escalated when one of the men snatched a survey form from a participant, demanding to know what the survey was about. One of the men, a member of the MIC Youth Brigade threatened us, “Do you want a hundred of us to come down, or what?”

Two gutsy Indian girls from our group stood up and told the men that we had every right to be there. Our Tuan Mee host tried to calm the situation. You can see the video here.

Relax man! We were leaving anyway. We were not there to cause any trouble, certainly not for our host. There is no need to threaten us.

They had to show their might and intimidate us, students. And so we need to ask ourselves, what are they afraid of? What did they not want us to see or hear? Did they not want the outside world to hear the residents’ frustrations over years of empty promises? Did they not want us to see the living conditions in the estate?

At the end of the day, I got my interviews. And I got my story.

But I also left Ijok with a heavy sense of helplessness, disappointment, anger, disgust, sadness.

I left the town wondering, what can I do about this? What can we as students do about this? What can anybody without political clout do about this?

I left with so many questions that cannot be answered with a simple, “Aiyah, Malaysia boleh!” Because all I can say is, “Tak boleh!”

You cannot trample all over our rights. You cannot use these dirty tactics to put students in their place, to continuously marginalize the poor and the uneducated.

Language was a significant barrier during our visit to the Tuan Mee estate. If not for our Tamil-speaking friends, it would have been more difficult for us to speak to the residents. Many of these residents, unable to speak fluent Bahasa Melayu, found it difficult to voice their concerns. Having no access to the Internet or other forms of media, many of them were unaware of their rights as voters and Malaysian citizens.

Over the next few days, I read the newspapers and saw that the press participated in the ruling party’s spin-doctoring. The stories reported were largely in favour of Barisan Nasional, paying more attention to the campaigning efforts of prominent leaders than to the real concerns of Ijok residents.

Have journalists forgotten the basic tenets of fair reporting? Why do the headlines look so biased?

Whatever happened to objectivity and accuracy in news reporting? Or has the system become so corrupt that our journalists are left with no choice? And where are the voices of the Ijok locals?

Unheard. Silenced. And what will happen to Ijok after the election circus is over?

Nothing.

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CHUA SUE ANN is a contributing writer for theCICAK.

Sue Ann is an aspiring journalist, currently pursing a degree in writing. She just completed a BA in anthropology and psychology from Melbourne University. She loves photography, great ideas, strange things and mojitos.