Ex-ISA detainees confident Indians will still snub BN

For nearly 47 years, Indian Malaysian were oblivious to the Internal Security Act (ISA), which they thought was for communists terrorists, and threw their support behind the Barisan Nasional (BN) government.

Everything changed in the 12th general election after five prominent Hindu leaders of the now outlawed Hindu Rights Action Force (Hindraf) were arrested and detained under the security law enacted solely to fight the communists.

“The Indian community have not forgotten what they (BN) did to us,” said lawyer M. Manoharan who was one of the five held under the ISA in December 2007.

Manoharan said the Indians will continue snubbing the ruling government “when this resurfaces in the next general election”.

“It will remind the Indians the atrocities committed by the BN government.”

The Indian community, long viewed as a fixed deposit for the BN, snubbed the ruling coalition in 2008 and voted instead for the opposition parties.

The detention of Manoharan, V. Ganapathi Rao, K. Vasantha Kumar, P. Uthayakumar (picture, top) and R. Kengadharan was seen as a major factor that swung the voters’ confidence.

Ganapathi said, although it would safeguard the basic human rights of Malaysians, the abolishment of the ISA will not be a major determining factor in the upcoming election.

“The ISA would not be a major factor in changing the voters’ mindset. They (BN) will give away goodies and promise temporary measures to change their mindsets. That’s what they have always been doing.”

He went on to say the government will not unleash the powers of the draconian law until after the general election, depending on the magnitude of support for the BN.

“But after the election, it will be a very powerful tool,” Ganapathi warned.

The ISA is a preventive detention law which empowers the Home Ministry to detain anyone it deems a threat to national security without trial for an initial period of up to 60 days, after which they can be further detained for a period of two years or more.

Thus, a person can be detained without trial indefinitely.

The law had been criticised by both local and international human rights groups for vesting total and unlimited power on the Home Minister at whose discretion hangs the fate of the detainees.

Manoharan (picture), a DAP member, stood for the Kota Alam Shah state seat in the 12th General Election and won with a 7,184 vote majority in the Chinese dominated constituency.

He made history by winning while still in detention at Kamunting, similar to Chan Kok Kit who won the Sungei Besi federal seat in the 1978 general elections with a 33,687 majority despite being held under the ISA between 1976 and 1981.

courtesy of Malaysian Insider