Home Minister Hishammuddin Hussein has warned that a government crackdown will continue against supporters of the Bersih 2.0 rally, setting the stage for a dangerous showdown that could end with the exit of Prime Minister Najib Razak sooner than anyone had anticipated.
Hisham warned that the Attorney General was now looking into the evidence they had gathered, and implied a swoop was not impossible.
"Issues raised before this will continue to be addressed, including the discovery of weapons, incidents related to bank accounts as well as certain groups. Don't think that we will not continue our investigation," Hisham told a press conference on Monday.
"Of those who were arrested, the AG's Chambers is currently studying the seriousness of their offences to determine whether to charge them or not."
Old tools to fight new war
But Hisham's threats are bound to aggravate public fury for the Najib administration.
In the runup to the rally, Prime Minister Najib Razak and the police had arrested scores of Bersih activists, pinning on them bizarre charges of rekindling communism and waging war against the King.
Najib also reneged on a public promise to grant the Bersih organisers a stadium in which to hold their July 9 rally for free and fair elections. Malaysians were further incensed when the PM tried to deny responsibility for the police brutality on Saturday that left one dead and thousands injured. The 58-year old Najib tried to flip the blame back onto the Bersih organisers and Opposition Leader Anwar Ibrahim.
Additionally, there has been widespread concerns that Najib might launch an Operations Lalang-type of crackdown to lock up political rivals, dissidents, writers and editors. This was done in 1987 by former premier Mahathir Mohamad, who through this suppressive tactic managed to extend his rule until 2003.
But Najib is unlikely to succeed with the same modus operandi 24 years hence.
"They are using old tools to fight a new war. This will only hasten their exit," PAS MP for Kuala Selangor Dzulkefly Ahmad told Malaysia Chronicle.
On UMNO watch now
A good example of the new world that Najib has yet to confront is the Facebook page that a group of Malaysians have put up in defiance against him.
As at 1.49pm, there were 118,262 'likes' on the '100,000 People Request Najib Tun Razak Resignation' page, and this number is expected to swell as more Malaysians here and abroad continue to show their displeasure over what they perceive to be his administration's 'dirty tactics', especially over the Bersih rally.
Should he fail to calm the current storm and instead begin a new fire with more foolish decisions, it is believed that his peers in UMNO will move to oust him. Already their party's image is in tatters, accused of racism, endemic corruption and extremism, due in ino small part to the plots and conspiracies hatched by his 'advisers'.
One indication that cannot escape notice is the lastest blog posting by Matthias Chang, a former political secretary to Mahathir. Chang lambasted Najib and his cousin Hisham for their series of misteps and making a "mountain out of a molehill" over the Bersih rally.
At 85 years of age now, Mahathir is still one of the most powerful politicians in UMNO, a nationalist Malay party that has ruled the country for 5 decades.
Media crackdown soon
Meanwhile, Hisham also lashed out at the media for the avalanche of negative publicity over the BN's handling of the Bersin 2.0, warning that the Malaysian Communication and Multimedia Commission was on their case for any 'false' reporting.
"We have visual recordings in our operation room. Whatever has been alleged will be investigated with concrete evidence, and action will be taken against those in the Internet and foreign media who have made baseless allegations," he told a press conference on Monday.
But while he threatened, he had no answers for the police denial that they were not responosible for the death of taxi-driver Baharuddin Ahmad, who of tear gas suffocation. Baharuddin is also believed to have been hit by the police as broken ribs were also detected in an autopsy conducted on Saturday night.
However, what might be most tough for Hisham to explain was why the police had launched water canons and shot tear gas into the compound of the Tung Shin Hospital where scores of rally supporters had escaped to.
The police have denied doing despite clear video footage and scores of eyewitness accounts that they had done so.
"We have certain footage. If what had been alleged has no proof, those who reported it will be brought to justice," he repeated when asked about the attack on Tung Shin Hospital.
Bersih officials have estimated a crowd of 100,000 and yet the Inspector General of Police insisted only 6,000 people showed up.
Najib's government is in denial mode over the rally, refusing to believe that their tried and tested modus operandi from the past no longer worked.
- Malaysia Chronicle
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