On the world stage, Najib is limp

In the wake of a citizens march, against the unforgiving glare of the truth and on the world stage - Najib Razak is limp. He is incapable of separating truth from the propaganda espoused by his UMNO party.

Lost in a 'reality' that only the ruling elite in his party understands, Najib and his cohorts continue to live in denial and defend their version of the truth - which in actual fact are outright lies.

The Malaysian PM is unashamed to lie to an international audience to justify his own incapability to rightly tackle the need for every-day Malaysians to speak up and be part of nation building. Najib has now totally lost credibility - not only among Malaysians but also among his peers in the international circle.

The bare-faced lies

It is proven, that Bersih has united the Malaysian public more effectively than any APCO-strategized 1Malaysia initiative. It was a united Malaysia that took to the streets of Kuala Lumpur to march peacefully in demand for a cleanup of the country's notoriously corrupt election process.

Even after weeks of systematic demonizing by the BN government, the people still turned out in droves on July 9 to prove a point to Najib and BN - that the people are the masters and not them.

And when the Malaysian man in the street chooses to stand up, Najib Razak releases his storm-troopers - the FRU and the police - upon them to beat them down.

After all this, Najib still has the audacity to turn his back on his countrymen and tell the world that the Bersih detainees were treated well and the crackdown "mild".

“It was quite mild because although they were taken in, they were released after eight hours and they were treated really well. There was no undue use of force and the demonstrators were dispersed using minimum force,” Najib told CNN in an interview conducted in London, where he is on a 4-day official visit.

Najib’s own assessment goes contrary to the growing international outcry against the high-handed and brutal actions of his FRU and police force. With mounting eyewitness accounts and video recordings uploaded onto YouTube, the proof of such atrocities are in plain view of the international community.

MCA president Chua Soi Lek and his deputy Liow Tiong Lai are the latest to be caught red-handed. Both men gave a slew of excuses including 'camera angle' to back their denials that the police had fired toxic materials such as tear gas and chemical-laced water into the compound of a hospital. But a group of 11 doctors, who were on duty that day, have come forward and issued a statement catching the ministers in their lie.

International community minces no words

Nonetheless, in the face of all these evidence, UMNO and their BN partners continue to lie and offer their own version of the facts.

"We stand for... the right for people to freely express their democratic aspirations and express their views freely,"BBC reported US State Department spokesman Mark Toner as saying.

"We are very concerned by the recent crackdown on peaceful demonstrators by the government in Malaysia. We are alarmed at the targeting of individuals for championing the rights of Malaysian citizens to express their opinions and to peacefully assemble," AFP reported Rupert Colville, spokesman for the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights as saying.

“Prime Minister Najib’s government rode roughshod over thousands of Malaysians exercising their right to peaceful protest. This violent repression by the Royal Malaysian Police flies in the face of international human rights standards, and cannot be allowed to continue. Any future peaceful demonstrations should be permitted and respected by the authorities," said Donna Guest, deputy Asia-Pacific director at Amnesty International.

In Queenly style

But it was the Queen of England, who won the hearts and minds of the Malaysian people with her subtle but strong message to Najib

When Her Majesty granted Najib and wife Rosmah an audience in London, which was supposed to be their greatest highlight and triump, Queen E wore what must surely be the brightest yellow outfit, as if in solidarity with the Bersih marchers. The British monarch truly made her point in fine style.

Yellow is the trademark colour of the outlawed Bersih and even up till Thursday, those caught wearing the yellow Bersih T-shirt in Malaysia will be arrested.

It is now the turn Pope Benedict XVI to remind Najib of his manners. Though yellow is not the color of the papacy, one can only wonder what sort of signals the Pope would send to drive the message through to a clearly clueless Najib Razak.

Before leaving Malaysia, Najib had boasted of being able to raise 3 million UMNO members to 'conquer Kuala Lumpur' and 'create chaos'. Such a boast is unwarranted, silly and smacks of bullying.

The Pope, as leader to 1.2 billion Catholics across the globe, can teach Najib a thing or two in the art of being a leader who does not stand pompous nor bully his own people and then have the cheek to lie to the international community.

After so many tutors, if that lesson is lost to Najib, then he is a leader truly limp.

- Malaysia Chronicle