‘Rais’ estimate of 22,000 at rally incorrect’

The figure was either derived from pictures taken during the early hours of the Bersih's 3.0 rally or of areas with low crowd density, says research organisation.

PETALING JAYA: Minister of Information, Communications and Culture Rais Yatim’s estimation of the Bersih 3.0 crowd is probably based on photos taken during the early hours of the April 28 rally.

Politweet.org, a research organisation no stranger to mapping crowd sizes, said that Rais’s estimation of 22,270 was either derived from aerial shots taken earlier during the day where the crowd was sparse or from shots of areas which had low crowd density.

Its founder Ahmed Kamal Nava said: “At its peak, the crowd stretched from the Church (St Mary’s Cathedral) across from Dataran all the way to Pudu Central junction. The crowd also stretched north towards Sogo but it was not as dense”.

He added that at the peak of the rally, the crowd at Jalan Tun Perak alone was about 42, 000.

“Assuming a density of 3.5 square feet, Jalan Tun Perak alone (not including Jalan Tuanku Abdul Rahman or Jalan Raja Laut) can fit about 42 000 people from the Jalan Kuching junction to the end where it joins the Pudu Central junction,” he said.

Kamal expects to complete the crowd estimate by early next week. He added that twitter updates by rally participants who contributed to the mapping was also significantly slower on the day due to slow network coverage.

Some media has stuck with a crowd size of around 80 000. The police said that the crowd was around 45,000 whereelse the organisers estimated that 250,000 people turned up while Opposition Leader Anwar Ibrahim put it at around 150,000.

Kamal, however, said that the figure may be closer to 70,000. On Tuesday, Rais said that the organisers and Anwar must be more “truthful” about the crowd estimate.

“The idea of glamourising it to be in the hundreds of thousands is not only mischievous but also a big misrepresentation to Malaysians and to the rest of the world,” said Rais.

The 22,270 number was derived from Bernama-based on aerial shots. Rais said that this number was reliable because it was closer to foreign news agency BBC’s crowd estimation.