The slogan-toting demonstrators, numbering not more than 15, must have felt they had succeeded in their goal.
They stood at the side of the road leading to An Nadzafah surau in Taman Mewah, Kamunting, and shouted their distaste for the notion that Pakatan campaigner-in-chief Anwar Ibrahim was to delivertazkirah there after evening prayers.
Earlier in the day, it was said that 73 police reports had been lodged in police stations in the Taiping area by like-minded people opposed to the idea that the PKR leader be allowed to deliver the talk.
The slogans the demonstrators carried denounced him as immoral and unfit to deliver religious homilies.
Of a sudden, several minutes before prayers were to begin at the surau, the demonstrators torched the placards they had held and vanished - satisfied, presumably, at having achieved their objective.
The word was that Anwar had cancelled his visit.
Not only had the demonstrators gotten wind of the cancellation, but a row of spectators, many on motorcycles, who had watched the demonstration from across the road, also dispersed when news spread that the PKR leader was going to be a no-show.
In the end, it was not the knot of demonstrators and the invective they had flaunted that were striking about the incident, nor even the fact of the cancelled visit by Anwar.
It was the row of impassive spectators that was noteworthy for, much later that evening, in Bagan Serai, a good 35 kilometers from Kamunting, innumerable rows of motorcycles and lesser numbers of cars lined the road leading to Taman Serai Perdana where the Pakatan supremo came to deliver the final ceramah of what was supposed to be a visit to northern Perak.
PKR info chief is Bagan Serai candidate
There people who looked like they had been content to be neutral spectators at Kamunting were transformed into an engrossed audience, about 10,000-strong and mainly seated on the grounds of an oval-shaped playground where the ceramah was held.
Impassive spectators at the earlier cancelled affair in Kamunting, they were now a rapt audience taking in the speakers whose only purpose was to be the hors d'oeuvres before the main meal is served.
To be sure, the stuff that PKR secretary-general Saifuddin Nasution dishes out at the ceramah more than nudges itself out of the category as whet for the appetite.
His arresting content and compelling delivery put him in the class just below Anwar's as a speaker. More dollops of humour and flights of eloquence would close the gap between pupil and master.
In the end, it was Anwar who leavened the populist toast tastefully served up by Saifuddin and it was way past midnight when the crowd filed out of the grounds, the horde of motorcyclists leading the parade out of the grounds before the cars and vans had any chance of a right of way.
They stood at the side of the road leading to An Nadzafah surau in Taman Mewah, Kamunting, and shouted their distaste for the notion that Pakatan campaigner-in-chief Anwar Ibrahim was to delivertazkirah there after evening prayers.
Earlier in the day, it was said that 73 police reports had been lodged in police stations in the Taiping area by like-minded people opposed to the idea that the PKR leader be allowed to deliver the talk.The slogans the demonstrators carried denounced him as immoral and unfit to deliver religious homilies.
Of a sudden, several minutes before prayers were to begin at the surau, the demonstrators torched the placards they had held and vanished - satisfied, presumably, at having achieved their objective.
The word was that Anwar had cancelled his visit.
Not only had the demonstrators gotten wind of the cancellation, but a row of spectators, many on motorcycles, who had watched the demonstration from across the road, also dispersed when news spread that the PKR leader was going to be a no-show.
In the end, it was not the knot of demonstrators and the invective they had flaunted that were striking about the incident, nor even the fact of the cancelled visit by Anwar.It was the row of impassive spectators that was noteworthy for, much later that evening, in Bagan Serai, a good 35 kilometers from Kamunting, innumerable rows of motorcycles and lesser numbers of cars lined the road leading to Taman Serai Perdana where the Pakatan supremo came to deliver the final ceramah of what was supposed to be a visit to northern Perak.
PKR info chief is Bagan Serai candidate
There people who looked like they had been content to be neutral spectators at Kamunting were transformed into an engrossed audience, about 10,000-strong and mainly seated on the grounds of an oval-shaped playground where the ceramah was held.
Impassive spectators at the earlier cancelled affair in Kamunting, they were now a rapt audience taking in the speakers whose only purpose was to be the hors d'oeuvres before the main meal is served.
To be sure, the stuff that PKR secretary-general Saifuddin Nasution dishes out at the ceramah more than nudges itself out of the category as whet for the appetite.
His arresting content and compelling delivery put him in the class just below Anwar's as a speaker. More dollops of humour and flights of eloquence would close the gap between pupil and master.
In the end, it was Anwar who leavened the populist toast tastefully served up by Saifuddin and it was way past midnight when the crowd filed out of the grounds, the horde of motorcyclists leading the parade out of the grounds before the cars and vans had any chance of a right of way.
It was announced that party information chief Md Nur Manuty has been tapped to be its candidate for Bagan Serai, a parliamentary seat currently held by Mohsin Fadzli Samsuri, who won the seat on the PKR ticket but quit the party in 2010 to become a BN-friendly MP.
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