Fighting back emotions, Izzah vows to fight on

Anwar Ibrahim's daughter urges the people to continue their fight for a better future.

PETALING JAYA: Nurul Izzah Anwar, daughter of charismatic opposition leader Anwar Ibrahim, made an emotional video beseeching her father’s supporters to continue to fight for a better future regardless of the outcome of her father’s appeal this week.

Drawing attention to her father’s brutal treatment while in police custody during his first arrest in 1998, Nurul urged her father’s supporters to keep up “the march towards democracy” as it was essential in establishing a “professional police institution with a police chief that does not issue thuggish-like threats for fun or beat his prisoners when they’re handcuffed in his custody and blindfolded.”

Clearly distraught, Nurul said that brushing aside Anwar’s conviction was akin to condoning all that was wrong with the country at present.

She said, “If we still decide that the Anwar Ibrahim trial is a mere personal issue, then we might as well accept the fact that the government knows best, that corruption’s acceptable, that religious and racial provocation is the norm.”

She also asked if the rakyat could accept that “selective biased prosecution and persecution” was okay or that our “declining educational standards” ran contrary to what our Education Minister said about Malaysia having “the best education system in the world”.

She also said the march towards democracy was important to realise “truly free and fair elections with an election commission that is dedicated to serving you.”

Pointing our that the last 16 years were difficult for her and the family, she maintained that the sacrifice was not in vain.

She said that because of her father, “In these 16 years, we have managed to establish a truly multiracial party and coalition.

“We have managed to deny the two-thirds majority of the six-decade old government in power”.

She also took comfort in the fact that her father was not alone and that there were many others like Tian Chua, N Surendran, Fahmi Zainol, Adam Adli and Azmin Sharom who were still pushing for reform and fighting her father’s fight.

She said, “We never stand alone, the truth will prevail” and closed the video with the encouraging words, “Remember, fight on, for us, our future, for you and me.”