Having seen the mockery of democratic process being ruined by the illegal take over of the Perak State Assembly by the Barisan National Government, I cannot help wondering how vulnerable an ordinary citizen becomes if the police, judiciary, the executive, and all the establishments that have been set up to guard the man in the street, turn their eyes away and an individual becomes undressed and open to abuse. This happened to the Speaker Sivakumar who was physically removed by the Police in the line of duty to protect the state assembly being turned into a circus.
The Raja Muda had not initiated the commencement of business by delivering his address, and wham even before that the BN representatives have replaced the Speaker Siva with an appointed Speaker.
Some eight lawmakers were arrested by the Police, and even a person drinking tea in a mamak restaurant is not spared.
Elsewhere I read that in the coroner’s inquest on the death of Sujatha, the Police wanted a post mortem done, but the hospital authorities thought otherwise, and no post mortem was done.
With all these incidents, comes the fear, our country in fast turning into a lawless state and where money and power is enough to hoodwink all rationale of good governance and practise. Is the clock being put back to the days of Hitler and his gestapo the secret police, as Pastor Martin Niemoller lamented in his poem “first they came…..”. Will we end up with no one speaking up for the ordinary man without political pull and money.
