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Hindu Sangam makes u-turn on rally

November 27th, 2007
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the same MHS which sat with glum faces behind MIC info chief saravanan saying they don't support the hindraf rally, now comes out with another statement saying its a wake-up call.

quote: "Malaysia Hindu Sangam national central council member C.M. Kopalan said the MIC and the Government had helped to fund, build, repair as well as settle relocation and land issues for temples nationwide."

Hindu Sangam: Rally a 'wake up call'
http://www.malaysiakini.com/news/75365
Nov 27, 07 7:30pm

The authorities must listen to the grievances aired by some 30,000 Indian Malaysians who participated in Sunday’s rally, said the Malaysian Hindu Sangam (MHS).

Describing it as a “wake up call for all Malaysians”, the influential Hindu umbrella body said the government must stop “festering wounds” within the Indian community from becoming worse.

“It is clear that there are tens of thousands of Indians in Malaysia who feel the government is not protecting their best interests,” said MHS president A Vaithilingam in a statement today.

Among others, he said, demonstrators were angered by the government and court’s inaction over infringements of religious freedoms by the “Islamic authorities”.

He cites ‘corpse-snatching’ cases between Islamic authorities and Hindus as well as the demolition of Hindu temples as examples.

“Almost all the victims (of infringements of religious freedoms) have been Hindus, fueling anger amongst the community,” he added.

Immediate measures

Vaithilingam said another catalyst to Sunday’s demonstration, organised by the Hindu Rights Action Force (Hindraf), was the demolition of the Sri Maha Mariamman Temple in Kampung Karuppiah, Shah Alam just before Deepavali.

“The unprecedented pictures of local authority enforcement officers throwing stones at devotees and at the temple caused an uproar amongst the Indian community,” he said.

He further urged the government to take immediate measures to improve the socio-economic conditions of the Indian community and to ensure that the nation’s wealth is distributed equitably amongst all Malaysians.

He also urged the government to make legislative reforms to protect religious freedoms.

“We call on the courts to start acting in their role as the guardians of the fundamental liberties of minorities against oppression by the majority,” he said.

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minister azmi says many indians studying medicine as proof community is well off

November 27th, 2007
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'Indians are not marginalised'
source
BERNAMA

KUALA LUMPUR, Tue.:

The Indians in Malaysia are not marginalised as claimed by the Hindu Rights Action Force (Hindraf), the organiser of Sunday’s illegal assembly, a cabinet minister said today.

Pointing out that the rally was evidently politically-motivated, Natural Resources and Environment Minister Datuk Seri Azmi Khalid said the Indians were given ample opportunities including advancing themselves in education.

Azmi said that during his visits to universities in Indonesia, the Caribbean countries and Russia, most of the Malaysian students studying medicine were Indians.

“Why must they talk about being neglected? We have more Malaysian Indians studying medicine in Indonesian universities compared with the Malays and other races.

“So from where the money came from? Definitely they got it from the opportunities to earn money in this country,” he told reporters after opening a conference on Forestry and Forest Products Research.

Illegal rallies would jeopardise foreign investments to the country which would in turn harm the nation’s economy and the people’s well-being, he added.

Thousands of Hindraf supporters gathered in the heart of Kuala Lumpur last Sunday to support the handing over of a petition to the British High Commission asking Queen Elizabeth II to appoint a Queen’s Counsel to represent the Indian community in a class action suit against the British Government for bringing Indians as indentured labourers to the then Malaya and exploiting them.

Hindraf has filed a US$4 trillion (RM13.5 trillion) suit in London claiming that the British were to blame for the marginalisation of Indians in Malaysia.

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nazri calls assembly attendees penyangak

November 27th, 2007
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aiyoo…some of my friends are now penyangak! my wife is now also penyangak! err…my dog too is penyangak? the professionals, group of singapore PRs, the chinese uncle, the taxi driver…all penyangak!!! oh my god, we have 20,000 crooks…police, what are you doing????

anyway, nazri accepts the figure 20,000 while police say some 4000-5000, MK says 30,000.

nazri sar, if the buses were not blocked, maybe can reach a higher figure. and if take into consideration all the govt staff threatened with sacking, plus those who are present in spirit to support their family members, friends, neighbors etc., we could be looking at 1 million people perhaps? oh ya…no forgetting our people in black and white.

in the end, samy vellu did say that nazri is a good person.

-"On Nazri comments yesterday that Devamany should quit the MIC, Samy Vellu said: “In parliament we can say so many things… Nazri is a good person. Sometimes he might say something but he may not mean it.”

'Gathering of crooks' hasn't tainted community's image
http://www.malaysiakini.com/news/75339
Yoges Palaniappan
Nov 27, 07 4:37pm

The mammoth rally which saw about 30,000 Indians taking to the streets has not tarnished the government’s view of the community, said Minister in the Prime Minister's Department Nazri Abdul Aziz.

(crooks) who participated in the rally would not jeopardise our viewpoint of the entire community," he told a press conference at the Parliament lobby today.

"There were hundreds of thousands of Indians who did not participate in the rally. They stayed back and showed that they still support the government," he added.

He also questioned the rationale of the Hindu Rights Action Force (Hindraf), which aimed to submit a petition to the British High Commission.

Hindraf, which organised the rally, wanted to submit a petition to Queen Elizabeth II asking Her Majesty to appoint a Queen’s Counsel to represent the organisation in its class-action suit against the British government.

Baseless accusations 

"If they want to submit a petition or a memorandum, they should just send it to the Prime Minister's Department. There's no need for a street rally," said Nazri.

"All the allegations put forward by them (Hindraf) that Indians are marginalised are lies and nothing more than accusations," he said, adding that the government would trace those who are responsible for the gathering and charge them in court.

However, he denied the possibility of using the Internal Security Act (ISA) against the perpetrators.

"We will not use the ISA. If we do, they will fire back at us saying that we're using the law unnecessarily. But we will use other laws, and among the penalties could be prison sentence," he said.

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kit siang suggests parlimentary committee to investigate indian community problem

November 27th, 2007
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this can be one of the recommendations that MIC can make use. save their time trying to think what to suggest!

Lim: Don't ignore cry of desperation
http://www.malaysiakini.com/news/75326
Nov 27, 07 1:41pm

If the cabinet is truly serious about addressing the long-standing grievances of the Indian Malaysian community, it should back a proposal for a parliamentary select committee. 

Parliamentary Opposition Leader Lim Kit Siang, who issued this call after earlier mooting the idea, said the ‘committee on the marginalisation of the Indian community’ should have three months to come up with a report.

He described the Hindraf rally in Kuala Lumpur on Sunday, which drew some 30,000 Indian protestors from all over the country, as a “cry of desperation”. 

The rally was in support of a US$4-trillion class-action suit filed against the British government for bringing the Indians here as indentured labourers and exploiting them for 150 years.

“The Barisan Nasional leaders, led by Deputy Prime Minister Najib Abdul Razak, should stop their truculent and confrontational responses to the demonstration,” Lim said in a statement today.

“Instead of threatening all sorts of dire consequences against the Hindraf organisers and supporters, the cabinet should acknowledge the legitimacy of the long-standing grievances of the Indian community (which is) becoming the most marginalised group.”

Other ways of showing that the government is serious, he said, is by releasing all 136 Hindraf supporters arrested during the demonstration and not to charge the organisers. 

The government should also hold an open inquiry into allegations of excessive force by the police, which saw water cannon being deployed and teargas being fired during the six-hour stand-off with protesters. 

Urgent issues

In listing the issues that the select committee should address, Lim added that it should be sufficiently empowered to make recommendations on: 

  • Increase in the number of Indian youth dying in police custody
  • Worsening socio-economic inequality between the Indian poor and rich and between other communities
  • Ineffective redress of social ills in the community
  • Policy on financial allocation for Tamil schools
  • University intake policy, which is a major source of distress for the community
  • State unwillingness to help resolve the Maika scandal
  • Closure into the Kampung Medan killings, as a public inquiry has not been held into the racially-motivated incident of 2001
  • Low-cost housing needs of the Indian poor
  • Aggressive displacement of the Indian rural poor due to the breakdown of the plantation economy
  • Rampant demolition of Hindu temples and disregard of the religious rights and sensitivities of the Indian community

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I will hand over says samy

November 27th, 2007
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Samy Vellu unperturbed by Hindraf protest

source


KUALA LUMPUR (Nov 27, 2007): MIC president Datuk Seri S.Samy Vellu today dismissed his community's biggest anti-government protest as an opposition ploy and denied he was out of touch with the increasingly agitated Indians.

Sunday (Nov 25)'s Hindraf (Hindu Rights Action Force) rally by more than 10,000 people, who defied water cannon and tear gas to protest racial discrimination, could pose a headache for the government ahead of early polls as Indians are traditionally seen as a vote-bank for the ruling coalition.

In an interview with Reuters, Samy, the combative head of the main ethnic Indian party and Malaysia's longest-serving minister, branded protesters as "trouble makers" and said he was not losing sleep over the bloody demonstration.

"We have fought worst battles than this during elections," the ebullient 71-year-old leader said.

"We don't worry about this. We are confident of winning the next elections handsomely," said Samy, the Works Minister and an architect by training.

"They (the protesters) are fighting to create problems. They are trouble makers," said Samy, dressed in a smart black suit and red tie, as he attended to a handful of Indians in his ministry. His luxurious Mercedes Benz was parked on the driveway.

He has been leader of the Malaysian Indian Congress (MIC) and a cabinet minister since 1979. MIC is a junior partner in Prime Minister Datuk Seri Abdullah Ahmad Badawi's ruling coalition, which is set to call general elections in the next few months.

The Barisan Nasional (BN) coalition dominates the 219-seat parliament with 199 seats.

His friends regard Samy as the "champion of Indians" but foes say he stands in the way of solving the many socio-economic problems facing Malaysia's 1.8 million Indians.

The community, which forms just 7% of Malaysia's 26 million people, is in a parlous state, said a Hindu rights group which called the protest.

It said Indians lacked educational and business opportunities, adding that a government affirmative action policy in favour of majority Malays had marginalised them.

The Indians have always struggled to air their grouses openly. The community's economic clout is a scant 1.5% of national wealth and that too is in the hands of a few top businessmen.

UNFINISHED JOB

Many blame the MIC and Samy, known to some for his authoritarian style, for not quickly solving their woes.

And Sunday's protest, which attracted Indian doctors, lawyers and other professionals as well, could be an eye-opener to the BN, politicians said.

A senior leader of the United Malays National Organisation (Umno), the bulwark of the 14-party BN coalition, said BN should study the Indian grievances and try to overcome them.

"We have to look at the real issues, what is causing this unhappiness and I think BN has to pay attention to it," he said. Samy took the criticism in his stride.

"To me, I can throw the records on the floor on what I have done. I am not a man on the streets. I am a man on the job. There's always unfinished business." But he gave no hint when he would step down.

"I have been around for 29 years. At an appropriate time I will hand over." – Reuters

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