The 40th anniversary of May 13 is a good time to lay the ghost of Ng Yat Sam to rest. Forty in Cantonese is ‘Say Sat' which means ‘must die'.

I was 17 when it happened. I was living in Menglembu, Perak, a small town south of Ipoh. As far as I remember, no one died there but there were lots of rumours though.

My older brother was in KL on some business and on the third day was escorted out of the city by some members of the army and drove home to Ipoh safely.

Yes, there are both good and bad accounts of the actions of the military when they were sent into the city to establish law and order.

As a nation, we have been suffering from PTSS- Post Traumatic Stress Syndrome on a national basis since that time. Every four years or so, we get flashbacks from some of our politicians to intimidate and terrify us into voting them back into power again.

Talk about terrorism. And such terror techniques will continue. Though it may be loosing its effectiveness because the May 13 generation is dying off and people are getting more educated and more middle class and therefore less likely to succumb to such tactics, the possibility and the danger exists and will remain unless as a nation, we push for some form of closure to the tragedy of May 13.

Closure will be achieved when we go through the treatment exercise:

Confront and accept

Grieve and forgive

Resolve and move on

We need to confront and accept everything that happened from every conceivable point of view. We need to grieve over every aspect of the human tragedy and let the people involved from all sides recall and share all their individual stories. We need to forgive each other and especially those identified to be the perpetrators.

From the different accounts, it did not sound like a spontaneous outburst of amok-ism but more like a planned attack to create havoc for political reasons. In such incidents, it is almost never done by the ordinary locals but usually by gangs recruited from elsewhere and led by a few locals with a clear agenda.

We then need to resolve to learn all the lessons that we can to prevent such incidents from happening again. And then only, and only then, can we move on forward with light hearts and hope for a Malaysia that has grown up and can take its place among the developed and mature nations of the world. Not developed materially only, but also mentally and spiritually.

Then ‘Malaysia Boleh' will no more be taken derogatively but solemnly and with a quiet sense of confidence and true accomplishment.

Yes. A Malaysian edition of a ‘Truth and Reconcilition Commission' is timely and will contribute to a genuine and authentic ‘1Malaysia' and not a ‘play-play'one.