The Human Rights Party’s advice to the Indian voters in Hulu Selangor – vote only for the candidate that delivers. Do not vote for the candidate that does not deliver.

It is that very promising time of the year – election time in Hulu Selangor. Promises and possible lies are what the people of Hulu Selangor are going to get if they do not play hardball with the politicians from both sides of the divide, now. Indian voters must vote only for the candidate that delivers.

Zaid Ibrahim please take note.

The Pakatan Rakyat Selangor Menetri Besar came out in the news after their weekly exco meeting recently and said that they will be giving out land titles for 100,000 squatter families and TOL license holders who have been living on the land for 15 years.

He further added that the Pakatan government was soon going to resolve reserve land issues relating to temples of worship, schools and roads. The promise of land is the Pakatan menteri besar’s promise. Delivery here to the Indian poor will mean:

1. They actually receive land titles in their names in their hands;

2. The gazetting process of Tamil schools’ land ownership begins in a way consistent with the way national schools own their land; and

3. Land titles given to temple administrators for the land on which the temples sit. This has to happen before April 25.

HRP’s demands are much more – we feel the Pakatan government should, for a start, give land to all the 97 Tamil schools in Selangor that do not own the land on which they sit, but we know that this will have to wait.

P Kamalanathan please take note.

The MIC/Umno combination for their part have promised a return of shareholders’ investments in Maika Holdings. Here, again, this is only a pre-election promise and if the deal is not sealed before the elections, they will come up with any number of reasons on why they could not keep that promise.

They can say, ‘Oh, but we did not know Maika had so much baggage’ or they could say ‘We overestimated the value of Maika, we can only pay 25 sen for every ringgit because the businesses all have been negatively impacted by the bad publicity ‘ and so on. Any number of reasons for them not to keep their promise.

Delivery here will mean:

All the poor Indians who are shareholders in the company should have their reimbursement cheques in their names in their hands. This has to happen before April 25.

From HRP’s standpoint of necessary justice, MIC/Umno must reimburse the RM1 of 1984 - not the RM1 of 2010.They promised a complete reimbursement. Complete reimbursement going by standard accounting principles and an average discount rate of about 6% means a reimbursement RM4 of 2010 ringgit value for every RM1 of 1984 ringgit invested.

Ask any accountant worth his salt. MIC/BN by offering to give back RM1 of 2010 are actually only offerring to give back only 25% of the value of the initial investment. The total sum to be reimbursed of around RM450 million is nothing when compared with the billions of ringgit spent on other colossal bailouts in the history of the country.

To name a few, the Multipurpose Holdings bailout (an MCA company), the Konsortium Perkapalan Berhad bailout, the Malaysian Airlines bailout, the Renong Berhad bailout, the national sewage company bailout and the bailout of Kuala Lumpur's two light rail public transport systems.

RM450 million is small money when compared to all these huge bailouts. Do not give excuses like this is asking for a yard when an inch has been offerred. We do not talk charity, we talk equity - if you can understand it.

This should not be the time for promises by politicians for the people. Rather it is the time for performance appraisal - by the people of politicians. Neither Pakatan nor MIC/Umno have performed well for the Indian poor during their period of opportunity.

Zaid Ibrahim or Kamalanathan – just vote for whoever who delivers now. Do not vote for whoever who does not deliver by April 24. Let us keep it simple.

The writer is national advisor, Hindraf/Human Rights Party Malaysia.