It’s another criminal intimidation and another threat of a protest by the red-shirts leader, Jamal Md Yunos.

This time around, it’s at the Bar Council following the Bar’s admission of receiving funds from George Soros.

Jamal claims the American billionaire is therefore “remote-controlling” the Malaysian Bar to topple the government.

This is something we saw in dictatorships ranging from Augusto Pinochet in Chile, Ferdinand Marcos in the Philippines to Suharto in Indonesia.

Obviously there are no concentration camps, torture centres or assassinations in Malaysia.

But we certainly have Jamal trying to paralyse Malaysians with fear.

We also have pervasive and rampant corruption, large-scale kickbacks, human rights violations and a repressive government that has failed to rein in Jamal.

It appears as if we are adhering to the ‘how to be a dictator’ rule book in allowing Jamal to terrorise Malaysian organisations, especially when they are for cooked-up reasons.

The bully boys who worked the commands of Pinochet, Marcos and Suharto were after people who questioned dictators on lack of transparency in governance, abuse of public funds and state embezzlement.

They serve as a ready-made army that can be deployed by politicians or political parties to terrorise local communities. And they enjoyed the protection of politicians from the law and its enforcement agencies.

We have a parallel situation here with the red-shirts. And we have been seeing signs of a country that is slipping into a dictatorship, which gives rise to totalitarianism, allowing one person too much power.

The National Security Council (NSC) Act, drummed out at 2am on the last day that Parliament sat in December last year, concentrates extraordinary powers in Prime Minister Najib Abdul Razak.

And Najib seems to have given tacit support to Jamal and his goons through his lack of criticism about their threats and incidents of violence against Bersih supporters.

Najib remained tight-lipped even when Jamal threatened to create a racial riot, such as May 13.

When he was elected to power in 2009, many were hopeful the prime minister would steer the country towards political reforms, tolerance and moderation.

Najib captured the imagination of many, including those outside of the country, as a progressive leader.

But we have only seen divisive policies and a crackdown on the media, civil society and federal opposition particularly after he was linked to the financial scandal of the sovereign state fund, 1Malaysia Development Berhad (1MDB).

Such repressive governance plus veiled support for Jamal will certainly speed up Malaysia's descent into a full-blown dictatorship.

CHARLES SANTIAGO is Member of Parliament, Klang.