'Anwar dapat bebas

Wan Azizah dapat suami

Nurul Izzah dapat ayah

Dolah jadi menteri

Kamu dapat apa?'

Anwar got his freedom

Wan Azizah got her husband

Nurul Izzah got her father

Dolah is now a minister

What was in it for you?

(This is an extract from some short staccato sentences, which someone tried to pass off as poetry. It was read out in Rumah Pena on the second night after Anwar was freed.)

How wonderful would it be if the Thousand and One Nights fable was true. And I was given the opportunity to make a request from the genie that emerged from Aladdin's magic lamp.

I would kneel, cry and plead for the thinking power of Malaysians, which has become most emasculated over the last two decades, to become vigorous once again.

The dulled Malaysian brain, which grows ever more emasculated, is no longer capable of pondering intangible matters, things that cannot be held in one's hands, things that cannot be put into one's pockets.

Thinking powers, which have become shrunken because of the power hegemony, have failed to read the narrative of the reformasi movement.

Being incapable of reading and understanding the narrative is akin to a bridegroom failing to understand that the sanctity of marriage is more than mere permission to remove his bride's brassiere, or a bride her brand new husband's briefs, without interference from the religious authorities.

I will not engage in a verbal duel to answer the question 'What's in it for you from reformasi?' when the question comes from FRU men or Special Branch officers. Because that was the kind of sentences that were forced into my ears when I was questioned, while detained under the Internal Security Act.

Spewing out short sentences, without thinking properly about their meanings is the trademark of those paid to defend a terminally ill regime.

However, if such sentences came from an artiste, poet, language warrior, Malay nationalist or thinker, then I become sad and melancholic. I would not be downhearted to face the poet or the language nationalist, I would feel unhappy when faced with a race, which has been made the target audience for such short sentences.

Speaking the truth

How sad it is for a race when its artistes, thinkers, artisans and intelligensia can no longer produce works that promote truth and sincerity. How sluggish the race will be if its thinkers are only capable of publishing a magazine called Thinker , which is devoid of any thoughtful works inside.

Imagine if the artistes of a race were incapable of producing any artistic work aside from apple-polishing and flattering pieces. Imagine how trite artistic works, which do not explore new grounds to shock people (leading to dreams of breaking the record for the world's largest ketupat) are.

The culture of a people must have declined severely if its intelligentsia only knows how to assess values using currency exchange rates.

But that is the truth about our people, who have strayed far from being a people that honour truth and sincerity.

I openly admit here that we - the reformists who protested on the streets - did not receive anything and will not be receiving anything in the future. The 'anything' I am referring to encompasses anything that can be held in your hands, sold, saved, put into a bank account and everything that can be used as capital to enrich yourself.

The reformists never gave a thought to getting this or receiving that. From my own experiences mixing with the thousands who protested on the streets, the thousands who came to our ceramahs and the tens who are still awaiting court hearings, they too did not hope to receive anything.

What the reformist movement bestowed upon reformists is a narrative to become sincere people who are brave enough to speak the truth.

That is the principal gift from the reformasi movement. To me, being brave enough to speak the truth is the main characteristic that differentiates mankind from amoebas. Mankind was created with the values and characteristics of humanity.

Courage to speak the truth is the pride of the narrative of the path of human civilisation. Read and refer to the Quran, the Bible, the Taurat, the Bhagavad Gita and the I-Ching - all of the holy books contain the courage to speak the truth in the narrative.

Search the ancient texts or listen to folk stories from every continent - you will surely come across narratives of human sincerity and courage. Courage to speak the truth is the pride of narratives that promote sincerity, transparency and justice.

Value of truth

To those who are still at the amoeba or hydra level, I would like to remind them that in life, not everything has a price tag on it or can be valued in terms of possessions. Not everything can be packaged and applied for with pink forms.

It is not likely that the reformasi movement can be valued in terns of land acreage or a Zurich bank account number. Sincerity and truth cannot be listed on the Malaysian stock exchange.

Courage to speak the truth to overthrow despotism and buttress justice is not of material value. Sincerely speaking the truth is not something that can be auctioned and cannot be found on the shelves of a Giant supermarket or a Bundle shop.

Courage to speak the truth is a basic motive force for human civilisation. It is a basic motive force for human dialectic - the dialectic of falsehood and truth. It is this dialectic, which spurs mankind to show its humanity.

The reformasi movement not only challenges the humanity of reformists but it has also posed a challenge to the humanity of the whole of Malaysia. For the first time, just like how it was for our grandparents and our parents, Malaysians are confronted with a choice.

It has to choose between what is false and what is true. To side with justice or to side with despotism. To take up arms against the Japanese and the British, or to be like an amoeba.

It is true that every second of our lives we have to make choices. Yet the choices we make every day are individual choices. An individual is given the right to make choices - whether to celebrate life or to live a mundane existence.

The reformasi movement has presented us the gift of a collective choice, which can affect the direction our civilisation is taking. Only amoebas would fail to value this gift as something that is priceless.

Imagine how the entire meaning of our existence as human beings is challenged when we are faced with the choice between falsehood and truth. Imagine how our brains calculate and weigh up the options, before choosing between falsehood and truth. Imagine how brave reformists were to stand up to speak the truth.

Nearly a million American citizens were on the streets of New York City at the end of last August to declare that weapons of mass destruction actually did not exist in Iraq. Two years before that, four million people in various capital cities worldwide had marched on the streets, protesting that attacking Iraq was wrong.

They did not march on the streets for personal gain. There were no contracts or pink forms waiting as rewards for doing so in New York. What they found was their own selves. What they achieved was successfully standing up to speak the truth. If that is not a paramount achievement, then I surrender my position as a human being.

True and false

If the genie from Aladdin's lamp exists, I would also like to ask him why many Malay intelligentsia are only capable of seeing tangible objects. Why is it that they can only assess the value of something if it can be bought from Tesco? Why and how is it that they find it so hard to choose between what is true and what is false?

And the grand prize question is something that has long been on my mind.

I always ponder and try to imagine what went through the minds of performers, writers, language nationalists, poets and Malay men of letters, when the waves of reformasi were surging through the nation six years ago. Did they close their eyes and ears?

Then I envisioned artistes like Susan Sarandon, Michael Moore, Tim Burton, Bruce Springsteen, Martin Sheen, Jessica Lange, Matt Damon, George Clooney, Julie Christie, Emma Thompson, Juliet Stevenson, Danny Clover and Sean Penn, who have all been on the streets before to speak the truth.

They are all artistes who are versatile, attractive and talented. Or am I wrong? Because according to Utusan Malaysia terminology, those who protested on the streets were 'certain parties' who

were fond of creating havoc.

Perhaps Utusan Malaysia has also spoken the truth, because until today, not a single artiste from the group has acted in any production featured in the Cerekarama slot on TV3.

I can also sympathise with any local artiste or artisan who is hoping to land a part or a job in some major production. Surely they could not afford to waste time protesting on Jalan Tengku Abdul Rahman, when the reformasi waves were in progress.

From my observations, till this day, there has still been nothing in the 'war and peace' genre from those hopeful artistes of ours.

The stunted stories I read in the Sunday papers every week are still stunted in content, and get more stunted with each passing week.

Fearing the truth

What is it that goes on in the heads of writers like Arundhati Roy, Salman Rushdie, Gunter Grass, Tariq Ali, who also hoped for work in artistic fields but still joined in the protests on the streets to speak the truth?

From my observations, they are not people who are considered weak by Islamic standards, but still, what made them go the extra step to be brave enough to speak the truth? Or am I the only person who thinks that their works are valuable even though none of their books have been published by the Dewan Bahasa dan Pustaka?

I am ready to be understanding, if our intelligensia, our artistes, our poets and our writers were conformists who lived in rehabilitation centres.

If that was so, they must have spent their days humming and fantasising, with not enough strength to walk far. I would have to accept that as a fact of life. However, from what I know and have experienced, when we are fearful, we do not hum.

The question is, why are they afraid to speak the truth? Why can't they understand the reformasi narrative? If they were afraid, what has scared them?

Dr Mahathir Mohamad has admitted that he has been deposed (even though Utusan Malaysia had used the word 'retired'). What kind of ghost has stupefied the thinking powers of our intelligensia?

Or is the truth actually that our artistes, poets, and artisans were afraid of the possibility that their stunted stories and poems would not be published in Mingguan Malaysia ?

Perhaps they were afraid that their work will not have any chance of being aired in the Cerekarama slot on TV3? Or that they will never again get an invitation to be a Dataran Merdeka rock singer? Or that they will not be recognised as a thinker by the Thinker magazine?

If that is the answer, then I will have to go to Basrah to look for the genie in Aladdin's lamp. If I can find him, I will not ask my grand prize question, but instead ask him to put all the artistes into a bottle and hurl it to the South Pole.

Hopefully that bottle will be found by Mahathir who is resting there. I hope they will succeed in setting up in building a 'Darul al-Bodek' (apple-polishing land) there. And I will never again be asked by them, 'What was in it for you?'