By all accounts, the march organised by Bersih to press for election reform in Malaysia last Saturday was a resounding success.

Those of us who have taken part in past elections, either as opposition or independent candidate, will know how hard it is to win a single seat against the mighty Barisan Nasional. The playing field is tilted and the goal posts keep shifting.

The Election Commission is supposed to be an independent body, but in reality, it behaves like a department under the office of the PM and the BN Secretariat. The print and electronic media are overwhelmingly one-sided, and the police, despite the effort of some officers who try to be neutral and fair, work under the kind of laws that treat the opposition like subversive elements.

(Elections are hardly free and fair in Malaysia. I contested in my home town of Kuching eight times from 1979 to 1995, and each time, I started the campaign by giving my BN opponent an unfair advantage of at least 5000 votes, even before nomination papers were submitted. The campaign was then a lonely frustrating uphill climb from there, against money politics, intense personal attack, restrictions in addressing the electorate, and voters' sheer apathy. Looking back, it was a miracle that I managed to win three times!)

Bersih is a loose coalition of 73 opposition parties and like-minded NGOs. Their calls for reform have been sporadic and inconspicuous statements sidelined by the press to the inside page and meriting no more than a few filtered paragraphs. That march alone from the Merdeka Square to the Palace has awakened Malaysians more effectively than shouting themselves hoarse through the media. The lack of press freedom is the most powerful justification for the "illegal" march.

Bersih had called for 100,000 people to join the march, and I was sceptical. In the end, my friends who participated gave me estimates of from 30,000 to 40,000. You never get that impression from the official and commercial media. Well, when our public space is so opaque, the opposition supporters are entitled to over-estimate the size of their rally as the government controlled media are instructed to downplay the extent of opposition support.

Denied access to 'crime scene'

I was sceptical because I have grown old and morose, and cynical about the Malaysian public. The PM and the Police Big Chief had been talking very tough in the days leading to the march, threatening people with arrests and all kinds of misfortunes. Some aspiring marchers must have felt intimidated.

Police road blocks were everywhere, especially on those roads leading into the city from the rest of the peninsula. A police helicopter with a big search light even flew over my home the night before. It had the feeling of a city under siege, as if the residents were going to be attacked by a foreign army. I was surprised no curfew was declared!

Then, at a little after 2 in the afternoon, an hour before the march was scheduled to begin, a heavy downpour pelted the city of Kuala Lumpur. That, and the police blanket of road-blocks, plunged the already congested metropolis into a traffic gridlock. The two LRT stations nearest to the Merdeka Square were closed to the public at about that time, just to deny Bersih supporters access to the "crime scene".

It was regarded a crime to join the march, because Bersih did not and certainly could not obtain a police permit for the event. All that the police chief was permitted to divulge was that the application for the permit had to be turned down because of the risks to public order and traffic congestion.

The police are still working within the strait-jacket of those rules and regulations enacted during the early part of our nation's independence to fight an armed insurgency. I am quite sure that until today, the few Declarations of Emergencies in place during that time have not been revoked. Technically, Malaysians still live under the dark clouds of a non-existent emergency.

Therefore, any assembly of more than five persons is considered illegal, if prior police permit has not been applied for and granted. This out-dated law makes a mockery of our constitutional guarantee for freedom of assembly, and should have been repealed long ago.

Unfortunately, often using the May 13 incident as an excuse, the ruling parties have continued to wield the kind of awesome power granted by those emergency legislations, partly to suppress dissent as well as the opposition parties, to ensure eternal victory for the BN poll after poll.

In the process, the supposed professional neutrality of the police force has been compromised. They have become a mere pawn in the clashes between the ruling and opposition parties. More often than not, they have been used to crush the opposition parties whenever they threaten the BN hold on power. The perfect example is Operation Lalang in 1987, when 106 leading opposition figures as well as social activists were detained under the ISA.

Malaysia would be truly democratic one day, if the opposition parties as ruling parties-in-waiting would be assisted by the police whenever they see the need for a march or a rally. Instead of setting up road-blocks all over the city to deter protesters, the police will station hundreds of traffic policemen to direct traffic, to make sure the protesters will have easy access to the site.

Of course, there would be many men in uniform along the route of the march, not to dispel the protesters with water cannons and tear gas, but to protect the protesters and their leaders, as the police are paid to do.

I doubt if I would see that day!

Eventually, the march from the Merdeka Square to the Palace turned out to be orderly and peaceful, despite the stupid water cannons and the tear gas. Obviously, the police did not display the kind of violence that we witnessed 10 years ago during the turmoil of the Reformasi Movement. No opposition leaders and social activists were arrested. Those two hundred or so protesters who were arrested were released after their statements were taken by the police.

On Saturday (Nov 10), there was no riot, no violence on the part of the protesters, and no damage to property during an "illegal" march of tens of thousands of Malaysians for better election rules and procedures. It goes to show that the police should grant permits for future events of a similar nature. It also shows that peaceful orderly marches and rallies can be a part of our culture.

The media cannot resist the temptation to interview traders in the area, about how these people's business for a day had been disrupted, and how they disliked the march. You wish those traders would close their business for one day, and join in the march. But in any country, there are always those people who deserve the kind of abusive and corrupt government they get.

More visible Royal concern

It was also graceful for the King's Palace to receive the petition submitted by the opposition leaders at the Palace gate. After all, these distinguished citizens come from His Majesty's Loyal Opposition, and they do represent a great cross-section of His Majesty's subjects.

Our Malay Rulers are constitutional monarchs, and so have to act on the advice of the prime minister. But lately, the Sultans have shown considerable poise on many burning issues, especially the very revered Sultan of Perak, who also was a distinguished chief justice at one time.

If Their Majesties can be seen to be more visible in their concern for Malaysians, they would help the Monarchy to evolve into an influential institution respected and loved by Malaysians of all races, as the King of Thailand is revered and loved by the Thai people. That will also take time and effort, by those people who sit on the thrones.

The reaction of government ministers after the event has been nothing less than hysterical. The IGP obviously worries about more massive gatherings of this type, in all parts of the country. The 'Disinformation Minister' is unhappy with the fair and prompt coverage by the independent Al Jazeera TV station. So what else is new?

Now we are waiting to see what kind of Royal Commission will be appointed to clean up the judiciary. Perhaps the Bamboo Curtain cast over the Malaysian sky during the reign of the last PM has begun to show cracks at its seam.

Today, one week after the march last Saturday, I think I will put on my yellow shirt and go down town for a stroll.

SPECIAL REPORT: Bersih's Nov 10 mass rally