It is resplendent when fellow writers (Appassionata in this case) cast wry remarks
on my suggestion that we Resurrect local council elections .I am not obscured by the lacklustre and often clumsy manner in which the rights of humans are consolidated in Malaysia, and that there are reasons, obvious and otherwise, why local elections would not be facilitated by the powers that be. But that is neither here nor there.
The Malaysian government would admit off-hand that they tend to compromise the rights of humans for the perceived good of humankind, in this case the average Malaysian. Its sugar-coated words do not deceive a readership like this, hence if its henchmen are reading the articles here, they would not venture to answer it the way they do in the regular press.
Yet would this be only a forum to state the obvious, something that would not be hard to prove by way of statement, or would this forum try to pursue ideas that are progressive with a keen understanding of the facts on the ground?
Humility is necessary when promoting ideas from those who have little persuasion to offer except moral persuasion. Not necessarily overstating and re-emphasising the bias of a government. That would walk right into the trap of the governing coalition/party (they are not too sure whether they are a party or a coalition, they take turns being the former and latter when it serves the general good).
There is merit in local elections, and I would like to stick to the merits of having elected officials, and not fall prey to the temptation of being overly critical of the government in this case. They want us to be overly critical so that we would lose the perspective, the fair-mindedness, the objectivity, or at least it can claim that we have.
After the formation of the Federation of Malay States in 1948 the British government allowed the people of Malaya to start taking baby steps. Asking the British government to allow suffrage did not mean we thought that they were right in ruling us, but only showing that we are committed to extracting rights from those people who hold that power.
Today, as ever, the disenfranchised must herd on for more rights. We do reserve the right to grumble and create noise, but let not the sound effects overwhelm the rights that we seek. Let it not cripple the maelstrom of democracy that we ride on, by letting them say we only complain.
Offer those that sit on that pedestal, the possibilities that we bring with us and the sincerity that drives us on. Moral persuasion has always been the first weapon of true revolutionaries. Cromwell pleaded to King Charles I to show more respect to the views of a Protestant England. Pleaded not demanded. So did the gentlemen and landowners of France, asking the kind husband of Marie Antoinette, King Louis XVI, to care a bit more and to allow them to have a better life without oppression and her excesses. The Menshevik Revolution, the American dissent of the 1770s...the list only grows longer.
If change is what we aspire for, we must always be focused on what we are after and that is change. Not the wrongs we have all endured due to the lack of change previously.
They say, you can never refuse an idea when its time has come. Id say, local elections are the baby steps we need to take for now. There are other ideas, other options, I am sure. Lets share them, and harvest them. Present them to those that must see them.
And if we are consistent and committed, and present it as many times as necessary for them to stop ignoring it, then we have achieved something. The great admonishment cannot equate the smallest achievements.