LETTER | Alan is 11, Alana, the big sister, is 12. Whenever a big significant moment comes, I would sit them down. And have a little chat with them.

The last time I had this chat, was when a dear friend's little girl left to meet her Maker. We all went to the funeral, and later that night I had a chat with Alan and Alana, about the significance of life and carpe diem - seizing the moment.

On the night of May 10, I started the chat with a question "What's the significance of today and yesterday?"

Kids. What do they know. Some hopeful answers like "Barisan Nasional dah tak jadi kerajaan" to "Rosmah dengan Najib dah tak jadi PM" were met with me shaking my head. They've exhausted their answers. To which I asked them:

"Do you know what Uncle Ben told Peter Parker the Spiderman?"

"No, abah"

"Uncle Ben said, power corrupts, and absolute power corrupts absolutely."

So that's how the chat went. Trying to explain about corruption to kids their age, about oppression, about honest leaders becoming corrupt, zalim oppressors and how having too much power for too long a time is the recipe for disaster.

All the time using the analogy of a head prefect turned big bully, 'pow'-ing one ringgit a day from the school kids, doing bad things to the students with no one even daring to lift a finger to object. Until, one day, the kids feel that enough is enough and rise up to overthrow the big bully.

And I end the chat with this statement:

"Kids, don't repeat the mistakes of Mummy and Abah's generation, Nenek and Ki and Opah's generation, and the generations before them. We were afraid. We took too long to recognise what is good and what is bad. And through our mistakes, the bad people continue making bad things to many good people in this country.

"My hope to you, Alana and Alan, is for you not to be afraid. To stand up to corrupt leaders immediately and not wait for 61 years like me and Mummy and Nenek Ki and Opah. To be brave and say 'This is Wrong'!

"To tell the bully it is not right to bully the weak."

I believe, parents everywhere, have a duty to explain the significance of the events since May 9 to our children. They might still be small, but this is a lesson to be learned. Learn from our mistakes, from our lack of courage from us keeping quiet while evil is prospering around us.

For them not to repeat the same mistakes if ever Pakatan Harapan is turned into another BN.

Never again.

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