There appears to be hardly any traction for the Oct 14 “Love Malaysia, Eradicate Kleptocracy” rally in Petaling Jaya, which organisers claimed would attract a turnout of 100,000 or more.

Realising this, the organising committee has vowed to intensify efforts to promote the gathering over the next week.

“There is not really a lot of attention. That is why we are promoting. We will intensify the promotion.

“We have to do a lot such as focus on mobilisation,” Amanah Youth's Faiz Fadzil, who is the technical director for the gathering, told Malaysiakini today.

Among the promotions in the pipeline include flash mobs, distribution of leaflets and increased campaigning on social media.

Faiz, who is the son of the late PAS president Fadzil Noor, conceded there is a lack of awareness and interest in the gathering, which is scheduled to be held at Padang Timor.

However, he believes this is due to several reasons, such as the economic factor.

The Amanah Youth leader pointed out that due to economic hardship, it would be difficult for people to travel to Selangor from other states.

Another factor, according to him, is that people are already aware of the issue, and are waiting for the election to express their disapproval.

“I think they support the gathering but the message has been delivered and they know about the kleptocracy. Maybe they are just waiting for the election,” he said.

Faiz said the people also might not have realised the true objective of the roadshow to promote the gathering.

“They could have thought it is just a normal ceramah, because some of the speakers forgot to promote the Oct 14 gathering,” he added.

However, the anti-kleptocracy gathering's deputy director Howard Lee disagreed there was a lack of hype.

“I can definitely tell you, with a few local editions of newspapers that I have been monitoring, there has been quite a lot of mobilisation. I can vouch for that in Perak,” said the Pasir Pinji assemblyperson.

The DAP leader said the perception of a lack of interest in the event is perhaps due to the promotion efforts being focused more at the grassroots level.

In the past, he said, there was a high dependency on social media to promote such events.

“We need to be able to reach out to a new audience, which may not necessarily be comfortable with the 'lawan tetap lawan' (keep fighting) approach.

“So we are taking an inclusive approach. We set ourselves this agenda from the start that it is not going to be confrontational,” he added.

The gathering would have more of a carnival feel, with food trucks, games, musical and cultural performances, and comic exhibitions, alongside the more traditional rally fare of speeches from the opposition’s top leadership.

The demands of the gathering include a clean government, corruption-free candidates, as well as to confiscate ill-obtained wealth and channel it towards building schools and hospitals.

Another demand is for Prime Minister Najib Abdul Razak, his stepson Riza Aziz and entrepreneur Jho Low to be charged over the 1MDB scandal.

Najib has denied abusing public funds for personal gain, and has been cleared of any wrongdoing by attorney-general Mohamed Apandi Ali.

The prime minister has blamed the allegations on those conspiring to topple him from power.