By Harmit Singh
On 8 November, Bersih organised a panel discussion-cum-forum that brought together promising youth leaders from six peninsula-based political parties.
The event was held in Armada Hotel, which stands dwarfed by the Sheraton Hotel right next door. From the shadows of Sheraton, it appeared the tables may finally be turning in Malaysia.
The good
Under the splendid hand of Undi18 extraordinaire, Qyira Yusri, as moderator, the audience peeked into what our politics might look like in years to come. We were treated to unfiltered opinions and witnessed a bipartisan discussion that put our elected representatives to shame.
While I don’t deny the panel of speakers curated their opinions to suit this youthful audience, witnessing ideas and ‘sensitivities’ discussed skilfully in the open was refreshing.
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Time and again, the Pas youth wing representative reiterated that the institutional setting and practices of Islam in Malaysia should never infringe on the rights of the minorities.
We had an Umno representative stand up and proclaim: “Kita tidak berjuang di atas paksi bangsa atau agama semata-mata” (We don’t struggle solely on a platform of race or religion). Maybe I have low standards, but that alone impressed me.
Even more remarkable and unprecedentedly, the PKR representative broke ranks and criticised her own party’s decision to support the recent regressive citizenship amendments. Can you imagine an Adam Adli making such a proclamation today? Well, these young leaders also refused to shy away from difficult conversations.
When asked about the Ministry of Housing and Local Government’s apparent U-turn on local government elections, the DAP representative explained – why the hurry? She walked us through the recent years filled with political turbulence and emphasised the need for political stability in this new era of coalition politics.
The average
Yet for all its glamour, the Reformasi agenda appears not as embedded as it could be. While all the representatives agreed that a multi-party system is essential for a healthy democracy, they also stood against attempts at historical revisionism – in this case, the call for one third of the seats in the House of Representatives to be allocated to Sarawak and Sabah.
However, I was disappointed by the panel’s positions on other institutional reforms, including the speakers’ take on our electoral systems and political financing.
It was a bitter pill to swallow when they suggested our first-past-the-post system works fine. In what might have been a blunder, one of the speakers appeared to suggest that having unregulated party financing is a fundamental freedom.
In the discussion on institutional reforms, the Muda representative shone the brightest, providing a thoughtful opinion on proportional representation. In a fine display of political communication, he explained that political financing is all about transparency. Drawing from Man of the Year (starring Robin Williams), he said politicians should wear the names of their sponsors on their uniforms like racing drivers. (Call me biased, but I also loved the shoutout to PSM, the socialist party.)
The beautiful
After a couple of months now of hearing the same few whispers on repeat mode – Is public participation dead? Is the writing on the wall? Is it time for all of us to close shop and focus on grant-chasing and elite lobbying – I have reached a conclusion.
I argue that anyone turning his or her back to participatory democracy and public action may be doing so prematurely. I counted up to a hundred faces in the audience, overwhelmingly young and excited. You could feel the gears slowly moving forward once the speakers and the audience got warmed up.
By the end, it seemed like everyone wanted to ask a question. If we had continued, we might have even reached other hot topics (conditional discharge from prosecution, pardons, house arrests, etc).
Though I left early to catch the last LRT train, one thought remained: Bersih will only be as relevant as we make it. It may not seem like it, but there are opportunities to rebuild a people’s movement. Hopefully, we will do better this time around.
Harmit Singh is vice-president of the Malaysian Punjabi Youth Movement (GBSM), a minority-based youth organisation promoting a more inclusive Malaysia. GBSM is a member organisation of the electoral reform coalition Bersih.
AGENDA RAKYAT - Lima perkara utama
- Tegakkan maruah serta kualiti kehidupan rakyat
- Galakkan pembangunan saksama, lestari serta tangani krisis alam sekitar
- Raikan kerencaman dan keterangkuman
- Selamatkan demokrasi dan angkatkan keluhuran undang-undang
- Lawan rasuah dan kronisme
