Batu Burok Clashes; PM Spins Like a Top on LSD

[ UPDATE ] 0253 . 12 Sept

BERSIH has posted a media statement on the Batu Burok incident here.

[ ORIGINAL POST ]

After 2 days of claiming that only one shot had been fired during the violence at Batu Burok, Terengganu police chief SAC I Ayub Yaakob has finally admitted that the police officer who discharged his firearm fired not one but FOUR shots, seriously injuring two men.

Meanwhile, Dewan Rakyat Speaker Ramli Ngah Talib has once again abused his office and blocked all Parliamentary debate on the riots, saying “It is just a riot and the police are investigating. Therefore I find the matter is of no urgency and I reject your appeal to discuss the matter now in this proceeding” and thus allowing the police to investigate the police over Batu Burok. Uh-huh. We all know where that ‘investigation’ is headed.

Of course, the Speaker’s political master the reliably irresponsible, irrelevant and delusional Abdullah Ahmad Badawi (who is also the Minister for Internal Security) has no such constraints, allowing him to flippantly blame the violence on opposition party PAS, saying — I quote: “…the opposition…prompted the riot after not being able to bring development to the state for the five years it was in power…”

Ah… media spin. Black turns to white, the dead are resurrected and hot steaming crap becomes a gourmet spread once seen through the lens of the Malaysian mainstream media. Or coming out of the so-called PM’s mouth.

Hot steaming crap.

You have to read it to believe it.

Excerpt from Malaysiakini:

Click on the link below for the full article:

msk-070912-pm-blames-pas-for-kuala-terengganu-riot.pdf

In the meantime, any cyberthugs who might find themselves out of work can apply for a lucrative and illustrious position as agents provocateur with the PDRM. With the General Election just around the corner, UMNO-BN and the PDRM are hiring frantically to cope with the expected increase in demand for agents provocateur once the election campaigns take off. All unemployed cyberthugs, please find job application details at myAsylum. Intelligence not required.

[ UPDATE 3 ] Batu Buruk Clashes; Int’l Media Takes Notice

[ UPDATE 3 ] 1800 . 11 Sept

Spotted on Rocky’s Bru: The Associated Press news network has picked up the story on the political violence at Batu Buruk. Good.

The IHT article below was sourced from here:

[ UPDATE 2 ] 1600 . 11 Sept

Contrary to reports received early this morning, both gunshot victims have survived and are in stable condition. Thanks EW for the update.

Separately, our gutter-quality Dewan Rakyat Speaker Ramli ‘The Stooge’ Ngah Talib has once again proved beyond a shadow of a doubt that he is signally unfit for the office of House Speaker. His blatant partisanship, spinelessness and clear incompetence was on full display today when he blocked an urgent Opposition motion to debate the issue of the Batu Buruk riots in Parliament. Since when was police brutality, partiality and political interference in elections ‘not an urgent matter to discuss?’

[ UPDATED ] Violence at T’gganu Civil Society Forum; 2 Hurt by Police Gunfire

[ UPDATE ]

Latest updates on the Batu Buruk incident:

It appears that both the victims, Suwandi Abd Ghani (37) and Muhammad Azman bin Aziz (20) suffered gunshot wounds (GSW) although the number of live rounds fired has yet to be ascertained. The police are claiming that no more than one live round was fired, but numerous bystander reports of multiple gunshots appear to contradict the police statement. What is known is that Suwandi Abd Ghani was shot in the chest while Muhammad Azman suffered a GSW to the neck.

Elizabeth Wong has more updates here.

Police also reportedly confiscated photographers’ cameras and prevented reporters from entering the area during the violent incident. So far only amateur photos and videos of the incident are available. The police had no good reason and no right to prevent the media from reporting on the incident, and it immediately raises the question of why they did so. It looks suspiciously like the police are deathly afraid that the photos and videos will contradict the ‘official’ version of events.

Jeff Ooi has posted pictures of the ‘unified’, ‘official’ and ‘approved’ mainstream media version of the incident here.

In a press conference in KL earlier this afternoon, PAS vice-president Mustafa Ali has alleged that the plainsclothes officer responsible for firing the live bullets was a police ‘agent provocateur’ infiltrated into the crowd in order to provoke police action. I am repeating the allegation here because the police have a known history of using infiltrated agents to instigate unrest in public gatherings deemed not to be in the ruling party’s interest, thus ‘justifying’ a police crackdown on civil society and opposition activists. This is similar to the ‘planted evidence’ tactics currently being attempted against civil society bloggers.

Excerpt from Malaysiakini today:

While no one condones mob violence, it appears (as I noted below) that it was largely the police presence and heavy-handed police actions that escalated tensions and triggered off the riot.

______________________________

[ ORIGINAL POST ]

[ photo courtesy of Present Point Power ]

I am extremely busy with work and work-travel, but I could not NOT respond to this latest outrage. You must have heard about it by now, the heavy-handed police response to a civil society forum in Terengganu:

Not all the facts are available yet, but those that are don’t look good. Here’s what has been reliably reported so far, as cross-referenced between Malaysiakini’s article, Harakah and BERSIH‘s own account:

The Coalition for Clean and Fair Elections (BERSIH) organised a forum to raise public awareness of the need for clean and fair elections and the problems with election fraud in Malaysia. The forum was to be held on Saturday night, 8 Sept, in Pantai Batu Buruk, Terengganu. BERSIH applied for a police permit and proceeded with the event, assuming that there would be no difficulties with this application as previous BERSIH events had been approved and proceeded without incident. At virtually the last minute, the police denied permission for the forum to proceed, and events escalated to the violence of Saturday night.

The following is a chronology of events as known at the time of this post. This will be updated as new information becomes available. It is based mainly on the one posted on the BERSIH website, translated into English and cross-referenced with the Malaysiakini report. I have inserted elements reported in Malaysiakini into the timeline; these insertions are highlighted in blue. Times given are approximate:

Port Klang Board Game: Counting Vested Interests

Smell that rotting smell? That’s the REAL reason Wee Meng Chee was so heavily persecuted.

From Malaysiakini, a summary of blatant corruption and conflicts of interest in the Port Klang debacle. Here’s a game for us all: draw an organisational chart of the parties involved in PKFZ and count how many conflicts of interest you can find. It’s infuriating family fun! Suitable for ages 2-102.

More soon.

UMNO Fascism: A Checklist

Dear readers,

You all know the disturbing pictures above. For several years now I have been referring to UMNO-BN’s increasing tendency towards inciting racism and suppression of dissent as ‘fascism’ and ‘UMNO Nazism’, and the tendency has become even more pronounced with recent actions such as UMNO Youth’s continuous racist threats (abetted by the crony-collaborator-lapdogs in BN, particularly the MCA and MIC), government impunity from wrongdoing and media suppression over the Islamic State debate and the ‘Negarakuku’ controversy.

Gestapo cum Waffen SS Chief Nazri ‘The Nazi’ Aziz

What is fascism?

Several days ago, I came across the reader Frank&Honest’s post in Jeff Ooi’s ‘Screenshots’ blog here, which refers readers to an article written by Dr. Lawrence Britt. Dr. Britt’s article gives a clear, point-by-point definition of ‘fascism’, which gives us a checklist to measure how much UMNO-BN has moved towards fascism and totalitarianism. Dr. Britt’s article can be found here.

I reproduce Frank&Honest’s post (and his follow-up post) and the article by Dr.Lawrence Britt in full below, and will post my point-by-point response to this later:

Idiot du jour: Hall of Infamy Update

The idiot of the day is served here: Hall of Infamy

Or click on the button above.