The Malaysian tin-pot-dictatorship government is over-reacting as usual.
Motorists of Indian ethnicity are being harrassed by the police at road blockades. There are traffic jams at every entry into the city.
It's a peaceful rally, for the love of God.
The only violence I expect to see is from the jack-booted thugs, more commonly known here as the police.
And of course, the organisers have been duly arrested.
From theSun:
Three arrested over planned Hindraf rally
PETALING JAYA (Nov 23, 2007): Police have arrested three key officials of the Hindu Rights Action Force (Hindraf) that is planning to go ahead with a mass rally on Sunday outside the British High Commission in Jalan Ampang although police had rejected their application to do so.
They are expected to be charged under the Sedition Act later today.
The three men are:
> Hindraf adviser, lawyer P. Uthayakumar, who was picked up at his office in Bangsar at about 10.30am
> Hindraf chairman, lawyer P. Waythamoorthy (Uthayakumar's brother), who was arrested at the Shah Alam toll plaza about 3pm
> V. Ganapathy Rao, who was arrested when he went to the Selangor police headquarters to see Uthayakumar about 2.45pm
Lawyer N. Surendran went to Selangor IPK in Shah Alam about 2.45pm when Uthayakumar was taken there by a police team. He was accompanied by Ganapathy Rao and Parti Keadilan Rakyat supreme council member S. Manickavasagam.
However, when Surendran came out 20 minutes later, he told reporters that Ganapathy Rao had been arrested as well.
He said he was informed by a police officer with the rank of Assistant Commissioner that the three men would be charged in Klang later today.
Outside the IPK grounds, about 200 people had gathered and when the police car carrying Uthayakumar drove past the gate, shouts rang out and some rapped on the car window. Several empty mineral water bottles were also thrown at the car.
On Monday, a police team had raided Uthayakumar’s law office with a warrant, in search of a publication that he had authored. They found nothing there.
Simultaneously, another team searched Waythamoorthy's office in Seremban, Negri Sembilan, where some 2,500 booklets, pertaining to a suit that Hindraf had taken against the British government, were seized.
Hindraf planned Sunday's gathering to hand a memorandum addressed to the Queen of England to support a class-action suit against Her Majesty’s government for bringing Indians to Malaysia as indentured labourers and exploiting them for 150 years. It is seeking RM27.7 trillion in compensation. According to Manickavasagam, the rally will go on despite the arrests.
Yesterday, for the second day running, police security checks at a number of roads into Kuala Lumpur caused traffic congestion.
Earlier today, lawyer M. Manoharan told theSun police had served him, Uthayakumar and several other Hindraf officials a restraining order to stop them from participating in the rally.
Police got the order from the Kuala Lumpur magistrate’s court, which also restrains all Hindraf supporters from participating in the gathering, which police said could disrupt public order.
The only disruption I can think of is the police themselves, and their juvenile roadblocks.
Now there is a motive behind this strategy. Read The Malaysian for his brilliant take on why these blockades have been put up.
Sieg Heil!
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