Advocating to wear black cause Wong's to be arrested for Sedition Acts

Despite the high crime rate and one of their own tied up and robbed in Johor recently, the Royal Malaysian Police decided to ratchet up crime prevention by turning fashion police yesterday.

They picked up Wong Chin Huat under the Sedition Act for advocating to wear black tomorrow. In their mind, this is a crime but in the people's mind, it makes a farce of the police force.

Of course, Wong's message had political undertones related to the Perak political impasse and the state assembly meeting approved by Sultan Azlan Shah to get a new speaker and, well, endorse the palace-appointed Datuk Seri Zambry Abdul Kadir as mentri besar.

Yet, instead of quelling a budding civil disobedience movement likened to those led by Mahatma Gandhi, Martin Luther King and even Umno’s “berkabung” movement to oppose the Malayan Union, the police have just fed the cause with Wong's arrest.

And, ironically, Wong's arrest last night has proved the electoral reform group Bersih's assertion that Datuk Seri Najib Razak's Barisan Nasional is clamping down on civil rights by getting the police to prevent any gathering in Ipoh tomorrow when the state assembly finally meets.

The police action, now under the aegis of Datuk Seri Hishammuddin Hussein as Home Minister, also shatters any semblance of hope in his cousin Najib's slogan of “1 Malaysia. People First. Performance Now”.

If anything, the high ideals espoused in that slogan have turned on the Barisan Nasional that is still reeling from its disastrous electoral performance in Election 2008 and the slew of by-elections since then.

No wonder Bersih and the Pakatan Rakyat have cleverly turned the slightly more than a month-old slogan into “1 BlackMalaysia. Democracy First. Elections Now” in regards to the Perak constitutional crisis.

They have urged, cajoled and organised their followers to head to Ipoh tomorrow in a sure face-off with the police who have already thrown a tight security cordon around the state assembly and banned any gatherings in usually sleepy Ipoh.

With his arrest, more people are expected to follow Wong's prophetic words, "Let everyone see a sea of black walking into an office, market, mosque, temple, church, college, park, bus... let us be united in one black colour to show the world that the 1 Malaysia under Najib Razak is 1 BlackMalaysia living in darkness”.

In more ways than one, the civil disobedience movement called 1 BlackMalaysia will have to thank the Royal Malaysian Police.

Their fashion sense has helped their cause, even if it has blackened Malaysia's name further. (TMI)