bigbrotherLKS feels people in some quarters are “shooting the messenger” when the plain truth of the matter is, this should’ve been expected. This doesn’t make it any less wrong, of course, but I get the feeling that he’s reacting in the wrong way: defensively. By that I mean, by merely countering the claims made in the media, especially here, in a Berita Harian article.

We all know it’s political opportunism since the whole incident has left a very bad taste, but more: I think we should focus on the fear apparent in this recent UMNO offensive. When the government itself doesn’t know what it was doing when the ear-squat incident exploded on the scene, even supporters of UMNO would trust it less and less. And now the situation is one in which the victim is Malay: whatever we may say about race, imagine how this gets played out in the average Malay voter’s mind.

The government is clearly in trouble.

Worse still, this whole incident was brought to light by Opposition members, and overnight, LKS and Teresa Kok have gained a mountain of political capital to use as they see fit; if UMNO can’t discredit them now, they have the potential to become ‘messianic figures’. I assure, this isn’t flattery; the last person deserving of that appellation, ‘messianic’, was a bald, skinny Indian gunned down by Hindu extremists.

We should be looking at the other “abnormalies”:

  1. The incident happened on 29 June 2005, but we’ve received “news” of it in late November 2005. The police apparently knew this had gone on but have not said a single word since their purported “discovery”. This points to a cover-up, but for who’s benefit? And who would be most affected if this news came out - as indeed it now has?
  2. The politicians have characterized this as a race issue by blaming LKS and Teresa Kok of grand-standing while “not getting the facts right” when they didn’t say a thing about the fact that “ear-squats” are contrary to human rights which can only point to vile opportunism.
  3. Blaming DAP ministers is a clear strawman, so imagine how these politicians look when attacking said strawmen. Instead, said politicians are blaming DAP ministers for the embarassment the incident has caused, rather than focusing on the solutions, which means they either don’t care for solutions, or don’t care that there were clear abuses of the victim’s human rights.
  4. Ear-squats are standard procedures that are more “tradition” than official rules; that these practices go on is a clear sign that either ministers didn’t know all this went on, or if they did, therefore sanctioned these abuses by saying nothing.

These politicians are piling themselves under their own heap. Sadly, people might just believe them, which is the point of all their verbiage, isn’t it?

Update:
Ear Squats : The Real Issue