Don't rush in with donations, Bersih urges supporters

The Bersih steering committee has urged supporters not to rush in with donations, but wait for guidelines from the committee.

“We will issue a clear guidance in the next couple of days, so we want people to hold on and not to start donating yet.

“We want to be sure that it goes to the right account and we don’t want unscrupulous people to use our name to raise funds and pocket it themselves,” said committee member Subramaniam Pillay.

Speaking at a press conference at Bersih co-chairperson Ambiga Sreenevasan’s house where the committee just held a meeting, he said the money would not only be used to fend off a government lawsuit, but also to pay for the legal and medical fees of other Bersih 3.0 protesters.

Ten Bersih steering committee including Ambiga had received a writ of summons yesterday for RM122,000 in damages, triggering calls by netizens to raise funds to pay for the damages.

Responding to the allegations, committee co-chairperson A Samad Said (centre in photo) said the committee would only answer to them in court.

“Our stance is not to speak outside of court. We will take up this matter and answer all allegations in court,” he said.

Meanwhile, Ambiga expressed thanks to members of the public for offering donations, and her neighbours who had to put up with several rounds of protests in front of her home, including one starting today.

“To my neighbours, I would like to say thank you so much for your patience, for putting up with something that they never invited. They didn’t ask for this.

“Their neighbourhood has been invaded. It did not have to come to this. If action had been taken sooner, our neighbours would not have to suffer the consequences of people invading their privacy and their neighbourhood,” she said.