Could mass protests dislodge Taib?

ANTIDOTE The Movement for Change, Sarawak (MoCS), a grassroots organisation dedicated to improving governance, has repeated its ultimatum to Chief Minister Abdul Taib Mahmud to step down within the next three months or face mass protests.

 

At a press conference in Kota Kinabalu, MoCS leader Francis Siah urged Taib (left in photo) to leave before Aug 13, after more than three decades of dominating Sarawak's political economy.

If Taib does not comply, according to the MoCS website, the movement will lead opposition and civil society groups in staging public demonstrations for “one week or even longer” to force Taib to recant.

Siah has said the MoCS would call on peaceful demonstrators to stay on the streets until Taib resigns, just as mass movements in Tunisia and Egypt have unseated dictators Zine el-Abidine Ben Ali and Hosni Mubarak.

The burning question in the minds of most Sarawakians and Malaysians is whether such tactics have any chance of success. Many would examine MoCS closely to try to gauge an answer. The MoCS is a loose grouping of concerned and politically aware individuals, comprising mainly but not exclusively Sarawakians, striving towards a new regime “free from money politics, corruption, nepotism and the politics of patronage”.

It promotes democracy and educates citizens on good governance. It is mostly funded by well-wishers and prides itself on being independent of political parties. Siah was once the secretary-general of the Sarawak opposition State Reform Party. He is well respected among Malaysian journalists as a former newspaper editor. 

I first met him 20 years ago when he was the deputy editor of the pre-eminent local English daily, the Sarawak Tribune. He had attributes almost unheard of in local media circles - integrity and courage.

His journalistic ethics placed him in direct conflict with the Taib family, and he was removed from his post. He then worked in Kuala Lumpur and later pursued a fellowship in journalism at Cambridge University in 1994.

Siah acknowledges that the MoCS has limited funds. But the movement has persisted in pressing its demands. The MoCS has lodged reports of corruption against Taib with the Malaysian Anti-Corruption Commission, and has also supported several Pakatan Rakyat candidates in the recent state election. 

Siah says he is fully aware of Taib's reputation for being relentless in destroying political opponents. “I have even been advised to go into hiding, as I'm now on the radar of (the chief minister), but (MoCS) has been operating openly and will continue to do so,” he told MoCS members last week. “We do not have any ulterior motive. So why must I hide? Only thieves, brigands and those who do evil have to go into hiding.”

Unanswered questions

The MoCS will have been encouraged by the enormous crowds that turned out at political rallies with a distinct anti-Taib message during the election campaign, culminating in 20,000-30,000 attending Pakatan's final ceramah in Stutong, Kuching, on April 15.

Advocates of civil disobedience will also have been heartened by the spontaneous, peaceful defiance displayed by the crowd at that rally. Pakatan supporters formed a human barricade, preventing policemen from storming the stage to stop the speeches. 

The police, taken by surprise, retreated. This was a demonstration of peaceful resistance, never before witnessed in half a century of Sarawak's election campaigns.

Can street protests gather enough numbers? This would be doubtful, given that Sarawakians have generally been laid back and politically passive in recent years, notwithstanding the communist insurgencies of the 1950s and 1960s, and the Limbang rebellion against the formation of Malaysia half a century ago.

BN supporters crowed when a planned 'Day of Rage' demonstration for free and fair elections in Kuching attracted more police than participants during the recent campaign. Bersih 2.0 activist Wong Chin Huat, an expected participant, had been prevented from entering the state. 

The police would certainly have an upper hand in any street demonstrations. Urban Sarawakians have little experience of civil disobedience. There have been many brave rural protests against land grabs by logging and plantation companies, but these were suppressed by the police with tear gas and beatings.

Even though it is an open secret that premier Najib Abdul Razak wants Taib to retire, the federal police would still clamp down hard on any public rallies, because they can.

The dispersed urban population in Sarawak also means maintaining large crowds would be difficult. The state lacks the urban concentration of politically aware workers and students, as in Cairo or Tunis.

Finally, most political observers agree urban Sarawakians have not been driven to the same levels of desperation as in Mubarak's Egypt, Ben Ali's Tunisia, Suharto's Indonesia or Marcos' Philippines, since inflation and poverty in urban populations here have not reached the same critical levels.

But perhaps we ought to take a step back, and question whether street protests are the most appropriate means of removing Taib from power.

Despite the glaring money politics in the state election, it remains clear a substantial majority of rural Sarawakians continue to support Taib and the BN. These voters must be the most obvious target for political awakening and reform.

Students of history argue whether a single figure can be an agent to change the course of history - as Napoleon or Sun Yat Sen were said to have done - or whether we are all tools of human history.

Taib is prone to grandiose self-image. He may even believe that he is a beloved and powerful leader. But he is no Napoleon. 

He has been the fortunate beneficiary of a 30-year period in Sarawak's history when Umno needed and supported him - a time coinciding with extremely low awareness of political rights among the state's poverty-stricken population.

Once Taib goes, whether from political or natural causes, Sarawak's political patronage, corruption, rural stagnation and structural economic weaknesses will remain.

Political reformers ought to focus on these long-term problems, instead of concentrating on Taib alone.