‘Urimai’ first, ‘nambikkai’ later

Athi Shankar | January 24, 2012

Hindraf wants the government to ensure the rights of the Indian community first before asking for their trust.

GEORGE TOWN: Ethnic Indians will never have “nambikkai” (trust or belief) in the Barisan Nasional as long as Umno continues to blatantly violate the community’s “urimai” (rights).

Hindraf Makkal Sakti supremo P Waythamoorthy reminded Prime Minister Najib Tun Razak that nambikkai without urimai was meaningless like a headless human body.

“Najib can’t expect members of a marginalised community to pin their hopes on a government that had systematically discriminated, isolated, and sidelined them for more than 50 years.

“Indians want urimai first before nambikkai,” he told FMT here today.

Following the emergence of Hindraf as a voice for working-class Indians, he said the community has finally realised that the BN government can never be trusted.

Waythamoorthy said Indians knew that the Umno-helmed government has been pursuing racist policies merely to serve the interests of a single community at the expense of millions of others.

He added that Najib should not expect the working-class Indians to place their nambikai in Umno and its “jaaldra” (stooge), the MIC.

He was commenting on Najib’s call on Indians to have nambikkai in BN government to deliver the goods for their well-being.

Najib said the community should build a vision centred on nambikkai to bring it forward

Waythamoorthy questioned whether Najib has the political conviction to correct all the wrongs that his Umno government had committed on ethnic Indians.

“Until and unless he shows guts to recognise and uphold our urimai, he should not talk about nambikkai,” he said.

He added that ethnic Indians knew too well Umno’s racist policies.

“They know that these racist policies were implemented with MIC’s support.”

He said thousands of Indians remain stateless in the country of their birth while foreigners, especially Muslims, have been granted full citizenship.

Obvious discrepancies

Waythamoorthy also said MIC deputy president Dr S Subramaniam had claimed that the government had disbursed RM235 million to Tamil schools since 2008.

But he said Indians were sure that the cash did not trickle down to the schools.

Similarly, he said Indians would not believe Najib’s claim that the government had been investing some RM2 billion for Tamil schools since 2009.

“There are obvious discrepancies in the sums mentioned by MIC and Umno,” he said.

He proposed that Najib carry out pro-active policies for Indians if he wants their nambikkai.

For a start, he said the government should allocate free land to all landless Tamil schools and make them fully-aided schools.

Secondly, he said the Najib administration should also create Indian housing areas in the vicinity of Tamil schools, which would provide space for the community’s religious and cultural growth.

“Ethnic Indians are no longer going to trust in political propaganda. They had had enough.

“They want the government to walk its talk first.”

He also took a swipe at the appointment of MIC president G Palanivel as Minister in the Prime Minister’s Department in charge of Indian socio-economic development.

“It was just another typical mandore appointment to hoodwink the Indians,” he said.