Selamat Hari Raya - Speak Truth To Power

Selamat Hari Raya Aidilfitri to all Muslims in Malaysia.

As all Malaysians, Muslim and non-Muslim, celebrate Hari Raya Aidilfitri, it is appropriate that thought should also be given to recent major developments in the country, including:

• Blogger Raja Petra Kamaruddin spending the Hari Raya Aidilfitri in Kamunting Detention Centre as an Internal Security Act detainee, not because RPK has committed any crime but because of his great act of patriotism to speak truth to power. Together with RPK in Kamunting Detention Centre are the Hindraf Five and some 60 other ISA detainees – all of whom should be released immediately and unconditionally.

• The last Hari Raya Aidilfitri for Datuk Seri Abdullah Ahmad Badawi as Prime Minister as a very clear message has been made in the “926” Umno Supreme Council emergency meeting that the “knives will be out” if he does not heed the ultimatum to announce before October 9 that he will relinquish the post of Prime Minister by March next year and that he would not seek re-election as Umno President. In case the message is not clear enough, four UMNO divisions have publicly stated their intention to nominate Datuk Seri Najib Razak and Tan Sri Muhyiddin Yassin as candidates for Umno President and Deputy President respectively. Will there be a stampede of Umno divisions declaring their intention to nominate Najib and Muhyideen for the two top Umno posts in the next seven days should Abdullah continue to be ambivalent whether to re-contest as Umno President or not?

• Whether the Prime Minister presiding over the Hari Raya Aidilfitri next year will be Najib or Datuk Seri Anwar Ibrahim heading a new Pakatan Rakyat federal government; and

• the unprecedented multiple crisis of confidence which had widened and deepened in the past seven months since the March 8 “political tsunami:”, whether political, economic, educational, good governance, nation-building, battle against corruption, eradication of poverty, international competitiveness, resulting in drift and total lack of national leadership and direction, driving away FDIs and rendering the nation ill-prepared to face the financial meltdown looming in the international financial horizon.

Selamat Hari Raya Aidilfitri.

Lim Kit Siang