KUALA LUMPUR, Nov 22: These past few weeks saw a series of protests in the Klang Valley.
One was led by a mother pleading for police help to find her daughter, said to be last seen with her former husband more than a decade ago, and another from truck drivers near the Parliament building before handing over a memorandum to the Transport Ministry, protesting several rules said to be affecting their businesess.
Then there one in Kampung Papan in Pandamaran, Klang, which got unruly, involving pushing and pulling between the authorities and residents. The residents were forcefully evicted and the homes they had been living in for decades were destroyed. A residential group in Subang Jaya meanwhile held a peaceful protest to say “no” to a proposal to build a flyover to disperse traffic from an upcoming development project in Sunway via Subang Jaya.
Of Indira Gandhi, her daughter and her missing former husband who is said to be using his identity card for government subsidised petrol
“Where is my daughter, please bring her back to me,” a plea made by Indira Gandhi to the Malaysian police years ago was repeated on Saturday, Nov 22. during a protest led by her, starting at the Sogo departmental store in Kuala Lumpur to the police headquarters in Bukit Aman.
Indira has endured a forced separation from her 11-month old daughter since 2009.
“My daughter will be 17, and I may not even recognise her if I see her, and no mother should go through this,” said an emotional Indira, whose plight was first highlighted in the media following her divorce and the conversion of her children to Islam without her consent by her former husband, Muhammad Riduan, who had converted to Islam.
Indira won a court battle and the children’s conversion were made null and void. The court had also also ordered for the return of Indira’s youngest daughter to her. She was believed to have been kidnapped by Riduan in 2009. The court also ordered the arrest of Riduan for defying court orders to return Indira’s daughter to her.
He is said to have left the country but recent exposure of his use of his identity card for petrol and other government assistance, sparked the latest protest organised with the help of two NGOs. Indira has reiterated her claim that a proper search has not been done by the police..
Kampung Papan Pandamaran and the need to recognise the non-negotiable
In Kampung Papan, Pandamaran, residents protested and fought to block the destruction of their homes in a land they had stayed for generations. Many of them said they had spent their entire lives there.
“How could the authorities not understand between what is negotiable and what is non-negotiable like the roofs above our heads,” said one resident, whose parents and grandparents had also lived there.
The homes were brought down anyway as authorities enforced the order to bring down the homes to make way for future development.
The state government of Selangor said the land has been sold to a private developer but there had been a prior agreement during the former Selangor Menteri Besar that the people would be given homes, with specified land allocation. However, the developer did not fulfill this and took the residents to court.
The rising cost of living
Meanwhile, several other protests in the city were related to the rising cost of living.
Asked for his comments on the protests, former Member of Parliament for Klang, Charles Santiago said it was crucial for both the state and federal governments to address these grievances effectively as it would impact them negatively, especially with the elections ahead.
“People are protesting because of the lack of solutions. Housing is a major issue. Nobody would want to give up the land they had stayed on for many generations. The state government and the developer must come together to resolve the problem. The state cannot avoid this by saying that the land has been bought by a private entity.”
Besides housing, the government must also urgently address the rising cost of living and among them would be to look at affordable healthcare for people, he said.
— WE