BERSIH 3.0

We were there.

With Krystyn and JJ behind the barricades

But from the beginning it was obvious the whole rally was not going anywhere...at least not physically. Dataran Merdeka was heavily barricaded by the police who showed up in great numbers. 

It did not appear that the government was about to be magnanimous at the last minute and allow the Bersih 3.0 crowd on to Dataran Merdeka at 2.00 pm. I felt this was going to be a problem since the size of the crowd at the intersection of Jalan Tun Perak and Tuanku Abdul Rahman was huge and increasingly being cramped by more arriving from the directions of Masjid Jamek and Sogo. There was no room forward and those in the front were ominously faced with barbed wire (I now know they used razor wire). It was a problem. 

We were part of that crowd for a while and looking at the developing situation we moved towards the Bank Negara side and somehow managed to go behind Federal Reserve Unit lines near the bank Negara roundabout. The FRU looked menacing and ready to advance.

At about 2.45 pm Twitter messages were saying Anwar Ibrahim was approaching with his group from the Masjid Jamek side. Shortly after, police at Dataran Merdeka suddenly started firing tear gas and water cannons.

People were saying after the fact, that over-zealous BERSIH 3.0 supporters had broken down the police barriers. I think it had more to do with frenzied Anwar supporters. As usual the police over-reacted and all hell broke loose. 



How will BERSIH 3.0 go down in Malaysian history? At the moment, the jury is still out. Next up will be the ballot box and Malaysian voters are in a pickle as the EC remains the EC. History as they say, is written by the victors.