The Najib Administration Logic!

It is difficult to understand the logic of the Najib administration. Actually it is easy, but more of it later.

When Bersih 3.0 wanted to hold a peaceful duduk bantah (sit-in) at Dataran Merdeka last month to call for changes to the electoral process and for clean, free and fair elections, the Najib administration did everything it could to frustrate it.

First, Bandar Raya (City Hall) said the the venue could only be used for national events, although this was clearly not true since several commercial events had been held there in the past.

Then the police went to the extent of obtaining a court order at the penultimate moment to make the Merdeka square off limit to Bersih 3.0 and even had the place locked down and barricaded.

Thousands of police personnel were deployed to control the crowds on rally day itself, April 28, even though Home Minister Hishamuddin himself had said the event was not a security threat and did not have any traction with the people.

Now, some two million people are expected to "invade" Putrajaya from today to Sunday for the "Jutaan Peluang, Ribuan Kerinagan" (Millions of Opportunities, Thousands of Happiness) carnival organised by the Najib administration.

By the way, the billing of the event "Jutaan Peluang, Ribuan Keriangan" sounds very much like North Korean stuff. Is the Najib administration trying to learn a thing or two about personality cult promotion?

Now, even though some two million people are expected to turn out for the event, there is nary a bother about whether this would pose any problem. There is nary an obstacle put in its way.

But when an event like the Bersih 3.0 rally that the main stream media said only attracked some 22,000 people, all sorts of obstacles were placed in the organisers' way.

Earlier I had said that it was actually easy to understand the Najib administration's logic. Well, it is this. If an event is organised to make Najib and his administration look good, then it is all right. But if it is an event that may be inconvenient to him, then it is not and you do everything you can to frustrate it.