Assalamualaikum w.b.t.
This special entry will uncovered the true story behind Bersih 3.0 based on my experience who was there in the heart of the Bersih rally. After reading some comments in facebook , twitter and seeing all the videos in youtube and hearing the news from the television , here's how my side of story starts :
*I will use "we" in this entry to include my sister and a guy whose named will not be mentioned here*
We were in the train that morning , Saturday , 28th April 2012 , from Klang train station to Bank Negara. It was 10 o'clock in the morning when we first jumped into the train. Along the way , few people wearing Bersih T-shirt had already started to occupy the train and by the time the train reached Subang Jaya station , It was already over crowded with people wearing yellow head bands and Bersih T-shirts. When the train arrived at the Kuala Lumpur station which is one station before the Bank Negara station, all the pro-Bersih people had already left the train and they started marching from there towards the Dataran Merdeka. As the train moved on , I watched through the window and saw that the police had already block the road from KL train station. Luckily we bought the ticket straight to Bank Negara train station as there is no road block from Bank Negara towards the Dataran Merdeka. We arrived at the barricade in front of Dataran Merdeka at around 11.15 a.m.
There were so many people there and it was an amazing atmosphere.Things were calm , no provocation , we were just sitting there , chanting some Bersih slogan and requesting permission from the police to enter the Dataran Merdeka. When I sat there , I realized the meaning of being true Malaysian. Different races were there together fighting for their rights. I was amazed when the non-Muslim stood silent as a sign of respect when the Zuhur Azan was being heard. This kind of mutual respect is much needed in this country.
Around 2 p.m , the Bersih's representative and opposition leader such as Anwar Ibrahim , Azmin Ali , Mahfuz Omar, Salahuddin Ayub and Tian Chua has started to give their speeches. In each speech, they demand for a clean election and repeatedly remind the protester from doing any provocation as this is a peaceful assembly.Things went smoothly without any incident from both sides since morning. Even a few police truck had passed safely through the center of the protest and into the Dataran Merdeka as we gave them space to pass through. I started to think that this was the most peaceful assembly that ever happen in Malaysia. The police had given much of cooperation without any violence since the start of the protest.
It was around 3.00 p.m. , the opposition leader had announced that we had already achieved our objective and will dismiss shortly. At that time , we are at the front line and only the barricade that separates us from the Dataran Merdeka. Suddenly , I saw the police were running away and we were all actually standing there puzzled at what actually is happening. The police were as though given us a "free" opportunity to enter the Dataran Merdeka. Based on the aftermath, some said that the police had initially opened a section of the barricade and this causes some people to rushed into the Dataran Merdeka as they thought the police had given their permission to enter the Dataran Merdeka.
Thus , I conclude that maybe it was a trap by the police to lure the protester in so that they can be charge of causing a riot or a few protesters themselves that remove the barricade.So there are two theories that can't be confirmed here. Because there is no police guarding the barricade anymore , people started to rush in and we were pushed inside the Dataran Merdeka. The people were rushing inside towards the Dataran Merdeka to sit there and continue the peaceful assembly (sit-in and protest). We were only a few meter inside the Dataran Merdeka when suddenly the police and the FRU (Federal Reserve Unit) started to released water cannon from their truck without warning. After seeing that , we decided to turn back and retreat to safety. The protesters had also run scattered in all direction.
Then the horrible things happened when the FRU started to fire the tear gas. The tear gas not only causes irritation to the eyes but also causes difficulty in breathing when the gas is inhaled. I had already covered my mouth with a towel. The towel was then I shared with my sister since she didn't bring any towel as she like many other people didn't expect that the police will do things to such an extent. At that moment I thought that I'm going to die that day. As when you inhaled the tear gas , you will automatically get an asthmatic attack or we called it induced asthma and your lungs will be filled with the gas. Just imagine like you were drowning in a lake , the more you tried to breath , the more the water will enter your mouth. Same thing happen when you tried harder to breath for air , the more the tear gas will enter your lungs until you'll be there half-dead gasping for air. The difficulty in breathing last for 4-5 minutes and completely relieved around 20 minutes. You should know that four to five minutes is very Very LONG..and people can DIE between those few minutes.
After the asthmatic attack has slowly reduced , we regain our vision back and luckily there was a kind woman who offered us some salt to relieved the effect of the tear gas. We were at the sides of the road near the Dataran Merdeka sitting on the pavement to gather back our energy. Suddenly , I saw a gas canister flew in front of me and before I had time to yell "run" , a second gas canister flew again besides us. This time we knew what can happen so we immediately run away from that scene. As we were running , we saw an old man had broken his legs and the Unit Amal (Organisation belongs to the opposition) quickly helped that poor old man and bandaged his legs. After that I didn't know what happen to that old man as the police has started to fire rounds of tear gas without mercy and we continued retreating from that horrible scene.
The gentleman whom named will not be mentioned here had already been separated from us during the chaos that was caused by the police. We contacted him and gathered back at the Subway opposite the Sogo. The FRU had chases us this far and again started to fire round of tear gases. This time few people had already been caught by the police. We wanted to go home but the LRT station had intentionally being sealed by the police. Now I wanna ask a question , why do they closed the LRT station when people already wanted to dismiss and go home?
Some of the protesters washed their face at a tap water nearby. Because the LRT station was closed, the people had started to regroup and prepared for another sit-in and protest. The police continues to blast the tear gas. Boom! Boom! Boom! The crowd again dispersed away from the police. Some of the protesters continues to sit-in and protest while we and few others continued running in searched for a monorail's station that the police didn't sealed. We arrived at Jalan Tun Ismail and quickly run towards the monorail station.The monorail wasn't sealed by the police like the previous station so we bought our tickets and Alhamdulillah went home safely. I had include few photos below as an evident to what I had wrote in this entry :
11.15 a.m
11.20 a.m
11.25 a.m.
11.30 a.m.
People had started gathering peacefully since morning.
near Dataran Merdeka
sit-in and protest
12.22 p.m
a policeman on a parachute
Look closely and you'll see a green bouncing ball.
throwing joyfully huge green bouncing ball.
Did you see it?
What we demand !
There is the police truck.
we gave them space to drive through
see, there is even a thumbs up
Police truck passed without any incident
another police truck passed-by
police truck passed safely
1.43 p.m.
again another police truck
1.51 p.m.
2.01 p.m.
2.18 p.m.
2.54 p.m.
2.58 p.m.
3.01 p.m
At Sogo : 3.51 p.m.
*the time taken is based on my phone's time*
p/s : That is all what happen on my side of story. It depends on whether you wanna believe it or not but it does happened and I was there seeing all those things when its happened.
p/s II : Thus , I wanna conclude that It was a peaceful assembly , we were there to demand electoral reform and not to create chaos like some media's accusation.
Let me leaves you with a question :
If they really want to create a riot , why wait for last minute?
