BATTLE LINES DRAWN: SARAWAK BLOGGERS TO THE FORE.

Saturday, March 14, 2009

BATTLE LINES DRAWN: SARAWAK BLOGGERS TO THE FORE.

For the benefit of those who are unable to access Malaysiakini I produce a posting by Sarawakian SIM KWANG YANG who was the MP for Bandar Kuching between 1982 and 1995. He can be reached at kenyalang578@hotmail.com

This posting is to reinforce the groundwork already in place by the people who want back their Native Customary Land. It is also to inform Malaysians in peninsular Malaysia to establish contact, link and bond with our brothers and sisters over there.

The article:


Sarawak bloggers, your first big battle begins in Batang Ai

As the political sky over the fair land of Sarawak begins to heat up in anticipation of the Batang Ai by-election, the attention is suddenly focused on a new phenomenon - the political bloggers in the state.

Alfred Jabu, deputy chief minister and PBB deputy president, has in recent months been quite vocal in his criticism of the bloggers. A few days ago, he warned that "outsiders" must be careful in observing Iban adat when lobbying in the Batang Ai area. Dr James Masing, the PRS president and a state minister, also warned bloggers not to stir up negative feelings that could divide Dayak unity - or something to that effect.

The way they talk about "outsiders", one gets the impression that they mean the PKR leaders and bloggers from West Malaysia. In cyber space, the blogs are already buzzing with all kinds of speculation on when Raja Petra Kamarudin and his fierce army of Barisan Rakyat bloggers will descend upon Batang Ai. Some expressed the view that they may be banned from entering Sarawak.

The BN ministers' tirade against the bloggers is interesting. Since the bloggers seldom answer back in the main stream media, Jabu and Masing appear to be engaged in an exercise of shadow boxing against flickering ghosts.

Those Sarawakians who are alien to the world of the Internet will be scratching their heads in puzzlement. Who are these bloggers and what do they do to deserve such scathing attack from important Dayak leaders. Are they that powerful?

More freedom of speech

I too discovered to my great delight the presence of these Sarawak bloggers only in resent months. Obviously, they are much younger than me, and therefore Internet savvy to a fault. Many are pro-opposition, but there are some who are obviously pro-BN. As they say, this is a free country.

As bloggers, they do enjoy far more freedom of speech than the mainstream media. But many also take responsibility by mediating (meaning "editing and censoring") the postings on their blog sites. There is a great deal of garbage floating around in cyber space.

The latest news of people being charged in court for insulting the Sultan of Perak is a warning sign. I too commented on the sultan's decision, like thousands of others. As they say, there is nothing to fear but fear itself. But free speech does mean responsible speech, defensible in court.

Those who are familiar with Sarawak blogs will have known by now that Masing and Jabu are two of the most vilified names in Sarawak's cyber universe. I will not sleep easy if I know that I am so much cursed on the Internet. But of all the most cursed names, none draws such blind rage as Sarawak Chief Minister Abdul Taib Mahmud.

I just pluck out at random what a reader to Joseph Tawie's blog The Broken Shield said about Jabu in a recent posting:

"But then again, every thing that Jabu touches turns to xxxx. I see from today's Borneo Post he is now resorting to associating everyone anti-BN that they will cause death and destruction when they visit longhouses. Can you believe this idiot? What about those YBs and other pro-BN people who have moved on to the next life? Are they there because they support BN?"

"Someone should tell this anak Numpang that politcs and religion should not mix. He is too high on his pedestal that someone should knock him down a peg or two...or throw a shoe or two at him."

I would not write such virulent words about anybody, but that is the Internet for you.

Unprecedented in Sarawak!


The emergence of these Sarawak political bloggers is a new phenomenon that the BN leading lights are grappling with. In a state where the newspapers and radio stations are overwhelmingly controlled by the government, dissenting voices can hardly be heard in the mainstream media. Blogging allows commentaries on current events to surface on the Internet, from the bloggers themselves, and from their readers. This is unprecedented in Sarawak!

For the first time, public statements of important political leaders published on the newspapers are no longer accepted as absolute gosple truths. They are dissected by the bloggers, with readers contributing insight and exclusive little known background information. The monopoly of the BN leaders to narrate the Sarawak story has been broken forever.

I read them every day. Living in KL as I do, I can rely on them to catch a glimpse of the undercurrents and nuances that pulsate beneath the stultifying political surface of Sarawak. The expose there can really open your eyes. I am grateful to them.

In the context of the Batang Ai by-election, the presence of the Dayak bloggers is particularly damaging to the BN propaganda machine. This bunch of New Dayaks are pretty independent minded, and they offer a diversity of views on what a Dayak agenda must be like. Diversity and a clash of ideas are essential to the intellectual progress of any ethnic community.

Of course, like all bloggers elsewhere, Sarawak bloggers are by the nature of their lonely work, individualistic people. Sometimes, they clash with one another. This is quite natural, and somehow, they have been able to kiss and make up in the unique Sarawak tradition after a while.

Sarawak Head-hunter - one of my favourite bloggers - has recently launched an attack on Dominique Ng, the PKR state assemblyperson in Sarawak, to the shock of everybody else. But that seems to have subsided somewhat, to the relief of all.

Sarawak is a vast state with a small population. Kuching City is a small town. Everybody knows everybody else. Naturally, I get to know the true identity of most of these Sarawak bloggers, and their personal and political background, though I may not know how they look in person.

In Batang Ai, coverage for telecommunication and electricity supply is very restricted. I am told that the telecommunication tower there can provide for 200 mobile phone lines at any one time. The number of rural Iban farmers outside the main town of Lubok Antu there with a PC at home must be infinitesimal.



Citizen journalism

This is a land where 56 of the 108 longhouses can be reached by river transport only. Physical and telecommunication infrastructure there still remains in the dark ages of the 19th century. So much for politics of development touted by the BN!

So the Sarawak bloggers cannot campaign in Batang Ai like the Barisan Rakyat Bloggers did for the Pakatan Rakyat in West Malaysia. What they can do very well is to influence the urban middle class Ibans in Kuching and elsewhere to influence their relatives in Batang Ai. Blood is indeed thicker than water in the Iban community.

Naturally, if these Dayak bloggers can make frequent trips to Batang Ai and make on-the-spot reports about heartaches and dreams of the poor Ibans there with dramatic stills and video pictures to illustrate their point, it will be an invaluable service to the Ibans, to the nation, and to the entire world in fact.

Perhaps they are inexperienced in this aspect of citizen journalism. I do hope that RPK and his gang of Barisan Rakyat bloggers can make that trip to Sarawak soon. A meeting between bloggers from both sides of the South China Sea may be an opportunity for learning from each other and the beginning of a beautiful relationship.

Unfortunately, RPK is caught in the battle for his life in the court. Judging from some recent judgement, to call our court a kangaroo Court is an insult to that harmless animal down under. With so much on their hands, there is serious doubt whether the Barisan Rakyat generals and soldiers can indeed go to Sarawak, what with the two Bukit by-elections held at the same time.

But I still value the contribution of the Sarawak bloggers. They are a new force, a digital civic society that accumulates social capital in Sarawak. As we know, civic societies and the social capital that they generate are the pre-condition for the democratisation and the opening up of closed autocratic societies all over the world. Taiwan is the most recent example.

Public engagement, social activism, and citizen participation in the political process in any form is to be applauded. Well done guys and girls in Sarawak! Your first big battle for a free Sarawak begins in Batang Ai.


Agi idup, agi ngeleban Raja Laut!


Go to links provided HERE. Visit them and give them all the support you can.
UPDATE AT 7:24PM

http://zorro-zorro-unmasked.blogspot.com/2009/03/battle-lines-drawn-sarawak-bloggers-to.html

This from a Sarawakian residing in KL now:

Shiok Guy said...

Dear Bro I am from Sarawak but now work and stay in KL.. In order for PR to have any chance in Sarawak! We need the indelible ink.. seriously!

http://shiokguy.blogspot.com/2009/03/sarawak-needs-indelible-ink.html or anything that we can control the repeat voters
Shiok Guy
March 14, 2009 7:05 PM
WHAT ARE YOUR THOUGHTS ON THIS, SARAWAKIAN BLOGGERS?

Oooh Ai..!BN Sarawak Will still be Government after 2011..

Oooh Ai..!BN Sarawak Will still be Government after 2011..

BN Sarawak will still be the State Government after the next State elections.

You don’t need to be a Harvard or Oxford Politically trained analysts to see it happening. Realistically speaking yes but the opposition figures in Sarawak will beg to differ. On what grounds are we saying this? Do we need to substantiate the above statement?

Even Sim Kwang Yang MP for Bandar Kuching from 1982 to 1995 posting his article in Malaysiakini “The fighting cocks in Batang Ai” has this,”But the newly emergent PKR in Sarawak is a rag-tag rainbow coalition of sometimes very unlikely allies, and Dayak politics in Sarawak has been nothing less than divisive traditionally.”

A political lecturer who teaches in a local university said this is apparently what the opposition leaders are fighting for to gain political mileage but knowing that they are against the mighty machinery of the BN government.

They need to realise that BN is a united front while the opposition seems a loose front in Sarawak. In Peninsular Malaysia its delicately put together as ‘Pakatan front” but in Sarawak its still VERY DIVIDED. The lecturer said it will be true come the Sarawak elections and if the by election in Batang Ai is a gauge the metaphor,”United we stand,Divided we fall” will be more than an indicator for the opposition.

The groundswell is apparent with PKR/DAP making inroads into the interior and rural BN Bastions. Are the rural areas ready for PKR or DAP? It’s another new political vehicle in which the rural folks seems confused with. There was the 1987 PBDS Dayakism and Permas platform in which 20 seats were wrestle out of a possible 48 seats.

The rural and interior landscape has changed dramatically since those volatile times. Would the voters just change and go against BN for something that they are unfamiliar with? 1987 represents the best time for the state to be in the opposition Maju group but it failed to materialise though the whole state was gripped with the ‘DAYAKISM FACTOR”.

What chances then does ‘KEADILANISM” or “AGI IDUP AGI NGELABAN” warcry adopted by top PKR leadership in its quests to take Sarawak from BN have..? Maybe a sprinkling of seats here and there in the 71 State seats. We have to be realistic and this article in Malaysiakini where Sarawak National Party (Snap) is believed to be keen to field a candidate for the forthcoming by-election in Batang Ai is already an indicator. What’s more even DAP is saying that they are keeping out of Batang Ai but they must have an eye on the seat too.

Is this happening to BN? No,no,no Parti Rakyat Sarawak (PRS) by concensus in the BN family is given the right to claim the seat. In the opposition front in todays tabloids headlined,”We’ll contest Batang Ai:SNAP committee” William Sirai Atom a central executive committtee member did not mince his words and this is politically very damaging to say the least ,” WE ARE READY FOR A THREE-CORNER FIGHT. SNAP WILL TRY TO WIN THE SEAT ON OUR OWN.”

In Malaysiakini report Kuching PKR division chief Dominique Ng said that PKR and Snap will have to agree on a single candidate as it was important to engage the BN in a straight fight. So in todays tabloids SNAPs statement must have thrown a spanner into the seemingly fragile political coalition of the opposition front.Is this formula still relevant..?

IMAGINE if PBB has an interests and was to say this to PRS? What will happen? This would obviously not happen as the CM Taib has a firm grip on the state and the leaders know when and where not to meddle or dirty their fingers. The former CM Tun Abdul Rahman Ya’kub statement below just about sums up the WHY..? WHY..? Oooh AI. BN Sarawak will still be governement after the 2011 State elections.

He said,”Only local leaders understand the situation in Sarawak because our scenario is different from that of the peninsula.The opposition does not understand this.”

Do wee need to elaborate further? The harsh terrain and vasts landscape of Sarawak is another factor which will ensure the BN stays on as governement. We already covered the PAKATAN BLOGGERS issue and also the HELICOPTERS. Also the HUGE WAR CHESTS that the BN has is another determining factor.

However, of course all is not losts. The opposition will have to turn to the PEOPLES MINDSET to vote for them. But what chances are there when they can’t even field a United Front candidate?

The advertisement ‘It’s your Choice” It’s Ali cafe” should be practise by the opposition if they even have the slightest thought of wrestling the State of Sarawak from BN.

We say as always,” This is the reality of Sarawak politics and the tsunami of 308 is just a one- off Peninsula happening. Here in Sarawak the opposition is still not UNITED.


http://audie61.wordpress.com/2009/03/01/oooh-aibn-sarawak-will-still-be-government-after-2011/