Dr.Paraman – Education and Project 15/38
A glaring point evidently visible as the primary cause of all the critical Malaysian indian problems is that they do not have proper political representations.
Even though being the third largest ethnic composition in Malaysia, the Indians only have a single constituency where they are a majority.
Even Sabahan and Sarawakians that constitute less than the population of the Indians in Malaysia in total, do have a much larger representations in Parliament and could exert more influence than the Indians.
Even though there maybe Indian Parliamentarians and State assemblymen but in reality they are very existence and future re – election chances is dependent on the majority of other races like Malays and Chinese. Therefore critical Indian issues will always never be raised or addressed to the actual gravity of the problem for fear that they may never get re elected again.
Whenever general elections looms, Indians will be referred to as king makers but soon after they will be referred to as insignificant. We used to wonder why? Until the 2008 general election that when we realized why. In November 2007 100,000 Indians participated in the Hindraf Rally to voice out their frustration of being systematically marginalized and deprived of all the basic needs that might colleagues had mentioned earlier. You must understand 100,000 Indians coming from a composition of 7 to 8% of the country’s population, to give a true reflection of how large that number really is, is equivalent to 1 million Malays on the streets. This effect spilt over and reverberated to all other races and therefore in 2008 general election the opposition unprecedented gains.
The Indians who have been traditionally BN supporters had swung to PR. And the results were seen clearly. Therefore the Indians are indeed kingmakers but only during a general election. After that they become insignificant. Over the years the Indians in general just accepted this predicament that they were in. This is known as the “Stockholm Syndrome”.
If I am allowed to draw an analogy the Stockholm syndrome is a term used to describe paradoxical psychological phenomenon wherein hostages express adulation and have positive feeling towards their captors that happier irrational in light of the danger or risk endured by the victims, essentially mistaking a lack of abuse from their captors as an act of kindness. Meaning all the marginalized issues example birth certificate, citizenship, no proper schools, no university places, no scholarships, no jobs….. it is all eventually considered acceptable.
While Mr.Uthayakumar was spending “ quality time” in prison he managed to compartmentalize this problem and came out with a logical solution.
The Indians do not necessarily need Indian parliamentarians or Indian State Assemblymen. They need Parliamentarian and State Assemblymen who are dependent on Indian majority constituencies.
Because just having Indian Parliamentarian etc, and we have had many over the years since independence, but they are toothless to bring up critical Indian issues.
Therefore we narrow down areas that composed of around 20% Indians and we are trying to get other Indians from other areas to register in these areas so that the Indian composition in the area can be raised to more than 50% of the total electoral population of that area. That is how 15/38 was born. And mind you, my distinguish friend it is not just for HRP’s benefit, but for all Indians in this country.
It is going to be a low process, but we have no other way. Eventually this is going to be the best solution. Because it is only during a democratic process such as a general election that the Indian vote is equal to another. One for One.
For starters we will be standing in these targeted areas come the next general elections, against Barisan Nasional. Whether Pakatan Rakyat chooses to be spoiler to us is really up to them. Our aim is to use this opportunity to traverse nationwide during the general election campaign period to enlighten the mass public of the principled stand that we are taking as well as to instill the values of our election manifesto to all.
Generally our election manifesto deals with equality to all. Our theme is “equality is not a privilege, it is your right, your human right”. It is based on clear and unambiguous commitment to the principles of equality for all as stipulated in article 8 of the Federal Constitution.
