KLCC Fuel Price Hike Protest Round 2

Technorati tags: Politics, Malaysia, Fuel Price Hike, Protest, KLCC

The second protest against the recent 30 sen price hike in fuels happened this afternoon, at KLCC across from the Ampang Mall entrance. KLCC security were well prepared for the event, blocking off the Ampang Mall entrance, as well as the Isetan entrances facing the mosque.

Silly me, thinking that it would be in the courtyard, waited in vain, until about 3pm, when I thought I'd check out the other side of the building. So, I missed the beginning of the rally. A crowd of approximately 200 - 300 people participated in today's protest rally, with an additional couple of hundred onlookers (just a guesstimate) around the front entrance of the mall. The FRU were again present, but basically were there "just in case".

More pictures, and a 2-minute video in the full post (below)

PAS memebers and their executive council were very well represented at the rally, with the rest of the participants coming from SUARAM, and possibly Parti Keadilan. Managed to capture some video footage with my still digital camera, but the sound of the first speaker (not exactly sure who it was) representing SUARAM is not very clear. However, the audio of Hj. Mohd Sabu (of PAS) is LOUD & CLEAR.

Mohd Sabu and the other PAS speakers tone was not just 'protesting' the hike, and lamenting on how it has affected the common people, but also included calls for Pak Lah to step down, citing the protests going on in Bangkok as an example. Plus, of course, the obligatory "Hancur BN" calls. One of the interesting things, though, that Mohd Sabu mentioned, is while the Government reduced the subsidy on fuel, he mentioned about the exhorbitant "subsidies" enjoyed by the ministers, like car subsidies, and even make-up subsidies (as in cosmetics) for the ministers' wives - which drew some chuckles from the crowd. This is the first time I've heard him speak in public, and I can now understand the attraction to this man. Pretty charismatic, if not in a somewhat callous way.

SUARAM's tone, though, was somewhat different, and focused primarily on the profits made by Petronas, and how the expected RM 4.4B Government savings could be absorbed easily from the over RM 20B profits the made last year. I believe I managed to get some of this on the video, but you have to strain your ears, 'cause the audio is pretty bad.

Up until when I left at 4pm, no untowards incidents occured, except for the apparent apprehension of one person dressed in black, carrying a black flag - unfortunately, I was video-ing Hj. Mohd Sabu at the time, and couldn't take a picture of the apprehension; the plainclothes police stopped him as he was walking away from the main crowd, and guided him towards a waiting van, without much struggle. On the video, towards the end, you'll notice the crowd take their attention away from Mohd Sabu, and this was around when it occured, just before 4pm. I did notice that there were press photographers there, so there should be a picture or three of this somewhere on the Net.

I am not certain whether the rally ended with the speaches, or whether the participants proceeded with a march, as I had to leave to head back to the office.

Check out the usual places in the bloggerhood for more news on this, as well as on blog aggregators like Petaling Street Project, SARA or SpyMy. This time around, there seemed to be quite a few representatives from the mainstream media (or so I assume, since they were wearing official Media tags), so there probably will be news postings on the news sites. I will do another post with listings of other blogs that may have pictures or videos of their own, as and when I come across them.