I HAVE always seen Global Bersih’s beginnings in an email discussion group set up by David Teoh, a Malaysian Architecture graduate working in Melbourne. It happened near the end of the new millennium’s first decade, not long after Malaysia’s 12th general election in 2008. Voters had broken the two-thirds parliamentary majority Umno and its coalition had wielded since independence in 1957, first as the Alliance and later as the National Front.
The time of conception is significant, because GE12 gave Malaysians living overseas the hope, spirit and wherewithal to believe in change, stand for a tangible cause, bring real action to bear on a floundering need to help family and friend at home.
I remember sitting at my PC in Sydney, late evening 8 March 2008, reading about the outcome of GE12, feeling the wonder and astonishment of the result, and the disappointment in knowing I had done nothing to contribute to such a momentous achievement by the suppressed and cheated citizens of my home country. I knew how they felt, I had suffered racial and religious discrimination early in schooling and it had not ended by the time I migrated in 1990.
Nevertheless, the message beamed globally from the election result motivated overseas Malaysians — soon to be known in the alternative online press as ‘the Malaysian diaspora’ — like nothing else. If Malaysians at home could break the parliamentary control that had allowed Umno and its National Front coalition to rewrite the Malaysian Constitution at will, then those of us who lived in less suppressed societies and countries could step up to the plate, try to help, make a contribution.
If the GE12 outcome was the catalyst for our coming together, the Bersih rally that followed was all the spark that was needed for the group to become more than a mailing list, a Skype hook-up. Along with other Malaysians overseas, we saw on BBC, CNN, Al Jazeera and other news platforms the vicious assault by police and riot squads on the peaceful protests, and many of us felt we couldn’t just stand by.
A Common Cause Among Strangers
Back in the early stages of our connection, David and I had not yet met face-to-face. We used email and phone, each of us adding brothers and sisters in arms to the digital discussion. The young Malaysian architect then brought us all together in one mailing list, which included people from New Zealand, Singapore, the US and England, to start with.
Most of the group had only made digital connections with others, just like David and I. We were strangers, save for a shared concern for what was happening under the Umno-led government of Malaysia, a willingness to try and curtail its worst excesses by making as many people, journalists and politicians aware of its dangerous and destructive ways.
I suggested we speak as one, become an overseas ‘voice’ on behalf of Malaysians at home. By this time, and on my own steam, I had already begun writing commentaries on Bersih’s strident calls for reform and the wider politics of Malaysia, for publication in Malaysiakini, whose editor Steven Gan carried my pieces every time I sent one in by email.
My professional background was journalism, I knew the power of the press, and its online ability to reach hundreds of thousands and more, how audiences would exponentially increase every time a story was shared on Facebook, the main social media platform of that time.
The group chose to give it a go. The work of building that voice was passed on to me — the sentiment was, ‘You’re the journalist… you’re already writing.’ I was not unhappy with the responsibility. The idea that a Sydney-based activist and writer should further the connection with online news sites back home also offered a practical advantage: among the cities represented in our fledgling group, Sydney-time was the closest to the KL clock, which meant we could speak out within the 24-hour news cycle of developments back home.
The next step was choosing between making our voice heard as quickly as possible after matters arising in Malaysia, on one hand, and time-consuming consultation with people from several timezones, on the other. There was just no question about it — David and I began phone discussions to pin down the theme of every piece. I would draft an article and email it to David, make corrections and changes until we were both happy with the final version. This was usually sent off first thing in the Sydney morning, at least two hours ahead of KL, and Kini would have it in time for mapping out the day’s headlines.
The pieces were all emailed from my PC to Steven, who, bless his soul, continued to publish my submissions. They all carried my byline, and every article was copied to the mailing list.
From the start, I was moved by the conviction that we had something of value to add to the clamour back home: the fact that we no longer lived in Malaysia gave us a perspective that was free of its stifling and oppressive political atmosphere, and it emboldened us to take Umno and its cohorts to task publicly.
A natural fit for the commentary I pushed was Bersih, which had begun to school Malaysians everywhere in the principles of government accountability, transparency, affirmative action for all, an independent judiciary, one man-one vote, an end to gerrymandering and malapportionment, fair and free elections… the universal values of a practising democracy.
Bersih actually became the key in my mind. Bersih had gifted Malaysians with a new political language. Bersih told us it was not a crime to peacefully demand reform of the government.
The feeling grew in me that we were nothing if not an instrument, an arm, of Bersih, the movement headquartered in Petaling Jaya, Selangor.
I brought these to bear on my writing — the evocative calls for reform at home, the courage of the man on the street in the face of state intimidation, and the overseas environment that helped us see things differently from those who woke up every day under the yoke of Umno. From the beginning, we were more than surprised by the readers’ comments — Malaysians were touched beyond anything we might have imagined and readily expressed gratitude for what we were doing and saying, for caring.
Rallying Cries
Two developments within the Malaysian diaspora provided real traction to Global Bersih, the movement. The first of these was the successful organisation of rallies across the world, held in solidarity with the Bersih 2 rally in Malaysia, which was followed by Bersih 3. Keep in mind that at the time of Bersih 2 back home, there was real unwillingness to take to the streets in the urban Klang Valley, due to the fear of arrest, losing one’s job, if it became known that one had taken part in the public protests.
The Malaysian government of Najib Razak played its cards like any other dictatorship: it declared that Bersih’s demand for accountability, transparency and free and fair elections were an attempt to overthrow the government. Thereby, Putrajaya could unleash the full and ugly might of the Internal Security Act, which allowed for indefinite detention without trial. People at home were naturally scared, and with good reason.
But Malaysians took to the streets in the face of all this.
By contrast, it was so easy for Malaysians and their supporters living overseas to gather in cities like Melbourne, Sydney, Wellington, Auckland, London, Washington, Geneva and elsewhere. In Melbourne, as David has recalled it, the solidarity rally for Bersih 2 was held in Federation Square, a state-owned public space that had been farmed out to the private sector for management. “We had to make an application to the management of the premises, which forwarded our application to the police station a short walk from the square,” David told me. “During the rally, a police officer approached me. I thought I was in some kind of trouble. Instead, the officer offered support by volunteering to delay all trams at the time the rally was scheduled to end, so the large number of participants could disperse safely.”
This stark difference in how the state responded to the right to protest was seen, felt and embraced in many other cities. The scene was the same in Sydney, where our application to rally was approved without question. Applications were only required so police could ensure only one protest was held at one time in one venue. Police officers were present at our rally, the public space in Town Hall in Sydney’s CBD. They had come to protect our right to peaceful protest.
The Sydney rally was held at 3pm, by which time the street marches in KL were at their height. We saw the violence in KL even before our Sydney rally had begun. It would have been the same in other cities around the world, and the ugly scenes in KL only increased the numbers at the overseas rallies and further galvanised the movement.
Bersih 2 in Sydney — Speeches and Song
Bersih 2 Sydney — When the Saints Go Marching In
In Melbourne, nearly 800 people turned up for the Bersih 2 rally; in Sydney, we numbered about 1,200 on that fateful 9 July 2011 Saturday afternoon. The numbers grew and grew at our overseas rallies as the flame of support and solidarity for Malaysians at home flared and spread.
I collated the reports, photographs and videos of the rallies from our co-ordinators in other cities via email, combined them into one news story, and sent the full report to Steven. By the time Bersih 3 was called for in Malaysia, the courage of people at home in the face of barbed wire, road closures, water cannon, riot squad troops, batons and boots fired the diaspora even more. Bersih 3 saw the biggest street protest ever in Malaysia. Conservative reports said KL alone had attracted more than 100,000 Bersih supporters. Overseas, some cities saw more than a thousand gather, smaller than in KL of course, but powerful in the symbolism of support.
The stories of Malaysians overseas gathering in solidarity with Bersih 2 and 3 in Malaysia transform the vague notion of our movement at home. Global Bersih, originally a few individuals who added their voice to the spectrum of government critique in Malaysia, was now walking the streets of cities worldwide, calling attention to the injustice, corruption and growing authoritarianism back home.
In the momentum of those events, I introduced myself to Bersih chair Ambiga Sreenevasan by phone, in KL in 2011, and asked if we could meet. Ambiga agreed. My meeting with Ambiga developed into a lunch gathering with other activists, at a restaurant in the Bangsar Shopping Centre in KL. I spoke on behalf of the group and proposed that we could work to support the aims of Bersih in KL, spreading the word on the fraught situation in Malaysia among international human rights organisations, politicians, activists and news agencies.
Ambiga gave her blessing for the idea of a global arm to Bersih, and she nominated me as the one to take the reins. I agreed, said it would be an honour, and assured her that the next item of business, once I returned to Sydney, would be to call for a proper vote to choose the group’s leaders. On a related note, and as a mark of how Bersih was touching the hearts of Malaysians, a stranger who had recognised Ambiga and probably heard some of our conversation paid for our lunch without telling us, and we only found out after we called for our bill. It was not long after that Maria Chin Abdullah assumed leadership of Bersih after Ambiga had served her term.
The First Executive
Choosing a leadership team was not easy in those days. The best we could do was group video-chats over Skype, and more often than not it was just audio. If anyone were to put to the group an important issue for discussion, we would often wait at least 24 hours as the clock moved through the various timezones our delegates lived in, before we could determine a majority view. Holding our first election was no exception.
Three days passed before I was nominated as Global Bersih’s first president. Individuals in the group that would comprise its first steering committee nominated themselves as delegates for the cities they lived in. David had by this time returned to Malaysia to practise as an architect and thought it best to leave the overseas work to those who lived overseas. However, he agreed to initially remain as a steering committee member and our Asean delegate.
Apart from spreading the word on the real Malaysia across the globe, delegates would also continue to organise, lead and provide support to solidarity rallies in their cities and countries.
Talk among GB delegates, who also formed the core steering committee, soon centred on some sort of official status. I nominated to our ‘executive team’ Dr Andrew Foong of Sydney as secretary and Praveen Nagappan in Melbourne as treasurer.
To recognise and pay respect to our roots, our reason for existence, I proposed that Global Bersih ask two people to do us the honour of becoming our patrons: Ambiga Sreenevasan and Malaysia’s National Poet Laureate and novelist, Abdul Samad, better known as A. Samad Said. The steering committee agreed unhesitatingly.
Both Ambiga and Samad very graciously agreed to become our patrons. I reached out to Ambiga personally, by phone, to ask her. She told me she was at once honoured and humbled.
David visited Samad in KL, along with Andrew, who happened to be home at the time. “I had to make the time for this,” Andrew has said, recalling that time. “I felt it was my duty to ensure at least one member of the executive was there in person.” Andrew remembers the group that met Samad over coffee in Bangsar included New Sin Yew, legal counsel for Bersih, and a couple of Bersih members. David later made a Skype call to me in Sydney as he sat with Samad; it was a very special moment to be in the virtual presence of such a Malaysian elder.
In consultation with Andrew and Praveen, along with input and feedback from the steering committee, I drafted and finalised Global Bersih’s statutes and constitution.
To formalise Global Bersih as an organisation, these documents were lodged in Geneva — by design or destiny, the Swiss City had become the seat of political activism by non-government, not-for-profit organisations. Andrew and I put our signatures to the statutes and constitution and posted them off on 17 December 2013 to Bala Chelliah in Geneva, the Global Bersih delegate for Switzerland. Along with a document that stated our origin, identity and purpose, these were lodged on 7 Jan 2014 with the Swiss government department that existed as a custodian of such documents for organisations like ours.
Global Bersih now had status as an official organisation. On behalf of Malaysia, we would speak and present our appeals to the United Nations, via the UN rapporteurs for human rights, the elimination of racial discrimination and free and fair elections. Bala of course played a key role here, personally making all our representations to various UN offices.
I continued to write our press releases and commentaries for online publication, and Kini began to refer to me as “inaugural president of Global Bersih”. Andrew and Praveen were always "by my side", keeping close watch on the writing, direction and management of Global Bersih. The Global Bersih that evolved in those days would have been an entirely different creature had these two gentlemen, who also devoted much time and energy to the organisation, not been there to bring their own vision to join with mine and for us to work together as its first executive team.
Overseas Voters
The second development that lifted Global Bersih’s profile in the sphere of Malaysian social activism had to do with the voting rights of citizens residing abroad. Between 2011 and 2013, a group of Malaysians living in the UK sued the Election Commission for their right to cast their votes overseas at official polling stations.
The legal activism succeeded and the EC was directed by the courts to ensure that Malaysians living overseas were given the right to vote at overseas polling stations such as high commissions, consular offices, embassies. I wrote for Kini at every stage of the legal proceedings. The court victory was widely reported online.
Suddenly, political activism was exciting. Milestones were being set. People power was real, alive and well.
The press releases kept flowing. My writing style didn’t change, but I felt I was no longer speaking for myself, or even a small group. This sense of representation brought with it a new level of responsibility, a kind of muscle, the need to deliver our messages in a professional manner.
By this time, it had been more than three years since I had left my full-time job as sub-editor with The Australian newspaper. In a strange and not unwelcome twist of fate, my work for Global Bersih demanded more time of me than any other job ever had. Work required my adjusting the Sydney day to various timezones and making myself ‘available’ for chats with delegates late into the night, or early in the morning, depending on where they lived. It was not easy, but satisfaction is a powerful fuel.
The One We Should Have Won
Global Bersih momentum moved up a few gears when GE13 was called.
The steering committee felt the need to reach out to world news organisations, like-minded NGOs and not-for-profit groups and concerned politicians in various countries, to tell them about what was happening in Malaysia — especially the corruption, election-rigging, detention without trial, state violence on peaceful protests.
Eschewing the path of more commentary and opinion, I chose to tell the story with published headlines. I began collating news reports from Kini, TMI and MMO and putting them together in a monthly e-newsletter. Kevin Bathman, a Malaysian in Sydney at the time, did all the backroom work on this e-newsletter. At the height of this strategy, the mailing list hit more than 100 recipients.
With an eye on the coming election, Global Bersih also had to turn its focus to registered voters who lived overseas, the vast majority of whom would be opposition supporters. Unsurprisingly, Malaysian distrust of the government and its instruments had not waned after the historical court judgment on overseas voting.
We chose to launch Jom Balik Undi, the campaign to encourage people to fly home to vote. After all, it was almost a ritual that overseas citizens returned home on holiday every year. We simply suggested politely that they now adjust their plans for that same holiday so it covered the election date.
Malaysians just loved the idea. Hundreds of registered voters overseas chose to fly home to vote, instead of casting their ballots overseas. The Malaysians who were to return spread word of their plans in their respective cities, and invited registered voters to entrust them with their completed ballots, which they would bring home as part of their luggage. They were all volunteers. Back home, another group of volunteers co-ordinated affairs to collect and distribute the voting papers to the respective constituencies once the volunteer couriers arrived.
We tried what we thought should be the obvious route: contacting opposition parties and asking them to be responsible for collecting the couriered ballots and distributing them accordingly. But the Pakatan Harapan mechanism was very slow to respond and their self-imposed bureaucracy sent home the message that we stick to our volunteers.
In all likelihood, the ‘tumpang’ voters and those who flew home to vote counted for less than a few thousand. But the symbolism of Malaysians flying home to vote was a powerful message that said, ‘We may not be home, but we have not left.’ Umno was buying votes. We were paying in cash for our right to vote.
Air AsiaX took to Facebook to say it would adjust their booking systems to prioritise Malaysians flying home to vote.
Singapore was in a class all its own. Malaysian activists there arranged for voters who worked or lived on the island to be allocated seats in buses, people-movers and other modes of private transport; on voting day, these vehicles waited across the causeway to take them to voting stations on the peninsula. Hundreds if not thousands of voters in Singapore were able to make the round-trip to vote and come back within 24 hours on this system. Others found their own way back to vote in their constituencies. All this happened while Singapore police made it very difficult for our activists to gather — I understand five was a crowd. Nevertheless, these brave Malaysian delegates stuck to the letter of the law while they pushed the JBU campaign to an astonishing level of success.
Global Bersih also ran a donation drive to fund East Malaysians working on the peninsula to return to their home states to vote. Success was limited in this case, because the travel logistics were mind-boggling. It wasn’t simply about paying for flights. Sabahans and Sarawakians then had to call on friends and family for pick-ups by car or motorbike and even boat-rides before they could reach their villages and towns to vote. Many would have to walk the last few miles.
East Malaysians in the peninsula and citizens in Singapore accounted for a huge swathe of voters. It was a deliberate ploy of an Election Commission that worked for Umno and the National Front to make it difficult for them to vote at all.
The story of JBU and the donation drive for East Malaysians was reported back home. My article for Malaysiakini, “Why I must come home to vote” for GE13, published 28 October 2012, went viral at a time when I didn’t even understand that word.
The result of the 2008 election was still fresh in the mind of the electorate, the ‘impossible’ had been achieved once. Our JBU campaign dovetailed with Bersih’s own push for voter registration at home. All of it combined to deliver a record voter turnout for GE13. Some informed commentators said that the voter numbers in Malaysia for the thirteenth GE had set an all-time world record.
The street slogan for GE13 was “Ini Kali-lah”.
The night after the result, a few activists were determined not to let the outcome of GE13 drown the jubilation of how far and how close we had come. We all gravitated to the Backyard Pub & Grill in the KL suburb of Sri Hartamas, a very popular don’t-worry-be-happy venue.
It was early in the morning when a friend, a comrade, said his goodbye and was about to drive off. I knocked on the window of his car, reluctant for the night to end. He wound his window down, reached out. We shook hands. I grasped him on the shoulder and said, “Lain Kali-lah.” We both laughed at ourselves, sharing the joy of a battle well fought.
I returned to Sydney soon after and my work continued. At every step of the way, the position I found myself in, of being able to help, was never more or less than privilege and responsibility. It was hard work, but immensely rewarding.
Less than two years after GE13, I resigned as president of Global Bersih.
Written on 9 December 2021 in Sydney
Born of a spontaneous outpouring of worldwide support for the demands of the Bersih 2.0 rally in Malaysia on 9 July 2011, Global Bersih was created as a non-government organisation that remains politically independent. Its primary purpose is to support Malaysian civil society in its efforts to strengthen Malaysia's maturing democracy.The Organisation pledges to perpetuate this vision as a Swiss association.In the light of the demands made during and after the Bersih rallies, demands that continue to this day, the Organisation aims at the following goals, on behalf of Malaysia and its people:
- To provide active support to the stated demands of Bersih 2.0, that is: 1. Clean the electoral roll; 2. Reform the postal ballot; 3. Proper use of indelible ink; 4. Minimum election campaign period of 21 days; 5. Free and fair access to media by all parties participating in any election; 6. Strengthen public institutions; 7. Eradicate corruption; 8. Stop dirty politics.
- To urge the Government of Malaysia to take the necessary measures to set up a truly independent Election Commission of Malaysia, one that would take into account the recommendations made by independent and constitutional experts.
- To urge the Government of Malaysia to immediately instruct such an independent Commission to investigate the discrepancies highlighted in the electoral roll and to take the necessary steps to clean up the electoral roll before the re-delineation exercise, with involvement of the necessary stakeholders.
- Protect and further human, civil, citizenship and environmental rights for all Malaysians and for all time.
Recognising that activist groups have already existed independent of any central body, and worked successfully to their own localised programs, the GB SC should therefore offer only the foundation stones of the organisation to the wider movement.
- GB's Outreach should seek partnerships with existing individuals and groups who have stood for the cause on their own, independent of a central entity.
- GB should avoid prescribing or imposing a structure on the global community.
- GB works bottom-up: Our base begins with existing towns and cities on the activist map. Eventually, these towns and cities may naturally suggest the need for regional groupings. Therefore, it would be unnecessarily prescriptive to propose a top-down structure at this stage.
- As individuals from regions and towns reply to our Outreach appeal, a picture will naturally emerge of global Malaysia, and its key towns and cities. This picture will in time determine whether a structure is needed, and what form it may take.
- This picture will also inform the SC [Steering Committee] about how it should expand, and key co-ordinators will be invited to join the SC and be given voting rights.
- The SC should be prepared to invite up to 20 members for this administrative cycle i.e. till GE14, and including the six-month transition that should ideally follow.
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