|
|
The
police surrounding the peaceful protesters before making their
arrests (Photo taken from
http://pseudonymity.wordpress.com)
|
A
personal account of the arrest - a must read
Chia
Ti Lik
SG Human Rights
17 Mar 08
My thoughts at this
moment at 2341hrs on the events of the day (15 Mar 08).
I
had started out feeling enthusiastic about the protest which i
was about to take part today. Early awakening in the morning and
thereafter straight for a breakfast with a couple of friends.
We
found ourselves under cloudy weather when we arrived near the
venue. After a while of speaking around, we proceeded towards
Parliament House. There were probably about 25 to 30 of us.
Excluding the children that were brought by their
parents.
Straightaway, the seasoned eye of an activist
spots a total of about 8 plain clothes policemen lurking around
to do surveillance. The police and the administration were
clearly rattled by the intention to protest in front of
parliament house.
To me this was a symbolic gesture. As
Parliament has failed Singapore in failing to keep the Cabinet in
check, a protest by people from all walks of life in Singapore
would bring them down a peg or two and for them to start
listening to the people. I prided myself for being able to pluck
up the courage to join in this protest.
After photos and
interviews were taken by the local and foreign press on the
paraphernalia and purpose of the protest, placards included. ASP
William Goh, fearful of being identified as a police officer,
failed to appear in his uniform. ASP William Goh made a hasty
introduction of himself and asked for us to disperse from the the
Parliament House. Dr. Chee Soon Juan and Gandhi Ambalam disagreed
and started walking across the road towards Funan Centre.
There
in front of Funan Centre, we were accosted again by a sweaty and
panicky ASP William Goh who now demanded that the placards to be
surrendered and if the placards were not surrendered, arrests
would be made.
Uncle Yap challenged the police to state
which law the protestors broke and why was it that they had to
hand over the placards. Uncle Yap was covering the event with a
camera of his. Kaixiong and Dr. Chee tried to reason with the ASP
and was getting nowhere. The ASP began uttering gibberish - about
something about the Parliament being gazetted as a protected area
and about the placards which must be surrendered. The police
officers blocked our way for a good 10 minutes or so ironically
preventing us from dispersing from the vicinity of the
Parliament.
I asked the ASP to see reason as the protest
was an entirely peaceful one and that there were many
Singaporeans affected by price hikes which the ruling party has
indirectly and directly caused and that it was totally
unremorseful about. I told the ASP that given the number of
reporters around, it would be a public relations debacle for the
Government Administration if Mas Selamat Kastari remained on the
loose and Police resources were freely used to stifle dissenting
voices for the benefit of the ruling PAP. This argument won no
ground.
After a couple of minutes more, when the police
reinforcements arrived, they acted. ASP William Goh ignored our
pleas that the protest was a peaceful one and that it was
concerned with the welfare of all Singaporeans. ASP William Goh
ordered the arrest of Uncle Yap. Uncle Yap passed his camera to
me. The Police tried to grab it and i passed it to someone else.
We locked arms. One by one using police officers, they tried to
pry as apart. The regime has in fact resorted to softening its
hardline approach by using non uniformed police officers and non
uniformed women to do the dirty job of arresting protestors. None
of them were in uniform.
From the corner of my eye, i saw
that the police vans were ready to take us away. Our grip became
tighter. So were the number of hands and arms on us pulling our
grip apart.
I had probably 4 or 5 female officers pulling
my arms apart from I think was SDP’s Ghandi. I ended up
facing away from Dr. Chee but yet locked arms with him. I was on
Dr. Chee’s left. John Tan was on his right. Soon we were
overpowered. I was led to one van only to find Siok Chin being
manhandled into the van. For some reason or the other then they
then decided to put me in another van. I ended up being trussed
by two policewomen into a police van with Dr. Chee, Kaixiong,
Sylvester, Seelan. It was only inside the van that the officers
were uniformed. There were 3 officers, all Staff Sergeants -
seasoned men. Seelan was dragged all the way in, face down onto
the van floor. The debacle was seen by hundreds of onlookers.
This was happening in Singapore.
Inside the van, i sat
opposite an officer. He forbade me from using my phone be it to
call or to receive calls. The reporters were still outside the
van, there were many people watching. There was also a traffic
police on a motorbike who had stopped the traffic. It was a real
spectacle. Amidst all these, i found tears welling in my eyes.
I
was surprised, was it the humiliation? Was there any shame? For a
lawyer to be trussed up into a police van watched by hundreds and
with cameras rolling? I searched myself. Yes it was shame. But it
was not mine.
The shame I felt was Singapore’s
shame. Of a situation and plight where people can no longer speak
and assemble freely in their own country. How has our island whom
we are taught to live love and die for become a place where the
citizens who are expected to carry the burden are treated lesser
than the foreigners who come in and who are deemed to have no
reason to be speaking up against their own government?
We
have a place which can no longer be called a country. Singapore
has been twisted into a macabre contortion by the People’s
Action Party. To live life and pay up AND shut up. I held back
the tears, there was no reason for the tears to fall in a
regime’s police van for the word Police, its emblem and its
uniforms no longer held any meaning. This was a police force
which allows the PAP’s subsidiaries e.g. CASE conduct
similar protests with impunity. This was a police force that
showed restraint against protesting foreigners. This was the same
police force that let Mas Selamat Kastari loose. This was the
same police force that accosted and bundled up Singaporean
activists into police vans.
My tears were too sacred for
them to have contact with the defiling instruments of the regime
. I held back my emotions. Dr. Chee joked abit as we backed out
into coleman street before heading towards Police Cantonment
Complex. Kaixiong broke into a song along the way.
I
thought about the state of which this country was in and the
position a citizen was in vis-a-vis a foreigner and the State.
The verdict was depressing. We were mere digits. To be enslaved.
To be taxed. To be bled. AND to be silenced.
The time is
0040hrs 16th March 2008. It has been a long day. I will recite
the events at the Police Station in Part II.
This
is Part I of Mr Chia Ti Lik's account. For subsequent
instalments, please visit: http://www.sgpolitics.net
|
|
