Freedom of speech is not something that is readily available in Malaysia.
It's not like we can simply organize a get-together and march in the streets, carrying placards to express our dissatisfactions. That would be illegal. Such rallies require a special permit from the police. This kind of permit is hardly ever granted—unless, of course, if we are people from the ruling Barisan Nasional.
The elected representatives are also no good. They are usually "yes-men" to those people holding high office in the Government; they can't afford to offend their superiors, you see. Well, not unless if they intend to retire from politics for good.
Then, of course, all the major papers, TV and radio networks are controlled by the Government, so those are the last avenues for people seeking to be heard.
So what's left?
Well, we can now communicate with one another by means of text messages through cellphones. But I expect that the police will soon enough find a way to control that too. We still have emails though. And these days, more popularly, we have blogsites such as this one where one is able to express his or her thoughts; and inevitably, some of those comments are negative ones. Regretfully, however, it is not Malaysian culture to criticise others through blogs. So I guess the best thing to do is to keep our mouth shut and hope that all the VIPs know what they're doing. I am sure we are in good hands.
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