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UPDATED VERSION. Road closures and blockades of entrances into the city? With three helicopters hovering over metro KL, the Police must now be wondering how did the 40,000 plus people break the cordon, decentralise and regroup effortlessly to reach the Istana by as early as 3.00pm, the start time scheduled for the march?

On hindsight, it must have been a cat-and-mouse game right from the start.

The Route... Graphics courtesy Malaysiakini

Organisers of the BERSIH rally had no qualms in announcing the four gathering points -- Sogo department store, Masjid India, Masjid Negara and Pasar Seni -- for the march to begin from Dataran Merdeka to Istana Negara. It now looks like a red herring to divert police deployment of force.

By 2.30pm. Tian Chua, leading a crowd of about 500 at Pasar Tani, marched to Dataran Merdeka only to be blockaded by the FRU and police personnel stationed in front of the Bar Council building, Jalan Pasar Besar.

Picture courtesy Malaysiakini

Verbal exchanges ensued, with wheelchair-bound Irene Fernandez of Tenaganita adding spice to the verbal volleys (pictures below, courtesy Malaysiakini).

A kilometer away, Dr Hatta Ramli engaged another police blockade, and verbal exchanges ensued with some physical contacts and minor skirmishes reported. Elsewhere in Masjid Jamek and Masjid India areas, some BERSIH rally participants, particularly those in yellow shirts, were detained and later released (Read AP/IHT).

Somewhere nearer, aroud Majid Jamek, where the LRT bypassed the station without making a usual halt at Pasar Tani, drama ensued before the rain poured.

That's the very spot where Al-Jazeera correspondent Hamish MacDonald was doused in the chemical-laced waterjets.

Meanwhile, another group led by Ustaz Hadi Awang (enroute from Pasar Tani) and Nasharuddin Mat Isa, coming from Masjid Negara and Jalan Tuanku Abdul Rahman, weaved through the alleys connecting the Dayabumi basement carpark and made their way to the Istana.

By then, Lim Kit Siang, Lim Guan Eng, Khalid Ibrahim and Kamaruddin Jaafar had waited patiently at the gate of the palace. The crowd, some meandering through Jalan Kampung Attap, had swollen to over 40,000, congregating behind the police condone some 200 meters away from the palace.

Police back-up were ordered, with truckloads of uniformed enforcers rushing to the spot. Traffic personnel were seen directing the crowd to cross the road safely.

The leaders appealed for more time when Brickfields OCPD Sulaiman Junaidi threatened to use force to disperse the crowd. Khalid Ibrahim asked for five more minutes as the memo was in the hand of Anwar Ibrahim and PKR president Wan Azizah Wan Ismail, who were caught in the snarling traffic, an outcome of police blockades mounted on the perimeters of the city.

Finally, Anwar arrived on the pillion seat of a big bike.

The delegation was, however, prevented from entering the palace compound. Minutes later, the memo was ultimately delivered at the gate, received by an Agong's secretary.

The crowd dispersed peacefully, in much the same way they had walk from the starting point of the route.

Unit Amal Malaysia

Obviously, the organisers had learned their lesson well from the Batu Buruk Incident, where agent provocateurs had induced a pandemonium that ended with live bullets being fired at the civilians by the police.

The unsung heroes were the brigade in maroon, the Unit Amal Malaysia, organised by PAS. This is the same group of youths who gave me a motorcycle ride from Taman Melewar to the Markaz Tarbiyah PAS Pusat in Gombak when I attended the Hari Raya Open House recently.

They were there to maintain crowd discipline, to detect agent provocateurs, and to clear up the rubbish after the rally was over (picturea below, courtesy Malaysiakini).

No peaceful demonstrations?

Last but not least, the presence of the Bar Council team of monitors, comprising some 40 voluntary lawyers and law students, had provided sufficient deterrent to prevent the peace rally from being hijacked into a ruckus.

There had never been peaceful demonstrations, the PM said?

Several of our brethren were seen saying their doa outside the Masjid Negara before the BERSIH memo was successfully delivered.

Picture courtesy Malaysiakini

Traffic jams in mainstream media

Meanwhile, this is how the two English dailies picked up and presented the news:

The Star

Headline: Road closures, checks cause massive jams in Klang Valley

Opening para:: Several roads in the city centre were temporarily closed, resulting in massive traffic jams in the Klang Valley yesterday.

The NST:

Headline: Illegal gathering causes traffic chaos in city

Opening para: A crowd of about 4,000 gathered for an illegal march close to Dataran Merdeka yesterday, causing massive traffic jams across the city.

In contrast to local media in Malaysia, there are now over 145 items in the global media indexed by Google News.

I could only feel aghast as we are a generation accultured in the era of old school journalism where media is supposed to report history as it unfolds and chronicled by their journalists. When had the media started to go with the version proffered by the politicians or their machineries, including the police, unquestioned?

'Trapping the Agong'

UPDATES: PM Abdullah Badawi today said the BERSIH rally was an attempt to “trap” the Yang DiPertuan Agong and to drag royalty into politics.

He also made an oblique reminder to the Agong. Quote Star Online:

"I believe the King is mature, and the royalty will not be trapped into their (the opposition's) politics," he said after opening the 22nd Parti Bersatu Sabah (PBS) congress here on Sunday.

A Sunday dispatch by AFP quoted Parliamentary Opposition Leader Lim Kit Siang as Lim ridiculing the police chief, Musa Hassan, for claiming that only 4,000 people attended the rally, and criticising the government for what he said was an order to the media not to cover the event.

"No newspaper dared to publish photographs of the mammoth peaceful gathering, which was a tribute to Malaysians for their love of peace and commitment to democracy," Kit Siang said.

In the same AFP story, leading human rights group Suaram said that up to 40 people were arrested, far from the figure of 245 given by police. Quote:

"They are trying to portray an image of the gathering being unruly and chaotic and that's why they had to arrest 245 people, which is not true at all," said Suaram executive director Yap Swee Seng.

"Seven people were injured by the police and one suffered a severe injury," he added. "One person said he was handcuffed and had already fallen to the ground when he was kicked in the head."

All pictures courtesy HarakahDaily.net, unless stated otherwise.